Final Fantasy 7 Revelation Just Solved the Biggest Problem With Open-World RPG

Being the open-world lover that I am, I've never really had a problem with a game giving me too much to do. In fact, I generally prefer it when an open-world RPG gives me plenty of reasons to ignore the main story for hours at a time, whether that means completing side quests, hunting down upgrades, or getting distracted by some random activity I stumbled across while heading somewhere else. However, there is a pretty significant difference between a game giving me a lot of optional content and making me feel like I need to complete all of it, particularly when some of the rewards tied to that content directly affect my character's progression. At that point, what is technically optional can start feeling a lot less optional.