"The history of gaming in the 2010s could theoretically be told entirely in open world games. If I were to pick that represents them all, I'd probably go for Far Cry 3, which was pretty good, but it was where an unpleasant trend was being to crystallise - the sandbox game becoming less "open-ended cathartic adventure" than "gigantic, three-dimensional checklist of busywork", its maps splattered with identical, copy-pasted challenges and collectibles designed mainly to torment the obsessive-compulsive, with a primary gameplay loop best summarized as "tidying up". Where the stories gradually devolved into withered strands of linear tutorial missions that don't even have proper endings, 'cos we have to go straight back to the sandbox afterwards to hunt for the remaining five hundred sliver pinecones."