Guillermo Del Toro On Best Video Game Worldbuilding: A Shooter Stands Out

Felix Dubois

5 min read

Post on May 30, 2025

4.4

Share

Del Toro's Choice and the Power of Immersion in Video Game Worldbuilding

Del Toro's surprising top pick for best video game worldbuilding is Bioshock. This unexpected choice challenges the conventional wisdom that expansive fantasy RPGs hold the crown for immersive worlds. However, it highlights a crucial point: immersive world design is paramount regardless of genre.

• The Unexpected Choice: Selecting a shooter like Bioshock over sprawling open worlds subverts the expectation that scale equates to quality in video game worldbuilding. It underscores the importance of focused, impactful design.
• Immersion as the Key: Regardless of genre, a truly great game world immerses the player completely. This requires a masterful blend of atmosphere, level design, and narrative.
• Building Immersion: Atmosphere is crafted through sound design, lighting, and visual style. Level design guides the player's journey, revealing the world gradually and meaningfully. Narrative weaves itself into the environment, creating a cohesive and believable story.

Further Detail: Bioshock's underwater city of Rapture is a prime example of narrative immersion and environmental storytelling. The decaying Art Deco architecture, the eerie silence punctuated by unsettling sounds, and the scattered audio logs all contribute to the unsettling atmosphere and reveal the city's tragic history. This contrasts sharply with games that rely solely on exposition dumps to convey their lore. Other games like Silent Hill 2 masterfully use atmosphere and sound to create a sense of dread and unease, enhancing the overall world-building.

Key Elements of Exceptional Video Game Worldbuilding

Beyond immersion, several crucial elements contribute to successful video game worldbuilding. These elements work together to create a believable and engaging experience.

• Cohesive Lore and Backstory: A rich history and believable mythology are foundational. Games like The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt excel here, with its deeply developed cultures, political intrigue, and monster lore.
• Consistent Visual Design: Art style, architecture, and environmental detail must be cohesive. The distinctive aesthetics of Borderlands or the meticulous detail of Red Dead Redemption 2 exemplify this.
• Compelling Characters and NPCs: Believable characters populate and bring the world to life. The memorable NPCs in Disco Elysium and the complex characters of The Last of Us demonstrate this impact.
• Meaningful Player Agency: Player choices should shape the world and narrative. Games like Fallout 4 and Mass Effect showcase impactful player choices that have far-reaching consequences.

Further Detail: The effectiveness of these elements varies across genres. Linear narratives can focus on impactful storytelling, while open-world games prioritize exploration and discovery. The key is consistency and integration—every element should support the overall world's believability and coherence.

Why the Chosen Shooter Excels in Video Game Worldbuilding

Bioshock's success lies in its masterful integration of these elements.

• Exceptional Level Design and Atmosphere: Rapture's decaying grandeur creates a palpable sense of mystery and dread. The environment itself tells a compelling story.
• Lore Woven into Gameplay: Audio logs, environmental storytelling, and even enemy design reveal the city’s history and the consequences of its utopian ideals.
• Mechanics Enhancing Immersion: The plasmid powers enhance the player's interaction with the environment, creating a more immersive experience.
• Impactful Characters: Andrew Ryan, Atlas, and other characters are memorable and complex, adding depth to the narrative.

Further Detail: Bioshock's relatively contained environment, compared to many open-world games, allows for a higher level of detail and focus on atmosphere. Unlike many shooters that prioritize action over narrative, Bioshock prioritizes storytelling and environmental detail, creating a richly immersive experience that exemplifies exceptional video game worldbuilding.

Comparing and Contrasting with Other Notable Examples of Video Game Worldbuilding

Other games also excel in video game worldbuilding, albeit with different approaches.

• Bullet Points:
  • The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt: Masterful open-world design and rich lore, but sometimes suffers from inconsistent NPC behavior.
  • Red Dead Redemption 2: Exceptional attention to detail and immersive atmosphere in a Wild West setting, but the vastness can sometimes feel overwhelming.
  • Elden Ring: A cryptic but captivating world with unique level design and lore but can be challenging for accessibility.

Further Detail: While these games utilize vast open worlds, Bioshock's focused design allows for a different kind of immersion. It demonstrates that compelling video game worldbuilding isn't solely defined by scale, but by the effective integration of narrative, atmosphere, and gameplay mechanics.

Conclusion

Guillermo del Toro's choice of Bioshock as an exemplar of video game worldbuilding highlights the importance of immersion, cohesive design, compelling narratives, and meaningful player agency. Exceptional video game worldbuilding transcends genre, prioritizing a captivating and believable experience above all else. The key takeaway is that a truly great game world draws the player in, making them a participant in its history and fate.

Call to Action: Dive deeper into the world of video game worldbuilding! Explore different games known for their immersive worlds, and consider how these techniques can inspire your own gaming experiences or even your own creative projects. Discuss your favorite examples of innovative video game worldbuilding in the comments below!