[quote]I don't understand why every single game dev thinks that their game needs to be open world, and then put nothing in the open world.[/quote] Same reason devs think their game needs to have hyper realistic graphics, and RPGs need to be dumbed down and made shallow, and everything needs an in depth tutorial. In other words, the gaming community (both players and reviewers) practically worships this kind of game, and then won't even give a different kind of game the light of day. So complex RPGs with a steep difficulty curve, art-style oriented experiments, and brightly coloured endeavours, remain popular only in a cult following. And hyper realistic, simple action adventures with huge open worlds and a shallow "RPG levelling system", tend to get all the press and all the awards.