White spots on the map

I really like the world of Azeroth in World of Warcraft, because it is relatively densely populated. Unlike the randomly created worlds of lets say Anarchy Online or Star Wars Galaxies, which were huge but mostly empty, WoW has a new encounter around every corner. Of course if you have your content densely packed, and the amount of content is limited, you end up with a relatively small world, in terms of square miles. You can travel the longest distance in the game, lets say from Moonglade to the south of Tanaris, or from Scarlet Monastery to Booty bay, on foot in an hour or so, and the longest flight path is about 10 minutes. So the whole Azeroth isn't much bigger than Malta, or Washington D.C., but nevertheless covers all climates from frozen wastes to steamy jungles. A lazy explorer's paradise, where you can see lots of different things without having to walk too far.

But if you look at the maps of Kalimdor or the Eastern Kingdoms, you will notice that there are still a lot of white spots on the map, with no population whatsoever and often no way to reach them. You can see these spots up close using a program like WoWMapView. And people used to make a sport out of visiting inaccessible places, by for example using a bug that allowed you to cross steep cliffs when walking slowly. That bug has been fixed in patch 1.9, and getting to places like the Ironforge Airport is not that easy any more.

The good thing with these inaccessible places is that it gives the developers room to expand without adding continents. For example both Zul'Gurub and Ahn'Qiraj were previously such blank spots. It seems that the blank area north of the plaguelands will be used as the starting area for the blood elves. There are areas with obvious future access points, like the Graymane Wall in Silverpine. The zone of Mount Hyjal, south of Winterspring, seems to be fully prepared to be opened in some future patch or expansion. And some large areas like the one north of Stormwind, south of the Badlands, or south of Un'goro offer further room for expansion.

On the bad side the whole WoW geography is based on most zones being walled up with very few mountain passes to connect them. There are only a few places where you can for example swim from one zone to another to avoid a longer or more dangerous land travel. Menethil Harbor to Southshore, or Westfall to Stranglethorn for example. Most coastal areas are completely blocked off by mountains, most people don't even realize that for example Dun'Morogh or Silithus are coastal areas. And the mountain barriers also block travel inland, for example from Mulgore to Desolace. Of course there are solid game design reasons behind that, you don't want level 5 Tauren to wander accidentally into aggressive level 40 mobs. But it somewhat diminishes the feeling that this is a world which you can travel around to see.
- posted by Tobold @ 12:42 PM Permanent Link