A big world?

FlamingBoi

Do you think it's a great thing that a mmorpg has a HUGE HUGE and i mean REALLY HUGE world for players to explore.. so huge that sometimes u have to walk a long way to see someone?

Arrgh

No, because then they don't have enough content and you end up with vast, boring areas. I'd much rather have a smaller, more interesting area.

 

 

FlamingBoi

Yea... actually quite true..

Take A Tale In A Desert for example..

Man.. played that for 2 months.. the world is just TOO TOO TOO big =/.. and like theres hardly anyone near your main camp coz the crowded areas are too crowded to build anything .. but.. if it's not huge.. there would be a lot of problems between players N stuff..

Maybe games with fighting ain't suitable for big worlds.. eh?..

Znith

Yes the world can be too big.  I think SWG is too big with all it's planets.  It's nice to visit differnt atmospheres and see different worlds but when it's only populated by a few people it gets lonely out there.  Looking at it a different way, Coronet needs to be expanded because of all the player cities and harvestors (at least on my 2 servers).  

I'd give up a planet or two if they would expand the over crowded areas

I guess the all the big bad monsters can keep us company....

FlamingBoi

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Originally posted by Znith

Yes the world can be too big.  I think SWG is too big with all it's planets.  It's nice to visit differnt atmospheres and see different worlds but when it's only populated by a few people it gets lonely out there.  Looking at it a different way, Coronet needs to be expanded because of all the player cities and harvestors (at least on my 2 servers).  
I'd give up a planet or two if they would expand the over crowded areas
I guess the all the big bad monsters can keep us company....

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Never played SWG.. but from star wars.. SWG should have a big world =/.. many ruins and stuff .. they should include places where u can gain FORCE in a secret cave off some unkown planet .. or be able to gain access to StarForge.. (if you've played swkotr) ..

Still.. having a big world creates lots of problems ..

Adreal

If it's a game that a lot of people enjoy or play such as (it seems) EQ was/is then it should leave room for expansion ahead of time. Not like in AC1 where the world map is extremely crowded now with islands around the main continent. When the land expands, it should be incorporated into the story line as well, and shouldn't always be just the addition of islands-maybe the addition of new places on the mainland (such as spires rising from the earth, etc.). However, I agree that is should not be too large. It should have a land mass based on the number of players it has and for the more "barren" areas it should maybe add some npcs or monsters/whatever else. But-I like large worlds just for exploration. The more there is to learn about a game-the more enjoyment for me.

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Dsty2001

WW2OL has the largest area modeled, and while it does hurt gameplay (Players spread out over hundreds of towns and miles), it is very interesting knowing that a small strategical/tactical move could move the map East or West.

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TaskyZZ

I like large worlds. When I and my group go off looking for adventure, I don't mind not seeing other groups. Seems more dangerous, ominous and fun. Then likewise, when we head in to town, it is fun to find mass amounts of people selling goods, arguing, starting fights, etc.

But it does depend on the game.

Problem for the developers is, they do not want to spend hundreds of hours designing areas that only get about 10 hours of playtime. But a good random dungeon generator, or some such thing could take care of this. The dungeons in DaggerFall were very well done and they were generated randomly on the fly.

Teei

I like a large world with secrets area to find and explore. Small area is some time are fill with people and not enough monster to kill. Large worl also give me a sence of realistic of a true RPG.

bad_boy_01

I personally love huge worlds. I like desolate places where u might not come across one person in a whole day , maybe even more. I actually prefer hunting miles away at the far edges of maps and just chatting in guild chat for a bit.

Clever_Glove

Having allot of content is good. But how big it is doesn't matter, it's how quickly you can get around.

Inspite of what Brad McQuad thinks, sitting on a boat for 30 minutes isn't a good time. neither is spending 20 minutes running down a long twisty vally.

Games need to be big enough your not fighting over mobs, but small enough you can find your friends and run into people. But the means of travel needs to be quick, or all is for not.

 

 

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MuppetHero

I think HUGE worlds are great.. If there is a mode of Fast Transportation.. I really like the idea of Dark and Light with 15,000 Square miles of world. thats half the size of main.. in actual area! They have lots of modes of transportation. So I see that as being very good!

Adreal

"Games need to be big enough your not fighting over mobs, but small enough you can find your friends and run into people. But the means of travel needs to be quick, or all is for not..."

Sounds perfect for me, except maybe you could expand on your last sentence? Hopefully, it wouldn't be anything like AC1 (rant, rant) where the quick means of travel would be portals everywhere. I think portals should be really rare and only to be come across once or twice in a life time. There should be a mysterious air about them instead of just-"well, take this portal route to get to this dungeon where you will have to go into another portal to enter the dungeon". Maybe not instantaneous but just like riding a horse or flying, etc?

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Elapsed

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Originally posted by Adreal
"Games need to be big enough your not fighting over mobs, but small enough you can find your friends and run into people. But the means of travel needs to be quick, or all is for not..."
Sounds perfect for me, except maybe you could expand on your last sentence? Hopefully, it wouldn't be anything like AC1 (rant, rant) where the quick means of travel would be portals everywhere. I think portals should be really rare and only to be come across once or twice in a life time. There should be a mysterious air about them instead of just-"well, take this portal route to get to this dungeon where you will have to go into another portal to enter the dungeon". Maybe not instantaneous but just like riding a horse or flying, etc?Socializer 66% Never would've guessed...

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I'm not completely up on my AC lore but I believe portals aren't really meant to be that mysterious, they just aren't there for no reason of course. Either Asheron created them or the ancient magic people that were around created them, I'm sure there's a book in the game some place dedicated to it. Obviously though the real reason for portals is that AC1 is old. When it was first created I don't think the engine was advanced enough to provide horses or other things like boats or swimming you said you wanted in other threads. Instead they made portals and gave characters the ability to run really really fast (does any other game have characters that run as fast on foot?). I actually like portals because they make you feel more into the game, like other games I've played you just get a loading screen when you enter a new area. I much prefer being in spinning portal space, it doesn't feel like I've left the game or am actually playing a game.

Adreal

"...and gave characters the ability to run really really fast..."

lol. right about that. In AC1 I ran 50 miles per hour and in Horizons I sprinted 2mph.

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Shmee

the bigger the better  i dont think it can ever be to big, a neverending vast land to explore, as long as the player base is big enough it would be great. I wouldn't care if there were big empty areas either, as long as you can get transport to scale the land fast enough to not be a huge bore

FlamingBoi

hmm.. i agree big worlds have to have fast transportation. but look at lineage 2.. though it's small compared to many games.. the amount of time travelling to a place a very long.. you run too slow and that sucks ..

Alient

You don't have to have a big world to feel like a big world. People are too stuck on the ideas of static virtual worlds where nothing changes. So, they think the more static content the better. How about we stop making static worlds with a lot of content that can easily take over a gig worth of space on my hardrive?

Adreal

"How about we stop making static worlds..."

I agree. Horizons has a crude dynamic world in which some trees will spawn in (all of a sudden I believe) and you can harvest wood from them. There's also different resources that spawn in-like amethyst deposits, etc. that one can mine. I'd like to see a really dynamic world where if it rains then trees grow (in different stages-seeds, sapplings, adults er whatever) and plant life (including grass) grows. I don't think this would necessarily create a lot of lag, but what do I know? I've never made a mmorpg. There should be some sort of randomization of dungeons as well. Loading screens (which I dislike) would probably be needed for this though.

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hercules

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Originally posted by Znith

Yes the world can be too big.  I think SWG is too big with all it's planets.  It's nice to visit differnt atmospheres and see different worlds but when it's only populated by a few people it gets lonely out there.  Looking at it a different way, Coronet needs to be expanded because of all the player cities and harvestors (at least on my 2 servers).  
I'd give up a planet or two if they would expand the over crowded areas
I guess the all the big bad monsters can keep us company....

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LOL ,is this same SWG I left about a month ago?Have you gone to datooine?At least on chilastra(not even as populated as eclipse for instance) there are player cities everywehre.With bikes it made the world too small even and since SWG relies on dynamic spawns you have missions bugged all over because of player houses/cities.And this a distant planet!If people could find good ground to place on endor they make that into a thriving metropolis.

However I agree that a world can get too big.First you need loads of content to ensure it does not look like some round and round landscape.And if the population is low even a small world feels too big.

BKOOL

It really depends on the number of people playing the game.  If there are a small amount of people there should be a small world, and the same goes for large numbers of people.  One game for example is Dark and Light.  They are going to have an extremely large world, but they say it is ok because they can fit like 10,000 people on one server.  The only problem with that is I doubt 10,000 people will ever actually play even though it looks like a really decent game.

Big or little as long as there are enough people to interact with and enough space to fit everyone in, the world is a good size.

Killer_7

World size all depends on what type of game it is.  From playing countless Counter-Strike levels made by ameturs, I think that less is more when you have more players and wide areas work better for less.  This seems like very backwards logic, but if you have more players, then they want to interact with each other more.  With less people, area size doen't matter as much.

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Nizor

I'd rather like a huge world instead of a small world. Because if it's a small world, then people usually are at the same place all the time and that's not roleplaying.

Oakstead

Yes, I like big worlds with lots of PvE content and lots of player generated content.

Dark and Light seems to be perfect. It is very large but since it will be on one server cluster all players will be on the same server. In addition it has grades of transport from ranging from portals, to flying transport, to mounts (and recall to "home"). Exploration will be worthwhile since explorers are needed to find mineral resources. They can then sell the location to others to develop. These found resources can be mined at a high rate but they do not last as long as "normal, slow mine rate" outcroppings.

bsherlock

I prefer big worlds, but with the towns and cities placed so that there is a concentrated place to go to interact with other players.

This gives you the small world scenario, because most people will have to gather in the cities etc. But is does give you a vast and varied world for when you just want to go out and explore. As long as there is a good transport system to allow you to get back into the cities and out again fast enough then this works quite well.

I personally likes the size of SWG, there were lots of planets and lots of places to explore, but on the server i played there were only really 4 of 5 cities that were used by people, so you could interact to your hearts content, or live as a nomad if you prefered.

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Anofalye

The bigger, the better.

 

As long as travel is easy and in 5 minutes you can move from anywhere to anywhere(unless the goal of the game is to travel, but I aint playing a MMORPG to travel myself, so it better not take to long).

 

Someone complaining about a world to big is like complaining because you are to rich.  But dont confuse it, the bigger the better.  Big world dont mean the game is interesting and that you can travel easily. 

 

It need content, it need something to motivate the player. 

 

Also, it need to remain easy to meet tons of players at random, you NEED to meet them and see them, I think the travel system can leave a mark(horse, ship, guide) just before it goes in the wild and it become to vast to randomly stumble on you.  That mark need to make it easy for peoples to know if you are soloing, grouped, tradeskilling, afk, LFG, and any other relevant information you get when you stumble on the player, it cannot be to central, if to central, you will be swarmed by to many such marks, it need to be a few here and there, all the time.  The /who system in EQ cover this aspect just nicely, you need something like that, artificial like /who, or whatever, it need to be fast, effective, and very accurate, so you know you are not alone in the void.  Some instanced zones need to share /ooc /auction /shout together no matter how illogical I sound.

 

Basically, size does matter, but it is not the main concern of a game, it is 1 of many details that need to be worked out.

 

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