Skyrim: A 1.04 Meter-Referenced DEM

This dataset is a meter-referenced digital elevation model (DEM) of the Skyrim game world, produced for a class project self-published here for public use in mapping, visualization, and geospatial projects. The DEM was generated by extracting raw Tamriel LAND/VHGT surface worldspace terrain data and mesh references from the game files, decoding and merging the resulting CSV outputs, and rasterizing the terrain surface in ArcGIS. It does not include the architectural meshes that makes up many cities, walls, bridges, and platforms (places like Solitude are missing). A vertical offset was then applied so that shoreline elevation was approximately 0 m. The final raster was scaled into meters using an in-game calibration based on 100 in-game Green Apples placed end-to-end in a straight line and using the player.getpos x,y,z commands in-game. In that calibration, 1135.9201 game units corresponded to 9.2518 m, (based on a measure of 10 real-world Granny Smith apple diameters I measured of 92.518 +/- 2.286 mm). Based on the green apple standard, I measure Skyrim to be 3.97 km wide by 3.14 km tall (12.4km²). Throat of the World stands 434m above sea level (~350 m above Whiterun)! Using the same apple standard, the in-game character jogs in light armor 9.2518m in ~3.20seconds, or 2.8912m/s, 10.41 km/hr, or 6.47mi/hr. The in-game walking speed I measured to ~13.69 seconds to cover the same distance, making the in-game walking speed 2.43km/hr or 1.51mi/hr. If you jogged across Skyrim in a straight line with no barriers, it should take you about 23 minutes.DEM Update 1: Adjusted the vertical datum by 14meters to more acurately label the sealevel.