History Main / ThrivingGhostTown

** ''GuildWars2'' averts this, there are hundreds of [=NPCs=] just wandering the city streets that serve no purpose other than ambience, making it feel like it's truly alive.

** All of the capital cities are this, but Divinity's Reach most of all. Understandable since the vast majority of the human population are living there just to be safe from the many threats within their lands (most notably the centaurs).

* {{Ratatoing}} has one in the opening.

In the earliest computer and console {{RPG}}s, this was a matter of economy; every kilobyte was precious and couldn't be wasted on extraneous houses or people. The tradition has continued into the modern day for several reasons, with TheLawOfConservationOfDetail being paramount among them. It does make it more feasible to TalkToEveryone. Especially with RandomEncounter[=s=], one aversion to this is that there's often MoreCriminalsThanTargets… Who love to GangUpOnTheHuman. It's often an AcceptableBreakFromReality because, really, as large as towns would be in real life, think of ''how long'' it'd take to render it, and how much space it'd take on your drive. Ouch.

** VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas has Goldsprings, a very literal version of this trope, being an actual ghost town real life.

** Parts of central London can be like this as well, which is how ''Film/TwentyEightDaysLater'' managed to film there on location.

* In ''{{Gothic}}'', you visit the 3 prison camps rather than actual cities. The smallest one is the Swamp Camp with over 80 people inside it, and the biggest one is the Old Camp with over 130 people, not counting over 60 people working in the Old Mine but also belonging to the Old Camp. ''Gothic II'' isn't as realistic with the actual city not being much more populated than the camps, and ''Gothic III'' is a good example of this trope.

** {{FalloutNewVegas}} has Goldsprings, a very literal version of this trope, being an actual ghost town real life.

** {{FalloutNewVegas}} has Goldsprings, a very literal version of this trope.

* In ''{{Terraria}}'', a world can have a maximum of ten friendly [=NPCs=] (eleven during the Christmas season). Although Terraria requires each of these [=NPCs=] to have a home to live in (and thus would constitute a small Thriving Ghost Town if a player built an actual ''house'' for each NPC), a "home" can be as simple as a room in a much larger structure, so it's more commonplace for players to construct a base or fortress instead of a town.

* In ''{{Terraria}}'', a world can have a maximum of ten friendly NPCs (eleven during the Christmas season). Although Terraria requires each of these [=NPCs=] to have a home to live in (and thus would constitute a small Thriving Ghost Town if a player built an actual ''house'' for each NPC), a "home" can be as simple as a room in a much larger structure, so it's more commonplace for players to construct a base or fortress instead of a town.

* In ''{{Terraria}}'', a world can have a maximum of ten friendly NPCs (eleven during the Christmas season). Although Terraria requires each of these NPCs to have a home to live in (and thus would constitute a small Thriving Ghost Town if a player built an actual ''house'' for each NPC), a "home" can be as simple as a room in a much larger structure, so it's more commonplace for players to construct a base or fortress instead of a town.

* Most of the games in both the ''HarvestMoon'' and SpinOff ''RuneFactory'' series tend to have the player settle into one of these. ''Island of Happiness'' and ''RuneFactory3'' are major exceptions: [=IoH=] has multiple {{NPC}}s move to the island and [=RF3=] has [=NPCs=] moving in and out of Sharance Village all the time; visiting, shopping or just traveling through.

* A good way to see this trope in action is to compare the cities and towns in the [[Anime/{{Pokemon}}]] anime to those in [[Franchise/{{Pokemon}} the video games]]. For example, Viridian City in the games is just five or six buildings, but in the anime, it looks like [[http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/File:Viridian_City_anime.png a proper big city]].

** ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim'' also continues to play this straight; towns with a believable population where reduced to shadows of their former selves thanks to the SpaceCompression. The way the world has shrunken down stands out when comparing locations featured in ''Arena'' to ''Skyrim'', such as the town of Riverwood. In ''Arena'' it's a bustling town that contains 200 or 300 buildings, but in ''Skyrim'' it's a hamlet with seven houses.

A typical town the heroes find themselves in usually consists of the following; a TraumaInn, a weapons/armor shop (the true metropolis may have a separate shop for each), an "item" shop, a specialty shop relating to the game's [[FunctionalMagic magic system]], and no more than three houses. With the exception of those {{NPC}}s living in those houses, the entire remainder of the population is apparently homeless; some {{NPC}}s seem to exist for the sole purpose of standing in a specific location and [[WelcomeToCorneria talking to passers-by.]]

* China's ghost cities. Large cities with full infrastructure and lots of construction, but very few people. Speculation is rampant about what they're for.