Is 480km world size sufficient in comparison to other games

So I saw this youtube video and that kinda shocked me a bit. In comparison to many other games and their size - AoC feels kinda smallish.

It's 10x bigger than Red Dead Redemption / Far Cry 3
It's 8x bigger than PUBG
It's 6x bigger than GTA V
It's 4x bigger than Assassin Creed Odyssey
It's twice the size of WoW + Burning Crusade + Pandoria / Day-Z

It is 2.25 smaller than Just Cause 2 & just Cause 3
3x smaller than Asheron Call - an MMO
9x smaller than Guild War - nightfall
18x smaller than Lord of the Ring Online

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwXV0oLEfCM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Fj6RdFpDc4

So is 480km sufficient + an additional 100ish underdark area for a seamless world.

WoW content was a total 207km which did feel small when I compare it to Everquest (googlefu showed ~300km) but EQ felt
very large due to movement speed was pretty slow, thus making each zone feel so much bigger. Traversing some zone can take almost an hour w/o boosting movement speed (Jboot, SoW)

But since AoC will have mounts - 480 may end up feeling smallish. There was a difference in feeling in WoW pre-mount vs mount due to movement speed.
Will Ashes of Creation actually end up FEELING LARGE?

Let's do some quick math too:

480km world map size with ~100 nodes.
each node on average will be 4.8km and that includes dead content / space - ocean if the nodes were divided equally. But it's not, so nodes will be even smaller than 4.8km since we know it's 100nodes, most of which is in-land and a few water/island nodes (if any) - so one can assume a node size will be around 3km - or the size of Apex Legend - World's edge map.

Your thoughts

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Warth

Tier 1 nodes should have such a small ZOI yes, higher nodes ZOI grow until they encompass 1/5 of the entire world in the Metro Stage.

Also, it will feel significantly bigger than those games you mentioned for one simple reason. No flying, no fast-travel.

AidanKD

Yes it's plenty big enough and @Warth is right that only having standard mounted movement being the predominant mode of transportation will in itself make the world larger.

Size is one element but you also have vacuous space that provides nothing in certain games. I think the world is actually big, and if they can populate it with meaningful locales then that will prove more immersive than size alone.

Noaani

novercalis wrote: »

Your thoughts

My thoughts are - you can't just the size of a game map by its size.

To illustrate, Guild Wars Nightfall does not feel bigger than Azaroth - yet it is listed as many times it's size.

Then you have the inconsistencies. One of the videos above lists Fortnite as being 6.7km², while the other lists it as 5.44km².

One lists GTA 3 at 8km², while the other lists it as 9km².

One video lists Mafia as being 12km², while the other lists it as being 31km².

Yet, they both have the same size for Skyrim, and Metal Gear 5.

However, one of them has GTA San Andreas as being larger than Skyrim, the other has it as being smaller.

The point is, there is no actual standard way to measure the size of a game world.

As such, there really is no point in speculation that is based on a comparison like this.

Nerror

I know specifically for Asheron's Call, player run speed was really fast because we had a run skill. We were absolutely thooming! 400 run skill = 40 mph, and above that a softcap was applied I believe, so diminshing returns. The world didn't feel small, but it didn't feel massive either.

I played LOTRO as well, but I honestly forgot how big the world felt. I only played to within a year after release though.

That aside, I have a feeling that they are currently increasing the map size from the initial plan, because the 480 km2 was a UE4 limitation that is now gone in UE5. I am fairly sure they wanted to go bigger from the start, but were held back by technology.

akabear

sounds like you are saying, "it is not the size of the map that matters, it`s what you do with it"

Artharion

For me WoW Classic feels really big, so I imagine that AoC map would give me the same feeling. Is not about how large it is, but how plenty of content is. SWG galaxy tattooine most of its size was desert.

Aerlana

size is only one thing in the equation
the question is also : time to travel.
density of content and ennemies
Density of population (we don't want to be all over other, but also not have to have to do big travels to find people)

lets say a 300km² (so 270km² of sea and other area where people really rarely go there is 200km² left + 100km² underrealm) for 15k players log in at same time : 300 000 000 m²/ 15 000 players => 1 players for 20 000m²
You will be alone in a circle around 78,8 meters of radius

Now, this calculation says that more than clearly 50% of those 470 surface are mostly empty of people...
And this doesn't include any vertical exploration : montain can lead to different cavern to explore one on top of another.
So this is a really raw and inaccurate idea of what we will have... there is chance that it will be a lower density !

Also... 15 000 co at same time ? yep, now during a siege with 300 v 300, the density on a spot will be really high. and not speaking about people afk or simply speaking/RPing in towns/taverns...

I feel that bigger map could fast feel empty of players

Dygz

Underrealm

BaSkA_9x2

I believe that the map size is directly related to the server size (max pop). So, sometimes, it might look like a game has a small map, but if a server can only hold 2.000 players, for example, it can be relatively big.

I also think that a problem in most games is that the low level zones/starter areas become forgotten places in most MMOs, so all that space is basically useless and can make "big maps" be actually quite small, since 80%+ of the server population never goes to those places.

At least in Ashes' case I don't think we will have this issue, because the "low level zones" will always hold some low tier resources useful even for the top tier crafters, which in turn is probably going to make every part of the map meaningful, even if only for farming low tier, but important, resources.

If I understand correctly, 480km² is the total size of the map, which is probably a big 22km by 22km square that includes the ocean but does not include the Underrealm, caves, dungeons, raids, etc, since those are inside (and under the ground, inside mountains, etc) the 22km x 22km square.

Let's ignore the ocean for now, as I'm not sure if we will be able to dive and farm resources on the ocean floor, so it'll "only" be used to fish, kill sea mobs/bosses and move goods. I think that it's safe to say that that Ashes will have at least 300km² of useful land (~580² [above ground map + Underrealm] - 280km² of seas and inaccessible land). If each server holds at most 10.000 players, that means each player "has" at least 30m² of land for themselves.

A game map shouldn't be too big so that you never need to fight for resources but it also shouldn't be too small that it takes one hour of competition to complete a "Kill 20 boars quest".

With that wall of text behind, I think the conclusion is that if the map feels too small during Alpha 2, Intrepid can decrease the server population to make the game play better. However, if the map feels too big, it might not be possible to increase the server size due to technical limitations.

novercalis wrote: »

WoW content was a total 207km which did feel small when I compare it to Everquest (googlefu showed ~300km) but EQ felt very large due to movement speed was pretty slow, thus making each zone feel so much bigger. Traversing some zone can take almost an hour w/o boosting movement speed (Jboot, SoW)

But since AoC will have mounts - 480 may end up feeling smallish. There was a difference in feeling in WoW pre-mount vs mount due to movement speed.

Will Ashes of Creation actually end up FEELING LARGE?

Your thoughts

I agree that the movement speed plays a big role regarding how large (or small) a game feels. If a mount moves at 22km/h, then you'd be able to go from on side of the map to the other in a straight line in one hour (if my premise of a 22km wide map is right), which kind of feels small indeed.

Leiloni

novercalis wrote: »

So I saw this youtube video and that kinda shocked me a bit. In comparison to many other games and their size - AoC feels kinda smallish.

It's 10x bigger than Red Dead Redemption / Far Cry 3
It's 8x bigger than PUBG
It's 6x bigger than GTA V
It's 4x bigger than Assassin Creed Odyssey
It's twice the size of WoW + Burning Crusade + Pandoria / Day-Z

It is 2.25 smaller than Just Cause 2 & just Cause 3
3x smaller than Asheron Call - an MMO
9x smaller than Guild War - nightfall
18x smaller than Lord of the Ring Online

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwXV0oLEfCM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Fj6RdFpDc4

So is 480km sufficient + an additional 100ish underdark area for a seamless world.

WoW content was a total 207km which did feel small when I compare it to Everquest (googlefu showed ~300km) but EQ felt
very large due to movement speed was pretty slow, thus making each zone feel so much bigger. Traversing some zone can take almost an hour w/o boosting movement speed (Jboot, SoW)

But since AoC will have mounts - 480 may end up feeling smallish. There was a difference in feeling in WoW pre-mount vs mount due to movement speed.
Will Ashes of Creation actually end up FEELING LARGE?

Let's do some quick math too:

480km world map size with ~100 nodes.
each node on average will be 4.8km and that includes dead content / space - ocean if the nodes were divided equally. But it's not, so nodes will be even smaller than 4.8km since we know it's 100nodes, most of which is in-land and a few water/island nodes (if any) - so one can assume a node size will be around 3km - or the size of Apex Legend - World's edge map.

Your thoughts

It's going to be absolutely massive. WoW also had mounts and that world even on launch felt huge. And this is bigger than that.

tautau

@BaSkA13 starting zone content...AoC will have mixed level mobs around all nodes so there is no 'starter zone' which means all of the land mass will be relevant to all players.

Warth

tautau wrote: »

@BaSkA13 starting zone content...AoC will have mixed level mobs around all nodes so there is no 'starter zone' which means all of the land mass will be relevant to all players.

That's not exactly true either though.

All the land mass can be relevant to all players depending on which nodes are developed, but all landmass isn't relevant to everybody at a given time. High LvLs have areas where they want or don't want to be. Same with low & mid level players. Most of the map still isn't relevant for them, it merely has the potential to be if the nodes were developed differently

novercalis

Welp - guess AOC answered that question for me.

Asgerr

I initially felt like it would be small. But I also played WoW and the world felt big enough, if you're not flying everywhere.

From user: u/jetpacksforall on Reddit, some 6 years ago:

Last year u/mysbananen timed how long it took to run from Booty Bay to Sunstrider Isle. Answer: 1 hour, 22 minutes.

Then to do it even better, u/vashtiii made the same trip RP walking. That took 4 hours 43 seconds.

But most players run everywhere, and RP walking is for escort quests. So let's say Kalimdor would also take about 1.5 hours to run. The other continents are each about 60-70% the size of Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor. So let's say they each take an hour to run. So an hour each for The Burning Crusade, WoTLK, Cataclysm, Draenor, Pandaria and Legion.

That's 9 hours total to run through all the continents.

This is pretty much in line with the 1h15 to run from top to bottom of a continent as described by Steven in the livestream.

So it should be alright if you think that WoW was big enough when on foot.

akabear

Yes, for now.

And if they do want to expand in the future, I hope they do three-dimensionally, meaning up, under, through.. not by just creating more flat land extension. (more underground caverns, caves, catacombs, more sophisticated cities etc.)

akabear

Can OP edit original post and give areas, not just X or %. without, not much to scale

beapo

It doesn't make much sense to compare it to other mmos in which they can easily teleport to the other side of the map within a couple seconds. It would probably make more sense to compare it to BDO.
You should also keep in mind that there is going to be alot of big underground worlds and whenever they want to make additional content they can easily implement a new underground area.

WHIT3ROS3

As our lord and savior, Morpheus said in the Matrix.

"Unfortunately nobody can be told what the Matrix is, you have to see it for yourself."

I feel this applies to map size. As map size is something that you feel, by doing. All the numbers in the world, will not do, what a mere few minutes in-game will do. Does the world feel vast and varied? Space can always be added in the future, but I am glad to have a tangible defined space that Intrepid can expand and explore in upcoming Dev streams.

There is a fine development line to be tread when it comes to "filling" the world. When you log in you want to feel there's a lot to see, do, discover and engage with, but you don't want the space to feel overwhelming, cluttered, or over-engineered.

novercalis

Welp - guess AOC answered that question for me.

akabear wrote: »

Can OP edit original post and give areas, not just X or %. without, not much to scale

huh???

novercalis

For many - seems lot of ya missed the part where I mentioned about movement speed and was making a comparison to WoW mount vs mount speed.

to me, hearing 75 min straight line for 1 continent seems rather smallish.
3 min in town feels rather smallish

On p99 (Everquest) - it took maybe 30-40 min from the wood elf city to the dwarven docks.
If you missed the boat, the wait time for a boat was 44 min. 22 min each way, 1 boat.
Freeport is feels about 5-6 min from 1 end to the other end (3 zones worth)

From Freeport to the entrance of Kitchikor Forest is about 15 mins w/o SoW.
then if you had to wait for daytime to dare pass Kitchikor forest (level 1 noob, no assistance). which is 4 min = 1 hr game time. so another 48 min wait. If you managed to survive High Hold Pass, the Karanas itself to Qeynos hill was easily 45 mins. To Halas City from Hill would be 20 min, or Erudite 25-1hr depending on the boat ride timing.

Excluding both continent in EQ, From Freeport to Halas could take a player without mount, without SoW, without death, perfect timing on Kitchikor forest ~3.5 hr running.

1hr distance to me, feel like running East/West/North Karanas zones only

I dont recall how long travel time was in WoW by foot - Booty Bay zone was rather large. but WoW and AoC does have mount - EQ never did mounts, so you felt the world all the time.

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