i’ll attempt to explain my feelings about it although they’re not fully formed yet.
as someone who was very skeptical about what the open world would add, it’s working a lot better for me than i was expecting. it communicates scale and journey and a sense of place. i love stupidly large swamps and impossibly tall castles in the background and the open world removes the contrivance of having to navigate a series of unintuitive mazes to get there.
i never get my “bearings” in souls games – rather it just feels like i’m memorizing a series of nodes connected in an arbitrary way. i think that design is tight and provides a consistent play experience, but it turns out i’m also willing to give some of that “tightness” up if it means i feel more connected to the world.
i also think the open world accentuates that feeling of excitement when entering a new place. when i go a hole in the ground in this game, i have no idea whether it’s gonna be some small hovel or a giant mine or and entire underground city. and even if that happens in other souls games, the limited number of nodal connections makes it feel less special, like it was inevitable i’d stumble upon it rather than “exploring” and it being entirely missable.
mechanically the open world isn’t the tightest but it’s giving me sense of wonder and awe and scale and discovery and i’m able to get immersed and role play without running into “artifice” (or the feeling of artifice) as often. i feel like a kid!