To Zone or Not To Zone.

Often times I find people talking about the "seamless world", one which zoning does not exist. Of course, this became something people often fantasized about over the years of FFXI where zoning was very prevalent. It's also something that other MMORPG players experience, while maybe not quite as often. But it seems people are always wanting a more seamless world with less zoning. Well, I'm going to say something that might sound completely crazy but... Zoning might actually be good! That's right, zoning might actually be a good idea, and here's why.

People have really underestimated the importance of zoning. To Square Enix, it was just a way to build the game easier, to us, it has just been a frustration, but quite honestly it's one of the best game designs I've ever seen. Why is that? Because when you zone you go from one area to another. You "traverse" across the lands. Think of it as a time skip. Imagine if while watching a movie, instead of there being parts of the movie where it skips from one scene in one place to another scene in another place, everything took place in one area and the camera never left one scene. Well, this is a bit extreme and exaggerated on my part, I know I know, but it's the same principle when all is said and done honestly.

Zoning actually helps "immerse" us in our online Journey. There are some MMORPG's of which I've played that didn't have zoning, one notable one being Aion. I'm not here to bash Aion today (as much as I would like to) but one of the biggest flaws is that you could pretty much go from a scorching hot barren desert, to a swampland, to a jungle, to a forest, to a mountain range, all in just jogging for about 20 minutes at a moderate pace. It felt extremely unrealistic and made you feel like you were in some kind of gigantic play box or fake world.

This is not the kind of feeling that gives you that "enormous" feel some where like Vana Diel does. In Vana Diel, when you go from the mountains to the desert, you happen upon what looks to be a mountain pass, you zone into it and the screen goes black, moments later you appear on the other end in the desert. Some times you can see far off details at the other end that look like they are a natural part of the environment. It really gives the game a feeling and a sense of immersion that when you go from one area to another you're actually traversing across a large area to get there and makes the world feel much bigger than it actually is as well. And you know us MMORPG gamers, we can never have a big enough world! (Just not enough transportation and quick enough)

So in closing, I hope while Square Enix keeps talking about a "seamless world" for once, in the millions of times they've inconvenienced players to retain the "feel" of something they do it in the right area (no pun intended) and give us at least some zoning to make the world feel vast, expansive, and realistic so we can truly be immersed in Eorzea!