"Imagine choosing what I want to be?"

Open worlds are consistently constructed with power fantasies in mind, so to take this genre — that excels when you're adrift, guideless, confronted with daunting expanses of a world unknown and the frightening amount of options that comes with that — and frame it as an introspective coming of age story feels revelatory despite being the most fitting narrative choice to make with that mechanical foundation.

And, yeah, the game takes a lot from the Breath of the Wild school of design, but it a has a deep understanding of what made that great (it guides you almost entirely by landmarks silhouetting the horizon; is confident on its vistas and history as a reward in itself; understands the value of empty areas as negative spaces; and never center stages repeated activities), so it can stripe away core aspects of that formula and not only make it work, but find its own essence.