"You'd be forgiven for thinking that Nioh 3's open world is its headline feature. But the way it's built doesn't call much attention to that, so it was easy for me to forget that I was, technically, playing an open-world game. The team's decision to call it "open field" rather than "open world" is telling, and it comes across as a conscious show of restraint."
"The world of Nioh 3 is several large maps, each made up of smaller regions. A region is really a bundle of the sort of curated levels found in every Nioh game, just with multiple routes of ingress and egress. This, of course, opens up different gameplay opportunities of its own. Roads and other distractions serve as the connective tissue holding those traditionally-designed levels and dungeons together, existing to subtly push you towards the next thing."
Nioh 3 preserves the series' core combat and design identity while introducing a restrained 'open field' approach to larger maps. The world comprises several large maps subdivided into smaller regions, each bundling curated levels with multiple ingress and egress routes. Those routes and connective roads provide optional navigation and subtly guide progression without long, empty traversals. The design intentionally avoids the pitfalls of sprawling open-world structures by prioritizing tightly designed encounters and multiple paths, enabling new gameplay opportunities while maintaining the focused pacing of traditional Nioh levels.
Read at VG247
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