Image credits: AlphaYellow

In the first part of the game Max goes through a corridor that leads to the building's garage. Notice that the corridor's width and height are much higher than they would be in real life. This is to accommodate the game's camera in third person. Were the ceiling lower and the corridor's narrower (it seems to have 6 m in game), the player would feel cramped. The corridor is wide because it has to have enough space for the camera to turn when Max turns to the right after the stairs.

Image credits: AlphaYellow

In the building's garage there is a sign at the ceiling that reads "Maximum height 2.5 meters". Max Payne is about 1.8 m tall. Notice that the ceiling is about 2.5x taller than the game's characters. Do the math and the ceiling is over 4 m high. No garage in the real world would have a ceiling that high. If you take the character's model and rescale it to 2x to be closer to the real world dimensions they will look like giants. On the other hand, if you lower the ceiling to match what the sign tells, the player is going to feel like a rat in a hole.

Image credits: AlphaYellow

Before breaking into the restaurant's kitchen, see how Max's height compares to the locker. The locker is taller, but Max's arms can reach up the highest shelf. Notice that the bottles, boxes and objects in the scene all have sizes compatible with the character's hands and arms.

Image credits: AlphaYellow

In the kitchen notice how the ceiling is twice as tall as the characters, which would equate to around 3.5 m tall. A kitchen in the real world wouldn't have a ceiling this high, but notice how all objects have the correct proportion when compared to the characters. The space between the island in the middle is larger than it would be in real life. That's to allow the player to jump and shoot.

Image credits: AlphaYellow

In the restaurant the tables and chairs have a size that is compatible to the character's model. Nothing is too large or too small. The character would fit in any chair in the restaurant. The ceiling is twice as tall as the character but it looks natural.

Image credits: Gameplay Store and PlayStation oficial

This game wasn't designed to be played in third person. This mod adds the third person at the cost of a severely distorted perspective. The player looks like a dwarf with boxes being taller than the player itself. The doors are more than twice as tall as the player. In first person everything looks good, with nothing being too large when compared to the player.

In these scenes the ceiling seems to be about 5x taller than the player, which would equate to the ceiling being as tall as 10 m. In the third person view the camera is in a low angle and far away from the player, which ends up distorting the perspective. To avoid confusion, it's not the perspective that makes the player appear a dwarf. The game itself was designed for the first person and the scale of everything accounts for that.

In this game the camera is at the player's waist, not at the same height as the player's eyes. Had the camera been placed at the eye's height the player would feel too tall in comparison to everything else. Almost all games place the camera somewhere below the player's head and there is a reason to do that. The camera's perspective and field of view are not the same as a real person. By having the camera at a height below the player's head the game feels more natural and matches the centre of view of all weapons. By having the camera below the player's head the game world doesn't appear to be taller or shorter than the player himself.

The boxes are 128 x 128 x 128 units. The smaller ones cut down to 64u. The player can jump over the 64u boxes but can't reach the 128u ones. A standard measure for a corridor is to be 256u tall and 256u wide. Taller than 256u and it feels too high. Wider than 256u and it feels too wide. When a player sees another one, the player's model appears to be a dwarf in comparison to the world around. Since this game is meant to be played in first person the scale of things is meant to look good from the first person perspective. If you take the character's models and rescale to 2x the original scale they'll look like giants. If you take the camera's height and put it in a higher position, all other players are going to be shorter than you when viewed from the outside.

The same room with the same textures and light. The only change is the scale of the textures, except for the texture of the box. The box is kept the same for comparison. With the texture scaled to 4x larger the room appears to be smaller. With the scale shrank to 1/4 the doom appears to be larger.

Codex, the same place with normal lights and much less brighter lights. With less brightness the room appears to be smaller.

In this game the ceiling is always higher than real life and all games have this because the field of view of the camera doesn't match the field of view of a real person. Notice how the doors are about twice as tall as the player. The width of all spaces is also a bit larger than it'd in real life. The game has to have enough space for the camera to move around in third person. It's also a space for the player to use their powers.

This game manages to keep the scale of things correct in first and third person views. For starters the field of view doesn't change from first to third person. The other technique is that all lamps, computers, control panels, are always placed in respect to the player's height. This helps keep things on a certain scale that feel natural because buttons, lamps, chairs, are always respecting the size of the player.

The Tie Fighter scale is about right, a bit smaller than it should. The player wouldn't fit comfortably inside it. The ship could have been made larger but that would force the space around it to be larger as well, which would end up making the player feeling smaller. Inside the Doomgiver the corridors are very wide, very tall, and there is enough space for a Tie Fighter to fit in. The warship is huge from the outside and the inside is also many times larger than the player.

In Dark Forces there is a huge warship that bears a similar design to that used in JK2. Although the tech is much older, the design is still able to convey the same sense of being inside a huge structure. Much larger than the player. This is to say that older tech certainly constrains how much detail you can put in, but it shouldn't restrain creativity itself.