At one time 256MB ram was delusional.

Have you ever played Dwarf Fortress?

Captain Blood? (with all 32768 possible planets to visit?)
I believe Terminator had 20,000 3d objects and half the city of LA to explore (in 1991).

Fallout3 could have had a vastly expanded map with procedural ruins spread for miles in all directions, before coming to a hand tailored settlement.
~For that matter (given the way locations work in the game), every copy of Fallout 3 could have pre-generated a unique wasteland, and randomized all the settlement locations not tied to a landmark.
Caves & sewers could have had random pre-calculated layouts that include a few set-pieces as well.

~Hows zat for a Fallout 4 suggestion

Why did RPGs move away from procedural design? Hell, most of the stuff in Oblivion and FO3 is of that quality (once you've seen one Ayleid ruin/cave/metro station you've pretty much seen them all for the most part)

Throw in some sweet raider vs. alien random encounters and we've got a deal...











JK











JK again...I'm serious...Darius vs. Meldar the Unconcionable would be pretty sweet!! (though one sided)

Amount of RAM is irrelevant.



Because miles of empty space is pretty much boring as heck.

To whom?
(and what does that have to do with the fact that 256MB ram was at one time delusional?)

That's what "wasteland" is :shrug:, and that's what it should be in the game.


*Though I intended that it be obvious that I meant Procedural environments
with random encounters, and with the option to fast travel over it
~(subject to random encounters along the way).

IIRC Arcanum did just that. It supposedly took 48 hours (real time) to cross from coast to coast on foot ~not using Fast travel. (Now... Imagine FO3/4 special encounters that can only be found via personal exploration of the wastelands [aided by the luck stat] ~and different for everyone's individual install.. Or randomized on a Per-PC basis ).

I think the procedural approach to the "wasteland" areas could be quite interesting, actually. This could concievably even open up things for the developers. As in, with Fallout 3 every location has to be physically "fit" into the existing game map. I've messed around with the GECK a little bit - this isn't such an easy thing. And we know that one thing there was certainly never a shortage of with the development of Fallout 3 was ideas for other locations. (Since I gather from interviews that were cramming content into the game right up until the last minute.)

Off-hand, I'd think it would be easier to add in a lot of these areas procedurally. Because you're not tied into the work of adding these places into an existing game map, for the most part. You could just design the surrounding area to the extent that the location physically makes sense; and the procedural model could add in the intervening space.

Personally, I think something like that could go a long way towards emphasizing that "wasteland" feel. I like all the stuff in F3, and certainly enjoyed finding all of these places. But I don't think there's much of an argument to be made that the Fallout 3 world map is fairly crowded. Sure, it makes sense considering that you're exploring the devestation of what was once a metropolitan area. But I personally never felt that same sense of isolation and desolation that I did in the earlier Fallouts.

I think another benefit of the procedural model could come in the form of DLC, as well. In F3, you have to walk to what's basically a teleporter that takes you into the new world space. How much neater might it be if when you download another DLC, it's simply tacked onto the edges of the existing world map through procedurally-generated areas? You download a new area, and it could just add in new areas to explore directly in-line with the existing game world (of course, that would only work for places that are physically close to the original world map...) And it's a very old trick, by this point, to disguise the loading time of a new area by having that work in the background while the player travels through a procedural area for a time.

Sort of in-line with that thinking, it's probably also worth re-emphasizing that one thing I think would make Bethesda games in general much better, would be procedural animation. I think it would exceptionally well with their game design philosophy. (Not to mention, it would likely add to that "immersion" thing...)

"Capital" wasteland == very small chunk compared to Fallout's California.. wouldn't make sense for it to be a big empty wasteland, considering it used to be the surroundings of a sprawling urban environment.

RadHamster found a wonderful Youtube clip showing exactly that, and I think you'll find it most impressive. (I certainly did).
http://www.youtube.com/radhamster

*And here are two that I found last year on my own...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMh5sRXqHq8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1P_B65XW4I

Something else of interest
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6mYRf-2SDU&feature=related

Yeah, I think going forward, that's going to be one of the determining features of "next-gen" games, is procedural animation. Especially in a game like Fallout, where you're navigating a lot of rubble, and many different environments, it would help a lot to make the animations appear more naturalistic. Just imagine seeing NPCs able to climb over rough terrain in a natural manner (or even to have their feet actually touching the ground in uneven areas, instead of that floating effect you get a lot of times. And what I always thought was especially apparent in Fallout with Dogmeat and the other non-bipedal animals...)

I think it makes sense that the DC area is a very crowded environment. But that's more about dealing with the constraints of the design they were going for. ie, I don't think they decided from the get-go that they wanted a very small area to explore within a finite and crowded space. More that they knew they wanted to have the entire game encompassed in one contiquous map, and then decided what scale would best fit that.

I think, though, that with procedural areas you could possibly have the best of both worlds, however. ie, still a largely contained world that is physically contiguous, a la Fallout 3 - as well as encompassing a larger area and lending the game more of a "wasteland vibe."

(Probably also worth mentioning that adding in lots of procedural in-between terrain would also give them a reason to add vehicles into the game - something I've noticed over my time here that it also a popular feature that people seem to want. So long as the scale of the game world remains so contained, there's never going to be any reason to include vehicles into the game.)

Not really. Its Commodore-64 text based if you want it to be. I'm not asking for huge leaps in graphics or even different loot. You could set up your team on a terminal, send it off and then have a result appear on your screen two months later. An elaborate Grognak the barbarian could do it. I'm not a modder or a techie but if they could do text based stuff on a C-64 and a Grognak beta ingame you sure as [censored]e could do something like that ingame. Some of the modders on the nexus have shown far more ingenuity than this idea. As for trading and stuff, you deposit something in a caravan "bin" and two months later you pick up some other stuff. Might be punga fruit from a caravan to Point Lookout. Doesn't have to be a whole new game. But a new game or a RTS feature would be nice too.

I'm not talking salt-flats... It doesn't all need to be empty... most of it could look like bombed out suburbs and even some multi-story apartment buildings (partially destroyed shells of their former selves).

Just have it be there... to exist in the vast space between one settlement and another ~To be overlooked, or explored ~hell... deep wasteland encounters with non-animals could even be [partially] leveled enemies; Out there in the wastes there could be a pair of malfunctioning Liberty Primes that attack the player if he's dumb enough to say he's a communist (or if he's wearing and using Chinese equipment) ~anything... anything at all... just like Fallout 1 & 2.

IMO a distinction should be made. In the future post apocalypse towns are few and far between; They are like ports of [moderately] safe harbor amidst a sea of desolation. Being alone in the wasteland should feel like being in a kayak on the open Ocean, where anything can happen. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRDusxig_vQ ). ^{http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjwxAJYKFbE&feature=related}

I'm not so sure this is (would be) true. Full service towns might be few, but there would likely be little enclaves of small numbers of people everywhere.

That aside, I don't think I'd want them to render all of that desolation. FO1 didn't even dop that to any meaningful degree. I'd rahter have them use the resources to build more playable areas, with more encounters and more things and buildings to explore.

I think that people would be more likely to consolidate small settlements into larger ones, and the isolated hermits and very small villages would often be wiped out. Shady Sands was about the size of Megaton, and had a good wall... but was still constantly attacked by gangs and an unending stream of Radscorpions.

Basically, it would allow one town to be a weeks walk from another, through a destroyed and abandoned landscape that looks like the abandoned parts of http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1864272_1810098,00.html ~but bombed. Mostly empty, but still dangerous, and prowled by predators (both four footed, two footed, and three footed); It would simulate in full 3d, the wasted cities you can find bits of in FO1. It would also be possible to fast travel past them (as you do in FO1), but not without risk of attack, injury (stumbling, cuts, and falls), radiation sickness, extreme thirst [IIRC if you went into the wastes without a canteen in FO1(or was it FO2?) you'd get dehydration damage].

*Endless rows of bombed out suburbia, damaged apartment complexes, strip malls, and industrial parks would be good candidates for procedural generation I'd think, and could be machine produced in whatever quantity needed. Giving the wasteland the true feel of endless destruction, isolation, and the possibility for strange anomaly from the very generation itself, as well as a bunch of hand made encounters peppered throughout (and set to only ever appear once in a game).

I think the idea is that it would increase the playable area, with more encounters and stuff to explore. With all of that on top of the existing pre-set areas.

If were going with realism here most towns would only be a day or two walk away from each other. Most settlements wouldn't be 60 miles apart since if they have to trade with other towns that would be near impossible if not flat out impossible. Granted I agree with you about larger settlements but out of practicality they wouldn't be that far away from each other (in real life). Any town, village, city that far away would require the game map to be over a hundred miles from one end to the other and Bethesda stop doing that after Daggerfall. Not trying to rip your idea apart I just doubt what your asking would happen in Fallout 4, 5,6 etc. Maybe someday but I wouldn't look for that anytime soon.



Gary Indiana already looks like Fallout 3 hell in some places it looks worse. Also if were going back to pure realism there wouldn't be anything standing anyhow unless people were maintaining it. Also forgetting realism here and just thinking about playing the game constantly encountering the samethings over and over again with the occassional random encounter would for the most part be boring. Yeah I know it's a "wasteland" but this is a game and having a true wasteland wouldn't be very fun now would it?

Depends on design ~[and definition of fun I guess]

Design-wise Fallout managed it (as did FO2)... FO3 could have been done the same way (essentially as I posted above).

Towns can be miles and miles apart for there not being enough people to populate the land between (or not wanting to).

*As for fun... A fun wasteland seems odd (almost silly) to me... Yet FO1 managed it (via design ~and humor). Personally I liked the FO1 design best, where you set off, and the game pulls the PC out of the world map for an encounter (often after days and days of 'nothing at all interesting'). But in FO4 (lets say), the possibility of finding forgotten loot, random encounters and Fallout's signature special encounters "out there ~somewhere", but needing to actually find them, could prove a fun incentive to explore the wastes.

*And if designed so that [nearly] endless wasteland (IE. filler) comes cheap, then FO4 could boast the largest game world on the market.

**EDIT:
There is also the other option, that actually walking (or driving!) the trek, might give you better odds against being caught off guard in an encounter, or allow the perceptive player to circle around or better avoid encounters if they choose. This based on the notion that during fast travel, the PC is basically on autopilot and blankly walks from point A to B (Making Perception checks here and there).

(A fully realized wasteland is good incentive to add vehicles once again,to the Fallout games.)

I know everyone screams for Commonwealth stuff, it is cool, but my idea is,

how about we go back about 25 years before the Vault 101 dude walks out of the door?

like a prequel to fallout3.

In Fallout 3, there are few scenes that I didnt quite get..like Dr.Li yelling at Lyon "open the dam door!" kind of thing, it made me wonder why is she being rude when she needs shelter from them?

maybe something happened before first project purity thing. And then there is something going on with Enclave and other stuffs.

or maybe about Three Dog;s history, etc

So did Daggerfall. Point I'm getting at though is why have endless nothing that the majority of players are just going to fast travel through and not bother with checking it out since there's really nothing to check out for hundreds of miles? Granted I'm all for a bigger game world but having actual hundreds of miles of nothing isn't very appealing to me. :shrug:



Going back to pure realism most people would stay generally close to each other yeah there could be one or two towns in the way out in the middle of nowhere but for the part humans tend to stay close to each other.



Essentially though your wandering around circles trying to find something interesting and after hours of gameplay this becomes tedious to a lot of people. Granted Fallout 3 you do find way to many things to easily and I'm not a fan of instant gratification however I'm not a fan of punishment either.



Bethesda already did that in TES 2 and changed that strategy under Todd Howard so I'm doubting this would happen.


[censored] man you edit your posts a lot.



You can add vechiles with a slightly larger map anyhow. Just because they might add vechiles in the next game doesn't mean the game world is going to need to be hundreds of miles. Again I'm all for a larger map however going back to daggerfall sized world is a bit excessive to me.

I'm going to bed now goodnight or should I say goodmorning????

I find that I don't much like http://i271.photobucket.com/albums/jj125/Gizmojunk/tobbit2.jpg.

**Also there is a minor edit to my previous post.

Its why I don't have twice as many posts as I do...


My main point here is that if the world can be made 90% bigger via procedural wastes (that contrary to first appearance, are not devoid of threats & incentives); If that can be managed, and the game creates that stuff automagically... Why not do it? and who cares if most folks fast travel over it... those that choose not to will have their own fun with it.

There's always a minor edit to all of your posts. :rolleyes:

Yeah... Force of habit. I often edit on re-reading them; but I try to avoid edits of posts already quoted.

(Unfortunately not this time, as your quoted link leads to a blank post )

You already have a ton of posts so does it really matter?



My point is that most people don't care about having a bigger world just for the sake of a bigger world. Also this has been done before by Bethesda and they chose to stop doing it which I can't blame them considering the issues with Daggerfall. That's not the answer that you want to hear but it is what it is.


Now I got to get some sleep. So go a head if you want to and edit your post infinitely.

Ah... but that's just it (I see your point ~from the start, but...)
Fallout 1 & 2 both had maps that cover parts of several States. FO3 covers the land of what... 16 square miles?

Its not "Big for Big's sake", its part of setting the mood, and the scene; and the scale of the disaster.

Post count doesn't, but clarity does.

Less like Oblivion, more like Fallout. I'd like a mix of the current engine with the Fallout 1/2 system of "fast travel" locations with random encoutners. Makes the game more epic if it takes place over a large mass. I wasn't much of a fan of a lot of the FO towns.

Really...I mean...are you sure? You actually understood my point from the beginning without me clearly stating it and your not just making that up in an attempt to make yourself look better now are you? Since honestly I wasn't sure if I had to spell it out. Your posts gave me the vibe that you weren't getting it. :shrug:



There's a lot of different ways without just having pure nothingness make up 90% of the game world.



It takes you 4 to 5 edits to clearly state something? :shakehead:



It's all in fun Gizmo don't take what I said to seriously.

I just thought it'd be fun to have a Fallout game that wasnt based in America. Like maybe one for China?
Like a perspective on the other end of the 2minute war from the enemy's standpoint.
Just thought it'd be interesting.

Posting this here as per note from Mod.