To Be Or Not To Be: The Map

Since R4 there has been a debate going on about the new overland map. Some want the old 3D overland view back others like the new sytlistic paper map.
The reason for having the old view back is that the change from third person scene view to overland view doesn't break the immersion that much as the graphical style is the same as the third person scene view and it gives the impression of exploring a living world.
On the other hand the paper map has a unique graphical style.

Maybe a tradeoff would be that if we leave a scene we get the 3D world view with lush forests, animals roaming around etc. and when we zoom out further we get to the paper map.

Something like this:

Zooming out into overland view:
http://www.gamezone.de/screenshots/...the_Avatar_22_SotA_screenshot_Overland_02.jpg

Zooming out even further:
https://s3.amazonaws.com/ksr/assets...1982404417f9a8f69f1a7df3_large.png?1362679950

Zooming further out:
https://d2sx9mrt4zumaq.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Phase11.png

Last zoom:
http://ultimacodex.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/overworldmap-1024x554.jpg

I would really like to hear the opinion of the devs about that suggestion, as some in the community have said that it maybe would be too expensive to create such an option and that it would also take too much time which could be used for other things. But I believe the overworld is very important for the exploration in an RPG and it should be as fun and immersive as possible. Some of us want to definitely spend much time exploring the overworld.

The inspiration comes from the game Age of Wonders 3 which uses such a style and it looks amazing. You can take a look at how this plays out in game in this video at about minute 1:30:

 

The map is still early, but I thought the plan was that the "paper" map was going to work like a fog of war. So for areas you have not visited it would be the paper map and when you visited a location it would change to a more overlooking view. This was one of those things that were discussed after the Dual Scale map idea was outlined.

 

The new plan according to Darkstarr is to have this paper map only without a 3D view of the world but to animate it with some paper waves for ocean, paper fire for cities under siege and a fog of war as well as zooming an panning. Here is the post from Darkstarr:
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/f...verland-map-poll-unofficial.8630/#post-149747

 

Imo the look of the map is irrelevant. The functionality needs to change - a lot. I hope that it will.

 

Yes, absolutely, sure. Though interestingly....that's basically what I thought they originally showed us.....you've just added the switch to paper map when zoomed out all the way (which, ironically, would mean more work than if they had just stuck to the plan...).

Curiously, all the minutia that has been stressed over in the past months suddenly seems unimportant when weighed against something which makes up the actual playability and structure of the game. Let this be a lesson to us all to focus on what really matters.

 

+1, this looks professional and from a game from 2014.. not 1998 This is kind of what i expected after seeing the videos.. I know the guys are playing with it, but to me at least over the R4 weekend, this was the most talked about issue. And so far its the only issue I have read/spoken to people about that is either for or against.. no in the middle

Ruval

 

I don't want to be mean to the devs who developed the new overworld map, but I do frankly hate it.

I really loved what we saw in all of Richard Garriott's prototype videos they had before. Can we please return to that style?

 

I'm a fan of this plan.

 

To the OP, thank you for showing the video. I don't play strategy games, I am very bad at it, my people all get killed off and poor crops die. Anyway I loved the look of the map and how the points of interest were animated.

I know there could be limits to designing some things people want, but I also did not have fun in the prototype map.

Having a map that is suppose to be like a paper map is one thing,

but we are playing a magical game. Imagine that things have magical properties wherever and whenever possible to add them, well in my opinion, lol.

I'm sure I don't know everything, but I look forward to a map that is way more fun to use.

 

Yea, I never liked that because it meant you could never get lost. I would prefer something like in U5, where rather than a fog of war, you have darkness where you can't see, and you don't know exactly where you are in the world. You'd have to reference a map and a sextant.

 

I agree.

It's funny, though... regardless of how the map visual turns out, the map system itself seemed like it might have potential for unique gameplay. As I was clicking around the hexes in R4, I wondered if there could be interesting choices to make, rather than it just being a plain travel screen. I know the developers would like to add additional information to the map - friend locations and showing sieged towns and what-not... but what kinds of things could the player actually do on this screen? Why is it there, from a gameplay perspective? Why does the player slow down as he goes through hills and forests...?

The map seems meaningful, but I can't figure out the meaning.

 

It's the banner representing my avatar I can't stand. It feels like I'm playing a board game the way it slides around. Very jarring.

 

But an Avatar walking around on a pop-up paper map wouldn't work, too. So you could have a cut-out cardboard figure wandering around... But this thought gives me the shivers...

 

What if the avatar was sepia tone?

 

I still stand by if they make the map look nice enough and add enough variety to which hex you could possibly see depending on time of day, date, etc...they could really make it work. Add in some random encounters as you go hex to hex and boom it isn't much differnt then the original ultimas.

 

I simply cannot see how this paper map can replace a living 3D world.
Aside from the exploration aspect the totally different graphical style destroys the immersion. I remember when many developers quit using rendered cinematic sequences because the difference to the game graphics would destroy immersion, but changing from the 3D third person view in scenes to a paper map adds to the immersion? Sorry, I cannot understand that.

 

I personally think it's that bad. I think with the right amount of interactions, like the ones I stated, the map could work quite well.

What you want is more of a seamlessness between the hexes and the actual areas, I think. They could do a it better with the actual map components to make sure they match and make it so the map isn't so sterile. I never said it adds to immersion, but it is understandable, mostly because it allows them to do a lot with the map that they couldn't do if they didn't have a secondary map. If you only spend a small time on that map to move to the next area I fail to see a large amount of immersion breakage.

 

I think that is the point. What is the overland map meant to be?
During the Kickstarter campaign when we were shown the 3D zoomed out view I got the impression that this was a substitution for exploring the world.
We won't get a big world to explore in SotA, we get scenes in which we can roam around. So I thought that they made the map view look alive and like a zoomed out view for us to get the impression and feeling of exploring a world. Similar to Ultima 4 and 5 where the map view also was a zoomed out view and not a map and you got the "illusion" of exploring the world this way. As exoloration for me is a fundamental element of an RPG I thought that this was a good solution when we won't get a monoscale map.
Now it is said that the map should be nothing more than a means to travel from point A to point B, thus eliminating the world exploration aspect from the game. They thought that we would spend only about 10% of the time on the map, just to get from destination to the other - similar to the map of Baldur's Gate. And when you think back to the old Ultimas there was no map on which you just travelled from one destination to the other, you explored the world. So the argument of the devs to make the game more Ultima like by exchanging the world view with a paper map doesn't hold.
Some of us wanted to explore the world in the map view an spent much more time than 10% in this view.
So if you think you can explore the world in a zoomed out 3D view it is breaking the immersion when you suddenly see a paper map and move a flag around on it instead of walking with your Avatar through a lush 3D world.

 

@Lord_Darkmoon

How much time do you think you would spend on the overland map?

What interactivity are you looking for in a map?

And would you be open to Ultima 5 type of limited visibility while exploring the overland map?

-

I think that they can accomplish a lot / specially a lot more if they go with paper style - more functionality and possibly more interactivity .. than with the 3D .. primarily due to time constraints. cash too

Is an isometric overland map out of the question - I would imagine no - from what I have seen, its doable and matches / blends with current art direction but it depends on what the artist feel more comfortable ... in the context of what they feel they can do well with the time

We have not heard from them but I would much rather that they undertake a task that they can do well with time constraints than one where they will not be able to do as good of a job ... this would hurt the game on release

I know you're not a believer but lets see what they come up with after they give it "a little more love" and see what comes out ...

 

There fixed that for ya....