I accept that vertical areas will add more playable space, however I'm only concerned with simple square mileage right now.

True.

3D

Just don't state ?Todd said Skyrim was bigger than Oblivion?.
Because he didn't.
He said it was about the same size, yet felt bigger due to its verticality.

Facts are facts. Fact is he didn't say it.

Another thing to know about the map size is you are determining size as a flat plane, which skyrim is not. For the people who understand the technical aspect of 3D design, 16 sq. miles when turned into highly elevated map routes is actually a seemingly larger amount of space. The land size had to be slightly smaller because the depth of the landscape and detail of dungeons was drastically increased. Oblivion was a large map, sure, but it felt REALLY empty. Skyrim will be brimming with many dungeons, rough terrain, and other things to make the travel from point a to point b seem longer and more filled.

So please don't worry. I assure you that you wont be disappointed. And if you aren't? Then you can troll me for the day when Skyrim comes out.

actually oblivion was about 24 square miles and skyrim is supposed to be about the same size but it will feel massive thanks to all the mountains and overall different landscapes

I dont have an exact source but, he said it's barely bigger.. I will try to look for it..

Skyrim is roughly bigger than 4400, in my 2005 OXM on the previw of Oblivion there was many questions on the size of the map and said it was around 4350 and 16.2 sq miles. You need to check your math.

Maybe Todd meant, CYRODIIL LAND MASS plus PLANE OF OBLIVION LAND MASS. Combine this with the land on the edges, which I am sure modders will use to build other provinces, and add on the 5 expansions, and this is going to be ONE HUGEASS game!

Those cell counts don't include interior cells or other world spaces besides the Tamriel worldspace(oblivion's main over world) and it's children (the city world spaces).

Skyrim = approx 4400 playable cells including the separate city cells(assuming they are a direct match to their parent as in OB)

Oblivion = approx 4600 playable cells including the separate city cells(it should be noted that with Cyrodiil's odd shape, accuracy is not as close as the Skyrim count and some rounding up was done leaving the margin of error as high as 100 cells or more)

My point is Skyrim's map compared to Oblivions map....well you will not see a difference at all. Skyrim will feel bigger becuase of the mountains and rough terrian and based of Todd's comments saying that some dungions will be 1 to 2 hours. So some of the Dungions will be as big or bigger than the Dungion in Oblivion from that DLC- Merunes Razor.

Well, Oblivion was 3D too. If we're counting that in, then I think we also have to count in what that takes away from the size, since you won't be able to occupy each and every square meter on the map if the map has lots of steep angles (i.e. mountains).

Size of a gameworld is difficult to measure since it's kind of subjective. An area in square miles will give you a good approximation, especially when you compare games where it's drastically different; but if you compare two games which are "about the same size", then it doesn't tell you that much anymore, because the subjective perception becomes more important. Morrowind feels bigger than Oblivion because it has a huge (and walled-off) mountain in the middle instead of being a giant basin. However, it's definitely smaller than Oblivion, and it is smaller than Skyrim will be.

By the way, I did the number crunching myself once; turned out that Morrowind had around 3200 cells, while Oblivion had around 4000 and Skyrim will have around 3800. My numbers are smaller than those mentioned here because I only regarded the area within each game's boundaries, instead of the full rectangular map.

It's MY math and it is a close approximation which is sufficient for a comparison.


No one here is disputing that. Your preaching to the choir bro.

http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1158964-how-big-is-the-map-in-comparison-with-oblivions/page__st__20__p__16994052#entry16994052
A few posts below it I put up a http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1158964-how-big-is-the-map-in-comparison-with-oblivions/page__view__findpost__p__16998032.

In summary:
Morrowind - 4000 cells
Oblivion - 4800 cells
Skyrim - 3900 cells

Like I said, I only looked at the number of cells within a game's limits.

This^ That doesn't mean anyone has to argue about it. You guys all act like it's a bad thing that he didn't explicitly say it's bigger or smaller. It really doesn't matter.



OB was 16.2 sq mi.

I'm not sure I like the idea that things like mountains will make the world 'seem bigger'. Replayability is important and I've come to notice with New Vegas that the map can certainly effect my desire to start a new game.

In Oblivion and Fallout 3 when you started a new game you found yourself near the center of an open world to explore and could literally take off in pretty much any direction you wanted. In New Vegas, though, you always start in Goodsprings and either have to make a suicide run through deathclaw country or you do that same circuit through Primm, Nipton, Novac etc. every time you restart. This makes the world seem less open and new games feel more repetitive.

I hope the map isn't designed in such a way that we are channeled down the same paths over and over again.

???
Skyrim is the same size as before, which is the same as Oblivion. Around 41 square kilometers.

It has been stated by Todd that the world feels bigger, however... if that's what you mean.

That's a bit strange to say.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrGJiOBPWTI

Oblivion is Bigger as for landmass but Skyrim and will have more stuff
-

This argument is largely pointless.

The people claiming to have "data" or "proof" or even logically-derived facts are just making things up.

We do not have access to the game. We do not have access to complete information about the game map / world.

It was stated that the world is "about" the size of Oblivion but that it would "feel" larger because of the terrain. That's all we know.

I would have liked a larger world than Oblivion and I don't understand why every new game in a series is an exercise is downsizing but the fact is we don't know enough yet to really judge it. The developer could solve this mystery, if they chose, by releasing more information about the size of the gameworld, if they were so inclined. Until then it's just speculation.

In any case unless they shrunk it a LOT it's going to be fun and we'll all play it and probably enjoy it.

I had another look at the video, and it has High Hrothgar in the background, I think that is located towards the centre of the map but he starts heading towards it then branches of to the right. Just wondering when was this map made? because they could have changed the Landscape (positioning of the road etc) For this game.



Oh, really? I didn't know about that, thanks for pointing it out. How large is a playable cell?