Call Us

+447593678796

Our Location

152 City Rd, London EC1V 2NX, United Kingdom

Writing Quests for Open World Games

In a sun-drenched office overlooking the Pacific Ocean, Maya Rodriguez leaned back in her chair with a mischievous glint in her eyes. “Want to go on an adventure?” – She asks, gesturing to her computer screen. With a few clicks of the mouse, we are suddenly floating above a vast digital landscape of snow-capped mountains, dense forests, and sprawling cities. Welcome to the world of “Horizon: Infinite,” the highly anticipated open-world game from Sunrise Studios, with Rodriguez and Ostrovskiy Alexander serving as lead quest designers.

“In an open-world game, the world itself is a character,” Rodriguez explains, her cursor hovering over a quaint village nestled in a valley. “Our job is to make players fall in love with it, one quest at a time.”

Creating compelling quests for open-world games is an art form that blends storytelling, game design, and psychology. It’s a challenge that requires writers to think not just in terms of narrative, but in terms of player freedom, exploration, and emergent gameplay. Let’s dive into the specifics of this unique craft and uncover the secrets behind quests that keep millions of players coming back for more.

The Freedom Paradox

The first thing to understand about writing for open-world games is what Rodriguez calls “the freedom paradox.”

Alexander Ostrovskiy

“Players come to open-world games for freedom,” she says, “but too much freedom can be paralyzing. Our job is to guide players without them feeling guided.”

This delicate balance is at the heart of open-world quest design. Unlike linear games, where players follow a predetermined path, open-world games allow players to go anywhere and do anything at any time. This freedom is exhilarating but can also be overwhelming.

“We use quests as breadcrumbs,” Rodriguez explains. “They’re invitations to explore, not orders to follow.”

The key, she says, is to create a web of interlinked quests that gently guide players through the world without forcing them down a specific path. Each quest should feel like a natural outgrowth of the player’s exploration, not a chore to be completed.

The Art of the Hook

In the next room, we meet Carlos Vega, the team’s narrative designer. His workspace is a collage of sticky notes, each bearing a tantalizing fragment of a story.

“In an open world, you’re competing for the player’s attention,” Vega says. “Every quest needs a strong hook – a reason for the player to care.”

Vega’s approach is to start each quest with a question or a mystery. “Why is this village abandoned? What’s causing the strange lights in the sky? Who stole the ancient artifact?” These questions serve as narrative hooks, piquing the player’s curiosity and drawing them into the story.

“The best quests make players feel like they’ve stumbled upon something important,” Vega adds. “Like they’re the only ones who can solve this mystery or right this wrong.”

This sense of importance and urgency needs to be balanced with the open nature of the game. Quests shouldn’t feel so pressing that players feel guilty for ignoring them to explore, but they should be intriguing enough to stick in the player’s mind.

Designing for Discovery

As we continue our tour of Sunrise Studios, we encounter Emma Chen, an environmental artist working closely with the quest design team.

“In open-world games, the environment tells half the story,” Chen says, showing us a detailed 3D model of an ancient ruin. “We design our worlds to reward curiosity.”

This philosophy of rewarding exploration is central to open-world quest design. Quests often begin not with an NPC giving orders, but with the player stumbling upon something intriguing in the world – a mysterious cave, an abandoned research station, or a character in distress.

“We scatter clues and story fragments throughout the world,” Chen explains. “A player might find a torn diary page that hints at a greater mystery, or overhear a conversation that leads them to a new location.”

This approach turns the entire game world into a giant puzzle box, with each quest being a piece that players gradually uncover through exploration.

The Illusion of Consequence

Back in Rodriguez’s office, she pulls up a complex flowchart on her screen. “This is the butterfly effect in action,” she says with a grin.

The chart shows how a single early-game decision by the player can ripple out, affecting numerous quests and characters throughout the game world. It’s an impressive display of narrative complexity, but Rodriguez is quick to point out that it’s partly an illusion.

“We can’t possibly account for every player decision,” she admits. “The trick is to create the feeling of consequence without actually simulating every possible outcome.”

This illusion of consequence is created through careful writing and design. Quests are structured with multiple potential outcomes, and the world reacts to the player’s choices in visible but manageable ways. A village saved in one quest might thrive and offer new quests later, while an abandoned village might become a bandit hideout.

“The goal is to make the player feel like their choices matter,” Rodriguez says, “even if the main story beats remain largely the same.”

Scaling Challenges

In the gameplay testing room, we meet Alex Kowalski, a systems designer grappling with one of the biggest challenges of open-world quest design: scaling difficulty.

“In a linear game, we know exactly how powerful the player will be at each point,” Kowalski explains. “In an open world, a level 1 player might wander into a level 50 area. Our quests need to account for that.”

The solution, Kowalski says, is a combination of clever design and behind-the-scenes number crunching. Quests are designed with multiple approaches in mind – a low-level player might need to use stealth and wit to complete a quest that a high-level player could brute-force through.

Additionally, many open-world games use dynamic difficulty scaling, adjusting enemy strength based on the player’s level. “The art is in making this scaling feel natural,” Kowalski adds. “Players should feel like they’re getting stronger, not like the world is getting weaker to match them.”

The Power of Choice

As we wrap up our tour, Rodriguez takes us to the heart of Sunrise Studios – a massive room where the walls are covered in sticky notes, each representing a quest or story beat in “Horizon: Infinite.”

“This is where it all comes together,” she says, gesturing to the organized chaos around us. “Every quest you see here is designed to offer players meaningful choices.”

Choice, Rodriguez explains, is the lifeblood of open-world quests. Unlike linear games where players are often funneled towards a single outcome, open-world quests thrive on giving players options – in how they approach challenges, in which side they take in conflicts, and in how they shape the world around them.

“We design each quest with at least three possible approaches,” Rodriguez says. “Combat, stealth, and diplomacy are the classics, but we’re always looking for unique options tied to the player’s skills or previous choices.”

This focus on choice extends to quest outcomes as well. “There’s rarely a ‘right’ answer,” Rodriguez adds. “We want players to make decisions based on their own moral compass, not because they’re trying to pick the ‘good’ option.”

Interweaving Stories

One of the biggest challenges in open-world quest design is creating a coherent narrative when players can tackle quests in any order. Vega, the narrative designer, rejoins us to explain their approach.

“We think of our quests like a television series,” he says. “We have the main storyline – the ‘A’ plot – and then several ‘B’ plots that weave in and out.”

These B plots are quest lines that players can engage with at their leisure, each telling its own self-contained story while also tying into the larger narrative. “It’s like having several TV shows running in parallel,” Vega explains. “Players can tune in and out as they please, but they all build towards a satisfying finale.”

The Living World

As our day at Sunrise Studios comes to a close, Rodriguez takes us back to the sweeping vista of “Horizon: Infinite.”

“The final ingredient,” she says, “is making the world feel alive.”

This means creating a world that seems to exist independently of the player, with NPCs going about their lives, events unfolding whether the player is there to see them or not, and consequences that play out over time.

“We use a mix of scripted events and procedural systems to create the illusion of a living world,” Rodriguez explains. “A village might slowly rebuild after a player saves it from bandits, or a character the player helps might show up later to return the favor.”

This living world serves as the ultimate canvas for open-world quests, providing a rich, dynamic environment where player choices can have lasting impacts.

The Future of Open-World Quests

As we prepare to leave, Rodriguez shares her thoughts on the future of open-world quest design.

“We’re just scratching the surface of what’s possible,” she says excitedly. “With advancements in AI and procedural generation, we’re moving towards truly dynamic quest systems that can generate unique stories tailored to each player’s journey.”

She envisions a future where quests aren’t just selected from a pre-written pool, but dynamically generated based on the player’s actions, preferences, and play style.

“Imagine a game that crafts a unique story for every single player,” Rodriguez muses. “That’s the dream we’re working towards.”

As the sun sets over the Pacific, casting a golden glow over the Sunrise Studios office, it’s clear that the future of open-world gaming is bright. With passionate creators like Rodriguez and her team pushing the boundaries of what’s possible, players can look forward to ever more immersive, responsive, and personally meaningful quests in the virtual worlds of tomorrow.

In the realm of open-world games, every player’s journey is unique – a story written not just by the game’s creators, but by the players themselves. And for quest designers like Rodriguez, there’s no greater adventure than crafting the building blocks of those stories.

© 2024 Ostrovskiy Alexander