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Scale of map size in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

Danneee

Member
Travelling long distances is part of the adventure in my point of view. All those quests when you have to find an item or a person who are just 5 minutes away, I don't call that an adventure.

Yeah, I edited my post a but and agree. Just not about a hyper realistic hour long in game hikes:)
 

EatChildren

Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
Look, I know the game is probably going to be great and that the amount of work needed to create a game world of this size is immense, but the fact is that in the books Geralt can track a single monster across the wilderness for days on end without seeing another soul. I want a Witcher game that lets me experience something like that. A game where you can spend hours exploring and feel genuinely rewarded when you finally find something. A game where you can actually get lost in.

I know I'd enjoy what you're describing, but I don't think it's reasonable to expect that kind of game out of what CDPR are promising and with equal production values.

I mean, it's nice to fantasise, but reality needs to sink in at some point. It's a video game. It needs to be structured not just in presentation immersion, but also logistics of play and pacing. And it needs to be reasonable in scope of production demands and cost. Most games cannot accomplish what you (and I) would like as it's just not possible without reducing your potential consumer base, or logistical with hand tailored content. Almost all games that get away with truly insane scope, scale, and play space do so with procedural content.
 

martino

Member
I never mentioned fast travel (don't think it's relevant) but if I read your post right we agree

I don't really care wether or not fast travel is implemented or not, if it's done well and it's warranted then it's great.

DD had fast travel and its implementation (the journey TO a destination being absolutely epic, fraught with danger and against the day and night cycle causing some sense of urgency) did not hurt the sense of adventure and exploration at all, while avoiding any needless tedium.

this i agree and for me it comes more from a correct world simulation that how big it is or filled with stuff
 

spuckthew

Member
This is the main reason why I'm done with that game. I simply cannot be bothered to finish it. The Witcher 3 seems to rectify that issue.

I fucking loved Skyrim when it first came out - I literally couldn't get enough of it and played it endlessly. Despite its repetition, the world had me hooked. Unfortunately that turned out to be its downfall as well because I only completed the first four (4!) main quests in my 150hrs of play time before something else came along to take my interest. I never met the Greybeards and I never will.
 

Odah

Banned
I want to buy this game so bad but I never played the previous one's.

I am a huge fan of The Elderscrolls. Please sell me on that game
 
I said the same thing once and some Witcher lore expert cut me short and said "actually, they're both for monsters, the silver one is for magical monsters and steel sword for non magical monsters. Witchers aren't supposed to kill humans but protect them"

I then thought back at how many humans I killed in TW1&2, Geralt isn't very good at being a Witcher.

*ah thats it- thanks forgot all about the use of silver vs. magical enemies- thanks for the reminder!

seems like ages since I played TW2- guess now is as good a time as ever to start it back up!

*bows
 
Look, I know the game is probably going to be great and that the amount of work needed to create a game world of this size is immense, but the fact is that in the books Geralt can track a single monster across the wilderness for days on end without seeing another soul. I want a Witcher game that lets me experience something like that. A game where you can spend hours exploring and feel genuinely rewarded when you finally find something. A game where you can actually get lost in.

Something that work in books wouldn't necessarily transfer well in videogames and vice versa, they're two completely different mediums. Not to mention that doesn't sound feasible on a technical level either. To me that sounds boring as fuck, and I love exploring for hours on end in videogames.
 

Trickster

Member
I want to buy this game so bad but I never played the previous one's.

I am a huge fan of The Elderscrolls. Please sell me on that game


What I can say is that the stories, characters and choices etc in the witcher games were much more interesting and morally ambiguous than other modern rpg's. You don't have your standard "oh I'm gonna be a bad guy so I only choose asshole dialouge options" or the same for good guys. The world in the Witcher series isn't that kind of black and white

The series also handles mature stuff infinitely better than any other games I've come across. Bioware does this horribly for instance, they almost make it into a minigame that lasts the entire damn game if you want to have sex with someone. In the witcher series that shit is just there, it doesn't devolve into this "gotta unlock the sex scene" . Geralt's an adult dude, sometimes he has sex.

As for Witcher 3, it looks like the world will be very big, and still full of places, people, secrets and quests. Honestly watching the gameplay footage out for the game would probably sell you more easily than I can by writing about it.

But basically the Witcher series excels at delivering interesting stories, characters and player decisions. And Witcher 3 looks like it will deliver on those fronts, while also offering a huge and beautiful world full of stuff for you to do.
 

erawsd

Member
I know I'd enjoy what you're describing, but I don't think it's reasonable to expect that kind of game out of what CDPR are promising and with equal production values.

I mean, it's nice to fantasise, but reality needs to sink in at some point. It's a video game. It needs to be structured not just in presentation immersion, but also logistics of play and pacing. And it needs to be reasonable in scope of production demands and cost. Most games cannot accomplish what you (and I) would like as it's just not possible without reducing your potential consumer base, or logistical with hand tailored content. Almost all games that get away with truly insane scope, scale, and play space do so with procedural content.

Exactly. The truth is that they could easily create a gigantic 50000 sqkm map that takes weeks to travel. The distance between two points becomes more realistic, but the detail between those points becomes less realistic and you end up with these big empty areas that all look the same.

That is the lesson learned by Kingdom Come. Initially, there was a lot of talk about creating massive and realistic landscapes where you could travel for hours to reach the next destination. They realized that it would be better to find a balance where they can feasibly have both realism in terms of scale and detail and they ended up limiting the map to just 16 sq km.
 

shandy706

Member
@Open World:
The one thing that bothers me in Open World games is that it is build around and depends on you instead of being a part in the World that moves on with or without you being there.
I don't know why in games you are the only adventurer in a huge world, where only you get attacked by (humanoid) enemies or monsters. There are maybe a few (handful) NPCs that you see or meet outside of cities and villages, but that's way too scarce. It can't be that hard to see some NPC's travelling around the world, explore it, fight some enemies (or monsters fighting monsters) etc. to make a living immersive world can it? The world doesn't need to be filled with lots of content nor having lots of empty space, but it should have a right balance between them.
Yeah, there are mods that do can that (i.e. in skyrim) but I expect it to be in the vanilla game, c'mon it's 2015.

CDP Red seems to remedy that Problem or at least some part of it, but I'd have to play the game myself to see it. I'm looking forward it.

Pretty sure I remember creatures, travelers, and the like in unmodded Skyrim. In fact, I never downloaded a "mod" that altered/added extra encounters that I know of.

I have many memories, despite that, of running into travelers fighting monsters. One of my favorite things to do if a random dragon came after me , is I would try and get it to follow me into a town/village. The whole town would start helping me take it down. :)

Looking forward to TW3 and just looking at everything. My wireless KB seems to have kicked the bucket this week though. I can't get it to connect to my main Rig, so it looks like I'm keyboard shopping.
 

EatChildren

Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
Avatars if anybody wants them.

av1tyu0b.png
av2y6u66.png
av3grunh.png
 

Pagusas

Elden Member
Looks tiny to me, i mean he covered so much space in the first 20 seconds of the video. I was expecting to be blow away, thinking that red dot would barely move, instead it moved a ton in such a short time. Then with everyone reactions to the end I am scratching my head. It barely zoomed out at all.
 

RCSI

Member
Echoing Pagusas thoughts, the world seems really small from the video. Then again, I'm sure CDProject also had work cut out for them in balancing size area and object density for the story they wanted to tell. I think the same argument we make against Skyrim and RDR will be made against The Witcher 3, the world will feel small but the quality of encounters will be much better than the likes of Skyrim.
 

Odah

Banned
What I can say is that the stories, characters and choices etc in the witcher games were much more interesting and morally ambiguous than other modern rpg's. You don't have your standard "oh I'm gonna be a bad guy so I only choose asshole dialouge options" or the same for good guys. The world in the Witcher series isn't that kind of black and white

The series also handles mature stuff infinitely better than any other games I've come across. Bioware does this horribly for instance, they almost make it into a minigame that lasts the entire damn game if you want to have sex with someone. In the witcher series that shit is just there, it doesn't devolve into this "gotta unlock the sex scene" . Geralt's an adult dude, sometimes he has sex.

As for Witcher 3, it looks like the world will be very big, and still full of places, people, secrets and quests. Honestly watching the gameplay footage out for the game would probably sell you more easily than I can by writing about it.

But basically the Witcher series excels at delivering interesting stories, characters and player decisions. And Witcher 3 looks like it will deliver on those fronts, while also offering a huge and beautiful world full of stuff for you to do.

Alright, thank you. I think I'm gonna buy it. I just don't know now when
 

Alienous

Member
Here's the Skellige Isles map (one of two main open worlds) with an overlay of a map snapshot with a bunch of locations/points of interests uncovered.

mapfkxnk.jpg

God damn.

You're really going to have to embark on a journey to get to some of those islands on the outer reaches.
 

erawsd

Member
Echoing Pagusas thoughts, the world seems really small from the video. Then again, I'm sure CDProject also had work cut out for them in balancing size area and object density for the story they wanted to tell. I think the same argument we make against Skyrim and RDR will be made against The Witcher 3, the world will feel small but the quality of encounters will be much better than the likes of Skyrim.

Unless its being compared with Just Cause or the entire World of Warcraft, "really small" is not a fitting word. Vs. some of the major open world games...

GTA:SA - 36 km/sq
RDR - ~ 41 km/sq
GTAV - 81 km/sq
Far cry 4 - 46 km/sq
Skyrim - 37 km/sq

Witcher 3 - 136 km/sq + 4-6 additional regions whose size are unknown.

Its not too far from GTAV+RDR+Skyrim combined.

Which region of the world in the second map is the first map in?

You mean the prologue/tutorial area? It is a separate area.
 

TheStruggler

Report me for trolling ND/TLoU2 threads
hope the console versions have photo mode implemented, this is the type of game where some amazing screen shots would come out
 

jesu

Member
This game desperately needs a first person horse riding view. Looks like a decent amount of gameplay time will be spent horseback riding and the last thing I want to stare at during that time is the horses ass.

What is it about horses arses that makes you prone to stare at them?
I'll be looking at the scenery.
 
hope the console versions have photo mode implemented, this is the type of game where some amazing screen shots would come out
I hope there is a toggle to remove the HUD, whichever platform. Or maybe it's soft where it goes away after a few seconds of inactivity?
 
I fucking loved Skyrim when it first came out - I literally couldn't get enough of it and played it endlessly. Despite its repetition, the world had me hooked. Unfortunately that turned out to be its downfall as well because I only completed the first four (4!) main quests in my 150hrs of play time before something else came along to take my interest. I never met the Greybeards and I never will.

I dropped it at 90 hours. But that's what happens when the game exhaust you with padding that trudging through the main quests can be struggling.
 

Gammacide

Member
I am NEVER going to have enough time for this. I may be done with Bloodborne by then, but not HoW. It'll be hard to get back out of Destiny again, but this looks sooooooo amazing. Ugh. Adulthood.
 

erawsd

Member
I hope there is a toggle to remove the HUD, whichever platform. Or maybe it's soft where it goes away after a few seconds of inactivity?

They've said you'll be able to toggle each element and scale at least some of them.

It also seems like there is an option to have a dynamic display where it hides in and out of combat. If you watch the "Precious Cargo" quest the health/item bars are hidden until he engages an enemy, but in a lot of other footage its persistent the entire time.
 
ok, im scared now. with this, metal gear and xenoblade X there is no time for a normal human being to play all of these games to the fullest... good that they delayed zelda and hopefully the new fallout will come next year as well and not this year o_O
 

Pagusas

Elden Member
ok, im scared now. with this, metal gear and xenoblade X there is no time for a normal human being to play all of these games to the fullest... good that they delayed zelda and hopefully the new fallout will come next year as well and not this year o_O

You know you dont have to play (or buy) everything at once, right? Buy one, than the other 2 on sale for almost nothing in a few months. I'd expect Xenoblade to hold its price the longest, so jump on that first. Metal Gears price will drop like a rock, Witcher will see 20 and 30% sales by summer. I got Witcher 2 for $10 5 months after release.
 
ok, im scared now. with this, metal gear and xenoblade X there is no time for a normal human being to play all of these games to the fullest... good that they delayed zelda and hopefully the new fallout will come next year as well and not this year o_O

Unless you play for like 3 hours a week theres plenty of time. MGSV doesn't come out for 4 months after the Witcher.
 
Sweet Jesus i will be lost for hours just to explore it all and not able to finish the main quest yet.

That's what happened to me with Skyrim and somehow this map is bigger? Still never finished the main story in Skyrim and put over 120 hrs into it. I should probably go do that.
 
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