any good exploration games?

[Cloudworxz]

essentially i'm looking for decent open-world exploration-heavy games for pc
preferably games where the player is given a map and placed in the middle of a large world, where they are free to walk around and look for secrets or similar
is there anything like that on steam right now?

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[McJob]

It's not on the same level as what you're thinking of, but I'd recommend FEZ which is going for $10.

It's a 2D platformer with a lot of different areas connected by hubs, and the goal of the game is to discover all the secrets. I absolutely enjoyed it, and there's plenty to see and think about.

[Rally]

Whenever someone asks me this, I automatically direct them to STALKER: Call of Pripyat. Any game in the STALKER series really.

However, the maps are (relatively) small as compared to the current industry standard, which generally involves gigantic maps that take 20 minutes to traverse, despite being full of absolutely squat.