I know they are trying to make the map be alive, there was a gif on twitter with a cart driving down a medieval road and mist rising from a waterfall, also they have said that small animals will be animated as moving around in wild territories, and you can see little foxes and elk in some of the screenshots.

There is also the animation of the shadows of clouds which gives a pretty nice feeling of an dynamic world. I really like this effect.

Ah, that's great news then! :)

The tweet in question where we showed a bit of animated terrain was quite some time ago, but you can see it in some of the shots in the new feature focus videos as well.

The-Cat-o-Nine-Tales wrote:

The tweet in question where we showed a bit of animated terrain was quite some time ago, but you can see it in some of the shots in the new feature focus videos as well.

Thank you for the reply. :) I can see animals moving there, water effects, smoke rising and people moving. This is really great!

The reason why I am so "obsessed" with these things is that they make the map alive, believable and memorable. Moving trees in particular were on the maps of the games I find had the most vibrant landscape, such as Settlers and Civ 4.