I think I'll go crazy with this and list a bunch of open world games that I've played, worst to best, strictly in terms of pacing. (Meaning, the list may not correlate with how I'd rank the games overall.) Now, when I think "open world pacing," I get the same idea that a few of you have already cited. Pacing is going to be an issue in the genre regardless, but how engaged do I feel on a moment-to-moment basis? I can at times consider lonely wanderings as totally engaging -- provided the atmosphere is great -- because I'm into that kind of thing. But more broadly speaking, this list has a lot to do with content variety, emotional beats, and main storyline compulsion.
It's likely that not every game I list will agree with everyone's standards of what constitutes an open world game. Double whoops.
15.) The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall
There was never a single moment in which I felt engaged in exploration.
14.) Assassin's Creed II
Cool representations of a nifty historical period. Felt like a chore to me, anyway.
13.) The Legend of Zelda
It's got some neat tricks to it and I'm a sucker for the series. But it hasn't aged well enough that I'd care to go back.
12.) Digimon World: Next Order
I like the combat and it's fun wandering around with Digimon partners, but the environments are aesthetically subpar.
11.) The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
It's Elder Scrolls post-Daggerfall, so fun and unexpected things happen in a vast world. Only, they're often rather same-y and don't happen often enough for my liking.
10.) Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag
Sailing the open seas is a gem. An absolute gem. I'd do it forever in a game of global exploration if I could. But once I made landfall, I never cared nearly as much about anything.
09.) Final Fantasy XV
The story suffered hard for it, but I quite like driving around the Lucian continent. Running around on chocobos rarely gets old, and the best part is all those optional dungeons that make me feel like I'm playing a gorgeous rendition of the very first Final Fantasy. Too bad the rest of the game isn't so well-crafted to say the least.
08.) Fallout 4
Another case where the story just fails to take off, although at least in Final Fantasy XV's case there are still a few moments where I could feel a tear coming on and a handful of characters worth giving a damn about. Yet Fallout 4 outranks FFXV on this kind of list because Bethesda pulled a Bethesda; the world is a treat to traipse across. Unfortunately, most of the quests don't earn their keep by comparison.
07.) Dragon Age: Inquisition
Yes, many of the zones (which arguably disqualify the game from "open world" status, I know) needed a lot more engaging content. But I think the issue can be overstated at times. There are a few zones that successfully rope me in with clever quests galore. Crestwood is a good example. But even in those places where it's fetch after fetch after nothing whatsoever, the Dragon Age team made a beautiful, beautiful game with Frostbite, so all is forgiven. Except for the Forbidden Oasis. Fuck the Forbidden Oasis.
06.) Final Fantasy XII
You'd be forgiven for wondering why I'd rank XII so high (again, if it even qualifies) when almost everything revolves around battling. It's true, there isn't a lot of variety in that regard. Not even relative to many prior Final Fantasies (and even XV). Like Dragon Age: Inquisition, though, I have a lovely time wandering around anyway. FFXII, for those of whom it clicks with, can be a charming continental tour with excellent music and sometimes enough storyline momentum to carry it. It'd rank higher if that momentum didn't fall apart at times, especially for a vast chunk of the second act.
05.) Fallout 3
Some would scoff at me for this, but I prefer Inon Zur's moody, post-apocalyptic tunes to the staple Americana jingles everyone always seems to have blasting through their Pip-Boy. I'll turn those on every now and then, but wandering across the ruins of a world gone by, in the middle of the night both in-game and outside of it, isn't complete without the right minimalist sounds to complement all that moodiness. That's why I love best about Fallout 3, but it has enough engaging quests and dialogue romps scattered throughout that the pacing comes out looking clean.
04.) The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
That's going to be a recurring note for most of the remainder of this list -- clean pacing. Morrowind features smarter writing than Fallout 3, too, and while I'm not quite as enchanted with the alien game world as some, I still quite appreciate it. There are some bizarre beauties to be seen; sunsets over purple dunes; the moon rising over giant mushroom things. This is a game that has to be experienced firsthand to be understood.
03.) Fallout: New Vegas
Ever-cleverer writing holds New Vegas up so high, creating a terrific sense of pacing out of a world which just doesn't interest me as much as several others here in terms of active exploration. In other sorts of lists, New Vegas would place lower. If I were simply ranking open worlds from an aesthetic perspective, hot damn, this wouldn't be it. But there's no dearth of things to do -- damn near ever -- as you encounter all kinds of memorable characters seemingly at every turn.
02.) The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Overall, Skyrim's writing isn't as great as a fair few of these other games. There are blatantly missed opportunities to make things feel more urgent, and to make me care more about the extended cast. I'd still take the writing here over Oblivion's, mind you, but Morrowind's is on another level. So what gets Skyrim so far? Hundreds of hours in, and I still can't get enough of its titular realm. There's a majesty about it, and a sense of bitter loss and primal courage, that still shines nine years in and will continue to shine for many years to come. And though there are far too many instances of dead people in caves and bandit ambushes you saw coming from kilometers away, there are also enough heartfelt questlines (especially in the DLCs!) to mostly make up for that problem. Bethesda knocked it out of the park with this game.
01.) The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
What can I say that hasn't been said? I could link you my LTTP for it, but it's already been read plenty, and there are folks who have penned better tributes besides. All I can tell you is that I can understand why Breath of the Wild doesn't work for some, but I am part of the majority here who thinks it's more than justified as a critical darling and sales evergreen. "But you hardly even do anything," some will argue. Maybe. But I was stunned by how many towns there were strewn throughout, and each town's population drew me in, made me care, and gave me a sense of heroism that cannot be rivaled. What matters more is everything in-between those towns; Hyrule is the leading character in Breath of the Wild, and it's a Hyrule so vast and yet so perfectly handcrafted that I "worry" we'll never see anything quite like it again. I don't need hundreds of intricate dialogue-centric quests in every game I play; I want that on the regular from certain other developers, because it's their bread and butter, but for Zelda I want to be set free and ride a horse across a mystical land filled with charm. I got so much more than that here.
