Message to Developers about Map redesigns...

[Rane]

The current zones just don't offer any sense of place. As I run through the Black Shroud, I find myself trying to pretend that I haven't just run across the same river for the tenth time, and that my character is actually traversing a forest. When I look across a lake toward the far shore, I try to tell myself that my character COULD swim over there and run through the trees if he really wanted to. But I just can't convince myself.

There's something wrong when you have to do that in a modern MMO.

I think it's actually more than just copy/paste, though that's a big problem. Coerthas is marginally better than most zones in my opinion, but even so, when I look across the field there, I don't see a field. I see an unnatural jumble of rocks. Even for what's supposed to be rocky terrain, it just doesn't look right. Given all of the great Final Fantasy worlds Square has produced over the years, how did these areas end up like this?

I get the feeling that these areas really weren't designed from the ground up as actual places. Rather, when I look at the Coerthas main map, I get the feeling that these "areas" are a collection of square-shaped map tiles that have been laid side by side. Some of the tiles were rotated, and some were edited a little, and then they were dropped down alongside each other. Plop enough of them down, do a little more editing, and voila!: a field map.

I'd like to note that this is pure speculation and nothing more. And if the map redesigns are as extensive as it looks like they're going to be, all of this will be a distant memory by the time of the PS3 launch. I hope that's the case, and I really, really appreciate that Yoshida and the dev team are willing to put in the enormous amount of effort that a redesign requires.

I think the current team already knows this, but the new areas need to start with an artistic vision of an actual location. From there, every step of the creation process needs to be directed at making that vision a reality. The goal isn't to make a "map"; it's to breathe life into a world.

[Preypacer]

I get the feeling that these areas really weren't designed from the ground up as actual places. Rather, when I look at the Coerthas main map, I get the feeling that these "areas" are a collection of square-shaped map tiles that have been laid side by side. Some of the tiles were rotated, and some were edited a little, and then they were dropped down alongside each other. Plop enough of them down, do a little more editing, and voila!: a field map.

Bingo. That's exactly what it is and how it was put together. Very intuitive!

In fact if you look closely, you can get an idea of where the tiles meet by looking at the overall design in some places. In Thanalan - especially in the narrow pathways between the regions - there are these arbitrary little "nooks" cut into each side of the corridor. They'll always run either perfectly N to S or E to W. Those are tile margins.

To prove it further, you can go to those spots and, looking closely, you'll see where they meet.. The textures don't match up perfectly and you can see a line running through it. It's not glaring and you have to look closely, 'cause SE did a great job with their texturing to make it as seamless as possible. But it's definitely there.

Funny thing is... FFXI was designed the same way. Only thing different with XI is they clearly were much more careful about how the tiles were created and allowed themselves a lot more variety in how they could be assembled. Hence, you end up with much more interesting and far less repetitive maps in XI. There is repetition... it's a bit more obvious in some places than in others... but it's not nearly as much as XIV.