Generally speaking, the overworld is the part of a game where all other levels and locations are interconnected. They are very typical of role-playing games such as World of Warcraft. However, this doesn’t imply that other genres of video games such as strategy games and platformers don’t have overworlds. Usually, they give uses the point-of-view of the third-person in the game world.
Also, the overworld in most video game designs contains different types of terrain, such as forests, caves, mountains, and water bodies. However, this doesn’t leave out such places as dungeons, collections of towns, or even levels. This location usually features the display of the world map on the screen, which displays when players enter it.
Like several other elements of the game world, there are different types of overworlds. They go by the names of role-playing video games, The Legend of Zelda series, Platform games, Minecraft, and Home level.
Role-playing games introduced some of the earliest uses of overworlds in gaming. These were especially true in the case of fantasy-based games.
Usually, you’ll find a sort of world map in many games that have an overworld. These world maps could either be basic or the type you can toggle off or on. An example of the basic is the dot amidst a grey rectangular diagram that indications the location of a character features in The Legend of Zelda.
On the other hand, the continuously changing location of the character is displayed in a rough outline of its surroundings in the overworld map that you can toggle on or off. The later version of the Zelda series features this type of map. And so this some releases of the Final Fantasy series of games.
Obviously, these maps aid in game character navigation throughout the different levels, worlds, and dimensions of the game world accessible through the overworld.