Noticed two things; 1) Ghostland isn't sealed off with mountains, and 2) Elvenbane is not sieged and ruined. One funny anecdote: In the lore, the wars in Darama (Ank, Dara and Drefia) was fought together with the grandfather of Thais, who is the father of Tibianus the 1st. But yet these cities were revealed fairly late in the expansions of Tibia.
Ps. Don't blame CIP for ruining what you love. Greedy players ruined that by making bots. Before anti bot systems were summon, they had to do a choice as a company. Remember they became one with introduction of Edron, premium account, a business rather than a hobby project.
I actually believe Souldrainer or and "Casa" from Otland sold their anti bot system to CIP, which was the official Tibia servers anti bot.
It was just too late to stop the transition towards hotkey aimbot. Servers and wars were owned with bots, and business were stealing money from CIP. They had to adapt. WoW and other games probably made an impact but aimbotters as well — it was an indication the game was too hard.