Battle of the Looter Shooters in 2021: Which one is for you?

Open World – Borderlands 3

Borderlands games always had large, explorable areas filled with many points of interest for farmable enemies and side quests. In Borderlands 3, that still holds true. There are multiple planets with these points of interest, collectibles, chests, and named enemy bounties. You are rewarded with XP, loot, and even eridium for exploring and taking on side quests that take place in the many areas on the many planets in this game.

2. Destiny 2

Destiny 2 is not too far off from being first in this. You just go on what is called a Patrol on the many planets in the game. There isn’t a specific objective you need to do, but there will be many things than just exploring and killing enemy mobs. Sometimes, public events pop up, challenges that you can do for quests, adventures, and way more. The activities are there as good filler or sidetracks for when you aren’t doing strikes, PVP, or raids.

3. Warframe

Warframe only in recent times started to add semi-open world areas which are called Free Roam missions. Basically, they are large maps with enemy strongholds, flora and fauna to collect, minerals to mine, tough field bosses to take on , and NPCs to accept quests from. They’re large and expansive, but are very much disconnected from the rest of the game in the sense that you can’t just have people hopping in and out of that instanced area. You essentially load into these areas with a purpose for something, and there isn’t much to explore or encounter while taking a few laps around the entire map.

4. Outriders

Outriders is an interesting one; the game doesn’t really have instances of an open world. There’s a hub area and different areas to take on, but there is a lot of loading in linearity that can definitely break immersion from the rest of the game. Sure, some areas can be large in scale, but don’t really reward you too much for exploring like the other games.