Dynamic weather
Weather changes over time — rain, storms, snow, heat — and ideally changes play, not just visuals: Breath of the Wild's rain makes cliffs unclimbable and its lightning strikes metal gear; Red Dead Redemption 2's mud slows travel. Designers use weather to make traversal of known terrain freshly situational, to drive systemic interactions (fire spreads in dry wind, rain extinguishes it), and to generate unscripted drama. The critical design line is cosmetic versus systemic: purely visual weather is ambience (cheap, safe), while mechanical weather is a gameplay modifier that must be telegraphed, counterable, and fair. Key decisions: predictability (forecast systems let players plan around weather instead of being ambushed by it), frequency tuning (BotW's rain is the canonical over-frequency complaint), interaction depth, and performance budget — particle-heavy storms are most expensive exactly when visibility matters most. Pitfall: weather that blocks the fun rather than redirecting it.
- Dev effort: Large
- Timing: Real-time
- Common in: open-world