I been running around just exploring and i started wondering exactly how big is this thing?

I'ts not completely open-world (at least not in the Morrowind sense, for example) but i can tell it's still pretty big.

Just to keep using MW as a reference point, that game's area was supposed to be around 10 square miles, how does Outcast compare?

Does anyone have a map?

http://www.cremo.de/outcast/

Click on the left side on "Lösung", Now you can see on bottom the links to the five parts of the Continent. Click on one, and then on top at red-colored writing, i.e. "Karte von Ranzaar - Hier klicken!".

It is not really as big as Morrowind ;)

There are five main "worlds" that are roughly the same size as one another, and then a sixth smaller area. If you run around an explore one of the areas until you've pretty much mapped it out, then you can safely say the game is approximately five times that size.

Not truly open-world, as you say, but very impressive for 1999. It manages to feel like it's truly open-world, despite the barriers in place.

There's this fan project:

http://www.openoutcast.org/wp/

I haven't tried it though. Not sure how long it will take to finish, or even if it will be finished, but it's still cool to see.

But I agree with you, the original actually still looks really impressive. I played in the original resolution too, and I was still struck by how beautiful it was.