How big world do you want?

[Osvir]

Simple poll.

 

Baldur's Gate World Map, I counted approximately 50 locations.

 

Baldurs Gate II World Map, I counted about 15 locations.

 

Total of 65~ locations with caves, houses, dungeons within.

 

Mega-Dungeons:

* Durlag's Tower is ~6 levels if Upper Levels are counted.

 

* Watcher's Keep is to my understanding, from here on these forums, 5 levels (11 levels in total).

 

* P:E will have a 15 Level Mega-Dungeon.

 

How big would you want P:E to be?

 

Be quick with correcting the poll or if you think there should be more answers/questions before the edit time runs out.

Edited November 4, 2012 by Osvir

[Carmelle]

I don't really care about # of locations or maps or whatever, so much as the actual content that goes with them. Having 100 locations is useless if most of it is empty land imo. It's kinda how fallout 3+ felt for the most part. You had interesting locations interspersed with vast amounts of barren land which had nothing of interest, and were a chore to walk from and to. Luckily you could quick teleport to locations once you've discovered them though I suppose.

 

Skyrim on the other hand wasn't as bad. It still has a similar setup, but as you're wandering through the map you find a lot of cool little things. Either the AI doing something interesting, some sort of encounter, random NPCs going about their way, etc..

[PsychoBlonde]

I would like the game to be big enough and complicated enough that I can get myself turned around and confused. If I pronounce the words "where the fook am I now?" or "where the heck am I trying to go?" even once during the game, I shall be happy.

[Crusader_bin]

Comparing number of locations to sandbox 3D environment games like Fallout 3 or Skyrim is a little pointless. I think the more locations, the better. After all we expect some kind of quality too. Obviously the real ammount depends on Obsidian, and the most obvious choice is: the most they think they can make. I voted 80 - 100, but would gladly see more If possible. Also number of locations counted only shows places on maps and those don't reflect real locations. BG2 had more locations, especially those interresting ones. BG1 had many empty or almost empty pieces of wilderness that hardly count as full locations though, but I think the total for both games (as in "loadings") would go well over 200? Some points on maps are one loading area/dungeon, while others could have 10 or more.

Still, for us gamers, the bigged the game, the better.

[Tychoxi]

I'm all for less locations if it means they are better integrated and interconnected with each other. (I'm not talking about shoehorning connections just for it's own sake).

Edited November 5, 2012 by Tychoxi

[Osvir]

Comparing number of locations to sandbox 3D environment games like Fallout 3 or Skyrim is a little pointless. I think the more locations, the better. After all we expect some kind of quality too. Obviously the real ammount depends on Obsidian, and the most obvious choice is: the most they think they can make. I voted 80 - 100, but would gladly see more If possible. Also number of locations counted only shows places on maps and those don't reflect real locations. BG2 had more locations, especially those interresting ones. BG1 had many empty or almost empty pieces of wilderness that hardly count as full locations though, but I think the total for both games (as in "loadings") would go well over 200? Some points on maps are one loading area/dungeon, while others could have 10 or more.

Still, for us gamers, the bigged the game, the better.

 

Yeah I suspected that (and know as a fact), but I was only counting the "On-Screen" location on the world map. If we count all those in-doors, inns etc. etc. the number rise up far beyond 200 I believe.

 

What I meant with poll?

50-65 areas would equal a size between Baldur's Gate and Baldur's Gate 2

65-80 would equal a world bigger than both of the above (combined)

80-100 would equal a very big world.

 

I don't know economy or resource management etc. etc. for developing games but I'm guessing that we'll get something between 50-60 (on-screen world map) locations. I can't really say I expect more or less or expect any at all. I'd like a big world though

 

EDIT: Also the first underline statement is very true (comparing a sandbox)

Edited November 5, 2012 by Osvir

[Falkon Swiftblade]

I want a really big world to explore. Exploration is my favorite RPG trope, it doesn't have to be like 25 miles big, but it can just be 5 with a crap ton to discover. Like even if there is specific content during certain days or nights in game. Such as the spirit of an NPC that comes out on nights of a full moon... That's not specifically a bigger zone, but its additional content that you may miss out on if you aren't in the right place at the right time. I want everything to have a purpose, and I'm hoping there is a story about each area and not just them saying, you know what would be cool?! Tree Village People! Even if it's a cool idea, I still want it to fit in context of the world. Like I would love sea battles and merchant ships since there's 2 cities and so much water, but I don't know if it would fit with their story. As far as things like Dungeons, I would like them to feel big and like it was really worth your time to explore. I don't like anything that waste's my time that isn't helping me in some way. I'm not talking about things like Fishing, if I just want to fish for food that's one thing, but to send me into a dungeon for 15 minutes to get a book and fight 3 monsters would make me a little frustrated.

[Gibbscape_Torment]

Depends on the content within. i'd take 40 locations filled with detail and nuance ove 80 locations that serve no other purpose than making the game bigger.

[Hellfell]

Simple poll.

 

Baldur's Gate World Map, I counted approximately 50 locations.

 

Baldurs Gate II World Map, I counted about 15 locations.

 

Total of 65~ locations with caves, houses, dungeons within.

 

Mega-Dungeons:

* Durlag's Tower is ~6 levels if Upper Levels are counted.

 

* Watcher's Keep is to my understanding, from here on these forums, 5 levels (11 levels in total).

 

* P:E will have a 15 Level Mega-Dungeon.

 

How big would you want P:E to be?

 

Be quick with correcting the poll or if you think there should be more answers/questions before the edit time runs out.

 

Did you play bg2 yourself? There are quite a few more locations than shown on that map.

[The Guilty Party]

A big as it has to be, but no bigger

 

A quality tale is not better for being longer, and good movies don't have a minimum length. It's our nature to want more of a good thing, but if we got it, maybe the thing wouldn't have been as good.

[SeekDWay]

As many as possible.

[Osvir]

Simple poll.

 

Baldur's Gate World Map, I counted approximately 50 locations.

 

Baldurs Gate II World Map, I counted about 15 locations.

 

Total of 65~ locations with caves, houses, dungeons within.

 

Mega-Dungeons:

* Durlag's Tower is ~6 levels if Upper Levels are counted.

 

* Watcher's Keep is to my understanding, from here on these forums, 5 levels (11 levels in total).

 

* P:E will have a 15 Level Mega-Dungeon.

 

How big would you want P:E to be?

 

Be quick with correcting the poll or if you think there should be more answers/questions before the edit time runs out.

 

Did you play bg2 yourself? There are quite a few more locations than shown on that map.

 

Hardly much but I know exactly what you are talking about I was only counting the locations seen on the world map. Do you get teleported elsewhere? Or are you hanging around Athkathla for the duration of the game?

[Hellfell]

Simple poll.

 

Baldur's Gate World Map, I counted approximately 50 locations.

 

Baldurs Gate II World Map, I counted about 15 locations.

 

Total of 65~ locations with caves, houses, dungeons within.

 

Mega-Dungeons:

* Durlag's Tower is ~6 levels if Upper Levels are counted.

 

* Watcher's Keep is to my understanding, from here on these forums, 5 levels (11 levels in total).

 

* P:E will have a 15 Level Mega-Dungeon.

 

How big would you want P:E to be?

 

Be quick with correcting the poll or if you think there should be more answers/questions before the edit time runs out.

 

Did you play bg2 yourself? There are quite a few more locations than shown on that map.

 

Hardly much but I know exactly what you are talking about I was only counting the locations seen on the world map. Do you get teleported elsewhere? Or are you hanging around Athkathla for the duration of the game?

 

There are 8 more locations that ARE shown on the world map where you will be able to travel. They are important to the main plot so they are not shown until you discover them.

[mstark]

I voted 50-65, since I am such a BG/2 fan I'm very happy for the game to have a similar amount of areas & quality (where "quality" would equal quest/npc/loot density of an area).

 

But let's do some absolutely out of the box, wild speculation & guesswork here (please join in with your own speculations and corrections to my theories I doubt even the PE team has any clue about the final size of the game, but that just makes this all the more fun! ):

 

Let's assume the original $1.1kk game was planned to be around the size of the IWD titles, based on nothing whatsoever I'd say this is fairly realistic, as they are smaller and more linear than the BG ones. That means no "big city" at all. That gives us 15-20 areas (where areas equal map locations). I'm getting this number from assuming one smaller city (2-5 areas) explorable wilderness (5-10 areas) and main quest specific locations (5 areas).

 

Let's also assume that when the kickstarter shot through the roof they quickly scrambled to reassess their situation, since making a game the size & quality of BG became more of a reality (at $1.6kk "the story grows", so let's assume that includes more areas). This brought it up to 25-30 areas (it's been mentioned by devs at some point that content density will be closer to BG2 than BG1). This is based off of one big city (10 areas), wilderness & side quests (10 areas), main quest (5-10 areas)

 

They then added further stretch goals, in the $2.2kk update they added an entire new "region". What can a realistic size of a new region mean? Seeing as this was double the initial goal, I would put it at expansion pack size - 10 areas. Now we have 35-40 areas.

 

At $3kk they added the Stronghold, let's assume it's similar to de'Arnaise Keep in BG2. This adds 1 area. 36-41 areas.

 

At $3.5kk we get another city: 10 areas. 46-51 total.

 

At $4kk they will enhance the whole game. I will take this as them meaning to make the content density greater, rather than adding a bunch of more areas .

 

Woop, 46-51 areas! But that means nothing without defining what an area (map location) is! I'm going to assume am equal mix of BG1 exploration and BG2 content density - where all areas have a purpose (quest related) & exploration being rewarding.

[Rink]

Like others have said: Bg2 had a lot of locations that are not shown on worldmap, if you just look at the number of maps then imho BG2 was bigger in terms of different locations than BG1, just that more locations were "children" of other locations (so you could only access them from other area) or main plot locations that you couldn't return to once you completed them. I liked BG2-style a bit better after a while, because it does reward you more for exploring and the world felt less empty than having all that locations where nothing was going on and only few sub-locations could be explored.

 

I would like the world to be big, but I measure that more in terms of hours of captivating gameplay instead of number of locations. What I do want to see is variability of locations, especially if the dungeons will be plentyful as I fear them to be. I don't really like dungeons too much, I like to breathe fresh air while adventuring, it is okay if they do not appear all the time though and if they are made in a way that makes them appealing through variability. Skyrim had some nice locations in dungeons but many did look very boring and gave me the "not again" feeling. But okay, that was of course even worse because the opponent-types were very limited and no tactics needed to beat them (how many enemy-types are there in that game? 3? :D). I rather have a bit more variabilty and a world filled with quests and wonder instead of the same dungeons all the time.

[sesobebo]

it's old, but: quality over quantity.

 

if the map points were to be as thought out as bg2's were, i'd be quite content with a bg1 sized map.

that's not to say that some of the wild areas in bg1 were not fun, and were missed in bg2, the proportion felt wrong in both games.

[Jarmo]

Smaller. Less is more. Sometimes.

Rather less areas all filled up with content and stuff and detail than more sparser ones.

 

On the other hand, in BG2 you'd get random encounters when traveling the world map, and sometimes it was a bit of

"we got ambushed, in the same damn alley.. again!" DA:O was all this as well. Sometimes more is more.

[Osvir]

Another thing I wish to bring up into the light:

 

This poll is kind of "Fan expectation versus Obsidian expectation", let's give Obsidian a scope or a "deadline" (a cap if you will).

 

Personally I want Obsidian to create a big enough world by Obsidian's standards (E.g., they have full control, they decide if they want 100 locations or 10 locations). This poll just brings some "light" (or insight) into it for Obsidian (which I think is important). Having an idea of "How many areas should there be?" as early as possible in their development project might be a good thing (Let's say they have created 4 locations thus far, knowing how far they are from "End of the tunnel" might be good for the production planning and organization of workload).

 

What do Obsidian expect out of themselves? :D (this I would really want an academic answer on... *goes to formspring to make an account*)

[Sacred_Path]

I like how the "don't care" option is in the lead. People seem to trust OE a lot

 

To be honest, I'd like to see really big outdoors for once. Kudos to TES in that regard. I also enjoyed outdoor travels in the Realms of Arkania series a lot. Hunting, gathering herbs, doing alchemy, assigning guards etc. Even though often the only thing happening on a stretch of the road was the occasional animal or orc. I wouldn't mind trudging through mostly empty maps as long as there's something interesting to do.

[Elerond]

I want good balance between content and areas in the game.

 

So I would not like to see hundreds contentless areas in the game but I would not also not like if we hava only one area so full of content that you will drown to it.

[mstark]

To be honest, I'd like to see really big outdoors for once. Kudos to TES in that regard. I also enjoyed outdoor travels in the Realms of Arkania series a lot. Hunting, gathering herbs, doing alchemy, assigning guards etc. Even though often the only thing happening on a stretch of the road was the occasional animal or orc. I wouldn't mind trudging through mostly empty maps as long as there's something interesting to do.

If it's technically feasible I would love to see an immensely huge exploration area, for example a ridiculously sized forest. I mean something like the Underdark x 100. Just because. We could go there for exploring, hunting deer, or collecting berries & herbs . I wouldn't want any of this to have any gameplay impact, like having to collect herbs for potion crafting, as it would encourage a grind-like exploration of the area. I just want it to be there, for optional enjoyment!

 

*dreams*

Edited November 5, 2012 by mstark

[Sacred_Path]

I'd also like to see some NPCs travelling around just like we do. With two big cities, there could be the occasional caravan coming through.

[Skie Nightfall]

This big.

[sesobebo]

This big.

|-------|*

 

*scale not to scale

[Osvir]

I want good balance between content and areas in the game.

 

So I would not like to see hundreds contentless areas in the game but I would not also not like if we hava only one area so full of content that you will drown to it.

 

A world that... spreads the content out (like spreading a deck of cards out on a table) perhaps?