How the checklist conquered the open world, from Morrowind to Skyrim

The first in a new interview series about a sprawling, exhausting genre

Image credit:Microsoft

There’s no genre like the open world for inducing choice paralysis, so it’s fitting that I’ve been agonising over how to begin this irregular article series on open world games for months. I have a lot of material, oodles of interviews with developers of all shapes and sizes - big shops like Remedy and CD Projekt, smaller studios like Ace Team and Awaceb, all holding forth on such topics as whether Elden Ring or Zelda did bandit camps better, and how you make a forest feel endless. There is so much you could talk about, so many trails heading off in all directions, but perhaps it’s best to begin with the more personal and superficial question that inspired this investigation: how did the open world game get so boring ?

I used to love open worlds for, in a nutshell, being virtual environments vast enough to get thoroughly lost in with no guarantee of what I’d find. They were enveloping mysteries, tantalising horizons. Nowadays, however, I regard open worlds as chores, because they are designed so insistently, even desperately, around recurring activities and rewards. Wherever I go, I always feel like I’m walking on the spot. The open world’s promise of scale has become its greatest disadvantage, inasmuch as that scale is now justified and structured by a surfeit of smaller, looping acts of content extraction, typically joined at the hip to live service fixtures, which create a momentum for exploration that used to be supplied by curiosity, and which conspire to drain the landscape of grandeur. Open worlds have never been larger in terms of acreage, but they do not spend your time well.

Image credit:Eurogamer / Ubisoft

This is a commonly heard criticism of the genre today, and not just from reviewers who have to write up these enormities for embargo.

“I think a lot of it has to do with the way some open world games are designed, where it is very much that checklist,” says Nate Purkeypile, creator of occult hunting sim The Axis Unseen , and a former Fallout and Elder Scrolls designer. His feats include carving out the vast Dwemer undercity of Blackreach in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim - a world beneath the world, revealed by the bronze elevators that pock the mountains above. “These games can be a lot of fun, and I’ve had fun with them, too, but I have that same fatigue,” Purkeypile says. Today’s open worlds, he suggests, might cast you as explorers, but they don’t feel like places you discover. “That feeling of not really knowing what’s over there and feeling surprised - you don’t really feel like you’re exploring the world, if you’re not actually surprised.”

As to why open worlds have lost that element of surprise, Purkeypile points straightforwardly to how expensive today’s biggest games are to make, and the number of people involved in their creation. There has never been greater pressure to standardise the format and mitigate the risk of a flop. And the larger the team, the harder it is to set aside time for exploration within the complex geography of video game development.

“When you have literally thousands of people working on the game, sometimes you need to be able to have these bite-sized portions of ‘do this, go there’,” Purkeypile says. “It’s very hard to run things at that scale without all those checks and balances and stuff.”

Purkeypile contrasts this with his memories of working on Skyrim , back in the noughties.

“We were like 100 people back then, and there were lots of trust in the team, where you could just take something and make it your own. Like Blackreach - that was not on the schedule at all. We did it as a skunkworks project on the side, and people saw it and said, oh, that’s really awesome - I guess we should keep it. And I have people, to this day, say it’s one of their favourite things, because they go into that deep, dark dungeon to find something we never tell you about. It’s like, vaguely hinted at, but it’s a surprise.”

Purkeypile left Bethesda partly because there was less opportunity for such trips into the undergrowth during development of Starfield , which Alice B (RPS in peace) pithily summarised as being so big it feels small .

" Starfield was like 500-ish people across four studios," Purkeypile says. “I think there is still a lot of individual storytelling there, within spaces, and cool places to find, but it is definitely harder at that scale.”

Image credit:Bethesda

ZeniMax Online president and Elder Scrolls Online director Matt Firor expands the point by noting that the audience for games nowadays has less patience for the sensation of feeling lost. He holds up Skyrim’s grandmarm The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind as an example of open world design that is no longer a practical possibility for a developer like Bethesda. The wonky fungal island of Morrowind now plays like the antidote to the concise quest templates and heavy HUD hand-holding of later open worlders. It’s an obscure and formless landscape where the geography must be actively navigated based on scraps of information, with no baked-in Google Maps-style functionality to breadcrumb you to an objective, and players are free to go thrillingly astray.

“If you play that right now - there is no compass, no map, literally the quests are like ‘go to the third tree on the right and walk 50 paces west’,” Firor says. “And if you did that now, no one would play it. Very few people would play it. So now you need to give them hints and clues, and because nobody wants to really devote that much time to problem solving. Like they want to go and be told the story, or enter or interact with another player, or interact with an NPC.

“Morrowind is a great game obviously,” he goes on. “It’s one of my favourite games. But the way it told its story with the open world is a little out of date for the type of gamers that we have now, where they’re not all hardcore, they’re not all PC or generation-one console diehards, right, who are going to go out and invest as much time in the game as possible. Now [that there are] so many other options for players, you really want to make sure that it’s engaging and fun, and wandering around a field trying to gauge 50 steps from a tree is not part of that anymore. Which is kind of sad, because I’m old school.”

Image credit:Microsoft

“[We now] have to support both those kind of hardcore players - I’m saying hardcore, that term is loaded - but the people that really want to take the time and live everything and make it difficult, and then the wider audience that really just has 20 minutes to burn,” Firor adds. You can see this balancing act in the forthcoming Assassin’s Creed Shadows , which opts for a looser quest format where players can narrow down the vicinity of a target by eavesdropping on NPCs.

One reason to preserve that touch of Morrowindy ambiguity is simply that developers love seeing players embroiled in the act of actually working something out, tracking something down. This is, Firor suggests, the fundamental appeal of devising an open world game, the emphasis that differentiates it from other genres.

“It’s make a space and then just populate it with things to do, and the players can do it in any order. And sometimes it’s a little chaotic. And sometimes you can’t figure out what the players are going to figure out, because they’re smarter than you. But that’s what the world is like too. And it’s so much fun, just to create space and let players into it, and then see what they do.”

I’m hoping to take a similar approach with this article series: make a space, and see what you all do within it, which overgrown paths you lead me down. Partly, this is a gesture of armchair designer resistance towards one of the fundamentals of open world design, the tendency to have that world turn on the movements of a single agent. But also, as Firor says, it’s just fun. I’m hoping that you’ll join me on this trek, and give me some headings.

We could explore the more famous open world landmarks, such as the infamous towers of Assassin’s Creed, which began life as a means of narrowing the divide between player and designer . We could devote pieces to individual games - not just yer Skyrims and yer Grand Theft Autos, but lesser-known, discreetly influential oddities such as The Abbey Of Crime , or mods such as Brookheights , an unofficial open world expansion of The Sims . We could investigate open world memes, like the urban legends that haunt San Andreas. And bubbling beneath all that, a cauldron of more diffuse thoughts about the philosophy or poetics of open worlding. How should you aestheticise size and open-endedness for their own sake? How do you characterise the player of an open world game - invader, explorer, wanderer, vagrant, collector, saviour, trespasser, woman, man or none of the above? What even is a “world”, anyway, and what really distinguishes an open world from a closed one?

Starfield

Xbox Series X/S , PC

The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind

Xbox

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

PS4 , PS5 , Xbox One , Xbox Series X/S , PS3 , Xbox 360 , PC , Nintendo Switch , Nintendo Switch 2

Rock Paper Shotgun is better when you sign in

Sign in and join us on our journey to discover strange and compelling PC games.

All 75 Arc Raiders Blueprints and where to get them

These areas have the highest chance of giving you Blueprints

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Looking for more Arc Raiders Blueprints? It’s a special day when you find a Blueprint, as they’re among the most valuable items in Arc Raiders. If you find a Blueprint that you haven’t already found, then you must make sure you hold onto it at all costs, because Blueprints are the key to one of the most important and powerful systems of meta-progression in the game.

This guide aims to be the very best guide on Blueprints you can find, starting with a primer on what exactly they are and how they work in Arc Raiders, before delving into exactly where to get Blueprints and the very best farming spots for you to take in your search.

We’ll also go over how to get Blueprints from other unlikely activities, such as destroying Surveyors and completing specific quests. And you’ll also find the full list of all 75 Blueprints in Arc Raiders on this page (including the newest Blueprints added with the Cold Snap update , such as the Deadline Blueprint and Firework Box Blueprint), giving you all the information you need to expand your own crafting repertoire.

In this guide:

• What are Blueprints in Arc Raiders?
• Full Blueprint list: All crafting recipes
• Where to find Blueprints in Arc Raiders Blueprints obtained from quests Blueprints obtained from Trials Best Blueprint farming locations

What are Blueprints in Arc Raiders?

Blueprints in Arc Raiders are special items which, if you manage to extract with them, you can expend to permanently unlock a new crafting recipe in your Workshop. If you manage to extract from a raid with an Anvil Blueprint, for example, you can unlock the ability to craft your very own Anvil Pistol, as many times as you like (as long as you have the crafting materials).

To use a Blueprint, simply open your Inventory while in the lobby, then right-click on the Blueprint and click “Learn And Consume” . This will permanently unlock the recipe for that item in your Workshop. As of the Stella Montis update, there are allegedly 75 different Blueprints to unlock - although only 68 are confirmed to be in the game so far. You can see all the Blueprints you’ve found and unlocked by going to the Workshop menu, and hitting “R” to bring up the Blueprint screen.

It’s possible to find duplicates of past Blueprints you’ve already unlocked. If you find these, then you can either sell them, or - if you like to play with friends - you can take it into a match and gift it to your friend so they can unlock that recipe for themselves. Another option is to keep hold of them until the time comes to donate them to the Expedition.

Full Blueprint list: All crafting recipes

Below is the full list of all the Blueprints that are currently available to find in Arc Raiders, and the crafting recipe required for each item:

Note: The missing Blueprints in this list likely have not actually been added to the game at the time of writing, because none of the playerbase has managed to find any of them. As they are added to the game, I will update this page with the most relevant information so you know exactly how to get all 75 Arc Raiders Blueprints.

Where to find Blueprints in Arc Raiders

Below is a list of all containers, modifiers, and events which maximise your chances of finding Blueprints:

• Certain quests reward you with specific Blueprints .
• Completing Trials has a high chance of offering Blueprints as rewards.
• Surveyors have a decent chance of dropping Blueprints on death.
• High loot value areas tend to have a greater chance of spawning Blueprints.
• Night Raids and Storms may increase rare Blueprint spawn chances in containers.
• Containers with higher numbers of items may have a higher tendency to spawn Blueprints. As a result, Blue Gate (which has many “large” containers containing multiple items) may give you a higher chance of spawning Blueprints.
• Raider containers (Raider Caches, Weapon Boxes, Medical Bags, Grenade Tubes) have increased Blueprint drop rates. As a result, the Uncovered Caches event gives you a high chance of finding Blueprints.
• Security Lockers have a higher than average chance of containing Blueprints.
• Certain Blueprints only seem to spawn under specific circumstances: Tempest Blueprint only spawns during Night Raid events. Vulcano Blueprint only spawns during Hidden Bunker events. Jupiter and Equaliser Blueprints only spawn during Harvester events.

Raider Caches, Weapon Boxes, and other raider-oriented container types have a good chance of offering Blueprints. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blueprints have a very low chance of spawning in any container in Arc Raiders, around 1-2% on average. However, there is a higher chance of finding Blueprints in particular container types. Specifically, you can find more Blueprints in Raider containers and security lockers.

Beyond this, if you’re looking for Blueprints you should focus on regions of the map which are marked as having particularly high-value loot. Areas such as the Control Tower in Dam Battlegrounds, the Arrival and Departure Buildings in Spaceport, and Pilgrim’s Peak in Blue Gate all have a better-than-average chance of spawning Blueprints somewhere amongst all their containers. Night Raids and Electromagnetic Storm events also increase the drop chances of certain Blueprints .

In addition to these containers, you can often loot Blueprints from destroyed Surveyors - the largest of the rolling ball ARC. Surveyors are more commonly found on the later maps - Spaceport and Blue Gate - and if one spawns in your match, you’ll likely see it by the blue laser beam that it casts into the sky while “surveying”.

Surveyors are quite well-armoured and will very speedily run away from you once it notices you, but if you can take one down then make sure you loot all its parts for a chance of obtaining certain unusual Blueprints.

Blueprints obtained from quests

One way in which you can get Blueprints is by completing certain quests for the vendors in Speranza. Some quests will reward you with a specific item Blueprint upon completion, so as long as you work through all the quests in Arc Raiders, you are guaranteed those Blueprints.

Here is the full list of all Blueprints you can get from quest rewards:

• Trigger Nade Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Sparks Fly”.
• Lure Grenade Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Greasing Her Palms”.
• Burletta Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Industrial Espionage”.
• Hullcracker Blueprint (and Launcher Ammo Blueprint): Rewarded after completing “The Major’s Footlocker”.

Alas, that’s only 4 Blueprints out of a total of 75 to unlock, so for the vast majority you will need to find them yourself during a raid. If you’re intent on farming Blueprints, then it’s best to equip yourself with cheap gear in case you lose it, but don’t use a free loadout because then you won’t get a safe pocket to stash any new Blueprint you find. No pain in Arc Raiders is sharper than failing to extract with a new Blueprint you’ve been after for a dozen hours already.

One of the best ways to get Blueprints is by hitting three stars on all five Trials every week. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blueprints obtained from Trials

One of the very best ways to get Blueprints is as rewards for completing Trials in Arc Raiders. Trials are unlocked from Level 15 onwards, and allow you to earn rewards by focusing on certain tasks over the course of several raids. For example, one Trial might task you with dealing damage to Hornets, while another might challenge you to loot Supply Drops.

Trials refresh on a weekly basis, with a new week bringing five new Trials. Each Trial can offer up to three rewards after passing certain score milestones, and it’s possible to receive very high level loot from these reward crates - including Blueprints. So if you want to unlock as many Blueprints as possible, you should make a point of completing as many Trials as possible each week.

Best Blueprint farming locations

The very best way to get Blueprints is to frequent specific areas of the maps which combine high-tier loot pools with the right types of containers to search. Here are my recommendations for where to find Blueprints on every map, so you can always keep the search going for new crafting recipes to unlock.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Dam Battlegrounds

The best places to farm Blueprints on Dam Battlegrounds are the Control Tower, Power Generation Complex, Ruby Residence, and Pale Apartments . The first two regions, despite only being marked on the map as mid-tier loot, contain a phenomenal number of containers to loot. The Control Tower can also contain a couple of high-tier Security Lockers - though of course, you’ll need to have unlocked the Security Breach skill at the end of the Survival tree.

There’s also a lot of reporting amongst the playerbase that the Residential areas in the top-left of the map - Pale Apartments and Ruby Residence - give you a comparatively strong chance of finding Blueprints. Considering their size, there’s a high density of containers to loot in both locations, and they also have the benefit of being fairly out of the way. So you’re more likely to have all the containers to yourself.

Buried City

The best Blueprint farming locations on Buried City are the Santa Maria Houses, Grandioso Apartments, Town Hall, and the various buildings of the New District . Grandioso Apartments has a lower number of containers than the rest, but a high chance of spawning weapon cases - which have good Blueprint drop rates. The others are high-tier loot areas, with plenty of lootable containers - including Security Lockers.

Spaceport

The best places to find Blueprints on Spaceport are the Arrival and Departure Buildings, as well as Control Tower A6 and the Launch Towers . All these areas are labelled as high-value loot regions, and many of them are also very handily connected to one another by the Spaceport wall, which you can use to quickly run from one area to the next. At the tops of most of these buildings you’ll find at least one Security Locker, so this is an excellent farming route for players looking to find Blueprints.

The downside to looting Blueprints on Spaceport is that all these areas are hotly contested, particularly in Duos and Squads. You’ll need to be very focused and fast in order to complete the full farming route.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blue Gate

Blue Gate tends to have a good chance of dropping Blueprints, potentially because it generally has a high number of containers which can hold lots of items; so there’s a higher chance of a Blueprint spawning in each container. In my experience, the best Blueprint farming spots on Blue Gate are Pilgrim’s Peak, Raider’s Refuge, the Ancient Fort, and the Underground Complex beneath the Warehouse .

All of these areas contain a wealth of containers to loot. Raider’s Refuge has less to loot, but the majority of the containers in and around the Refuge are raider containers, which have a high chance of containing Blueprints - particularly during major events.

Stella Montis

On the whole, Stella Montis seems to have a very low drop rate for Blueprints (though a high chance of dropping other high-tier loot). If you do want to try farming Blueprints on this map, the best places to find Blueprints in Stella Montis are Medical Research, Assembly Workshop, and the Business Center . These areas have the highest density of containers to loot on the map.

In addition to this, the Western Tunnel has a few different Security Lockers to loot, so while there’s very little to loot elsewhere in this area of the map, it’s worth hitting those Security Lockers if you spawn there at the start of a match.

That wraps up this primer on how to get all the Blueprints in Arc Raiders as quickly as possible. With the Expedition system constantly resetting a large number of players’ Blueprints, it’s more important than ever to have the most up-to-date information on where to find all these Blueprints.

While you’re here, be sure to check out our Arc Raiders best guns tier list , as well as our primers on the best skills to unlock and all the different Field Depot locations on every map.

ARC Raiders

PS5 , Xbox Series X/S , PC

Rock Paper Shotgun is better when you sign in

Sign in and join us on our journey to discover strange and compelling PC games.