Size is one thing, pacing and content handling another. Talking about classic BG, Kingdom Come Deliverance reminded me a lot of BG1, except taken a step further.
-It's world is generally neither an amusement/theme park (Bethesda school of design), nor a movie setpiece (Bioware school of design). -Places exist not merely to feed the player a new quest, loot or enemies, but because they exist, as they would in the world (which makes things also less predictable, as a hut in a forest may be jsut that, a hut, whereas in most games that hut is specifically placed there for the player to discover something in) -Every house in a city/settlement is enterable, however, inhabitants may actually object if you enter private territory
As a consequence, both kinda feel like actual worlds, as opposed to something existing solely for the player to toy around with/in and/or advancing plot and character.
To this day outside of KCD I've rarely played a game that feels much like BG1, which is of course because the majority found BG1, in particular the wilderness areas to be empty and boring (KCD is even more extreme than this, and the devs are well aware it is not made for everyone, 34:15).
Larian's world design firmly fits the theme park mold, btw. Not only do you stumple upon another NPC, location or combat at least every ten feet or so. It's also heavily compressed and condensed, as druid groves happily sit right next do damp dungeons, which in turn sit right next to goblin camps, etc. Technically, their maps are quite big, but due to the compressed and packed nature, it doesn't always quite feel like it.
As such I'm curious what their vision of BG as a city will be like. One of the more "ingenious" aspects of BG1 in turn was the stark contrast feeling you had when you finally could enter Baldur's Gate, which is comparable late into the game's campaign. Rather than adventuring oft barren plaines, woods and mountains, you suddenly had a place that was busy with stuff to the hilt. Obviously BG3 is gonna be a bit different in that regard. Curious what it will be like nonetheless.
