There are a couple of games that I'm considering buying (Outcast - Second Contact and Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen).

People say in their reviews of both of these games that they're open-world. However, this term is used ambiguously, so I need to be clear on exactly what they mean in this context before I decide whether to buy them.

I don't mind if a game has a large, connected world that you can explore without any load time while going between different places (actually I prefer it all connected like that), or even if there are a bunch of quests that are independent of each other and can be done in any order, including optional ones.

However, what I absolutely CAN'T STAND is when a game makes me choose whether to do thing or a different thing instead but it won't let me do both! This applies to everything: quests, ways of handling the outcome of quests, which things to say in a conversation with an NPC, etc.

I'll give you an example to compare: in a lot of the Fallout games as well as Dragon Age, Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale, etc., you must make these choices, but it most JRPGs such as Final Fantasy, Wild Arms, Chrono Trigger, etc., you don't. This does NOT mean that the only kind of RPGs that I like are JRPGs, but I was just using them as examples because they tend to work in that way.

I'm a completest and I like to do absolutely EVERY little thing that I can do in a game, so if I ever have to choose then that's a deal-breaker, and I'd rather avoid playing (or buying) the game at all.

Thanks if you can answer my question about the two games that I specified at the beginning.

I've only played the original version of Outcast, don't know how much they changed in the remake (though I think the basic structure is the same). If I understand correctly, you're asking whether you have to make a choice in the game which will lock you out of content...the answer to that is no. The game is made up of several different regions (ice region, desert region, volcanic region etc.), connected via teleport portals, where you have to complete objectives. You can do those regions in any order and switch freely between them, but you have to do all of them and your choice is mostly limited to how to fight your enemies, which optional sidequests to do etc. You don't have much choice about the basic structure of the game, advancing the plot etc. which is always the same.

Dragons dogma has an expanding open world. As you progress, you open up more world. You can definitely go way outside of your comfort zone in difficulty, recognize it, and either select stronger pawns or return later.

Highly recommended.

Thanks, morolf, because I think that answers my question about Outcast pretty well.

Tallima, you really didn't answer my question though, because I want to know whether I would ever have to choose one mission or another, and depending on which I choose, I can't do the other one also, or if I would ever have a conversation with an NPC, and if I say one thing then I would not be able to say a different thing that I could have said instead if I hadn't said the first thing, and stuff like that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcDZYkOCrtw

I haven't played Outcast, but Dragon's Dogma is fairly open-world. I took a hiatus due to life stuff, but I was wandering around exploring rather than doing quests.

Of course, the difficulty level is fairly high and exploring too incautiously will lead to a lot of inglorious ends - some of that is probably my moderate skills, but some of it is that you'll stumble into a lot of opponents who outgear/level you significantly.

There are certain quests that expire when you've advanced the main story too far (the merchant escort quest early on), and other escort quests seem to expire if you don't do them by same in-game clock deadline, but by and large there's a lot of flex in when you do what, and there are other ways to get loot and xp if you miss one.

So while I'm maybe only 12 hours in, the game has never made me feel like I missed out on anything significant by pursuing my dreams.

Are you suggesting that there's an actual time limit on some quests, rather than only a specific order in which to do them?

Well, other than that, it seems like I would be able to do all of the quests as long as I do the optional ones as soon as possible.

But what about this: have you ever been in a conversation with an NPC, and you were given a choice of what to say, and then after you chose something, it never again gave you the option to say some or all of the other things that you didn't choose the first time?

I'd have to double-check, but not that I recall. I haven't played in about a month, but I think dialogue is more exposition than branching gameplay options.

Which, if you're looking for that sort of dynamic story-telling, this may not be your game (you should confirm my memory, though). It does have the trappings of an RPG, and for the most part it does them well enough to be enjoyable, but it's really a combat & exploration game.

The "companion NPC" part of the game isn't perfect, but I enjoyed the voicework and commentary, and it is interesting trading around the various skill sets as you level up. I wouldn't have thought that would be my thing, but I actually quite like it.

If combat isn't your thing, you can set it to "easy" and you'll still probably die moderately often. I switched to that, and actually had more fun with it on easy (at least playing with KB+M).

Actually, that sounds great! If you'll recall, I said that I want to avoid any branching gameplay options, because I never want to make any choices - instead, I want to do everything.

Perhaps interactive fiction is not your thing then. Books.(avoiding choose your own adventure and such like) would suffice.

Interactive fiction is a specific type of game, which basically is like those choose-your-own-adventure books, but in electronic form, and more similar to the text games like Zork, etc. And you're right, I don't care for interactive fiction, per se, but I do like the other text games, in which I can type what I need to do, but it's not about choosing a path from a list of options, but rather, just figuring out all of the things that need to be done throughout the game and doing them. Basically, they're like regular adventure games in text form, but I really like adventure games, and they typically don't ever require players to make choices.