Watch Dogs: 5 Reasons It Could Be Game Of The Year

5. A Properly Next-Gen Open World

Next-gen is fairly light on open worlds right now. There's Assassin's Creed 4 - but there's the definite sense that it was created for current-gen and then upscaled - and there's Dead Rising 3, although it isn't your traditional side-missions and roaming open world. Watch Dogs, on the other hand, was built from the ground up for next-gen and then downscaled for current-gen consoles - so Watch Dogs' Chicago will be one of the first proper next-gen open worlds in games - and with the potential that brings, it's really quite exciting. There's an awful lot of things that can be done with an open world and a beefed-up development kit - first things first, there's straight-up size. While Watch Dogs doesn't look to be angling for the sheer size of Grand Theft Auto V, it's certainly looking like Chicago is one big city. With more power, there's also more space for the (arguably more interesting) outer districts and countryside; GTA IV suffered back in 2008 by being squeezed into four small purely-urban islands, and thankfully Watch Dogs shouldn't be falling for this. There's more than just size though - the density and atmosphere that is sometimes missed out by more soulless open-worlders can be entirely avoided here, with next-gen allowing for a living and breathing city. And considering that you'll be spending a far bit of time scanning the lives of the Chicago residents, it's important to feel more like a tourist than the king of a realm you created yourself. Of course, there's the pretty graphics and big draw distances that come with next-gen, but the new consoles could just give Watch Dogs an edge in creating the best open world of 2014.