The Size of Open World Games Compared

A new comparative map shows the scale of some of the biggest and most open world games around to find how many Fallout 4 maps you’d have to walk to get to the other side of the universe in No Man’s Sky. While even the smallest is a far cry from shooters like Call of Duty, No Man’s Sky is so colossal in scope that the others pale in comparison; it’s over 7.925×1019 times bigger than Just Cause 3, the next biggest game included. And that’s not even including space travel!

Although Bethesda’s games – those of The Elder Scrolls series and Fallout – are well known for being large open world games, surprisingly they both ranked among the smaller numbers there. These were the games with the highest square mileage across the research:

1. No Man’s Sky – No Man’s Sky’s big marketing point was how large and infinitely explorable its universe was. While that wasn’t a lie, hype died and critics fell upon the game for its lack of anything to do, in the 31,700,000,000,000,000,000,000 square miles of planet surface it encompasses.
2. Just Cause 3 – It’s not quite as big as No Man’s Sky – only 400 square miles – but there’s much more scope for mayhem and wandering, with a wider range of vehicles, grappling hooks, and explosions to propel you across the islands.
3. The Witcher III: Wild Hunt – Game of the Year 2015 winner from multiple outlets, The Witcher offers 52 square miles of places to go, but it’s the 100 hours of content that really makes it feel huge – only 27% of players who own the game have finished it.
4. Grand Theft Auto V – at 49 square miles, GTA V is a big map, though it can feel similar in size to some of the smaller options due to the wide array of fast-moving vehicles players can use to get from one side to the other (and to get away from police in hot pursuit).
5. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild – The most recent release on the list, Breath of the Wild has a map with 23.5 square miles of adventure, secrets, and new experiences in the Legend of Zelda franchise.

For the rest of the games, and to see the maps alongside each other, check out the full graphic on Netent Stalker here.