Not to mention, F4 is not the Mojave desert or the remains of a totally nuked DC. It is also not a medieval Scandinavian like province that is mostly wilderness.

It is the 200 year old remains of the greater Boston area that was left nearly untouched by the Great War.

The population mostly didn't survive the aftermath of the Great War, but it has to be one of the least damaged urban areas in the remains of the USA.

Add in that with the vertibird and jumpjets, we will be able to go places we never could have gone in previous Fallout and Elder Scroll games, and we are talking some serious verticality.

So what ever the scale it will still be one of the densest maps Bethesda has ever done.

I'm not worried about it. Fallout 3 and all of the TES games have been pretty darn big, so I'm expecting FO4 to be the same.

This isn't a TES game, it doesn't HAVE to be "their biggest game yet" scale wise.

As long as it's as big as Fo3/NV but with more quality I'm fine.

I don't think their general statements have taken that into account. Todd seems really apathetic towards putting a number to the size of the world, and his reasons for that make sense to me. I expect it to be Skyrim-esque in terms of both size and density, although there will be downtown areas that will be much, much denser. I feel pretty good about it.

yeah, my worries about size are pretty non-existant. Im sure when I first enter the wasteland ill have that moment where I think how large this place is, how much there is to do, and being overwhelmed by not knowing where to even begin lol.

I'm going to stick with what was said when the guy was asked about it, that the overall size of the world map will be bigger than the Skyrim main continent map, but minus the mountains that ate up so much of the area.

I'd say pre-ordering the game has a LOT to do with trust, but whatever.

With the confirmation that the game is fully x64, I wouldn't worry about world size as that one fact will allow for massive changes in how they design exterior cells in both detail and what they can include as traversable ruins and semi-enclosed spaces (not to mention vertical architecture).

I'm still a bit baffled at all the speculation and concern over the size of the game world. I have yet to play a Beth game where I felt shortchanged in that area.

I am not worried about size...when statements floating around saying 400 plus hours and still much to do....that good enough for me besides every game todd howard has created its ben well beyond my expectations. You will get your moneys worth and more!

I just said that wondering about the size of the game doesn't have to do with trust. Pre-ordering does.

Anyway, it'll be interesting to see if the architecture of areas ends up being drastically different to accommodate for this change. We've seen it at a smaller scale with the prewar towns, but not really with some of the larger areas.

The map is going to be tiny.. I'll easily be able to lay it on the floor and step over it when I have to get up from playing the game to go to the bathroom. Yep, tiny map. No need to worry about it taking up your entire living room floor. Wouldn't fit in the box if it was really big would it?

Not smaller than I think but probably smaller than I wish for.

For crip sake its as big as skyrim and much bigger than fallout 3...some of you complain before even playing it yet...good grief why not wait till it comes out then you can ventilate all you want!

You could also try reading my post to realize I'm not "ventilating". It's an honest question.

I am not talking directly to you necrovamp just a couple of post regarding the map size being small there is nothing concrete out there on the web on its actual size, just speculation? The team mentioned the size of Skyrim without the mountains that's big, big enough for me but that's my opinion?

Agreed.

Better to be vague than to have some one take it wrong and start screaming about being lied to.

Oh, I see. So...it's definitely going to be big, but I'm not sure what they meant by Skyrim without the mountains. Did they mean that it's the size of Skyrim if you took the mountains out and made the map smaller? The size of Skyrim if you flattened the mountains but still had the same area? All we know is that the game is going to be big, but it seemed like even Bethesda was having a hard time approximating the exact size.

Things like mountains, unexplorable buildings, explorable skyscraqers, density, and diversity are just a few things that can make one game feel bigger or smaller than another. It will be fine.

Thank you fredfredd...it will be big, Todd Horward said that Fallout 4 is there biggest and best game they have ever created...hearing that from the man himself is a wastlanders dream. Nov 10....cant wait!

He meant that there was a lot of un-utilized space on the mountain slopes.
Imagine an unenterable giant building that took up a big chunk of space. Sorta like that.

OP makes some good points. I wonder if the fact that many small interiors don't require loading screens means less or more inaccessible "boarded-up" buildings and such.

Also, I think it's worth considering how this affects towns. Witcher 3's towns had a really nice flow to them, in that you could enter and exit all houses at will and it felt mostly natural and realistic. However, it also made the house interiors feel a bit cheap and plastic in comparison to interiors in TES.

It's hard to explain or put my finger on it. I'm really not sure if I'd rather there be separate cells for interiors within towns or not. With Bethesda's reputation for its "major" cities actually being really small, I think settlements will feel even smaller if interiors don't have their own separate cell.

As I said in another thread, size doesn't matter. All that matters is density. Travelling 50 miles between each point of interest is completely meaningless if there is nothing to do.

Its getting to about the point where the size of an open world game is becoming irrelevant. Its all about how good a company is at making that world feel like there's interesting enough content. Unless you've got different classes of vehicle that can significantly increase the speed at which you cover distance, can any of us really say we can feel the difference between a world the size of Oblivion and a world the size of Skyrim?

Map size only have meaning if you don't doze off getting from one side of it to the other because there is "stuff" to see and do and watch out for on the trip. If I run on any map, in any game, and I go 10 minutes without ducking, dodging, or talking to something, then the map is too big.

This is true. I liked Gun and LA Noire's worlds on a cosmetic basis but there wasn't too much going on.

I don't think it's that big a deal. Oblivion's game world is the largest of them all, and it's also the least interesting. And Morrowind's the exact opposite, the smallest and most interesting. (although if Viking Fantasy were cooler than Sci-Fi Bugs-&-Ash Fantasy, Skyrim would have Morrowind beat).

As for separate cells vs. one big worldspace, I think that just means smaller spaces like the neighborhood homes in Sanctuary Hills or some of the less significant ruins or buildings. Large interiors like the museum in Concord or a military base I fully expect to be just as large and just as separate as always. Skyrim experimented with more smaller buildings that didn't load separately like some of the Nordic towers or domes, or some ruined houses, and I'm just expecting more things like those in Fallout 4's world.

What I'm excited about is that it looks like there are actually lots of disparate regions, this time. Fallout 3 only really had the DC Ruins, and then the rest of the wasteland looked generally the same beyond the landmarks and settlements. From the footage we've seen so far it looks like we get the ruined cityscapes and deserted wastelands, and Point Lookout-esque swamp regions, and Lonesome Roady death regions like the Glowing Sea, as well as some of that sweet coastal action.