Solar Crown’s map is comprised of 14 districts of vastly ranging biomes, with a good number of local landmarks peppered in, as Lead Artist Stéphane Cambier explains:
To increase exploration options, we used our expertise from WRC games to transform certain walking and hiking paths into small mountain roads that a car can use. Conversely, some light redesign was done to the major thoroughfares to make them more fun and adapted to very fast cars, while respecting the identity of Hong Kong Island. To emphasise the fast and smooth driving, for example, the very dense urban network of HKI needed some small adjustments because of certain little streets that were very (too?) narrow. Hong Kong Island is an amazing playground that offers incredible diversity, and each environment received special attention to make them more fun for players. But TDU is a different kind of experience and more challenging. Thanks to the experience gained developing many rally games (WRC series) and motorcycling games (TT series), we have considerable expertise in creating realistic environments on a large scale. It was a challenge technically as well as in terms of gameplay. To increase immersion and transport players to a new country, we also wanted to make HKI very realistic, which is why we recreated it at 1:1 scale. In an open-world game like TDU, we need to provide a seamless and interesting driving experience as well as encourage exploration, which is an important part of the experience.
Recreating Hong Kong Island with all its variety and small details was a considerable challenge. Creative Director Alain Jarniou offered a little insight in the newsletter on how the team has attempted to replicate the spirit of Hong Kong Island, albeit with 595 km’ worth of roads better suited for racing. Not every path on the island has been recreated true-to-life, because 1) that’s just not feasible and 2) even if it was, it wouldn’t guarantee fun gameplay.
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