Former GTA 6 Developer Talks About the Biggest Problem in Open-World Games
Open-world games keep getting bigger and bigger, but is that actually a good thing? Cameron Williams, a former developer at Rockstar Games who worked on Grand Theft Auto 6 and Red Dead Online, believes that too much content might be a bad thing.
During his talk, Williams explained that modern open-world games are so large and filled with so many activities that players don’t always know what to do. This can make exploring feel more like a chore than an adventure. He called this problem “analysis paralysis”—when players are overwhelmed by too many options and struggle to make a choice.
In a panel discussion, Williams shared his thoughts on why players might avoid exploring huge game worlds. He believes that many games require a big time investment, making it harder for players to pick up and enjoy them casually.
“Players just don’t explore, right?” Williams said, “Whether they just simply aren’t compelled or your game has a huge time investment and it’s hard for players to pick up and put down, which is an increasing challenge, especially with the sort of evolving ecosystem of free-to-play and live service games that are kind of eating everyone’s time and attention.”
Williams also pointed out that long travel distances in games can make players question whether exploring is worth it: “They’re wondering, ‘Okay, how far away is the next thing? I really gotta run all the way across the map? And what’s my gain?’”
At Absurd Ventures, Williams and his team are working on ways to avoid this problem. He believes that making game worlds too massive can actually hurt the player experience rather than improve it. Instead, developers should focus on making exploration more rewarding and meaningful.
“We want to avoid creating a possibility space so large that players simply just don’t know what to choose,” Williams concluded.
As open-world games continue to grow, developers may need to rethink how they design their worlds. Instead of just making maps bigger and adding more content, they might need to focus on quality over quantity. If players feel overwhelmed by too many choices, they might not explore at all.
Williams’ insights could influence how future games are made, including whatever Absurd Ventures is working on next. For now, his words serve as a reminder that bigger isn’t always better in game design.
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