Zanzoken
Arcane
- Joined
- Dec 16, 2014
- Messages
- 3,585
What is proper map design for an open world cRPG? It's something not a lot of games get right, due to poor content design.
For example, here is a map from World of Warcraft, marked up to show the level of the content (i.e. enemies) in each zone.
The problem with this is it's not going to actually feel like an open world to the player.
If a player tries to explore this world freely, they're going to run into big problems. Imagine being a new character in that central 1-20 zone. Even if you grind your way up to level 20 before venturing out, the only directions you can actually go are north and possibly east. Venture south or west and you'll immediately run into enemies that will effortlessly kill you. So the design is forcing you to move through the zones in a predefined, linear fashion.
Now you might be thinking, okay but that's WoW and we all know WoW is shit. However we can see a similar pattern in Divinity Original Sin, a highly praised cRPG even on the Codex.
Once you get through the starter area and make it the town of Cyseal, you technically have access to the entire area. But because of the way the content is designed, you only have one way that you can actually go, which is northwest toward the lighthouse. All other paths lead to death (for those who don't know, in D:OS enemies that are a level higher than your characters are quite difficult, and a 2+ level gap is virtually insurmountable).
So is this bad? I think it is, because the player is essentially being presented with a false choice. What appears on the surface to be an open world game ends up being effectively on-rails. It's jarring and undercuts the key promise inherent to open world design, which is that you can move freely throughout the world.
What's the answer? Well obviously it's not level scaling, made (in)famous by Oblivion. While that does ostensibly solve the problem of allowing the player to explore, it also completely neuters several key aspects of the cRPG experience -- challenge, character progression, worldbuilding, etc. A case of the cure being worse than the illness.
The real solution lies in smarter map and content design. Instead of a series of zones that flow in a linear fashion from one to the next, designers should go for a broader "hub and spoke" type design that gives the player a lot of initial freedom, but also makes some areas prohibitively dangerous.
Here's a quick (i.e. shitty) mockup I did in Paint to help demonstrate.
See the difference? You can explore a lot of the world from the outset, but there is also a lot of territory that is too challenging for a new character and must be tackled later on.
This is where you use worldbuilding to inform the player's actions and reinforce the content design. For example, why is there a city (Scarytown) out in such a dangerous part of the world? Because that's where all the <insert precious resource here> is and we need it in order to <insert reason here>. People braved the danger and built a fortified town, along with Fort Safepassage at the start of the trail to help guide and protect travelers to and from. This makes the world feel believable and real, because it's in line with how people actually behave.
Even in the safer parts of the world, you can place "pockets of resistance" that only high level characters can withstand. No handholding, just give the player a heads up. NPCs might say "stay away from Fort Dragonslair because the dragons attack all the time and people are killed" and guess what? If you go there as a level 3 character, that's exactly what should happen. If the player doesn't heed the warnings then that's on them. Then later they will go back as a level 20, and actually be able to fight a dragon and win, which feels good. That's the essence of character progression... being able to do shit that you couldn't do before.
Anyway, this post is long enough but I hope that it generates some interesting discussion. The point is, avoid strict zoning and level scaling in open world games, and just design the content in a way that gives the player an appropriate amount of freedom to explore but also presents mid- and late-game challenges. It's difficult but if you have the right design goals in mind it can be done.
For example, here is a map from World of Warcraft, marked up to show the level of the content (i.e. enemies) in each zone.
If a player tries to explore this world freely, they're going to run into big problems. Imagine being a new character in that central 1-20 zone. Even if you grind your way up to level 20 before venturing out, the only directions you can actually go are north and possibly east. Venture south or west and you'll immediately run into enemies that will effortlessly kill you. So the design is forcing you to move through the zones in a predefined, linear fashion.
Now you might be thinking, okay but that's WoW and we all know WoW is shit. However we can see a similar pattern in Divinity Original Sin, a highly praised cRPG even on the Codex.
So is this bad? I think it is, because the player is essentially being presented with a false choice. What appears on the surface to be an open world game ends up being effectively on-rails. It's jarring and undercuts the key promise inherent to open world design, which is that you can move freely throughout the world.
What's the answer? Well obviously it's not level scaling, made (in)famous by Oblivion. While that does ostensibly solve the problem of allowing the player to explore, it also completely neuters several key aspects of the cRPG experience -- challenge, character progression, worldbuilding, etc. A case of the cure being worse than the illness.
The real solution lies in smarter map and content design. Instead of a series of zones that flow in a linear fashion from one to the next, designers should go for a broader "hub and spoke" type design that gives the player a lot of initial freedom, but also makes some areas prohibitively dangerous.
Here's a quick (i.e. shitty) mockup I did in Paint to help demonstrate.
This is where you use worldbuilding to inform the player's actions and reinforce the content design. For example, why is there a city (Scarytown) out in such a dangerous part of the world? Because that's where all the <insert precious resource here> is and we need it in order to <insert reason here>. People braved the danger and built a fortified town, along with Fort Safepassage at the start of the trail to help guide and protect travelers to and from. This makes the world feel believable and real, because it's in line with how people actually behave.
Even in the safer parts of the world, you can place "pockets of resistance" that only high level characters can withstand. No handholding, just give the player a heads up. NPCs might say "stay away from Fort Dragonslair because the dragons attack all the time and people are killed" and guess what? If you go there as a level 3 character, that's exactly what should happen. If the player doesn't heed the warnings then that's on them. Then later they will go back as a level 20, and actually be able to fight a dragon and win, which feels good. That's the essence of character progression... being able to do shit that you couldn't do before.
Anyway, this post is long enough but I hope that it generates some interesting discussion. The point is, avoid strict zoning and level scaling in open world games, and just design the content in a way that gives the player an appropriate amount of freedom to explore but also presents mid- and late-game challenges. It's difficult but if you have the right design goals in mind it can be done.