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Map size?
DeCeaseD1
Member Posts: 29
in Guild Wars 2
Can anyone confirm or does anyone know that the size of the map in the beta is the actual size that will be in game on release.. ? I figured that during the beta the map would be limited in regards to what was visible, because I noticed when looking around the map that I didn't see any zones that were labelled any higher than level 40-ish. But perhaps the fact of the matter being that they don't label levels for areas outside of that? I would just really be in awe to find out that the map is actually two times the size of what was already shown, considering how huge and highly detailed things were..
Comments
Not all the zones were labelled on the map in the beta, because they weren't in the beta. So if you are asking if there will be more zones then, yes, there will be lots more zones than what you saw on map in beta. The level 30+ zones are also much bigger, some are more than twice the size of the starter zones.
As for the map 'image' I think its the full one. But it also has an upper and lower tier if you noticed. So there may well be a lot more to it.
This is what is supposed to be there are launch:
http://www.guildwars2junkies.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Gw2-World-Map-Labeled.jpg
I'm unsure about this map though because according to that there is only 1 zone that covers levels 25-30. Only one level 80 zone worries me as well. how packed is that zone going to be 2 months down the line? There needs to be more options for 80.
and I'd expect more to come in updates. There is no doubt in my mind that the crystal desert and ring of fire areas will make an appearance since they were key areas in GW1.
then there's the other 2 continents from the other GW1 campaigns as a possibility for the future.
This is a good video of the full 'planet' map that they have to work with. According to this, what is shown as the main map in GW2 is only a fraction of world.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdyAXWj3YAM
Not sure how complete that map is, it's missing the Sylvari starting area for one.
It's a level 30-40 zone. Not a level 60 zone.
Linky!
I'd say the to total available landmass at release is at least as big as WoW at release, if not bigger.
Definitely much bigger than Rift or TSW, and also bigger than SWTOR (and also way less linear).
Keep in mind that the underground is also much more varied than in games like WoW were almost every cave is a carbon copy of the others.
Respect, walk
Are you talkin' to me? Are you talkin' to me?
- PANTERA at HELLFEST 2023
It ddn't show the level ranges for the rest of zones because they were not in the beta. Those titles and ranges will be an overlay and not part of the actual image file so they can add and remove them as they please.
But, yes, that map is the release map. At release you will be able to see the level ranges for every zone on the map immediately, unless they change it without us knowing.
This one is pretty cool:
http://www.guildwarsinsider.com/backend/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/unfoggedmap.jpg
This one is cooler. :P
Thank you for that.
That's one's freaking awesome.
Very rough guess on scaling, 24km x 18km with about 35% terrain coverage*. Average zone looks to be 2km x 3km (or 3x2).
* based on "cooler" map above and judging scale by width of road. Margin of error is very high, could be +/- 50% depending on how badly I guessed.
As The Korrigan points out, it's definitely a bigger game that TSW, though I'm not sure that TOR is really as small as it seems. I'm most familiar with WoW's size as a point of reference.
By the base running speed method I believe players have found that Queensdale is roughly equivalent to Elwynn Forest in WoW; so in terms of "time-space" where base running speed is like the speed of light -- constant in all frames of reference -- GW2 and WoW zones are comparable in size.
However, I don't know that people have had enogh time to test yet, but I believe GW2's effective running speed is somewhat faster than WoW's, so there is more actual content in the same "time-space." From my own personal experience in BWE2 it seemed like I spent about twice as much time clearing a GW2 zone than I would an average WoW zone, but some of that had to be attributed to the slower kill rate because of the relative difficulty and not the size of the zone.
Of course, it's possible to PvP in WoW's zones but not in GW2s, so WoW zones do offfer additional potential gameplay in that respect. GW2, however, has the big WvWvW map that WoW doesn't.
GW2 zones also utilize quite a bit more of their space (though people conveniently forget that WoW also has caves and explorable underwater areas).
In some cases GW2 is truly traversable at multiple levels, like Rata Sum, so they get more out of the same space in those cases as well.
WoW launched with 34 zones. GW2 will launch with 25.
Overall they seem fairly comparable to me; I'd need to see substantial hard evidence supporting a claim that "GW2 is much bigger" before I'd believe it. Words are wind.
thats an interseting map. I can see that the tengu city surrounded by its wall is blacked out, so its not in-game yet. I had been wondering about that.
But I saw someone link another map that showed literally the whole world (greyed out) with the parts that are in-game colored in. The whole world (planet) is ginromous.
Neat, two questions though.
How big are these zones? Compared to say...... Damn it.. Alright compared to your standard WoW zone lol.
Is the transition from one zone to another seamless I.E no annoying loading screens or anything?
Just fixing a few inacurate details. I agree with you overall - GW2 over the ground is approx. the size of Azeroth at release, if you include both continents of course and if you exclude the 4 huge WvWvW areas in GW2. But if you include underground areas which are all unique and not copy/paste of yeti caves, GW2 is larger than Azeroth in 2004.
Respect, walk
Are you talkin' to me? Are you talkin' to me?
- PANTERA at HELLFEST 2023
I can't tell you how big they are in comparison to WoW, welp because I don't have too much experience with the game because I've never liked it that much. But from what i've seen in GW2, the zones are pretty damn huge, plus consider that fact that within the zones there's a HUGE amount of content to indulge the players.
In regards to your second question, no the areas aren't seemless.. but with consideration of the size of the areas, hitting those loading screens takes a bit, plus they don't take very long to load on top of that. :P
Sadly, no, there is a loading screen between zones (however, it's a short one. Usually only takes 1-3 seconds to load), but it's not seamless.
That said, they do a very good job of having a natural progression from zone to zone (something WoW did very well). You don't really get this 'okay, now this is the snow zone, this is the desert zone, etc. etc.' feel that you get from a lot of other games (like SWTOR). The jungles naturally start to change from zone to zone gradually, and I haven't seen any abrupt changes from 1 zone to another.
Furthermore, in terms of size they seem roughly equal to the larger zones WoW had (like barrens). It's really difficult to talk about 3d maps in terms of physical scale (because it's all relative), which is why most people talk about it in terms of travel time. Last estimate I saw was that it took ~7 minutes to run from one corner of a map to the opposite corner. This will of course vary from map to map, but the average sized map is about that big.
The average map seems roughly the size of one of WoW's barrens, but much more dense in terms of content.
Loading screens suck so bad, nothing breaks immersion more than that.
I too would of preferred a seamless zones but the zones themselves are so immersive I can overlook it. I also was very immersed in EQ1 when that was first released which also featured loading between zones.
I angered the clerk in a clothing shop today. She asked me what size I was and I said actual, because I am not to scale. I like vending machines 'cause snacks are better when they fall. If I buy a candy bar at a store, oftentimes, I will drop it... so that it achieves its maximum flavor potential. --Mitch Hedberg
Same here - I'm usually strictly "anti-zone" in the general game world of a MMO, but in GW2 it doesn't hurt immersion.
Respect, walk
Are you talkin' to me? Are you talkin' to me?
- PANTERA at HELLFEST 2023
Here is that map more up to date with names, of course not all up to date.. still havent found a better version of this.
Think its weird and maybe a bit lazy that ALL zones are square or rectangular.