Highly Visible Landmark

I wonder where we're supposed to go?

High visibility structures meant to help the audience (or characters) orient themselves in an open-world setting. Generally these striking reference points can be seen from anywhere in a region, so that a certain kind of person is less likely to lose their bearings.

These make for very convenient navigational destinations as well, since they can be tracked on the horizon by eyesight alone (removing the need for a map).

In video games this operates as Instructive Level Design, since players will naturally want to head towards large structures, even without knowing what they are—sidestepping the need to make them Follow the Plotted Line. Developers will sometimes subtly drill this into the player's mind using a Video Game Vista to force attention on the landmark.

Larger open worlds may have multiple of these built into the landscape to make the environment easier to comprehend visually. Where exactly they are placed can vary. They might represent a home base, the center of the map, or a faraway goal. These landmarks might also be part of a Portal Network to move between sub-regions.

The Pillar of Light variation of this trope often comes up as an Anti-Frustration Feature, where players can choose to set a beacon at a location they are headed towards. This helps minimize the need to pause gameplay to reference a MiniMaps.

Landmarks can also function as omnipresent Meaningful Background Events, meant to foreshadow an important endgame location. In this case, they tend to be initially inaccessible (or impossibly far away) and exist moreso to taunt the players' curiosity about how their adventure may eventually lead there.

These landmarks commonly manifest as a World Tree, Evil Tower of Ominousness, Pillar of Light, or Death Mountain. May involve some geographic artistic license to force it to be visible even when it probably shouldn't be.

Compare Notice This and Eiffel Tower Effect.

Subtrope of Instructive Level Design. Supertrope to Crow's Nest Cartography (which is when the landmark is used to unveil the map).

Note: It is not enough to be a large structure, its function (either for the audience or for the characters) has to be it's practicality as a visual reference point.

Examples:

Myths & Religion

• Some interpretations of the Book of Genesis claim the Tower of Babel was intended as such, to prevent people from getting lost and scattering too wide. Since this conflicted with God's orders for humanity to spread over the Earth and fill it, he stopped the project.

Podcasts

• In Season 5 of The Magnus Archives, After the Dread Powers invade reality, the Magnus Institute becomes a massive tower that (according to Jon) is visible from anywhere in the world. Luckily that makes it pretty easy for Jon and Martin to figure out where they need to go to try and undo the changes brought by the invasion.
• Welcome to Night Vale: Played with in the desert otherworld. Dana discovers the desert has a large mountain with a red blinking light as its only landmark. Trying to walk away from the mountain or use it as a context clue to orient yourself inside the desert is useless, and leads to Alien Geometry. However, moving towards the mountain is permitted by the desert, making it at least a valid navigational target.

Tabletop Games

• Warhammer 40,000: Imperial Navigators orient themselves and the voidships they're aboard in the Warp using the Astronomicon, a psychic "lighthouse" generated by the God-Emperor's near-dead body on the Golden Throne. There are areas of the galaxy where the Astronomicon is not visible, however, and these are particularly dangerous to navigate. Most of these are on the far side of from Holy Terra of Warp phenomena like the Eye of Terror or the Cicatrix Maledictum, but the Astronomicon has been slowly dimming as the Emperor gradually succumbs, and is visible from a slightly smaller radius every year.

Theme Parks

• Disney Theme Parks: In designing Disneyland, Walt Disney used highly visible landmarks ("weenies", as he called them, after the way his dog would follow him around the house when he was carrying a hot dog) to draw the guests into the park and then into various sections, with Sleeping Beauty Castle at the center of the park drawing people down Main Street USA, then the rocket ship in Tomorrowland and the pirate ship in Fantasyland to guide them out of the hub. The idea expanded to the rest of the Disney Theme Parks, with each park having its own iconic landmark: Magic Kingdom parks have their castles, Epcot has Spaceship Earth, and Animal Kingdom has the Tree of Life, for example. In addition, sections of the park still have smaller "weenies" to draw guests in, such as Space Mountain in Tomorrowland, the Millennium Falcon in Galaxy's Edge, the international pavilions around World Showcase Lagoon in Epcot, the Tower of Terror at Disney Studios.

Video Games

• DREDGE: The Greater Marrow Lighthouse is a beacon burning brightly that you'll be able to see from anywhere on the map, be it midday or in the middle of the night, and since it's at the dead center of the map it can help as a way to quickly orient yourself to your position as well as find your way safely back to Greater Marrow should you need to.
• The Elder Scrolls often has these. Notably, these major landmarks tend to be one of The Tower: natural or artificial structures that are said to hold up the world.
  • The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion: The White-Gold Tower in the heart of the Imperial City at the center of Cyrodiil is visible from almost everywhere else in the land, and nearly all roads in the land lead back there.
  • The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim: The Throat of the World, Tamriel's tallest mountain, is visible from almost everywhere else in Skyrim. It is a landmark of great historical significance to the native Nords, believed by their old religion to be where the goddess Kyne "exhaled" and created mankind.
  • The Elder Scrolls Online: Various zones have major landmarks visible from nearly everywhere in the zone. Just like Oblivion, the Imperial City and Cyrodiil have the White-Gold Tower. Grahtwood has the Elden Tree, Vvardenfell has the volcano Red Mountain, and Summerset has the Crystal Tower.
• Elden Ring: The Erdtree is a gigantic, glowing, golden tree that can be easily seen from anywhere on the map.
• Fallout: New Vegas: The Lucky 38, the tallest building in New Vegas, is visible from nearly all of the surrounding Mojave Desert. This is especially true at night, when it lights up like a towering beacon, broadcasting the location of New Vegas itself to all those around.
• Genshin Impact:
  • When following quest breadcrumbs, the end goal will manifest as a glowing Pillar of Light in the distance, which vanishes as you approach it.
  • Celestia is a minor example, being visible in the sky across Tevat as a mysterious floating landmass that promises future plot importance.
  • The game map has surprisingly few traditional examples, only adding about one or two per nation. This includes Dragonspine's icy peak, Seirai Island's central storm nexus, Enkanomiya's artificial sun, and The Mausoleum of King Deshret. Wangshu Inn is a minor example, only notable for being placed across a flat portion of the map to entice the player to venture in the direction of Liyue Harbor.
• Journey: Exaggerated. In the game's opening, you awaken in an endless desert landscape with nothing but a solitary mountain in the distance, which becomes your unstated goal to reach.
• The Legend of Zelda:
  • The Wind Waker: The Tower of the Gods can be seen almost anywhere on the Great Sea once activated and can serve as a navigation point.
  • Twilight Princess: For most of the game, Hyrule Castle is the central landmark that the player may orient themselves with. It won't be visible in some places, but anywhere in and around the Eldin and Lanayru provinces, where you spend most of the game, will be able to see it. To a lesser extent, the Arbiter's Grounds are visible from all over the Gerudo Desert.
  • Spirit Tracks: The Tower of the Spirits can be seen anywhere in Hyrule.
  • Breath of the Wild has these at several different levels of the game. The four Divine Beasts are the most obvious examples, being titan-like structures you can see from across the map that help you orient yourself. Visiting and overcoming each of them operates as a major goal of the game. Certain other features, especially Hebra Mountain, Death Mountain, the Dueling Peaks, and Hyrule Castle, dominate their regions and can be seen from literally miles away to peek player interest. The game also lets you place six Pillar of Light beacons wherever you choose.
  • Tears of the Kingdom: The geographic points from Breath of the Wild's map remain, although additions are added such as the sky islands (and their falling debris). In the depths, the glowing Lightroots serve this function as well. Falling Star Fragments and glowing cave entrances are more temporary examples that can be seen vividly at night.
• Lil Gator Game: There is no in-game map, but the four plot-sensitive locations are each near a tall landmark (hill, tree, windmill).
• Minecraft: Invoked by players, who in the early game tend to build dirt towers to mark locations. The game itself prefers the use of compasses and maps to find your way around, and lets you mark locations on your map with placed banners. In the endgame you can eventually craft a shining beacon for this purpose, and place it somewhere to take advantage of the various Status Buffs it grants the players in its radius.
• Myst was inspired by Disney in its design. On Myst Island, each of the main puzzles is tied to a building that is very noticeable and has a different architectural style from the others. Additionally, the central tower, or the library at its base, is visible from any location on the island.
• Outer Wilds: The Sun is this by default, due to being the extremely bright gravitational center of the solar system and having all other planets moving relative to it. Anxiously considering your location relative to the sun takes on additional meaning once the "Groundhog Day" Loop begins since it is the nexus from where the supernova begins.
• Palworld: Upon death, your dropped belongings will emit a skyward beacon to help you find the location again. Each of the regions also has a boss that can be found in a highly visible menacing tower.
• Quake II: The Big Gun is visible in the skybox of several levels, most notably in the Reactor Unit, where it's seen right after entering the "Power Plant" level.
• RiME is centered on a single gigantic tower, with the first section of the game spent trying to reach it.
• In Sable, almost all settlements and ruins are built in high places so they can be seen from far away. Individual NPCs out in the wild always have a campfire near them, which sends a column of smoke high up. Cartographers' balloons, which provide Crow's Nest Cartography, are always perched on one of the highest natural features they can find.
• Spider-Man (2018): Being in New York City it's only natural that there are plenty of tall buildings, but the main three for determining distance/location are the One World Trade Center, the Empire State Building, and Avengers Tower.
• Subnautica: Downplayed in that most navigation in the game is done underwater (with the low visibility that implies), but whenever you surface you can see the gigantic, burning wreck of the Aurora from just about anywhere in the playable area. Until you get a proper compass and enough beacons, you can guide yourself by whether you're closer to the stern or the prow, and how much closer or further away it is.
• Superhot: A pyramid-shaped building can be seen from every level, looming closer and closer as you progress. This turns out to be where the Pyramid Core is located at the endgame, which The System has brainwashed you into finding, in order to upload your mind into it.
• Unreal: The Sunspire is a huge pillar with a hotel crafted in its interior, complete with bedrooms, bathrooms, kitchens, a church, and a wine cellar. It's seen right after the player enters the level "The Trench", roughly a quarter into the game's story, with the maze-like ISV-Kran levels and the Spire Village area prior to it.
• Warframe:
  • The Orokin Tower of the Unum towers over the gate leading from Cetus to the Plains of Eidolon, and is visible from pretty much everywhere aboveground in the Plains.
  • The lift going down to Fortuna from the Orb Vallis has a smokestack — while the building itself isn't visible from afar, the black smoke it belches out certainly is.
• The Witness: The game is built around a mysterious mountain location, and every completed puzzle shoots a laser beam towards this mountain to further reinforce its endgame importance. The sky lasers also help you determine which puzzles surrounding the mountain you still haven't done.
• World of Warcraft: The Cathedral of Light can be seen from just about anywhere in Stormwind City. In the vanilla game, it was actually a clever façade — a fake 2D version of the cathedral was added to the skyline in various districts. When Cataclysm allowed players to fly in the old world, the cathedral was subtly redesigned so the real building was visible from anywhere.
• Xenoblade Chronicles 3: The Swordmarch is a gigantic, tower-like sword that was once wielded by The Mechonis. It can be seen throughout most of the game's map and acts as the gang's main destination for the first half of the game. It is also where The City is located, at least until the Moebius destroy the top of the Swordmarch, and the city folk have to relocate.

Web Animation

• In RWBY Volume 9, the Ever After has a gigantic tree that Team RWBY must head for and can be seen anywhere on the island. However, because of the magical nature of the place, they are forced into Railroading and can’t just go straight to it.

Western Animation

• Animaniacs: In Wakko's Wish, the fallen wishing star emits an extremely bright light that can be seen from anywhere, allowing the various factions to quest towards it by eyesight alone.
• Avatar: The Last Airbender: The Si Wong Rock is this for the Sandbenders, being the only visible geological formation in their desert. The rock is also the magnetic center of the desert, meaning all of their sandsailer compasses point towards it as well.

Real Life

• This used to be the function of lighthouses before GPS navigation rendered them obsolete. Many towns have a central clock tower or monument intended to serve this purpose as well.
• In Pittsburgh, the Cathedral of Learning is a skyscraper on the University of Pittsburgh's campus that is known locally as the "Drunken Compass." It's one of the tallest educational buildings in the world and can be seen from anywhere in Oakland (Pittsburgh's "college town" district that's home to Pitt, Carnegie-Mellon University, and several smaller colleges). As such, it's very common for college kids to use the building to orient themselves while walking home after a night of partying.

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