For an open world in a computer game, it's size is ample.

Just make a AAA game generator.

I'm for a smaller world, personally. Not that I think smaller is better - on the contrary, of course larger is better. But I'd rather have unique rather than monotonous locations, and have them do everything right, like include spears and crossbows.

Well said, I agree completely.

This isn't what actually happens though...

TIME AND MONEY

Skyrim is a land, not a world. Well, not even a land, more like a province... Its got the perfect size, alittle bigger and it would ruin it since it means the wild will be empty. Little smaller and it wouldn't feel right.

I say - good call on the size, bethesda.

Not to mention the vast manpower needed to create such a game. It just won't be possible until computers can realistically generate quests, npcs, voiceovers, storylines, unique landscapes, without any bugs.

PRIORITISING.


...

Why include gimmicky [censored] like marriages, when you can spend more time on the world, which is arguably the most important feature of TES games?

Besides, expanding the world really wouldn't be that time consuming. As others have pointed out, it's just a case of finding the right balance between random generation and hand-crafted design.

Ahahaha, like that'll ever happen.

I want it to be about twice the size of Oblivion, Oblivion was far too dense. It felt a bit unrealistic. But not too big, it should still be a bit interesting. Twice the size - half the density.

I'd like a bigger gap in between cities, so that traveling from one to the next doesn't feel like an afternoon's work.

You were forced to fast travel in Arena just because the world was so big.

How does that relate to a TES game being maybe twice or three times the size of Oblivion? That wouldn't be so big that you'd be forced to fast travel.

The world size is more than okay. I'd like to see you try to design, program, and draw something the size of Oblivion or Skyrim, and you'll see how easy it really is.

Heightmaps are pretty easy.

That's not the problem, the problem is the landscaping.

It took me about an hour from bruma to leyawin

Bigger is not always better.

As long as we have some sort of a fast travel system bigger maps would be cool- if it takes a few weeks to fast travel acrossthe map then you could incorperate things like farming which would take a while in real life

The size now is good, some use for fast travel but still workable for those against fast travel.

Maybe m'aiq will give you an air pump...

But in all seriouness I think the game worlds could do with being quite a bit bigger but with the same amout of stuff, plains and other such open expanses.
NV is a good example of this failure, should be vast so you don't trip over new dungeons every 30 seconds, at the end of the day once you've exsplored you can fast travel barer areas, currently you're plagued by the things like a town right next to a nest of boss creatures with no world reflection of this, or land just unsuitable to live off of, lol farms that wouldn't feed the family that live on them.
if you were a character in tes or fallout you'd need to be lucky enough to be the hero/pc's follower or be in a group of like 8 npc, just to do some basic stuff like leaveing your house to take a dump, as no one has a chamber pot and I'd rather not do in the deadroth infested woods by my self...

A bit of open sprawling farmland, grassland, snow field, ice sheet, open water ect never hurt anyone, and it couldn't hurt the engine that much surly, you could actually go hunting or something and actually feel lost in the land not just pretending the beasts you stalk arnt spitting distance from a settlement, doing loops of the same stretch of woods.

Hopefully skyrim with help this problem by just having variable terrain both in looks and physique.

It's easier for the ArmA2 makers, but not because of what you think of. Their landscaping tools simply can import common geographical height-map data (GeoTIFF, DEM and so on), like those produced by professional GIS tools (ArcGIS, GRASS, ...). They have to, since the engine is used in military simulations for real-world armies too. Basically, you can create a fantasy landscape using those extremely powerful tools, then import it just as easily - and people did so. There are a lot of high-quality maps for ArmA2 which are at most inspired by the real world, but not copied from it.

See, there needs to be a fine balance here. I personally felt that NV Was devoid of life, while Oblivion thrust points of interest down your throat. I dont mind the size of the map, since a game where there are unique quests, characters, points of interest, etc. the world really cant be that big. If it were 4x the size of oblivion, I cant even imagine the amount of time that would be put into more NPC's and villages. Plus, damn that'd be a whole lot travelling in a game with no vehicles. I dont want a HUGE world, because to me TES the stories and unique environments are what make it, with the size of the world being a plus...but if it were 3-4 times bigger I could see myself being less interested with a lot of empty space.

I would prefer a small world, but we don't have the technology yet.

So inflated world should suffice.