Highlights
- Open-world games offer a unique sense of exploration and freedom, allowing players to create their own adventures.
- Games like Saints Row: The Third and Minecraft provide a lighthearted and creative experience with wacky weapons and limitless building possibilities.
- Just Cause 3, No Man's Sky, and Grand Theft Auto 5 offer diverse and immersive open-world environments with a range of activities and experiences, from chaotic physics-based gameplay to exploration of planets and cities.
These days, it seems like every other game has an open-world or open-zone component. But that’s not a bad thing. After all, exploring a large map while checking off a smorgasbord of objectives seems to scratch a very particular itch that most players of this type of game often get.
The 26 Best Open World PS5 Games, Ranked (July 2024)
The best open-world games on the PlayStation 5 push the system to its absolute limits, offering players some of the most stunning locations in gaming.
An open-world game further ups the ante when the sandbox is built with player agency in mind. The best ones anticipate what the player might want to do, giving them the tools to make their very own adventures. What follows is just some of the best that open-world sandboxes have to offer.
8 Saints Row: The Third
A Raunchy City Take-Over
What Makes This Sandbox Great?
- A wide variety of weapons to goof around with.
- Satire that shows through every part of the game.
Saints Row: The Third sets itself apart from other games in the genre by not taking itself seriously at all. The story involves the 3rd Street Saints working to take back their territory of Steelport from a group called The Syndicate. But the whole thing is really a satire of the commercialization of gang life.
From its arsenal of more than 30 wacky weapons to the hilarious wrestling-style take-downs that can be performed on anyone, it’s easy to see how this game garnered such a large following. Unfortunately, Saints Row: The Third is showing its age these days. Regardless, taking a trip down memory lane and indulging in one of the most silly sandboxes imaginable is as easy as picking up the 2020 remaster.
7 Minecraft
A World Both Kids and Adults Can Get Behind
What Makes This Sandbox Great?
- Build just about anything imaginable.
- Thumb through other people's intricate creations.
At this point, everybody and their mother knows Minecraft, with its deceptively simple building mechanics. On the surface is a kid-friendly game about building shelter to hide from creepers. However, dig a little deeper, to find that pretty much anything is craftable. Which is why it's hard to see this game going away any time soon.
Every Tameable Mob In Minecraft, Ranked
Minecraft may feel like a lonely game at times, but at least players have buddies to help them out! These are the ranked tameable mobs.
With Minecraft being available on just about every console there is, people have mastered the entirety of its playground. It’s not uncommon to come across recreations of entire cities or tributes to other games and shows throughout the many servers. The blocky art style might be off-putting to some, but it's a small barrier of entry to the otherwise amazing world.
6 Just Cause 3
Sling Across A Beautiful Island
Just Cause 3
- Released
- November 30, 2015
- Developer(s)
- Avalanche Studios
- Genre(s)
- Open-World , Third-Person Shooter
What Makes This Sandbox Great?
- Traversal that is easy to get the hang of.
- Devastating physics in a crumbling environment.
Taking on the island of Medici and single-handedly overthrowing the regime of Just Cause 3’s antagonist, General Sebastiano Di Ravello, might seem like a monumental task. But that’s just the backdrop for some ridiculous antics, headlined by one piece of equipment—the grappling hook.
Use it as a tool to extend a parachute ride or get around faster by hitching a ride on a moving jet. It could even be used to grapple a car to an explosive tankard and see the immaculate Avalanche Engine do its work. Critically, Just Cause 3 didn’t do very well due to its bugs and generic story. Despite this, delving into its open-world is a great way to blow off steam after a long day.
5 No Man’s Sky
Build A Life Among The Stars
No Man's Sky
- Platform(s)
- Switch , PC , Xbox One , Xbox Series S , Xbox Series X , PS4 , PS5
- Released
- August 9, 2016
- Developer(s)
- Hello Games
What Makes This Sandbox Great?
- Countless planets to visit and set up a base on.
- Constantly updated to extend play.
No Man’s Sky launched with bugs and boredom abound. Over the years, though, it has blossomed into something truly special. It follows the Traveler on their way towards the center of the universe. As planets pop up, the player is tasked to inspect and record them to learn new things about the galaxy as a whole.
Hello Games has taken the core of No Man's Sky and built varied systems around it, post-launch. For instance, one allows players to build a base anywhere, and later updates made the addition even more varied and engaging. Every day seems to bring something new to flesh out No Man’s Sky’s already unparalleled expanse.
4 Grand Theft Auto 5
Committing Crimes Is Just The Beginning
Grand Theft Auto 5
- Platform(s)
- PS5 , PS4 , PS3 , Xbox Series X , Xbox Series S , Xbox One , Xbox 360 , PC
- Released
- September 17, 2013
- Developer(s)
- Rockstar North
- Genre(s)
- Open-World , Action
What Makes This Sandbox Great?
- A large map based on real-world Los Angeles.
- Enjoy it both off and online for entirely different experiences.
GTA 5 didn’t change a terrible number of things that earlier games in the series established. However, it did move away from classics in the gangster movie genre, in favor of the vapid nature of Los Angeles for its story inspiration. Los Santos is a living, breathing city, and playing as three separate protagonists as their individual stories develop and converge is a great change of pace in the open-world genre.
Grand Theft Auto 6 and Every Other GTA Game Set in Vice City
Vice City is one of the most popular locations in the GTA franchise and has appeared in some of the very best Grand Theft Auto games to date.
Things get really interesting online where there are countless fan-made game modes, racetracks, and the fabled role play servers. With so much to do, it becomes common to see hours of time slip away.
3 Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain
Slink Through The Sand Or Bust Out The Big Guns
What Makes This Sandbox Great?
- Tackle conflicts in any way.
- A unique take on the popular stealth genre.
Metal Gear Solid 5's story is intriguing, albeit confusing, seeing Venom Snake work to prevent the spread of a virus that kills a person just by them speaking. However, the crux of the game has players developing their home base, collecting resources from infiltrating enemy strongholds, and exploring the breadth of Afghanistan.
The desert is dotted with dozens of enemy-rich camps and outposts. Go into them guns blazing or opt for using a quieter approach with the classic cardboard box to snatch what's needed inside. And when the situation calls for a quick getaway, a vehicle is just a call from being dropped out of the sky. MGS5 is highly polished and addicting, making it a must-play for fans of stealth games.
2 Red Dead Redemption 2
Gather A Posse And Take To The Open-Range
What Makes This Sandbox Great?
- Lots of period-specific things to do.
- Diverse array of areas on the map to get lost in.
Red Dead Redemption 2’s insistence on the details is what envelops the player in its deep depiction of the wild, wild west. The main story involves the Van Der Linde gang as they try to make their way through the latter years of the cowboy renaissance. Meanwhile, main character, Arthur Morgan, is just trying to get by while helping his crew finish the next big score.
Take on outlaws or become one with RDR2’s robust combat and looting systems, hunt game and sell their pelts for a premium, or hop online and run a moonshine business with friends. The beautiful world, consisting of mountainous ranges, open fields, and perilous swamp lands is a cowboy's paradise just waiting to be explored.
1 The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Indulge In The Endless Possibilities Of Hyrule
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
- Platform(s)
- Nintendo Wii U , Switch
- Released
- March 3, 2017
- Developer(s)
- Nintendo EPD
- Genre(s)
- Action , Adventure
What Makes This Sandbox Great?
- Go wherever, whenever.
- Tons of secrets to discover throughout the map using the sheikah slate.
Both Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom give the player a world with disparate objectives and let the player tackle them in any order. That being said, TOTK simply wouldn’t exist without the polished guts of its predecessor's open-world.
BOTW gives the player puzzle pieces, like the stasis ability, and tells the player to figure out the design. The bespoke shrines function as skill checks and teach new uses for sheikah slate abilities, which are then used to uncover Hyrule's many secrets on Link's journey to save the princess. The game constantly asks “what else can be done?”, leaving the player with the exceptional task of answering that call.
