So, this has been pissing me off for quite some time now. Before you begin writing, thinking, or even thinking about writing, have a look at this wonderful picture:

http://i53.tinypic.com/2u7q3j7.png

Do you think that it is okay that 38,2271% of the map is unreachable? (yes, i counted the squares).

Also, what could they have done to use that empty space?

Oh, and here is a picture of Fallout: 3's map to compare:

http://i56.tinypic.com/2r3fqpu.png

Compared to FO3, no. The size within the limits (places you can reach) is the same as FO3

Actually, you are wrong.

In Fallout: New Vegas, 136 squares are unreachable. Fallout: 3 is 72 squares smaller than Fallout: New Vegas, but you can reach out all the way to the edges.

That means, that there are 64 less reachable squares in Fallout: New Vegas than Fallout: 3. And that's hell of a lot of squares.

Given the size of most in game areas as they are, I say yes tbh.
I would have rather had more internal cells with greater numbers of named and unnamed NPC's, than the large areas of free roam.
Strange as it sounds I love free roam, but those areas that are already in game need more attention than the extra filler space.

All that said the boundries could have been a lot smaller, and the distance between areas vaster.

Now who's going to guess where they hid the chocolate egg?
Or the crystal skull at least... Oh wait its, its me... dun, dun, duuuun..
Pheeww lucky escape just plain ol' regular talking, floating, prevaricating bone cranium and mandible.

There have to be places you can't get to, and empty places that are empty just for the sake of being empty.

Without either of those, the world would feel small or cluttered.

No, the world feels small and cluttered when it is surrounded by huge, non-climbable and invisible wall-infected mountains. And then you get angry, because you see on your Pip-Boy, that there are a world behind the mountains.

There are at least 3 ways of reaching the empty space but as this isn't the spoiler forum so I can't say.

Maybe there is. But that doesn't change the fact that it is empty space.

FO3 and New Vegas feel small next to the originals were locations could be hundreds of miles apart.

Empty space could be for Future DLC

Or it was a gift to the modders from the Devs.

FO3 seems to have alot of space but really alot of those "locations" are just a bunch of junk with raiders popping out to attack and many of them don't even have the raiders.

It has been mentioned by the developers at the actual play areas of the overland FO3 and NV maps are very similar, with NV being a tiny bit bigger. Open the maps in GECK and see yourself.

There's no scale on the maps you linked, so comparing the cells in them is moot.

Let's hope for that.


Too bad for us console players then.


There certainly are in Fallout: New Vegas too. Here are some examples:

Goodsprings Gas Station.
Yangtze Memorial.
Sunset Drive-In.
Goodsprings Source.
Fields' Shack, Raul's Shack, Bradley's Shack, Cap counterfeiting shack, Fisherman's Pride shack, Neil's Shack, Deserted Shack, Harper's shack.
Lone Wolf Radio.
Jean Sky Diving.
Mole Rat Ranch.
Ivanpah Dry Lake. (most pointless location ever)
Mojave Drive-In.
...

But in most of these, there aren't anything but a Sunset Sarsparilla Star Bottle Cap and some minor loot. And unlike in Fallout 3, they are marked locations.


There is.

Yes :goodjob:

All that matters [to me] is that the areas where they intend the player to visit be well thought out and well done.

Oh? Tell me the unit then.

The two pictures that i posted, is split into the same sized squares.

Irrelevant as long as there's no unit telling us how big each cell is.

Why's that?

Consider the following image:

[img]http://img138.imageshack.us/img138/3298/mapunits.jpg[/img]

Which of the two upper-most grids is the biggest? That's pretty easy to determine.
Now consider the two lower grids. Which one is the biggest of those?

Without a unit, the size of the map is impossible to determine.
GECK gives a unit when you open the FO3 and NV maps in it, and if we are to believe the people who made New Vegas, the available areas are roughly the same size.

Wow, that is quite a bit of unused space.. I never realized how much of it there was.

That might be, but they could still have easily spread the locations out more, so the huge space wasn't wasted. And for God's sake, put some random encounters in between!!!

Anyways, I'm still pretty sure that the amount of walkable space was bigger in Fallout 3.

I logged in for the first time in months just so I could quote this post, lol. I completely agree with you.

I hate all these random locations out in the middle of nowhere, and there's nothing to them. Yes, FO3 had a lot of "empty" locations as well, and besides a few goodies weren't really worth revisiting.

But there must be 20+ locations (to include all those shacks you listed) that i've literally never been back to since I've discovered them. If anything, they get in the way when i'm looking around the map to fast travel.

At least maybe give us some history. Let us go into one of those abandoned shacks and do some searching through the place and learn about who used to live there and what might have happened to them.

I remember my first playthrough when FNV was released. I would see what looked like a small town or building off in the distance. I'd finally get up there, only to realize that none of the buildings can even be entered. Kinda disappointed.

Yeah, I would agree with the OP. I felt F3 was a lot more rewarding for going out and exploring. I like NV, but it seems like everywhere you go, there is either buildings with wood over the doors, or you go all through a huge building, and find 3 caps, a 9 mm pistol, and some pscho. The walls are annoying blocking that area as well. I think it's funny how before they released NV, they kept saying "there are a lot more locations than FO3", yet 80% of the locations are filled with a whole lot of nothing. It's like "you have found a dead Brahman", map marker, and XP pop up. I'm thinking, "ok....what is the point. I think they should utilize that space for DLC. I am sick of travling to other smaller cells, and losing my goods.

Dlc

Someone posted there's empty land there, perhaps they had intended for it to be more space at some point in development but there wasn't time. Or perhaps as some of the places leading to it make it out to be this is intended for DLC. Or they just used the extra space to flavor the pipboy map.
As for non-climbable mountains. I prefer them over hitting a wall in the middle of nowhere and getting a message that I've reached the end of the map.


There's a [censored] ton of boarded up building in F3 as well, but I agree some more flavor places would have been nice. Fallout 3 went a bit overboard, but the little stories to many places greatly added to the game.

I couldn't care less. The game gives me more content than any game I've purchased in the past couple of years. Life is too short to sweat the small stuff.

I can't believe how much whining the fact that the map is not a perfect square has brought. <_<