Bigger, emptier, but faster? Or smaller, denser, but slower?

[NotAI]

Goku supersaiyan he fly vroom vroom

But if so, then small map gey

Now realistic distances needed?

Do you enjoy empty grassy fields, beautiful but empty forests, amazing rivers as long and wide as the amazon, with nothing there, just tall grass, water, trees, some birds, if the PC always drives a motorbike at 300 km/h for every quest, and gets from one side an empty place to another in only a few seconds?

Suppose time spent going from location with stuff to location with stuff is identical to as if the PC walked, as usual, but the PC doesn't walk. He rides. He flies. It means a lot of empty space, which helps the view, but does anything really change, for you?

I, for one, hate empty places in games, but that's maybe because almost every game that has large distances and empty regions forces the PC to walk for half an hour through every pointless emptiness and eye-candy spot (Ubisoft? Huzzah!), even games with cars and planes; they are bigger, emptier, and also slower... What if games didn't do that, but picked?

[Tadeusz]

If it's the same distance I guess it doesn't matter much but I'd still prefer smaller areas because of less disk space and more developer time to actually fill this space.

[maidenhaver]

I enjoy a mission structure. Open worlds aren't so appealing to me, but I would choose one with dense areas, and areas with nothing but wilderness. There should be places where nothing happens, and the player can take in the setting, or fool around without aggroing monsters and npcs.

[Vergil]

This is basically just Val's thread again

[asf]

you can fly in frontier over infnite procgen land, and it is boring

[Tangerine]

This is basically just Val's thread again

At least Val's post is thought out instead of this stream-of-consciousness posting.

[Norfleet]

Goku supersaiyan he fly vroom vroom

But if so, then small map gey

Now realistic distances needed?

This is why I measure game distances in terms of time instead of units of distance. Because ultimately, the size of a world is determined by how long it takes to cross it, and whether the world is traversed by a character on foot or a spaceship's hyperdrive isn't important, if the end result is that the world is still maybe 5 minutes across.

Density, therefore, derives similarly from this: How long does it take me to trip over something that wasn't my intended destination?

So it comes down to this: What is the purpose of your game's space? Is it merely decorative, so that everything isn't just piled in one place and looks prettier than a menu when the player clicks to fast-travel? Or is there actual strategic value to it, such that where things are actually somehow matters?

[Val the Moofia Boss]

It depends.

I think in some games, it can be used to immerse the player if the intent is that the player is not supposed to have a lot of pressing objectives. For example, Shadow of the Colossus, ARMA, FF11, etc, where a large part of the gameplay experience is just travelling to the place and sucking in the sights and the smells. I think it is especially effective at conveying the idea that you are way out in the unpopulated wilderness alone. There is no civilization out here, and you are the only man in the world. That can be really atmospheric. However, those games are constructed around those long distances, as the player does not have a lot of objectives that are thinking about trying to complete. In a traditional RPG where you acquire a bunch of sidequests and you are trying to knock them all out at once, then the long distances would become an annoyance.