Do you like fast travel in video games?

Started by Legend, Aug 24, 2019, 10:31 PM

previous topic - next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Legend

Off the top of my head, Elite Dangerous and The Witness are the only open world games I can think of without fast travel. There are lots of metroidvanias without it but I wouldn't count them as similar.

I generally dislike fast travel. Once you start using it, it really breaks the game imo. That's awesome when you are finished and just want to return to areas, but it's bad when you end up skipping lots of the world.

Far too often fast travel is used as a band aid for bad world design imo. Open world games often become relegated to a menu system with it. "Hey want to do this quest? Then fast travel to the general area, run for a bit without gameplay, and then begin!"

BananaKing

Yeah I like fast travel. Because sometimes you just want to continue a mission after playing one thats very far off. So it helps keep the flow of the game going. Or you explored that area and just want to get to the story and continue it.

Sometimes it's cool because you want to do something specific real quick. And in big open world games you dont want to spend 10 minutes just getting there. You want to buy something from  a shop before a mission? Fast travel there. Want to hunt something because you need the loot? Fast travel and back. Want to reach a certain area to continue exploring beyond it? There you go. Or want to head back to a certain place after wandering off? Just gast travel.

A good open world game makes you want to fast travel as less as possible though. That's my opinion

the-pi-guy

I view fast travel as a necessary evil, in a way.  

I really like big open world games where the world feels like it's alive.
And I really like real life scale, but it can be tedious getting around and returning to previous places.

Skyrim is probably small enough that no fast travel would be okay.  
But larger games would more than likely start to get tedious.  

kitler53

i agree legend that fast travel is a band aid for poor world design. 

i also agree with Pi that travel can be tedious if all you want to do is travel to a place and it takes 10 minutes to get there even with a mount. 


i generally disagree with large open world being a good thing.  smaller but denser with a good focus on exploration/discovery is better to me.  


Featured Artist: Vanessa Hudgens

the-pi-guy

i agree legend that fast travel is a band aid for poor world design.

i also agree with Pi that travel can be tedious if all you want to do is travel to a place and it takes 10 minutes to get there even with a mount.

i generally disagree with large open world being a good thing.  smaller but denser with a good focus on exploration/discovery is better to me.  
Yeah, large empty open world's are bad.  

Density is more important than size i think.  A small dense open world is better than a large empty one.  
Walking 15 minutes with nothing to note just makes it tedious.  

I personally like large open world's as long as they have the density to make it feel like there's a reason to be that large.