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MMO, maps, and planets
lectrocuda
Member Posts: 604
Why do developers insist on clumping all the continents on one side of the planet?
I think if they are going to do it, they should at least incorporate some science into the lore as to the wobble of the planet versus the impact of the stars.
To the caterpillar it is the end of the world, to the master, it is a butterfly.
Comments
I dunno, it seems to work pretty well for good 'ole Planet Earth. No serious wobble that you'd notice...
Take a globe and turn it so that you are staring at the center of the Pacific ocean. You'll clearly see that most of the continental landmasses are all "on one side of the planet".
-Johnaudi
It's easier to render a game world that is flat than a sphere. If the game world is going to be flat, then it makes the most sense to put all of the continents on one side.
Some games (mainly those that use a map of Earth) have gone with a cylinder, which makes some sense if you consider the polar regions so cold as to be impassable. Some have even gone with a torus, as that's the topological result of making it so that going off one edge puts you back on the opposite edge. That doesn't seem to be so common anymore.
I think it would be nifty for a game to have an actual spherical world, using an icosahedron as the shape of the map, with the vertices either impassable or small areas requiring a loading screen and zoning.
touche, but alas there is a significant wobble which wobbles itself. They call it the procession of the equinox or somethkng to that effect
To the caterpillar it is the end of the world, to the master, it is a butterfly.