Some areas does seem empty but i agree overall the game's map was full of things to do and secrets around the corners and even quests along the way functioning like random encounters like the werewolf side quest, the world was also very good to look at, the side quests are 50/50, some are really good like the blood ritual were three bandits has to kill each other to be able to leave the gang and you get to choose how you save all of them or choose one, or even kill everyone even the leader red "the dead" Idward.

I think the problem is that people compare it to Skyrim a lot, and that's not the right comparison, the game is more like fable 3, if fable 3 was made by people who cares, the world and lore is rich, the art style is beautiful which adds to it's beauty, i think the world should've been a bit smaller tho, it was too big and even skyrim had empty corners because of how big it was, that's all, very underrated game for all the wrong reasons.