Best Open-World Games That Let You Play Your Own Way

One of the great appeals of open-world games and why they’re so popular is the freedom they offer players. In theory, a great open-world game will have open-enough mechanics where the player can decide their own way to fun, through whatever method suits them the best.

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There’s a lot of leeway for what constitutes freedom. For some sandbox games, freedom is everything, whereas more tightly controlled open-world action games have a relatively wide range of options for their genre. This list is ranked not just by game quality but by how much freedom a player has, compared to how much that genre usually allows freedom.

The Final Metal Gear

Metal Gear Solid 5 The Phantom Pain

Stealth

Action-Adventure

Shooter

Adventure

Released

September 1, 2015

OpenCritic Rating

Mighty

While Metal Gear Solid 5 is probably the most controversial entry into the Metal Gear Solid series on account of its strange structure and the tumultuous exit of Kojima from Konami afterwards, no one is in any doubt that the game is an absolute clinic in open-world stealth gameplay that remains unsurpassed almost ten years later.

Set in the broad maps of Afghanistan and Angola-Zaire, players have a wide scope of freedom with their choices in stealth action. They can be chaotic, quiet, have companions, use vehicles, lethal, non-lethal, almost anything they can think of, and usually the enemy AI will respond in interesting and new ways. For stealth-action, it’s an unparalleled amount of freedom.

7

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom

From The Ruins Of The Old World

Systems

Released

May 12, 2023

Developer(s)

Nintendo

OpenCritic Rating

Mighty

After the release of Breath of the Wild, the game that revitalized the entire Legend of Zelda franchise in an open-world context, many gamers wondered how Nintendo could surpass the freedom now offered to avid fans. Somehow, Tears of the Kingdom managed to up the ante again, making creativity a core part of its central design.

With Link’s new magical arm and set of new abilities, players are able to construct vehicles, weapons, and solutions to puzzles and combat on the fly, saving them as blueprints, where the player’s creativity is the only limiting factor. This is maximal freedom in a game that already celebrates it openness, leading to some truly remarkable machine designs from the worldwide community.

6

Elden Ring

Foolish Ambitions

Released

February 25, 2022

OpenCritic Rating

Mighty

FromSoftware games are renowned for being difficult, but they vary wildly on how much freedom they offer the player in surmounting that difficult. Games like Bloodborne and Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice are very limited, where the player has to adapt to what the game wants or suffer. Elden Ring is the opposite side of the scale.

In Elden Ring, not only do players have unparalleled freedom in a massive open world, but player builds can wildly divert based on stats, gear, and world progression. No two builds are exactly alike, and the player is free to choose whatever solution suits them best to conquer the game’s fearsome bosses.

5

Skyrim

Emerge Dovahkiin

Skyrim

Released

November 11, 2011

While Skyrim wasn’t the first game to feature a classless progression system, it undoubtedly popularized the system, taking a marked step away from the fantasy RPG’s roots in the class-based TTRPG world and towards a more dynamic, open, and flexible modern game design that annoyed some hardcore fans, but opened up the genre to a whole new list of possible Elder Scrolls aficionados.

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In the game, skills level up alongside player use. So, if the player uses a bow a lot, their character will naturally get better with a bow, but other skills like magic will fall behind. It’s an intuitive system that lets the player dynamically take the lead in constructing their own build, letting them play however they like.

4

Fallout New Vegas

A Big On His Hip

Released

October 19, 2010

Ever since evolving into the video game space, RPGs have struggled between the demand of modernizing and being open to new players, while still satisfying the TTRPG hardcore who like their gameplay systems complex and freeform. Somehow, Fallout: New Vegas bridges the gap between the two camps, becoming one of the best open-world RPGs ever made.

In the game, players can dynamically make a build based on investing points wherever they like, and the game’s quest design is famously open, particularly with its many factions. To get past a situation, a player can likely talk their way out of it, shoot their way through it, find clever solutions, or just avoid it all together. The game somehow captures the endlessly adaptable nature of TTRPGs within the limitations of a video game, and no other game (perhaps excepting Baldur’s Gate 3) has managed to do it again.

3

Dwarf Fortress

Controlled Chaos

Roguelike

Strategy

Simulation

Systems

Platform(s)

Linux, macOS, Microsoft Windows

Released

August 8, 2006

OpenCritic Rating

Mighty

Dwarf Fortress is a game about failing. This new version, based on the ASCII classic but with some updated graphics, brings the classic hard game to a whole new audience who soon learn that disaster awaits no matter their choices. In short, Dwarf Fortress finds the player trying to make a home for a procedurally generated clan of dwarves who inevitably get up to mischief, resulting in total collapse.

There are no goals in Dwarf Fortress. Instead, players are encouraged to make their own fun. If that means making an actually successful dwarven city, then go for it. If that means RP, then the game covers that too. If it means causing absolute mayhem and seeing what happens, Dwarf Fortress is more than happy to accommodate. It’s an endless sandbox full of disastrous fun.

2

Grand Theft Auto 5

The Ultimate Crime Sandbox

Released

September 17, 2013

Developer(s)

Rockstar North

OpenCritic Rating

Mighty

The great appeal of a Rockstar game isn’t just the story, world, or the presentation, but the simple baseline appeal of a sandbox crime simulator where the player is free to do whatever they like. Quite like a sandbox in a playground, creativity isn’t just encouraged, but is necessary to making the whole thing work.

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While the single-player mode accommodates plenty of freeform fun, that creativity really comes into play in Grand Theft Auto Online, which uses the basis of Los Santos as a mutual playground where it’s truly difficult to get bored. Racing, fighting, shooting, exploding, acting, RPing, and so much more can be done in Grand Theft Auto Online, where players really are free to play however they want.

1

Minecraft

Unlimited Creativity

Platform(s)

3DS, Android, iOS, Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Wii U, PC, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, PS Vita, Xbox One, Xbox 360

Released

November 18, 2011

OpenCritic Rating

Mighty

It’s genuinely hard to imagine a game that allows a player to have more freedom than Minecraft. Based on the simple idea of a procedurally generated world based out of a variety of blocks, Minecraft has evolved into the most legendary and influential game of the 21st Century so far, largely due to the freedom it offers players.

In either the unlimited creative mode or the more mechanically-focused survival mode, players can build cities, dungeons, spelunk in the caves, fight other players, construct battle arenas, tell stories, and do whatever they like. With an active mod scene, the game is a functional foundation for anything a player wants.

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