One world is not enough
Sorry for the Bond-esque title here, but this is something that has been bugging me for years and I thought I'd share it.
See, I love writing sci-fi. I love reading sci-fi. I even love sci-fi games although I've never yet found one that encapsulates my idea of what a sci-fi game should be.
And there-in lies the problem that I wish to discuss.
Most sci-fi games have you flying around in a space-ship exploring worlds and fighting bad guys, picking up stuff to trade, selling it for a profit, improving your ship, etc... I think the first real game of this nature was called Elite, back in the 1980s. I think it is actually still running somewhere?
Anyway, the thing I have about these games is the worlds. See, I have, in the past, tried mapping an entire world myself, at various scales. Drawing a map of a planet on a sheet of A4 paper is quite easy. Drawing a map of each city on that planet on a single sheet of A4 is also easy. But if you want to draw maps at "street level" of the entire world, you are talking about several BOXES of A4....
Doing it on computer is no easier - you are simply changing the drawing medium, not reducing the amount of work!
Incidentally, if you need proof of this, just download Google Earth (if you don't already have it). Then find your house, zoom in to an altitude of 300m. Then follow a road, river or railway line for half an hour. I suggest (if you're like me and get absorbed in maps) that you use some sort of timer. Then at the end of half an hour, or whenever you get bored with it, zoom out and see how far away from home you are...
Seriously, if you've reached a border or coastline it was because you live close to it...
THAT is how big (and detailed) our world is.
Oh, and the varying level of detail on the satellite images is interesting. Some places you can zoom in close enough to make out what type of car is parked out side a house, in others you can't even make out where the roads go...
That in itself is quite telling.
My point here is that, to truly simulate a world the size and complexity of our own would require a program the size and power of Google Earth for each world. Now imagine a program that has (say) fifty or so worlds that size...
But then again, why would you want to? One world that size would take your average game player several months to explore just one continent...
Interestingly there are no games like that... Most games that have you exploring a single world are at a very "low" resolution... Sid Mere's Civilisation being the classic example. Imagine playing Civilisation on a map the size of Google Earth, and at that scale? It would take years to play a single campaign! *drools at the thought* Yeah, I'm a strategy game nut, too...
Anyway, breakfast is done, and I've said what I wanted to...
See, I love writing sci-fi. I love reading sci-fi. I even love sci-fi games although I've never yet found one that encapsulates my idea of what a sci-fi game should be.
And there-in lies the problem that I wish to discuss.
Most sci-fi games have you flying around in a space-ship exploring worlds and fighting bad guys, picking up stuff to trade, selling it for a profit, improving your ship, etc... I think the first real game of this nature was called Elite, back in the 1980s. I think it is actually still running somewhere?
Anyway, the thing I have about these games is the worlds. See, I have, in the past, tried mapping an entire world myself, at various scales. Drawing a map of a planet on a sheet of A4 paper is quite easy. Drawing a map of each city on that planet on a single sheet of A4 is also easy. But if you want to draw maps at "street level" of the entire world, you are talking about several BOXES of A4....
Doing it on computer is no easier - you are simply changing the drawing medium, not reducing the amount of work!
Incidentally, if you need proof of this, just download Google Earth (if you don't already have it). Then find your house, zoom in to an altitude of 300m. Then follow a road, river or railway line for half an hour. I suggest (if you're like me and get absorbed in maps) that you use some sort of timer. Then at the end of half an hour, or whenever you get bored with it, zoom out and see how far away from home you are...
Seriously, if you've reached a border or coastline it was because you live close to it...
THAT is how big (and detailed) our world is.
Oh, and the varying level of detail on the satellite images is interesting. Some places you can zoom in close enough to make out what type of car is parked out side a house, in others you can't even make out where the roads go...
That in itself is quite telling.
My point here is that, to truly simulate a world the size and complexity of our own would require a program the size and power of Google Earth for each world. Now imagine a program that has (say) fifty or so worlds that size...
But then again, why would you want to? One world that size would take your average game player several months to explore just one continent...
Interestingly there are no games like that... Most games that have you exploring a single world are at a very "low" resolution... Sid Mere's Civilisation being the classic example. Imagine playing Civilisation on a map the size of Google Earth, and at that scale? It would take years to play a single campaign! *drools at the thought* Yeah, I'm a strategy game nut, too...
Anyway, breakfast is done, and I've said what I wanted to...