8 Hardest Open-World Games To 100% Complete, Ranked

In the past, there wasn’t much difference between beating a game and completing it 100%. It was either beating Super Mario Bros. using its hidden warp pipes, or doing it stage by stage — or getting all the Chaos Emeralds to get the best ending in Sonic 3 & Knuckles. But as games got bigger, they began offering more for the player to do beyond story missions and boss fights.

It especially shows in open-world games where there’s some minigame or side mission hanging around every corner to tempt players away from the main story. Players don’t have to follow the couriers in InFamous or chase the pigeons in Marvel’s Spider-Man to beat those games, yet they’re required for 100% completion. Even then, they’re child’s play compared to the hardest open-world games to 100% complete.

8 SnowRunner

Snow Drifts, Storms, And More Impede Players On Their Way To Completion

Open-world games aren’t necessarily the same as third-person action adventure games. There are a few that take place entirely inside vehicles, like SnowRunner. Instead of racing around tracks and performing stunts, players drive big, off-road vehicles to carry heavy payloads across frozen tundra to help American and Siberian communities clear their roads, fix flood defenses, and more.

The player earns cash with each successfully completed contract, which is enough to upgrade their vehicles — or buy new vehicles better suited for certain jobs in SnowRunner. Some of the contracts are quite straightforward, but the hardest ones require nerves and luck as well as decent vehicles. Even the best routes will require the player to power through raging torrents, frozen lakes, and thick snowdrifts.

7 Assassin’s Creed Valhalla

Where Players Would Rather Fight Hard Bosses Than Stack Cairn Stones

The Assassin’s Creed series has become one of the biggest names in the genre, though not necessarily the most testing in difficulty. Not that they don’t have their challenging fights, bosses, or missions (as players who took on Leonardo’s Machines in AC: Brotherhood may recall). But, they tend to be more infamous for testing players’ patience with its collectible hunts across its vast maps.

Assassin’s Creed Valhalla tends to take the cake, as players must help Eivor find artifacts, open chests, and stack cairns across Dark Ages England. The former two aren’t so tricky, but the latter requires mastering a stone-stacking game that’s so frustrating that most players would rather fight the toughest legendary beasts in Valhalla. But if they want to get 100%, they’ll have to do them all.

6 The Legend Of Zelda: Tears Of The Kingdom

Sequel Expands An Already-Big Game With Even More Stuff To Do

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild also gave players tons to do. Finding every ingredient to cook every dish alone requires scouring every nook and cranny of Hyrule, and fighting its different enemies if players need some meat. That’s without getting into the golf minigame, paragliding challenges, and collecting Korok seeds, which gave the player a just reward.

Its sequel, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, simply doubled up on everything BOTW offered. There were more dishes to cook, more enemies to fight, races to complete, and 1,000 Korok seeds to track down for a similarly pleasing reward. Only there were also new powers to master, which could help make wildly creative Zonai Creations, and craft new weapons, adding more for players to complete.

5 Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas

With Or Without The Fuel Glitch, Its Vehicle Challenges Are A Pain In The Neck

It’s not enough to give players a time sink to make it hard. Otherwise, it would just be the longest game to complete. Grand Theft Auto Online via GTA5 has a ton of stuff to track down, though driving every car, performing every stunt, and completing its Triathlon will feel like a breeze compared to beating the ‘Supply Lines’ mission in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.

The original PS2 release suffered from a glitch that caused the RC plane’s fuel supply to run out sooner than it should have. This got fixed for the game’s other ports, but that didn’t make its controls any easier. Completing the Gold Challenges for the proper planes, cars, and bikes wasn’t a cakewalk, either. Compared to completing Driving/Flying School, stealing territory from rival gangs might as well be a game of tiddlywinks.

Side Objectives Turn One Of The Easiest Metal Gear Games Into One Of The Hardest Ones

Out of all the MGS games, Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain is undeniably one of the easier ones. Players can either sneak deep into the heart of enemy territory without alerting anyone or kill everyone on sight and still get an S-rank. The game allows nearly any and every tactic the player can think of to beat its missions. Completion is another matter, as the missions will often come with grueling side objectives.

For example, beating ‘Lingua Franca’ requires saving every POW. Completing it requires listening to their interrogations beforehand, which can be ruined by glitches (e.g. soldiers can shoot the POWs before their interrogation). That’s without considering the RNG-like challenge of extracting every species of animal from the field, which tests the player’s patience more than their skill.

3 Batman: Arkham Origins

If Players Don’t Complete The List Of Stunts In Order, They’ll Have To Try Again From The Start

Between the main campaign, side missions, combat challenges, and predator challenges, the Batman: Arkham games weren’t a walk in the park to complete. But this spot goes to Batman: Arkham Origins, as it has an issue with its Dark Knight System. They were essentially lists of combat, travel, detective, and predator stunts players had to complete to earn extra EXP and upgrades.

It was simple enough for combat and travel, but the predator list only works for the main campaign’s predator sections. If players beat the game without completing all its stunts in order, they’d either have to start a fresh campaign or play New Game+ to give it another go. The only achievements with a lower TA ratio are beating I Am the Night mode (where dying once ends the game) and the now-inaccessible multiplayer mode achievements.

2 Dead Rising

Completion Requires Keeping An Eye On The Clock While Corralling Low-AI NPCs

Dead Rising’s open world is limited to the Williamette Parkview Mall, though it was still a broad place with a lot to do in it. If it were just a sandbox where players could race through hordes of zombies with makeshift weapons, and some life-saving orange juice on standby, it would’ve been a fun but brief affair. The challenge comes from protecting its dimwitted NPCs while escorting them from one location to another.

Not only that, but many of its missions are on a timed basis. If hero Frank West isn’t at the right place at the right time, and often after having completed some key objectives beforehand, the player will be locked out of the game’s best endings. That’s fine enough if they’re aiming for Endings B-F, but getting Ending A, Overtime Mode, then Ending S requires much more care.

1 Yakuza 3

Players Fight Against Janky Controls To Beat Expert AI At Pool

When it comes to the hardest open-world games to complete, the discussion wouldn’t be complete without at least one Yakuza game being mentioned. Alongside beating the story missions, substories, Ultimate Matches, etc., they require players to become decent mahjong and shogi players, keen gamblers at both Western and Eastern card and dice games, expert arcade gamers, unequal underground fighters, and more.

The original Western release of Yakuza 3 wasn’t so bad as, due to time constraints, most of its minigames were removed. Now, thanks to the Remastered Edition, completing the game now requires beating those re-established minigames from their easiest bouts to the hardest challenges. Beating all the Billiards games in Expert mode with its wonky physics could potentially be enough to put completionists off for good.