Cities with different districts, slums etc.

While walking around in some of the NPC cities in SotA it occured to me that there are some things missing.

For example different districts like slums, a merchants district, a district for aristocrats etc. Corners where bandits rule and not even guards want to go... Those districts could look different to give the cities more depth and personality.

Also I am missing theatres or museums or maybe a sanitarium or a hospital in bigger cities.

 

I agree, we definitely need to flesh out the cities so they have more of a lived in feel to them.

 

They do have some general districts to them, market/residential/keeps/palaces.

But yea they do need a bit of some texture love. I think its mostly due to the minimal art assets they are working with.
I know the art team really want to go back and work on some of this stuff, but they are focused on creating new stuff needed for quests/combat/animation/items right now.
But in time the level guys def want to go back and add more detail/unique textures.

Think of them doing a painting. They are laying down the base shapes and colors of the entire piece. Then they will go back and add the highlights and finer strokes once they have the bottom layer laid out.

Or a sandcastle, where they just make a big base pile of the general shape. Then slowly carve out the details Scottie seemed to really like that analogy

 

The new ones definately have this. Aerie comes to mind.

But the old ones doesn't.

 

So badly needed. THIS IS TOTALLY THE POINT OF DUAL SCALE MAP SYSTEM.
Multiple entry points.
Connected-ness of zones that actually makes sense.

 

One of the things I'd like for my POT is the ability to label "districts" or "areas" of town so that people have a common vernacular that they can share with each other.

 

Encounters in cities like ambushes in dark streets would be cool, too.

 

I'm more concerned they get the NPCs more varied. The weird clone effect is getting old. Are we ever going to be able to change our vendors? Everyone having generic old man is creepy lol.

 

The problem with this i think is the towns are going to need to be added so fast to account for all the housing lots needed that i fear there will be alot of towns that look very similar.I liked the way aerie and resolute were done. hope this is a sign of things to come. Maybe after release more time might be spent on them to improve the detail. They do need to look different somehow. you do have some very interesting ideas lets hope some of these do eventually appear in game.

 

hopefully they have a lot of towns they've been actively working on for a while. I mean, they don't usually preview any new zones until it is near completion. So they might have a lot of this work already done.

Since we don't know, most of us are just kind of thinking they have to shoestring all these towns together in the next 5 months.

 

They could create the various "districts" by adding advantages/disadvantages to certain areas of town. Things sell for less unless theyre in a "merchant district." Auto open pvp in the slums (or at least, spawn of bandits). Bonus to crafting in the "industrial district." Bonus to focus regen for spending N-many minutes in the "social district." ETC