forever grateful that archive.org has rescued the magical Boohbah zone from the death of Flash: archive.org/details/boob...

As a buyer in the UK I do lean towards using itch over Steam, but a big push factor is that often prices are the same as Steam, except not including sales tax where the Steam price does. A 20% premium is palatable on smaller amounts, but it stings on a £20+ title.

Perhaps "gated" is the word I'm after? Open world games might have gates to unlock but are defined by their expansiveness, vs a game like Metroid Prime that's open-ish but with a much more restrictive structure. More of a maze than a world in some ways.

That makes sense! To my mind the unlocking structure also contrasts with e.g. Zelda or Elden Ring where gaining skills or knowledge can unlock new areas, but it's usually the case that you can explore the whole area once you reach it.

I wonder if "backtracking to unlock" is a vital aspect of this type of game. It's not enough just to have areas gated behind abilities, it's about returning somewhere to take the path you saw before but couldn't reach. Hard to capture that in a single adjective though