map scale

[Uaine]

Does anyone know what scale the Fallout 3 map uses? It seems a lot smaller than 1:1, maybe even smaller than 1:10.

If one wanted to apply a proper 1:1 scale to DC, do you think it would be easier to make the map bigger to match the scale of the characters, or to make the characters smaller to match the scale of the map? I know that this would be a very big task either way, but it completely wrecks immersion to walk from one side of the map to the other in practically no time.

 

[Tagaziel]

1:60

 

[gregor_y]

Problem is theres a lot empty space already....dont see reason for more i think its perfectly balanced...i would just want more random encounters ruring travel and fast travel....

 

[Uaine]

Problem is theres a lot empty space already....dont see reason for more i think its perfectly balanced...i would just want more random encounters ruring travel and fast travel....

Empty space is what a "wasteland" is all about.

My long term hope is for a good map-travel system to be built in to the game, with random encounters. But for me, the whole reason to use map travel isn't even there if I can just walk halfway across the map in five minutes.

And like I said in the first post, it really does wreck immersion. That nuclear bomb in Megaton is a mere stone's throw away from Tenpenny Tower. Raiders and slavers camp out mere minutes from where people live. And, VaultTec apparently decided to put however many vaults in an area that amounts to what, maybe five square miles? This is just scratching the surface of my problems with the scale.

Exploration feels empty with the map scaled as it is. This is supposed to be a wasteland, but the population density is ridiculously high. As long as a properly-scaled map was accompanied by a decent map-travel system, I think it would be a real improvement.

 

[gregor_y]

This is supposed to be a wasteland, but the population density is ridiculously high.

LOL...high population density...biggest city is what? rivet city and how many people are living there 50? no offence but fucking play the game before you say anything...

My long term hope is for a good map-travel system to be built in to the game, with random encounters. But for me, the whole reason to use map travel isn't even there if I can just walk halfway across the map in five minutes.

Again you want bigger map right? and fast travel...so you can travel from 1 end to secound in matter of secounds...

I personaly dident use fast travel at begining but in middle of game i was so fucking bored i pressed this button all the time so i dont care about scale...

 

[Uaine]

1:60

Really? That seems too small. Are you maybe thinking of the time scale? (I've read that time scale is 1:30). Just comparing the Fallout 3 map to Google Maps, it seems to me that the Fallout map represents an an area of about 14x14 miles. At 1:60 scale, the map would be only about a quarter mile across.

This is supposed to be a wasteland, but the population density is ridiculously high.

LOL...high population density...biggest city is what? rivet city and how many people are living there 50? no offence but fucking play the game before you say anything...

Oh, I've played the game, but I didn't lose my sense of scale while doing so. When I think of population density, I'm considering every pre-spawned (non-random) human, mutant, and non-feral ghoul. You have to count all those pre-spawned raider outposts. mutant outposts, etc.

I think it would be conservative to estimate that number at least 1000. Probably a lot more. I realize that each settlement probably doesn't have more than 50 actors. But, there are so many of them crammed so close together. Pick any spot on the map and you can probably find someone within a 2-3 minute walk to either talk with or shoot at. That doesn't feel anything like what a wasteland ought to be.

 

[MutantDwarf]

Really? That seems too small. Are you maybe thinking of the time scale? (I've read that time scale is 1:30). Just comparing the Fallout 3 map to Google Maps, it seems to me that the Fallout map represents an an area of about 14x14 miles. At 1:60 scale, the map would be only about a quarter mile across.

Depends on what you mean by 1:60 scale. If it's actually a 14x14 mile area, that's 196 square miles. If you put the 1:60 scale on the square mileage, that'd be represented by an area of 3.26 square miles, which corresponds to linear measurements of a 1.8x1.8 mile area.

If he meant 1:60 linear scale, then you're right - way too small to be correct. Linear scale is usually what someone means when they say 1:60 scale or whatever, though.

Mind, either way it's wrong as far as I know. Fallout 3's world is approximately 16 square miles of land. If in reality it's 14x14 miles of land and we've got 4x4 miles of land, then it's only a 1:3.5 scale model - which, honestly, isn't that bad.

 

[Uaine]

Depends on what you mean by 1:60 scale. If it's actually a 14x14 mile area, that's 196 square miles. If you put the 1:60 scale on the square mileage, that'd be represented by an area of 3.26 square miles, which corresponds to linear measurements of a 1.8x1.8 mile area.

If he meant 1:60 linear scale, then you're right - way too small to be correct. Linear scale is usually what someone means when they say 1:60 scale or whatever, though.

Mind, either way it's wrong as far as I know. Fallout 3's world is approximately 16 square miles of land. If in reality it's 14x14 miles of land and we've got 4x4 miles of land, then it's only a 1:3.5 scale model - which, honestly, isn't that bad.

I've seen that 16 square mile figure kicked around a lot since I've been trying to figure out the map scale, but I've never seen it substantiated. The earliest mention that I am able to find of this figure here leads me to believe that people just took this figure from Oblivion, and never tested it. Oblivion was 16 square miles, but I seem to remember the Fallout 3 devs saying that the Fallout 3 world would be smaller than Oblivion's.

In an effort to get a good understanding of what size this map is, I just did a run from the very top of the map to the very bottom, after setting timescale to 1. It took 11 minutes of in-game time. If the map is really four miles across, then the player runs faster than an olympic sprinter!

I'm not sure what speed the character runs at, but if we imagine 10 MPH (I was wearing vault suit with weapon holstered, and unencumbered), then the map is about 2 miles across.

 

[Tagaziel]

Uh, no, not 1:3.5 scale.

14 x 14 = 196 sq. miles
4 x 4 = 16 sq. miles

So more like 1:12.

 

[Uaine]

Uh, no, not 1:3.5 scale.

14 x 14 = 196 sq. miles
4 x 4 = 16 sq. miles

So more like 1:12.

As MutantDwarf said:

Linear scale is usually what someone means when they say 1:60 scale or whatever, though.

1:X scale typically is referring to linear measures, not their square. For example:

1:72 scale is a scale used for scale models, most commonly model aircraft, corresponding to one sixth of an inch representing one foot. In other words, 72 of a given model placed end to end would represent the length of the real thing.

Can anyone think of an in-game object whose length is known? For example, lets imagine the game had a football field. Assuming it was sized correctly (360 feet), one could run across it and measure how long it takes the character to traverse it. This speed could then be applied to a run across the map to roughly measure the length of the map.

 

[Tagaziel]

I am still trying to wrap my head around how can you possibly have 192 squares and claim that 16 squares is 1/3.5 th of the first number.

 

[Uaine]

I am still trying to wrap my head around how can you possibly have 192 squares and claim that 16 squares is 1/3.5 th of the first number.

1:3.5 only means 1/3.5th in one dimension (a line). In two dimensions (a square), it would be 1/3.5^2.

Lets imagine that you have a 4x4 square, and you want to make a 1:2 scale copy of it.

The way you are currently thinking, you are saying, "ok, the 4x4 square has an area of 16, so a 1:2 copy would have half the area, 8. So, each side of the 1:2 copy would be SQRT(8) = ~2.282"

That's not quite right. You should say "ok, one side of the square has a length of 4, so at 1:2 scale, each side be 1/2 the size, =2."

So, the original square had an area of 16, but a 1:2 copy of it has an area of 4. (1/2^2 of the area of the original).

 

[Uaine]

Ok, I found the answer. From the Geck wiki:

Each exterior cell is 4096 units by 4096 units or 192 feet by 192 feet or 58.5 meters by 58.5 meters

And by my observation in the GECK, the map encompasses 51x51 cells. So, the map is 51 * 192 ft = 9792ft across. In miles, that's about 1.85 miles. The total map area is 3.4225 square miles.

So, in terms of real world scale, it's pretty close to 1:8.

 

[Ghost_loy]

I think increasing the overall size of the entire map and then increasing the size of all the cities substantially would be great.


For example megaton shoulst have a much larger area within and outside of its walls.

Tenpenny tower should have a significant village/town area around it and rivet city needs to use more decks of that carrier.


Then also make the wasteland much more....vast