what experience do i want the player to have?
a great experience to have within a game is wonder / awe, the feeling of being introduced into a element that truly amazes the player, an exciting and exhilarating experience that not only encourages the player to keep playing but fills them with anticipation to do so. a great way of doing this is good environment design, a setting that captures the players interest that introduces unique and interesting level design with world building and the sense of adventure.
two games that are great with this are nier automata and xenoblade chronicles, both games have amazing world building both being about different versions of society, that have unique and extremely beautiful settings, another feature of both of these games is that everywhere you can see within the game you can travel to, this adds to the feeling of adventure and true awe because its makes the experience more expansive and broad, theres no set direction or path, the player is free to do whatever they want, and with awesome environment is the feeling of overwhelment, in some games this can be bad especially if it stop the player from being able to play the game, but if it can be executed well the feeling can only elevate the experience of looking at the expanse of a world and feeling awe.
what is essential to that experience?
as previously mentioned the feeling of wanting to go and explore is essential to this experience, it is all good and dandy to have an amazing world design and setting but if the player doesn't want to explore it and the design doesn't fill them with excitment to explore the world then its failed to fulliful the purpose of itself. the player needs to see the world and want to explore, to get lost adventuring random nooks and crannys of the world, and to learn and experience the setting of that world, this is also essential to world building, having the player learn more about the world as they explore it, making a more personal and satisfying experience.
how can my game capture that essence?
ultimately the best way to capture the feeling of awe with the environment, is having detailed and interesting designs, this can range from a post apocalyptic world where the player explores the ruins of the world and learns of what happened, or a entirely new world which the player is thrown into which they explore and learn the rules of. in order to successful capture a feeling of awe, the world needs introduce new ideas and designs, something that player hasn't seen before and wants to explore for themselves.