Huge unscale-able mountains (Even to the gravity defying Oblivion horses) and a pass with a guard telling you your not allowed to leave the country because your passport expired. The passport office having been burnt down just before the game starts (By you, mwahaha)

I'll take a stone wall encompassing the entire province of Skyrim along its border. It would be impassable and, where roads lead out of the province, a permanently closed gate would be attended by guards who inform you that "You shall not pass!"











...or an invisible wall

Probably my opinion would be a Dragon comes down and picks you up puts you back in the region. Would be fun to watch, at least for me.

It's a video game. You're going to have to deal with invisible barriers since they can't create the entire planet of Nirn as an oblate spheroid. They don't bother me at all.

But your idea is essentially an invisible wall

My vote is for Cliff Racers living in the mountains along the border. There should also be roads leading THROUGH the mountains, but with guard posts with gates that are closed for a good reason.

But yeah... Cliff Racers. EVERYWHERE.

oblivion was fine to me. i just went and it told me you cannot got further but i didnt mind the invisible wall much

How about they make it so when you go over the mountains you get a volley of arrows to the face? With Morrowind to the left, Cyrodil to the north, a big sea monster infested, toxic, gaseous sea to the south, and angry spell slingin', trash talkin', axe carryin' redguards to the east! So simple!








But hell a simple Gandalf "YOU SHALL NOT PASS!" would work just fine.

Not bad, but I think you're looking at the map upside down.

But yeah, stick with invisible walls. Everything else sounded even more immersion breaking.

EDIT: On request of OCD, can you please make this topic a poll, OP.

I didn't read everything in this thread, so I don't know if this has been brought up already.

But there should definetely be roads leading into/ out of Skyrim, because no roads connecting the province with other provinces was even more immersion breaking in Oblivion than the invisible walls and messages.

Invisible walls with a turn back message are fine by me. What's important is that these walls are pushed back a good distance from the game's usual playing area. You shouldn't be butting up against them unless you're specifically trying to find the edge of the map. That means Beth shouldn't stick a whole bunch of stuff prtty much on the invisible wall like they did in OB.

Think you've been holding you map upside down mate, Cyrodiil is SOUTH of Skyrim, Morrowind is EAST, The sea is NORTH and Hammerfell is SOUTH WESTISH. Just thought I'd point that out.

Anyway, I'm fine with invisible or natural barriers, it makes it so much easier for modders.

Forests.. I like that idea, however maybe only one or two borders should have this:

You enter the very western area of the Skyrim map, you see a forest. You enter the very thick forest and lose sight of where you are on the map. After strolling around, for example going forward all the time, should bring you back to the very western part of Skyirm. Magical forest that prevents you from entering it.

I think natural border would be the best. I mean determited enought people will eventually find a way to get around it, but thats part of the fun (I admit, I love climbing mountains and getting out of maps in games)

Mountains to the south, imperial borders/gates to the east, dense forrests to the west (which get so dense, you can't travel further. and a invisible wall (Or sea monsters that will swallow you whole) after 2 miles of ocean to the north).

and yes, levitation would undo almost all of this, but do you really think they will add it with all those complications?

If you get too far north in the sea, you will get messages that you are freezing to death as the water gets colder. Magic will fail because you are getting closer to atmora(I know that it doesn't make any sense), so you will fall into the water and can't walk on it/levitate. No ideas for the land borders.

Abording fan comes and pokes you with his torch

if possible no invisible walls please !!!! Should be able to come up with things that kill you or turn you back and make it actually fun to experience. I like the pack of wolves, dense fog passing you out, ideas a lot ! I like the way Gothic always handled the water restriction with that huge water beast killing you. But of course Beth could pull it off with something even better. Rip tides ? water so cold you freeze after swimming for a while ? Waves so powerful you can't swim against it and you are slammed back on land ? oooooh yeah baby.....

Keep it the way it was in Oblivion

Natural Barriers would work best. Large bodies of water, thick foliage or tree's and mountains that couldn't be climbed.

They should just put up a ten-foot privacy fence around the whole thing with a sign "No Trespassing, Beware of Dog." And then every now and then a little old lady would climb over from the other side to attend to her Azaleas, but only when you're not looking.

:rofl: hahah! Funny!

I agree with this. It'd make it much more realistic that Oblivion's meadows - the walls are placed randomly...

Invisible walls, simple and elegant.

Um... the southern borders aren't water...

I don't mind the invisible border and the "you cannot go this way". The only thing I miss is this border being shown on the maps, so that I can at least avoid the message. In some places in OB this border is also placed at very unnatural places. Like 200m in front of me there is this deep fjord that could have served as a perfect natural barrier, but instead I'm getting the message at flat passable areas.

Don't make everything unpassable natural obstacles, it would just feel unnatural I mean, there could be roads going over mountain passes across the southern borders. You could have a natural indication of a border, like a bridge or river or elevated pass (that you could climb onto) or texture change (Bruma area changing to winter textures), without it being an actual physical barrier all the time.

So for me, a natural *indication* (rather than a natural barrier) combined with a "you cannot go this way", that is also marked on the maps, would be the least intrusive solution.

Arma2 (realism based combined warfare) has a different approach, in that at the edges the landscape is fully replaced with a fractal landscape without anything. So you can go on forever until floating point errors stops you. It also have skyboxes that you can always see but never reach. It could be a method, but it is highly dependent on how the landscape system works in the engine. Might not be viable at all.