The Avernum series is set on a huge map and is awesome for scratching the exploration itch.

Two Worlds is enormous, but unsatisfying to explore. You'll be lucky to meet one memorable NPC. In my last game, a character named Poz Heim was killed by boars on the outskirts of a village. I then met another Poz Heim in an adjacent village. I saw another copy of him in a city. The game can be enjoyable, but don't expect to find anything exciting around the next corner.

Gothic 1 is excellent and Gothic 2 is my favorite game ever. They are a pleasure to explore.

Haven't played them all but Gothic 3 and Two Worlds maybe.

I spent so much time randomly exploring Morrowind. I know the older RPGs had huge game worlds, and it's a shame that those games are not on gog.

Erm... Darklands, Gothic 2 and 3, Geneforge Saga, Sacred... I heard The Witcher 2 is pretty big as well, but never played it myself, so can't confirm.

Sacred, good call. That place is HUGE and it's loaded with easter eggs and other cool stuff that has NOTHING to do with the plot but is still fun to hunt for. DD probably tops them all but that's been mentioned several times already..

Yeah, forgot DD, I must be having a bad day :P

They seem to just be clones but are much different. Diablo from what i remember was mostly about looting, mostly just grinding and getting stuff and xp and growing big and strong. Divine Divinity has loads of quests where you don't really need to fight anything, you need to figure out stuff and talk to people a lot. You are not stuck to a certain skill tree after you choose a character, you can be a thief and learn stuff from the warrior or wizard skill tree. The combat is like in diablo and it has some looting but you will get most of the good stuff by discovering some hidden treasure or solving some mystery or some quest. It has an open world with a nice world map you uncover gradually.
I liked it a lot more than diablo but that's just me.

DD is NOT a Diablo clone. I'm not critical of Diablo clones, I love them and play most of them, and DD is NOT one of them. Titan Quest (not on here) Nox (on here) are Diablo clones.

This isn't going to be a particularly helpful post but Baldur's Gate 2 is a huge and epic game but it is not very "open world" and it is not as vast and sprawling in terms of gameworld size as something like Morrowind / Oblivion or Fallout New Vegas. I haven't played the Gothic games but they often get mentioned in discussions about Morrowind / Oblivion. Fully expanded and even vanilla, Morrowind (especially I think) and Oblivion are MASSIVE gameworlds but Fallout New Vegas is OUTRAGEOUSLY huge in my experience, especially if you include the areas added by the DLC expansions.

I think he means they feature a Diablo-like combat and loot system, which they do. It's just that DD is a full-scale RPG with a quest system, branching dialogue, etc.

Yeah, I realized that as soon as I posted it. I still stand firm that comparing the two is apples to oranges but ultimately it's a silly argument because they are both GREAT GREAT games and should be played by all gamers regardless of their preferred genre.

Largest game world is a but hard to define. There are games with absolutely massive game worlds, but where things are focused on some specific locations (like Arcanum, which still has plenty of big locations to explore, but most of the map is just randomly generated trees)

With all games combined in each set, the Avernum, Geneforge, Krondor, Might & magic & Ultima sets will all have game worlds that are absolutely huge!

Gothic 3 & Divine Divinity both have really big game worlds out of the box.


As for games with actual borders to the game world (i.e. it won't just keep randomly generating new content for all eternity) Daggerfall (not on GOG, but you can get it for free) is still most likely king. That being said, Daggerfall's game world is still mostly randomly generated.

Other notable games:
King's Bounty series (tactics game & RPG mix, not the largest single game worlds, but each game will take you ~50h to beat!)
Lands of Lore 1 & 2 (again, not the largest game worlds, but 2 in particular is still quite big)

I'm sure I saw a map/diagram someone drew up on a messageboard a long time ago, which showed the maps of the biggest worlds in video games compared to each other, by square mile I believe.

Arena was first, Daggerfall second, and Ultima 7 was near the top too

After finishing Gothic 3 I was looking for something similar. Got Two Worlds 2 Epic Edition from the sale and installed it "just to give it a try". I've been playing it daily ever since.

It has a lot of cut scenes but they add to the story that develops as you progress. The game allows you to "disassemble" found loot and upgrade your existing gear. It does have quest markers but you can avoid using the markers by leaving a quest you don't want to do as the active quest. If you do need a hint you can make any unsolved quest active which gives you a marker on your map.

It seems to have an extensive magic system but I've ignored magic in favor of swords and bows.

The camera can be annoying but once you get used to it . . it's not really a problem. It's not the best RPG I've played but it is one that I am having a lot of fun playing.

Edit: The game starts with a tutorial which gives you the necessary "how to" for game play. I had trouble early on finding health potions only to realize I could brew my own potions. I had enough ingredients to brew around 40 potions once I realized that brewing your own was best for keeping a good supply on hand.

Wizardry 7 has one of the largest worlds among RPGs. If you can't stand outdated interface/graphics, go for my favourite Wizardry 8. Both available on GoG. Open world, you are free to go wherever you want.