When discussing massive in-game worlds, talk often turns to games like Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.  These free-roaming games have massive game maps that take just short of forever to traverse.  As big as these game worlds are, they pale in comparison to the monstrous map belonging to upcoming off-road racer, Fuel, which was recently honored for having the largest playable environment in a console game ever by the Guinness Book of World Records.

Fuel’s playable terrain clocks in at a staggering 5,560 square miles, which is just slightly smaller than the state of Connecticut.  There doesn’t seem to be a previous official record holder, but to compare, Oblivion’s map is only 16 square miles, and GTA: San Andreas was only 7 square miles.  The mostly empty nature of racing games’ maps allows them to be significantly larger, with Burnout Paradise’s world estimated at about 200 sq. miles and Test Drive Unlimited’s at around 1000 square miles, but even for the genre, Fuel’s playable area is simply enormous.

Please note that this is the record for console games only.  On the PC, things get way more out of control with games like The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall boasting over 62,394 square miles of terrain, including some 750,000 NPCs and 15,000 individual towns.  That’s an area slightly smaller than Florida, with the population of El Paso, TX.  And the game is 13 years old.  And worst of all, you have to walk it.