Single Open World or Partitioned?

[meinza]

I prefer sector, IMO much accessible to many user that didn't have massive computing power, given the single open world and sector have the same exact detail environment.

 

[SigilFey]

...assuming the engine is indeed replaced, the question is what would the new engine be...?

I really don't think they need a "new engine". Let me state something clearly (just to make myself and my stance clear): the Gamebryo / Creation Engine is, like, the single greatest thing to hit CRPG gaming since the idea of a computer RPG. Not that other engines haven't done certain things much better since, but it's basically the granddaddy of fully 3D, open-world gameplay.

Basically, it's a game-building template. Everything you can imagine is already there (literally) in some form. Getting it to work, though...that's a different bag of narwhals.

The issue I have is that...oh...back in 2-0-0-6, when I bought Oblivion, 1.0, retail...there was...this bug. See...if I wandered into an area where distant LoD (like a tall tower ruin on the horizon) needed to be replaced with closer, more detailed LoD...it...just...wouldn't happen. The model would vanish out of the world, and I would amble forward, at a "Bethesda Walk" (read: dragging myself forward by my lips)...until the whole...tower-fort...complex...spawned into the world 2 FEET in front of my face.

The last time I encountered this, particular issue was...(frantically searches his database)...in...FALLOUT FRICKIN' 4. Back Bay Area. Near Trinity Tower.

2017 - 2006 = 11. 11 years. Hold on...highlighting...

11 @#$%!NG YEARS.

The same bug has persisted for eleven (11), bleep-a-doodle years. Over five (5) titles.

There is...a problem here.

Bethesda needs to bring their engine current with the potential of modern hardware. I would be fine with new bugs (and new bugs will always arise when trying new things). But basically, the Creation Engine is Gamebryo with strobe lights duct-taped all over it and several layers of cosmetic surgery applied. Time to do the job properly.

The idea of Gamebryo is PHENOMENAL. It needs its guts rearranged for the modern world. But, I have come to accept that we're probably never going to see that.

That would be a huge city, actually, Novigrad in TW3 is probably not even one square mile. On this map, a diagonal line from the NW corner to SE would be very roughly 10 km, I think.

Good point. I got lost in Novigrad, uhm, several times. During my last playthrough. This is my 5th playthrough. Cities probably don't need to be bigger than Novigrad. (But if they were...I would LOVE that. Being able to get lost in individual districts? aaaAAARRRGGGHHHhhhaaahhh...)

Random non-interactable civilians on the streets do not really need to be persistent...

They would need to be persistent to take the load off the CPU and pre-cache each region into RAM, ensuring the most efficient streaming of "load areas" within that cached region. This is clearly up for debate. I am personally of the mindset that I would rather have longer initial load-times rather than experience "stutter" or "lag" during play. So, if NPCs were pre-configured to the nuance, that would, unfortunately, have to be pre-cached. Longer load times. (Realistically, I think we're looking at about 1-2 minutes of real time between areas given modern specs.) The trade-off is that, if the region happens to experience a "random event" (e.g. dragon / vampire / Wild Hunt / Stormcloak / Empire / etc. attack)...the response would be seamless and instantaneous. You would be able to hear a rumble of discord from another area, carried on the breeze. People around you would start reacting in real-time, believably. Pausing. Listening. Staring to titter among themselves. They would break off into groups, gather their children, run for cover, ask guards what was going on...seamlessly.

Because it had already been loaded into memory.

But that would require, probably, more than 1 minute for high-end systems...maybe more than 2 minutes for low end systems...every time you changed between most areas.

If not, NPCs could have to be streamed according to an algorithm. They would be given randomized names, clothing, etc., and there would be no persistence between loads. This massively shortens load times, but also means that they would function exactly like "extras" in GTA, Assassin's Creed, etc. There would be no defined "community", just lots of bodies randomly assigned idles.

It's a hard sell. I'd be asking players to trust me that the trade-off is worth it. But I believe it would be. Once a player got a taste of their first large-scale event...I think they'd jump for joy at the execution.

And, as time / technology got on...the inconveniences would disappear. Transitions would become instantaneous...and NEW players would be far more prone to pick this "old" game up.

Or it can be done in a mixed way, pedestrians are not persistent, but NPCs inside buildings are remembered.

...and this is a great suggestion. Not sure. Would it be beneficial to have a "core" of established NPCs...and random NPCs that you meet only occasionally as they wander the streets. Perhaps...the best of both worlds?

Well, in this case, you'd probably be able to "interact" with them in that you press E on them and they give some random line of dialogue.

It would be expected, I guess. Most importantly, I would occasionally have NPCs approach you. (For a reason, not just spewing random dialogue if you walk into their detection range.) Based on your class / skill / rank, various NPCs would be more / less likely to engage you for various purposes.

So...

I'm a level 12 Thief, known as a wanted man throughout this area. NPC "tough guys" try to interact with me (at random!). When they start "talking shit", I'm given the option of staring them down...inviting combat. Or drawing a weapon with a flourish...discouraging combat. Or uttering a snarky response...encouraging a dialogue duel. Or whistling for "unexpected allies"...creating a faction-specific resolution. Or doing some clever sleight of hand move to dazzle them...resulting in a skill-based outcome.

Random interactions like this should be a chance for the player to further establish their characters.

Additionally, all houses (In his suggestion) would be enterable, just procedurally generated, but persistent.

Yup. More or less like Morrowind / Oblivion / Fallout 3 / Skyrim / Fallout 4...just multiplied many times and not so carefully hand-crafted.

One key thing is the AI's daily schedule. This is a huge part of Bethesda RPGs. It's not super in-depth, but they have jobs, they relax at the inn, sleep/eat at home, etc. - this is all important stuff. The game indeed only needs to process stuff in a certain visible radius around the player, but it's still something to consider. Working in existing elements of Bethesda games into this new hypothetical system would go a long way towards making the environments more believable and fun.

PRECISELY what I want to improve.

I want to rob a warehouse. I wander into it at 4:00 am...and I encounter one, sleepy but dangerous-looking guard ready to end his shift. If I show up at 2:00 pm, I get 5 security guards on pretty high alert. They're not looking for trouble...but they're not looking to negotiate either. If I arrive at 9:00 pm, there are two guards. One is young, and really serious about the job. The other is a 50+, retired vet of the military, jaded beyond belief and willing to hand over anything for the right sum.

How do I play this...?

Set dressing NPCs (NPCs without schedules or homes) are fine in games like Assassin's Creed, but they are less effective in a Bethesda rpg, for the reasons I've stated (having enterable houses, for example).

No NPCs without homes. All NPCs are final. If someone dies...they're gone forever. How to deal with that loss...positively or negatively...is up to the player. I'd also have a light system "burying the dead". If people die in an attack, you'll find funeral services, new graves, pyres being built after the battle. If a whole family is wiped out, their house gets boarded up and abandoned. That sort of thing. Conversely, if their homes are burned in a battle or something, they appear as beggars on the street, maybe tents and camps of squatters start to appear outside the walls of the city, a community of impoverished begin to inhabit the sewers, etc. Something that reflects the impact of events.

One solution would be to build off of what you suggested at the end - not only are pedestrians inside buildings remembered, but they have AI. They go to the inn, you can see them around town, etc (again only if they are in a certain radius). We could say at least 1 NPC for each accessible building (Which would be most of them, probably), but you can still have plenty of "ignorable" NPCs just milling about the city that are not remembered, and don't have AI schedules.

One thing that could be really neat is having player-activated AI/personality packages...[marriages]

Yep! Spot on. That's kind of what I would try to do procedurally, then tweak. So, I create a leveled list of all possible NPCs, looks, clothing, jobs, possible schedules, etc. The system generates everything. Populates houses, creates families, schedules, etc. Then, it's just a matter of wandering around in-game and looking for "oddities" and fixing those particular NPCs. I think it would be necessary to have everything repeat according to a 24 hour clock, though. (Just to keep things reasonable and avoid bugs.)

So, you could show up at a house. At 6:00 am, the husband leaves. The kid runs off for lessons at 7:00, comes back at 3:00. Wife goes to the market at 8:00-2:00. If I follow the husband around, he can be found hauling crates at the docks between 7:00-12:00. He sits in a group of ~20 other workers and has lunch from 12:00-1:00. Hauls crates again between 1:00-5:00. Goes to a tavern between 5:00 to 7:00. Ambles home half-drunk at 7:00. Can be found passed out in his bed between 8:00 pm and 6:00 am. (But that would repeat every day.)

 

[Suhiira]

No NPCs without homes. All NPCs are final. If someone dies...they're gone forever. How to deal with that loss...positively or negatively...is up to the player. I'd also have a light system "burying the dead". If people die in an attack, you'll find funeral services, new graves, pyres being built after the battle. If a whole family is wiped out, their house gets boarded up and abandoned. That sort of thing. Conversely, if their homes are burned in a battle or something, they appear as beggars on the street, maybe tents and camps of squatters start to appear outside the walls of the city, a community of impoverished begin to inhabit the sewers, etc. Something that reflects the impact of events.

This would be fantastic ... if a pain-in-the-ass to implement.

While randomly generated NPCs would probably reduce load times and may (may, not necessarily will) reduce the amount of CPU time needed to deal with them they'll of course lack any consistency and "permanence". I'd rather see the same wino on the same street corner every day then suddenly notice he's missing (if I'm observant as a player) and have the option to investigate then have totally meaningless random winos all over the city. Because that's what you get with randomly generated NPCs, they're ultimately meaningless, just eye candy.

 

[metalmaniac21]

Being able to get lost in individual districts? aaaAAARRRGGGHHHhhhaaahhh...)

More like "REEEEEEEEEEEEE WHY DOES THIS GAME NOT PLAY ITSELF I'M LOST AGAIN" (c) Polytaku journo

 

[SigilFey]

I'd rather see the same wino on the same street corner every day then suddenly notice he's missing (if I'm observant as a player) and have the option to investigate then have totally meaningless random winos all over the city. Because that's what you get with randomly generated NPCs, they're ultimately meaningless, just eye candy.

That's a good way of expressing what I mean by a sense of "community". Everyone has their place, and as things change, players notice. It would be neat to have NPCs actually be a part of events in the world, as well. The player could start getting occasional waves or familiar nods from NPCs they've visited numerous times. Maybe you could hire NPCs if you belong to the same guilds or factions. If a war breaks out, the actual NPCs in the city form the in-game army. You'd literally be fighting alongside people you see on the street every day.

Not sure if would be that difficult to implement. Just time-consuming. It's greatly simplifying the way Beth NPCs work now while significantly bumping up the number.

More like "REEEEEEEEEEEEE WHY DOES THIS GAME NOT PLAY ITSELF I'M LOST AGAIN" (c) Polytaku journo

Opens map. Selects fast-travel destination. It's giving players the right to get hopelessly lost.

 

[Lisbeth_Salander]

No NPCs without homes. All NPCs are final. If someone dies...they're gone forever. How to deal with that loss...positively or negatively...is up to the player. I'd also have a light system "burying the dead". If people die in an attack, you'll find funeral services, new graves, pyres being built after the battle. If a whole family is wiped out, their house gets boarded up and abandoned. That sort of thing. Conversely, if their homes are burned in a battle or something, they appear as beggars on the street, maybe tents and camps of squatters start to appear outside the walls of the city, a community of impoverished begin to inhabit the sewers, etc. Something that reflects the impact of events.

Maybe it would be cool. But, wouldn't it go against the fact that a huge city like Night City probably has millions of civilians and tourists? To make these deaths significant to the player, he should kill hundreds of thousands of Npcs no? Or does this rule apply only to middly important npcs like shop owners?

 

[Decatonkeil]

Why not. The alternative is a miniature version of the actual city that might still be huge, but it'd have nothing or very little to do in it but walk/drive through.

I mean, what's the point of showing off everything that has no point of being shown? Some things of course come naturally and are unavoidable, but... There's a multimillion denizen metropolis to render. Does the player really need to be able to touch and count every building in it (just for the sake of being able to)?

Exactly. This is a fairly large modern city not a midevil town, the scale is multiple orders of magnitude larger and there's no practical way, or need, to flesh out everything because 90% of it would be boring as hell ... you've seen one run-down studio apartment you've seen them all.

That won't do it for me. I'd be happy to have any good cyberpunk game, so I'd have to take it, but not what I'd ideally have. I'd rather have a smaller city setting, in the vein of GTA's typical city recreations that you can roam freely than a set of "greatest hits" cage scenarios that you can access only through fast travel mediums or tunnels. Give me something to have me not stop so much to notice. The best way for the game not to have me waste my time on samey apartments is through gameplay. What makes those events tedious is Fallout 3 type of design, where you feel like you have to enter every single ruin and they're a nightmare to navigate. If you make me feel, through gameplay, that I don't have to just grind or scavenge, I won't be wasting time.

 

[Garrison72]

In the early promo stuff, a poster on their office wall that we had to blow up and examine, it was described as multi-region. I prefer this to one huge map since in TW3 each region was more than big enough to roam freely.

 

[kofeiiniturpa]

I'd rather have a smaller city setting, in the vein of GTA's typical city recreations that you can roam freely than a set of "greatest hits" cage scenarios that you can access only through fast travel mediums or tunnels.

It's a matter of taste then. I like RPG's to have interactivity, reactivity and the illusion of scale over (in my mind pointless) spaciousness and the eventual realization of miniaturization, and I'd gladly sacrifice the latter for the former without second thoughts.

 

[Snowflakez]

It's a matter of taste then. I like RPG's to have interactivity, reactivity and the illusion of scale over (in my mind pointless) spaciousness and the eventual realization of miniaturization, and I'd gladly sacrifice the latter for the former without second thoughts.

I partially agree here, though I'm curious what specifically you're asking for from the game. Is there another game that has what you're looking for that you could give us for reference?

Personally, I don't want the game to be Dragon Age: Origins where you have super tiny areas to run about and complete quests, but I'm also not in favor of having the entire city compressed to an unrealistic degree like in GTA V. I think a partitioned world could help with this.

I think the Witcher 3's Novigrad - while not as big as an actual medieval city, perhaps - felt about right. The buildings were tall, interiors were realistic in scale (And many buildings could actually be entered) and fit their outer appearances, and the city just felt large. Even Oxenfurt felt decently-sized, though it was even smaller IIRC. That said, it still only took a few minutes to run from one side of the city to the other, if that, so it was still quite compressed.

SigilFey had a really cool idea for solving this problem in a medieval setting, though it's tough to say how it would translate over to a futuristic world like 2077. Population sizes in a place like Night City are massive, and -- AFAIK -- he was specifically talking about his proposed system in the context of a medieval world, where it might be much more do-able.

 

[kofeiiniturpa]

I'm curious what specifically you're asking for from the game. Is there another game that has what you're looking for that you could give us for reference?

There is no game (that I know of) that would have exactly what I'm asking for.

I suppose if you...
- took DX:MD and increased the hub sizes roughly around 5-10 fold (that's just a spat out number, though, what I mean is that there'd be room to roam around and find things out and explore and interact much more than there is in DX:MD),
- made the train/taxi/bus travel an interactive scene (talk with people, get info, get missions, encounter a scene, make a scene, look at the passing vistas from the windows, take a nap and skip it all...),
- gave it the sort of free overland travel system (on foot, or on vehicle) like Fallout (1&2) that would render a randomly generated scene based on the location in the map if you decided to (or were forced to) stop outside a hub,
...it would be pretty close.

 

[Snowflakez]

There is no game (that I know of) that would have exactly what I'm asking for.

I suppose if you...
- took DX:MD and increased the hub sizes roughly around 5-10 fold (that's just a spat out number, though, what I mean is that there'd be room to roam around and find things out and explore and interact much more than there is in DX:MD),
- made the train/taxi/bus travel an interactive scene (talk with people, get info, get missions, encounter a scene, make a scene, look at the passing vistas from the windows, take a nap and skip it all...),
- gave it the sort of free overland travel system (on foot, or on vehicle) like Fallout (1&2) that would render a randomly generated scene based on the location in the map if you decided to (or were forced to) stop outside a hub,
...it would be pretty close.

So in this case, the city districts might be the "hubs", and that highway you mentioned once (I think?) would be the "overland travel system"?

Just trying to understand better.

 

[kofeiiniturpa]

So in this case, the city districts might be the "hubs", and that highway you mentioned once (I think?) would be the "overland travel system"?

Yes.

The "highway" thing was a sort of "do it manually if you wish" kind of thing to answer to the "but I want to drive cars, why can't I, GTA allows me to..." pleas that'd no doubt be there if the game did not allow it, but I do prefer what I said here if those two were not compatible (for some reason).

 

[Rawls]

I suppose if you... - took DX:MD and increased the hub sizes roughly around 5-10 fold (that's just a spat out number, though, what I mean is that there'd be room to roam around and find things out and explore and interact much more than there is in DX:MD), - made the train/taxi/bus travel an interactive scene (talk with people, get info, get missions, encounter a scene, make a scene, look at the passing vistas from the windows, take a nap and skip it all...), - gave it the sort of free overland travel system (on foot, or on vehicle) like Fallout (1&2) that would render a randomly generated scene based on the location in the map if you decided to (or were forced to) stop outside a hub, ...it would be pretty close.

I'd be happy with that. Not ideal IMO, but more than satisfactory.

 

[Mefris]

[...]- took DX:MD and increased the hub sizes roughly around 5-10 fold (that's just a spat out number, though, what I mean is that there'd be room to roam around and find things out and explore and interact much more than there is in DX:MD)[...]

More like 20 or even 30 fold.Most of the districts in Prague barely hit the square killometer mark.They felt bigger because there were a lot of layers to each hub area (which I liked alot).If CP2077 would have a map like you are describing then I think each area/hub should be around 20 square killometers at least (for reference that's about half the size of Skyrim's map) and have multiple layers.It wouldn't be as open as The Witcher 3 but the multilayered aspect would help with that a great deal.

 

[Guest 4149880]

It's a matter of taste then. I like RPG's to have interactivity, reactivity and the illusion of scale over (in my mind pointless) spaciousness and the eventual realization of miniaturization, and I'd gladly sacrifice the latter for the former without second thoughts.

Yes, its far better to have a sensibly sized world full of density and detail then a massive open world full of essentially nothing and filler areas. Games that are massive and you clearly see they've built the size of the map first and attempted to fill it up with useless clutter after. When details of 2077 being, I think they said 4 times bigger then Witcher 3 and dlc combined? Has me worried.

 

[Snowflakez]

Yes, its far better to have a sensibly sized world full of density and detail then a massive open world full of essentially nothing and filler areas. Games that are massive and you clearly see they've built the size of the map first and attempted to fill it up with useless clutter after. When details of 2077 being, I think they said 4 times bigger then Witcher 3 and dlc combined? Has me worried.

Were they referring to map scale or the scope of the game itself? Because those are two very, very different things. I'm assuming the latter, because I don't think there's much of value to be gained by making a map 4 times bigger than the Witcher 3 and it's DLC combined... at all. It was plenty big enough as is, and a lot of people felt it was too big (Not me, personally).

Not saying it won't happen, but it'd sure be a weird move. It just means extra time spent on designing stuff that is relatively pointless. I'd tthink CDPR would be a bit smarter than that.

Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of big open worlds. But the Witcher 3's size was fine, we don't need to go AC:Origins level of open world here...

 

[kofeiiniturpa]

I'd be happy with that. Not ideal IMO, but more than satisfactory.

What'd you think would be ideal?

More like 20 or even 30 fold. Most of the districts in Prague barely hit the square killometer mark.

That'd be big, I don't think I'd go quite that far. 10 or 15 times the size would be quite big already if you add in verticality and more interiors. And I would bet there'd be more than four of those hubs. DX only showed what was relevant to its storyline, Cyberpunk should not have that problem.

When details of 2077 being, I think they said 4 times bigger then Witcher 3 and dlc combined? Has me worried.

Likewise. I didn't like the sound of that at all and I can only hope they didn't mean it as in "corner to corner" map size or even two maps combined.

There is the thing, though, that it's an urban environment. There's no forests or open fields and buildings take up most of the space, so the amount of movement space (on the ground) might actually be smaller inspite the map being bigger. That doesn't alleviate the concern, though, nor the desire for hub design over big huge map(s), it's just a thought.

 

[Mefris]

That'd be big, I don't think I'd go quite that far. 10 or 15 times the size would be quite big already if you add in verticality and more interiors. And I would bet there'd be more than four of those hubs. DX only showed what was relevant to its storyline, Cyberpunk should not have that problem.

Not really.If the game had,let's say,10 regions/hubs/whathaveyous then the total would be 200 square kilometers and that's about the same size as the Witcher 3.

 

[kofeiiniturpa]

Not really.If the game had,let's say,10 regions/hubs/whathaveyous then the total would be 200 square kilometers and that's about the same size as the Witcher 3.

Plus the verticality. There might well be a need to climb up to an elevated area that works quite the same as the lower level (and both are still part of the same hub you're in).

I don't really think it needs to be as big 'in sheer size' as the Witcher 3. More important than the physical mileage is what all you can do there and what ways the areas are designed to respond to what you do.