Which is bigger...Skyrim or Oblivion?

[gideonkain]

Hammerfell? I think you mean "Daggerfall", which spanned the provinces of High Rock and northern Hammerfell. Yeah, Daggerfall is huge. Let me put it this way... this is what fast-travel looks like:

That'd be it, don't know where I got hammerfell from. The fast-travel looks awesome, I hope they implement something like that in the next Elder Scrolls, or the MMO.

Ya, that was totally awesome - if the quest system played into the timetable that would be amazing.

- Pay the ransom by Friday or the cultists will kill the hostages

$hit, it's Tuesday and it takes 70 hrs to get there. I suppose I could sell my some armor and send them confirmation via Mage Stone...or buy a Teleport to the town and wipe them out, except my sword is damaged and I have 3 Health Potions...

 

[masticina]

Mmm I agree that maybe in size both are kinda equal but Skyrim does things better. It USES the space better.

 

[OpticalJunction]

Oblivion seemed a whole lot bigger to me but many of the areas were boring especially the caves and ruins. Skyrim has a diverse world yet has smaller cities. Playing it for the first time it surprised me how quickly you could walk from one place to another. Both of them seem tiny compared to morrowind, just exploring one town in that game could take you a whole day, if not more.

 

[Rawne1980]

Daggerfall beats them all.

It has the largest game map of all time .... OF ALL TIME.

Seriously, no other game has ever come remotely close to matching Daggerfall in size.

 

[Meight08]

According to the Elder Scrolls Wiki, both Skyrim and Oblivion have about 41 square kilometres of land (16 square miles). Morrowind had 16 km[sup]2[/sup] and Daggerfall had 161600 km[sup]2[/sup], for comparison. The different areas aren't exactly in scale between all the games, as you can see.

Oblivion's world did feel more empty, though. Especially around the edges of the map. And Skyrim has the mountains always blocking your way.

Am I misunderstanding you or are you saying that Daggerfall is 161600 SQUARE KILOMETERS? As in 4 times tHe size of Denmark?

Bigger, actually. Bethesda claims the size is about double that of Great Britain. About 487,000 square kilometers.

There's also 15,000 or so towns, cities, villages, and dungeons for the player's character to explore, and around 750,000+ NPC's. Dis game be BIG. Though it did make heavy use of procedural generation, making things seem a bit same-y.

Everything was procedurally generated except most of the towns.

 

[DeathChairOfHell]

EDIT: Just realised I was wrong. oopsy, and now I can never ever ever delete this post. Rats.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

Size doesn't mean crap if you don't do anything with it.

Oblivion has more dungeons, more cities, bigger landmass, and more NPC's.

However, they're all rather bland and uninteresting. Skyrim has less of those things, but they're far more fleshed out. If you're looking for the better game, get Skyrim. After playing it... Oblivion just doesn't compare.

Yes, exactly. Exploring in Skyrim is far more fun due to the comparatively varied nature of the dungeons and areas - it takes a lot longer to start feeling repetitive. I'd have liked a few less linear ones in there too though.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

Daggerfall beats them all.

It has the largest game map of all time .... OF ALL TIME.

Seriously, no other game has ever come remotely close to matching Daggerfall in size.

Was there actually a point to it though or was it just big for the sake of bigness? I mean, on average, how long would you spend wandering in a direction before encountering a town/ruin/dungeon? And was there any variation in them?

 

[Rawne1980]

Daggerfall beats them all.

It has the largest game map of all time .... OF ALL TIME.

Seriously, no other game has ever come remotely close to matching Daggerfall in size.

Was there actually a point to it though or was it just big for the sake of bigness? I mean, on average, how long would you spend wandering in a direction before encountering a town/ruin/dungeon? And was there any variation in them?

It was pretty much just big for the sake of being big.

There wasn't much in the way of variation and there was a hell of a lot of aimless wandering.

 

[endtherapture]

TES4
Cyrodiil
~2 times bigger than TES3 map, but more boring and inconsistent to lore (Cyrodiil was supposed to be rain-forest-ish area)

I thought Tiber Septim changed the climate on Cyrodiil to be more temperate or something.

 

[darlarosa]

Wait which felt bigger or which is technically bigger?

To me Skyrim felt huge. I constantly felt like I was traveling. With Oblivion I kind of felt like I was running in circles. For some reason I just enjoy traveling more in Skyrim.

In Oblivion I constantly felt I was on a lonely quest to the most remote areas of Tamriel, which had it's own charm.

In Skyrim I never feel more than 5 minutes away from civilisation which is weird.

I disliked Oblivion in part because Tameriel felt so empty to me for some reason. It could be nice at times, but I dunno the world felt so static.The thing about Skyrim is that even when you are on the road you can run into a farm, mill, or people actually traveling in a more...I suppose realistic manner. It constantly feels like you're moving and encountering things and people. You are kind of 5 minutes from civilization

 

[unoleian]

In Oblivion I constantly felt I was on a lonely quest to the most remote areas of Tamriel, which had it's own charm.

In Skyrim I never feel more than 5 minutes away from civilisation which is weird.

That, to me, is weird. I often get exactly the opposite impression while playing Skyrim. It feels so much more remote and lonely to me, often, than Cyrodiil did.

 

[endtherapture]

Wait which felt bigger or which is technically bigger?

To me Skyrim felt huge. I constantly felt like I was traveling. With Oblivion I kind of felt like I was running in circles. For some reason I just enjoy traveling more in Skyrim.

In Oblivion I constantly felt I was on a lonely quest to the most remote areas of Tamriel, which had it's own charm.

In Skyrim I never feel more than 5 minutes away from civilisation which is weird.

I disliked Oblivion in part because Tameriel felt so empty to me for some reason. It could be nice at times, but I dunno the world felt so static.The thing about Skyrim is that even when you are on the road you can run into a farm, mill, or people actually traveling in a more...I suppose realistic manner. It constantly feels like you're moving and encountering things and people. You are kind of 5 minutes from civilization

That's weird though for me.

Cyrodiil was the cosmopolitan heartland of the Empire and it felt really empty and desolate, a land in decline with all of civilisation existing around cities.

Skyrim, as the desolate barren northern land should've at least felt more empty instead of really busy.

Both games have a weird atmosphere.

 

[DRes82]

Hammerfell apparently, but I haven't played it. I think they're roughly about the same size in terms of how long it'll take you to get from one end of the map to another, but they differ slightly in how large they are on the map of Tamriel. The size of the provinces isn't really conserved at all in Elder Scrolls games.

Hammerfell? I think you mean "Daggerfall", which spanned the provinces of High Rock and northern Hammerfell. Yeah, Daggerfall is huge. Let me put it this way... this is what fast-travel looks like:

Oh, lord, if people want to complain about graphics...


OT: Don't quote me on this, as I'm lazy and don't feel like trying to reaearch every single one, but I believe there was plenty more things to discover in Skyrim.

Graphics? This game was released when MUDS were still pretty popular. I thought the visuals in Daggerfall were AMAZING.

OT:I will agree that Bethesda used their space in Skyrim perfectly...much better so than in Oblivion or even Fallout3. As for size, Cyrodiil seemed to be pretty near the same size as Skyrim, just a lot more empty.

 

[Greni]

I think the two are about the same...maybe Skyrim is a wee bit bigger.

What's more important is that it feels much bigger.

This.
Saw an interview with Todd Howard (lead director or some similar fancy title). The development direction was basically to keep the size similar to Oblivion to keep it from being overwhelming but cram much more stuff inside to make it feel much bigger. Which in my opinion worked rather splendidly. Also 8 dungeon designers instead of one means much less ctrl-c -> ctrl-v, which helps.

 

[RandV80]

Daggerfall beats them all.

It has the largest game map of all time .... OF ALL TIME.

Seriously, no other game has ever come remotely close to matching Daggerfall in size.

Was there actually a point to it though or was it just big for the sake of bigness? I mean, on average, how long would you spend wandering in a direction before encountering a town/ruin/dungeon? And was there any variation in them?

I'd say there was a point to it, the game was just going for a different vibe than the direction Morrowind and the following TES games took. Daggerfall wasn't meant to be a game where you wander around and explore, rather they were trying to create something that felt more like a living society, hence the scale. There were a lot of old school CRPG elements in it, like if you stopped to talk to the townspeople wandering around you'd get a list of generic options to ask about people/places/events that if they liked you well enough would answer. So the first thing you'd do when stopping into a town is asking someone where the inn/armory/clothing store/etc was and they'd update your map.

But like I said there was no real appeal in the game to wander around exploring. However, this game was made in what... 1996? It's not like they had the tech capable of making an explorable 3D world, and for a massive procedurally generated open world it was basically the first of it's kind so could almost be considered a 'beta' version. I'd be really, really interested in seeing what could be accomplished with some refinement on the original algorithms and utilizing today's technology.

I loved the interesting handcrafted feel when Morrowind came out but we've been getting the same basic thing for 10 years now with little actual improvement apart from graphics.

 

[Aerosteam]

If you're going to exclude copy/paste dungeons, then Skyrim is bigger...

But if you're going to include DLC, then maybe Oblivion...

I don't even know anymore. =/ But I like to think it's Skyrim.

In terms of the entire series, Daggerfall wins hands down.

didnt the original elder scrolls have the largest world? it was ALL of tamriel, after all.

Actually, the in-game landscape for TES: Arena wasn't the full-scale size of Tamriel. But for TES: Daggerfall the scale of the landscape is more realistic, so it was bigger in-game than Arena.

 

[Loonyyy]

Oblivion has the bigger cities... Skyrim has... well that's already been covered in this topic.

Oblivion GOTY will ultimately have a bit more to do and some more going for it, because Shivering Isles, but...

ignore all that. If you want a game to get into Elder Scrolls with, go with Skyrim. Both games have wonderful and awesome worlds to explore. However, Oblivion has this terrible level up system that you basically have to fight with and figure out how to trick before you can just enjoy the damn game world. In a lot of games that level up system would have just flat out ruined the thing entirely, but the stuff behind that in Oblivion was awesome enough to make it worth it. But in Skyrim the level up stuff just works, and you should be able to just go ahead and enjoy the world on your first character. Play Skyrim first. If you enjoy it, then later go back to Oblivion and just do some research on dealing with it's leveling beforehand.

On the other other hand, Oblivion is a lot cheaper, and if you have the patience to learn an annoying leveling system before you can really enjoy the game behind it then I guess why not?

I'm the guy it ruined it for. Playing it on the harder difficulties whilst trying to use Sneak, Archery, Long Blade (Was there even short blade in Oblivion? Meh), Destruction, Restoration, and Light Armour? No fun at all. I had to turn the difficulty right down at around midgame mark to keep going. I gave up almost immediately after. If only they'd tell you to focus your character!

 

[darlarosa]

Wait which felt bigger or which is technically bigger?

To me Skyrim felt huge. I constantly felt like I was traveling. With Oblivion I kind of felt like I was running in circles. For some reason I just enjoy traveling more in Skyrim.

In Oblivion I constantly felt I was on a lonely quest to the most remote areas of Tamriel, which had it's own charm.

In Skyrim I never feel more than 5 minutes away from civilisation which is weird.

I disliked Oblivion in part because Tameriel felt so empty to me for some reason. It could be nice at times, but I dunno the world felt so static.The thing about Skyrim is that even when you are on the road you can run into a farm, mill, or people actually traveling in a more...I suppose realistic manner. It constantly feels like you're moving and encountering things and people. You are kind of 5 minutes from civilization

That's weird though for me.

Cyrodiil was the cosmopolitan heartland of the Empire and it felt really empty and desolate, a land in decline with all of civilisation existing around cities.

Skyrim, as the desolate barren northern land should've at least felt more empty instead of really busy.

Both games have a weird atmosphere.

Well I think in part thats just do to the technological shift. Oblivion has good graphics, but very little is visually striking. You can easily walk around for what feels like forever not encountering anything but the occasional monster. Oblivion never quiet felt...real. It did not have the subtle little things to make it feel truly alive. Skyrim did. Correct me if I'm remembering correctly but Oblivion felt oddly dead because you did not see bugs, animal encounters were somewhat...forced at times instead of feeling like a natural element of the environment. While characters aren't quite developed they tend to, as I said, move around. Skyrim has these cities and villages spaced across vast distances, but due to the ever changing enviroment, graphics, and traveling people, it never feels as static as Cyrodil. It's just a result of the technological advancements.

In terms of narratively that Skyrim should have felt more empty, I highly disagree. If we look to comparative cultures in Earth history we can see that even in cold climates populations grew. Skyrim is not barren so much as it's just mountanous and cold. People, animals, and beasts adjust as best they can to that environment. Skyrim has a large enough population where a civil war is politically relevant in terms of the whole empire, and each city has the right amount of people to keep functioning. Factor in people who traveled there and are not nord, you have a nice size population. I think Skyrim would be significantly less interesting if it was more empty. Besides it's just bad practice to decide because Cyrodil was technologically limited we need to make Skyrim's world less populated so players remember that Cyrodil seemed large.