To those that are mentioning that Skyrim is smaller on the map of Tamriel, that's irrelevant because the scale of Cyrodill in Oblivion wasn't even close to 1.0.

Also, I agree. Larger game world, please.

my wife says that alot to me.....i wonder what she means.....uurmmm.
Anyway...i want skyrim to be bigger at least twice the size of cyrodil.
I also agree with some,that morrowind felt bigger than oblivion,but i can only put that down to fast travel.
What do i think...i think skyrim will be bigger,just my feeling.....this game as epic written all over it.

Nah, I don't think the cities have to be colossal cities compared to Oblivion's, assuming every building has an interior. I'm just talking about the countryside being that scale.

That would be pretty weird, having a major city a quarter of a mile across and then having to travel 80 miles to get to the next one. That scale just seems silly. There's no point gameplaywise having it that huge.

How is travels not a point in an adventure based gameplay? Daggerfall was the only thing to get scale close. In realtime I spend about two or three minutes going from one town to the next. If I did that here, I would get from one bus stop to the next in the same (small) town. They compensated by letting speed go by faster (which is ok I guess, but only to a certain extent), but everything non town seems very cramped together as if there wasn't enough space for it all. I believe I heard "almost twice as big", but I can't imagine it being enough given we probably loose a lot of usable space to mountains. But even with the shortened time, I'm reaching level 40 in like 100 days - not good.

/sigh

Skyrim needs to be smaller than Cyrodil. Look at a map!

You can make a world feel larger than it really is. It all comes down to the design. For instance, if you were making a space game and a planet was a desert, similar to Mars, and it had craters and hills, but that's it. This would contrast greatly to Earth. Earth has a vast variety of landscapes and features that would allow for MUCH more exploring despite any size difference. Mars would feel boring.

K so it's not the best example, but you can make a full, rich game world that isn't just full of more of the same stuff. Do you want to walk twice as far everywhere?

I'd rather Bethesda create a world full of unique things instead of rolling hills and tundra and mountains. Sheer size =/= a better, fuller game world.

You obviously haven't played Daggerfall yet.

There would be minor villages and settlements in between, as well as shrines, inns, camps, ruins, caves, forts, ruins and of course roads - perhaps even some novel type of structures that occupy the land called something new. And if it's non-desirable to sprint or use a horse/creature/vehicle (whatever personal transportation might be in Skyrim) to the city of choice than there would be fast travel. It makes sense to have it larger like 400 square miles because it makes it feel a lot more realistic, which seems to be an aim for Bethesda. It would bring the player the feeling of being in something extremely epically profound to be able to have that scale so you could have that freedom of movement, see that diversity of terrain, diversity of scenery viewpoints, number of scenery viewpoints, etc. You'd have so much more to explore in a game of that magnitude, which to me is a fun thing.

And another thing - it would never be 80 miles to get to the next city. 400 square miles is equal to a map being 20 miles by 20 miles.

just as important as being larger than cyrodil........it should be higher than cyrodil. the mountains need to look like mountains. ive been playing dragon saga and i had to climb a bunch of ladders to get to the top of a very high bridge leading to a super tall citadel. it actually felt like i was really high up. also it had super high mountains in the distant............i havent gotten that far yet so im not sure if they are just LODs or if you can actually get to them but they at least give the illusion of being surrounded by mountains.

As long as the map is a reasonable size and is filled with interesting things I'll be happy.

Oh, my mistake. I was thinking in terms of length across. Well that's not so bad, still a bit big for my preference though. I think something like 8-10 miles each way.

I don't really have a preference as long as the world doesn't feel very close together.

Don't be silly.

Yeah, Oblivion's map was four miles by four miles.

That's how it was pretty much for Morrowind. But it worked, because of the low view distance. It does look a little weird now with the graphics extender.

I would like to see it much bigger, but with the same amount - but more detailed and diverse - dungeons and ruins. But truthfully, I'm pretty sure it will be about the same size. The limit is not so much technical but in human resources. You just can't make a much bigger world that still feels detailed in the amount of time you develop a game. The only other option would be a lackluster game world that feels empty and without the character that handplaced detail adds.

Cyrodil should of been alot bigger in the first place.....thats gone now....i say skyrims game world should still be bigger,much bigger.

Maybe more detailed, with more little things that make one game great, like more short stories that you can hear or read,
or you meet some strange hunter deep in the woods, or witch that will tell you some strange stories and she lives in some remote part of Skyrim, more hidden items...

Yes, the idea that the gameworld of Skyrim should be physically smaller than Oblivion's Cyrodil is irrelevant. Oblivion's game world was an abstract interpretation at best. The idea of an entire country being 4 miles by 4 miles is a ludicrous idea, plainly. They got around this by accelerating game time to x30 normal time i think it was. However, it's not a perfect solution, clearly. You still end up with towns sat right next to supposedly undiscovered ruins and the sense of distortion is somewhat unavoidable. It is unfortunately the price you pay for have a seemles game world.

However, as the oblivion gameworld was an abstraction, there is nothing to stop the Skyrim game world, also being an abstraction, being physically larger. It's been quite some years since oblivion and I am sure it is possible to create a bigger game space.

As to your argument, KorVegor, there are several points I would like to make. Firstly, this game has almost certainly been in production for a lot longer than most other games, so I suspect that if they wanted to creat a lot more content than in oblivion, that is not likely to be a problem. Also, as stated above - perhaps a little emptyish space between points of interest would be a good thing. As it was, distortions of distance, especially compared to what we as players can actually see, meant that places seemed improbably close together. Of course, a bustling wilderness would still be preferable to a deadland between.

So, I think Skyrim could stand to be much much bigger though I can accept that it will always be an abstraction.

Moar, plox (or so sayeth the Romans?)

Bigger.
Why ? I don't know.
I just want a long and hard game to play lot of time.

yes it needs to be bigger, or atleast FEEL bigger. if im lost in the great forest i want to feel lost, not run 3 minutes in any direction to get out

Same size. With mountains all around and slightly grimmer weather, I suspect it'd feel alot more claustrophobic, and as such a great deal larger. If they make it too big then there'll just be a lot of bleak, open spaces with nothing in them.

Space is key, roaming land scapes. OB and FOnv could have done with another half again just open grassland/desert to make every thing seem more vast. I don't think it comes down to detail but proportion, as said above with big land forms needs to come space I'd prefer half the enterable locations OB had if it ment twice the map size with amazing landforms and roaming space, large scale plant life, ambient wildlife and particle effects help make open space full with out clutter.

Have a bit of faith in Bethesda, guys, i'm sure they know what they're doing.
Besides, as somebody else probably already pointed out: gamesas stated that they increased their draw distances enourmously, what's the point of doing so if your world is small. Not to forget: the mountain screenshot in the GI (those mountains were HUGE), if it really IS a screenshot, then the world will propably be bigger.

And unless gamesas is suddenly dumping all of their lore in a bottomless pit, i don't see how they can create 7000 steps without the Throat of the World being enormous.