Is it just me, or are the new maps exceptionally small?

I decided to start a new game on the 'Large' map setting, and lo adn behold, it seems like the map is incredibly small for that setting. In fact, I would guess that 'Large' is smaller than the default setting in the previous Civ games. Any reason why Firaxis chose to do this? It seems safe to say that all my games will be on either Large or Huge from now on.

heh, i logged on just to see if my game was messed up or something, but yes i deffinatly notice, the huge map seems like a small map from civ 3. i remember someone saying that expanding will be hard in civ 4, you're not gonna run more than 10 cities for like 200 turns or something

I don't know, are you exceptionally small as well?

But seriously, I'd like to know some hard figures comparing Civ 3 maps with Civ 4 maps, but nobody's come up with any yet.

if you zoom all the way out you can roatate the map, its actually a globe so it appears smaller than it actually is in the corner mini map. At least thats what it looked like to me.

Yes, Maps are small. A little too small (the standard map) - which seems the largest map I can play.

Reg Pither said:

I don't know, are you exceptionally small as well?

Click to expand...

Teehee.

Anyway, I have started just my 2nd game (big mistake because I wanna keep my job) and also think the maps seem a bit smaller. I dont mind this...so far

Anyone got evidence about this?

Well, for one thing there are less cities around as expansion is more costy at the beginning - so you only want to have cities on very juicy places. I also have the impression that cultural borders expand way faster than in civ3 (didin´t do the numbers yet).
I don´t think it is important that the areas might be smaller. Anything beyond the "core" in civ3 was just there for preventing the AI from spreading and added MM effort with little gain (exception being communism which was never that relevant except for domination wins).
As much relevant cities as in civ3 with larger spacing on a maybe smaller map. OK for me; more cities = more fun does not hold true for me.

I agree with Mr. Blonde. I do agree that the maps are smaller, but let me ask this, do they acually need to be bigger. I found when i was playing Civ III that many of the cities I built were pointless. I usually only built them to stop someone elses border.

With that said, the borders in this one do increase alot more. I had 5 cities but the culture borders on all of them increased quite a bit. That and building settlers isn't quite as easy anymore either and expansion is alot harder than it was before.

Barry Caudhill already announced Civ4 maps to be smaller than in previous releases, months ago. This is due to 3d, since otherwise most machines would run into untolerable lags in late game.

About the question, whether maps have to bigger: Yes.
I understand that many player like to have quicker (shorter) games on smaller maps, and that is absolutely fine with me.
Nevertheless, for these players you have all kind of limited map sizes available. On the other hand, there are quite some player who like to have long-lasting games with the chance to build really EPIC empires. And those have intentionally left out by Firaxis' developers.

I am one of those who wants solid evidence that the maps are significantly smaller than they were in Civ3. I read somewhere that maps are 'taller' rather than longer, so that MIGHT make them look smaller. Also, don't go on the minimap in the early part of the game, because it is only showing you the area of the world you know about. I have heard from people who have said they feel the huge maps are BIGGER than in Civ3, and the map from the 'mediterranian WWII' scenario was definitely bigger than similar Civ3 scenarios (I went and checked civ3). Can someone actually set up a huge map in civ3 and count the number of tiles, then do the same for a Civ4 huge map? Need to put this matter to rest once and for all !

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

Try a Terran map. They are bigger than the equivalent Civ3 maps at the same size (although they have a twist - there are at least two continents, but everyone starts on one - I would think a modder could easily adapt this map script to have the normal distribution of civs).