Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim announced

[walTer]

Any game that makes me say, “Ok now I need to turn in that quest…wait never mind, I can do that later, I am gonna jump on my horse and head west for a while” makes me happy.

And yeah, the dungeons are pretty long.

[Blackadar]

Of course they have glaring faults. All hugely ambitious monstrosities do. If you demand perfection from Bethesda games you shouldn’t play them, because they’ll never achieve that.

No one is demanding perfection. You missed the point of his post.

Let’s face it, the initial reviews on something like Oblivion were great because it seemed like a great technical achievement, but after 10-15 hours the game just died for many people. It’s the Black & White of RPG games…wonderful presentation, but ultimately tragically flawed and soulless. So someone who got burned by Oblivion’s reviews is going to be naturally cautious with Skyrim.

I’m in the same boat. There were too many game design flaws in Oblivion that ultimately manifested themselves as insurmountable obstacles after a while. The character leveling mechanics, the empty world, the lousy questing, the bad interface, poor combat, the monster leveling…these really didn’t hit home until I’d spent many hours with the game. Once they did, it was like a light going out. Many of us just couldn’t see past these issues and gave up.

But I think the answer that some of us are looking for can’t be given because the game is evolutionary, not revolutionary. I think Tim James may have the best answer - the changes are incremental, but those make all the difference in the world.

[Telefrog]

It’s the Black & White of RPG games…wonderful presentation, but ultimately tragically flawed and soulless.

That’s a bit of hyperbole, isn’t it? I enjoyed Oblivion (unmodded!) despite the warts. Even with the levelling isues and cut & paste dungeon sections, I played over 100 hours of Oblivion.

Black & White was some kind of collective Punk’d on every gamer.

[Cal]

No one is demanding perfection. You missed the point of his post.

Let’s face it, the initial reviews on something like Oblivion were great because it seemed like a great technical achievement, but after 10-15 hours the game just died for many people. It’s the Black & White of RPG games…wonderful presentation, but ultimately tragically flawed and soulless. So someone who got burned by Oblivion’s reviews is going to be naturally cautious with Skyrim.

Who the Fuck has ever described Oblivion as the Black and White of the RPG world? Im sure im not the only one who put in 100’s and 100’s of hours with the game, mods etc.

[Adam_Eayrs]

Who the Fuck has ever described Oblivion as the Black and White of the RPG world? Im sure im not the only one who put in 100’s and 100’s of hours with the game, mods etc.

Me? Not in those words, but yeah. Blackadar’s phrase “like a light going out” describes exactly my feelings on that “game”.

[Brian_Seiler]

That’s a bit of hyperbole, isn’t it? I enjoyed Oblivion (unmodded!) despite the warts. Even with the levelling isues and cut & paste dungeon sections, I played over 100 hours of Oblivion.

See and raise. I put in a hundred and twenty hours of Oblivion on the 360, no mods, warts intact, with a guide, and never even got to the central plot and loved every minute of it. And this was at some point after Bioshock released that I did this, so it’s not like I was starved for content at that point. Granted, I would probably have done less of that if the game had a better GPS (I spent a while climbing mountains to get to the thing on my map when I was supposed to take a road in the opposite direction that doubles back), but I suspect that I would have just replaced my mountaineering with more dungeoneering.

I still intend to go back and finish it. One of these days. I’ll wrap up that Fighter’s Guild quest and then do the story. And then we can think about the DLC. Come to think of it, I did sort of the same thing for Fallout 3 (though I got further in that one before I got distracted - I believe I legitimately finished every sidequest and got up to the big simulator mission before something shiny caught my eye). And I’ll probably do the same thing in New Vegas in the imagination future when I have time to play it.

[Blackadar]

That’s a bit of hyperbole, isn’t it? I enjoyed Oblivion (unmodded!) despite the warts. Even with the levelling isues and cut & paste dungeon sections, I played over 100 hours of Oblivion.

Black & White was some kind of collective Punk’d on every gamer.

Oh, I knew that comment would get people. ;)

Some people completed Black & White and spend a lot of time with that game despite the flaws. Empire:Total War is another game where people either could or couldn’t get by the fundamental issues. But what they all have in common is they all got terrific reviews that never uncovered fundamental flaws that caused a large portion of their player bases to walk away from the game. Hence the hesitation at taking the reviewers and initial buzz as the gospel…because it didn’t turn out that way for many of us on Oblivion.

I think of all games, Oblivion is the most divisive of 'em all. Either you loved it and spent a massive amount of hours with it, or you simply grew to hate it and walked away. There isn’t much middle ground.

I think the most encouraging things I’ve heard are from the people who didn’t like Oblivion, liked FO3 and seem to really enjoy Skyrim.

[Giaddon]

You could take all the questing out of Skyrim, all the level advancement, all the loot, give me a stone axe and plop me down in Riverwood with nothing to do and it would still be one of my favorite games of the year.

Skyrim is one of the more remarkable places to explore in videogames.

The fact that this amazing place also has a plethora of NPCs to talk to, quests to undertake, loot to find, enemies to defeat, factions to join, potions to craft, weapons to smith, an interesting magic system, and an engaging leveling system is just delicious, delicious icing.

[Stridergg]

Let’s face it, the initial reviews on something like Oblivion were great because it seemed like a great technical achievement, but after 10-15 hours the game just died for many people.

If Oblivion just died for you after 10-15 hours, you need to figure out why and then ask people if those particular aspects have changed in Skyrim.

If you don’t know what you didn’t like in Oblivion then no one can help you because Skyrim has changed in so many ways and yet in so many ways it remained the same. So one has to be specific in his questions.

One thing can help though on a generic level. There seems to be a lot of people (including myslef) on this and other forums that say “Love Skyrim, hated Oblivion”.

[Stridergg]

I forgot one other major flaw with the interface: dual-wielding. It unbinds my number key when I’m swapping between a torch, bow, and dual daggers. Is it like that on X360 too?

I noticed the game unbinding the key when I had two exactly the same shields (it was listed as “Steel Shield (2)” in Inventory) and a key mapped to them. Every time I’d hit the key, it would unbind. It worked again when I dropped one of the shields. I guess the game gets confused.

Try dual-wielding two different weapons, it should work fine. For example, enchant the same swords with different things, they should become different items on the list and then you can bind them to different keys.

[Tracy_Baker]

Oh, I knew that comment would get people. ;)

Some people completed Black & White and spend a lot of time with that game despite the flaws. Empire:Total War is another game where people either could or couldn’t get by the fundamental issues. But what they all have in common is they all got terrific reviews that never uncovered fundamental flaws that caused a large portion of their player bases to walk away from the game. Hence the hesitation at taking the reviewers and initial buzz as the gospel…because it didn’t turn out that way for many of us on Oblivion.

I think of all games, Oblivion is the most divisive of 'em all. Either you loved it and spent a massive amount of hours with it, or you simply grew to hate it and walked away. There isn’t much middle ground.

I don’t understand what evidence you’re basing your assertion that a large percentage of the player base ended up walking away from Fallout 3 and Oblivion after a short amount of time. Not saying you’re wrong, but from what I can tell burnout for both titles only set in after players had sunk a substantial number of hours into them. I guess we’re just working with different sets of anecdotal data.

I see your point regarding overhyped reviews, but this isn’t a Black & White situation at all. It’s more like Final Fantasy or Metal Gear Solid where the breatlhess reviews make perfect sense if you like that particular sub-genre but the games never change enough to make you like that particular sub-genre if initial titles in the series never appealed to you. It’s safe to say that if you hated Oblivion you’ll also hate Skyrim, even though Skyrim improves on the formula in every conceivable way.

[Telefrog]

Some people completed Black & White and spend a lot of time with that game despite the flaws. Empire:Total War is another game where people either could or couldn’t get by the fundamental issues. But what they all have in common is they all got terrific reviews that never uncovered fundamental flaws that caused a large portion of their player bases to walk away from the game. Hence the hesitation at taking the reviewers and initial buzz as the gospel…because it didn’t turn out that way for many of us on Oblivion.

I think of all games, Oblivion is the most divisive of 'em all. Either you loved it and spent a massive amount of hours with it, or you simply grew to hate it and walked away. There isn’t much middle ground.

I’ll agree with what you wrote, except I’m willing to say that the gulf between the ratio of people that liked B&W enough to spend more than 10 hours on it and the people that liked Oblivion enough to spend over 40 hours is a lot wider than your post makes it seem. There is no way that Oblivion can be compared to B&W. Oblivion may be “divisive” among some folks, but I literally don’t know a single person that came away from B&W with fond memories. None at all. B&W was some kind of sick experiment on gamers that reviewers must’ve enjoyed snickering about.

Obviously, individual tastes vary, but it’s just plain nuts to suggest that Oblivion’s flaws caused the kind of collective backlash that B&W deservedly received.

[Vesper]

It’s like listening to two different albums by a band you like. Both albums sounds unmistakably like the band, but one album sucks and one is a masterpiece. Oblivion is Bethesda’s St Anger, cut and pasted riffs (dungeons), missing guitar solos (fun), and all. Skyrim is Bethesda’s …And Justice for All, a juggernaut of craftsmanship and skill, demonstrating some of the absolute best work that the studio has to offer.

Sure, there are a few things to like about St. Anger, and you can tell that underneath all the bullshit the album would (and could) be so much better with even a little tweaking. But, except for a few fans who find it enjoyable (I like St. Anger, but understand the grievances of those who don’t) it shits all over fans of the genre, and gets so much wrong even when almost all the right ingredients are right there.

They might feel similar, but one is exemplary, the other is vomit.

This may the best description of how I feel about the games (and Metallica albums) ever.

[TimJames]

Try dual-wielding two different weapons, it should work fine. For example, enchant the same swords with different things, they should become different items on the list and then you can bind them to different keys.

Obviously I really want it to be one key, but I’ll try this again. I swear the last time I did this (two crafted fine steel daggers were listed as separate items) it still got confused about which hand was which.

The torch confuses it too. It’s clearly grafted onto Oblivion’s system, and they didn’t go far enough to make it work magically. It seems like something modders could provide greater control over though.

[Blackadar]

If Oblivion just died for you after 10-15 hours, you need to figure out why and then ask people if those particular aspects have changed in Skyrim.

If you don’t know what you didn’t like in Oblivion then no one can help you because Skyrim has changed in so many ways and yet in so many ways it remained the same. So one has to be specific in his questions.

One thing can help though on a generic level. There seems to be a lot of people (including myslef) on this and other forums that say “Love Skyrim, hated Oblivion”.

That’s what the guy was asking on the page before this one. I’m not the one asking here…

[scharmers]

For me, describing Skyrim is simple, and doesn’t require tortured Metallica analogies (what – is Arena “Kill 'Em All” or “Garage Days Revisted?”): Skyrim is Oblivion with 4 years of good user mods dumped on it. This not only includes the obsessive (if overly-sharpened) texture mods and graphic mods, but tons of self-indulgent and very welcome “atmosphere” mods. All of this is a very good thing.

So…if somebody loved Oblivion (me), this makes Skyrim one of the Best Games Evar. If you didn’t like Oblivion (other fools), then there is absolutely nothing you will find pleasing and you should stop posting new threads about the game. Foxstab.

[Blackadar]

I don’t understand what evidence you’re basing your assertion that a large percentage of the player base ended up walking away from Fallout 3 and Oblivion after a short amount of time. Not saying you’re wrong, but from what I can tell burnout for both titles only set in after players had sunk a substantial number of hours into them. I guess we’re just working with different sets of anecdotal data.

I see your point regarding overhyped reviews, but this isn’t a Black & White situation at all. It’s more like Final Fantasy or Metal Gear Solid where the breatlhess reviews make perfect sense if you like that particular sub-genre but the games never change enough to make you like that particular sub-genre if initial titles in the series never appealed to you. It’s safe to say that if you hated Oblivion you’ll also hate Skyrim, even though Skyrim improves on the formula in every conceivable way.

Who said anything about people walking away from FO3?

I remember seeing polls for Oblivion a couple of years ago and the large majority ended up walking away after a few hours. I can’t remember where I saw 'em, but I remember 'em.

I don’t think your last statement is safe to say. There are a number of people on Qt3 who have said they hated Oblivion and are enjoying Skyrim.

Again, I think the answer some fence-sitters are looking for was said by Tim James on the page before this one: Incremental but critical changes = FUN!

[skyride]

I’m pretty sure he’s just trolling with the B&W comment. I don’t know anyone who liked B&W. Majority of the gamers I know liked Oblivion/Fallout despite the warts. I think if you despised Oblivion, Skyrim won’t change your mind. It feels like a streamlined Oblivion to me.

[TimJames]

Skyrim is Oblivion with 4 years of good user mods dumped on it. This not only includes the obsessive (if overly-sharpened) texture mods and graphic mods, but tons of self-indulgent and very welcome “atmosphere” mods.

I don’t think it’s just that. Maybe that’s enough for you if you thrive on lack of direction. As hip as that sounds, that’s not quite me. I like the glue they’ve added to tie it into an exciting adventure. I have to refer back to Nehrim again: interesting world to explore, decent story so far, and many dungeons have a unique boss or magical item at the end. They also took a page from Fallout 3 and included micro-stories to flesh out the world, like a dead bandit couple or soldiers eaten by trolls.

Those things are compelling to me. I don’t think Oblivion mods were ever in the same league until Nehrim.

I could be wrong though. I hear people talk about interesting things in Oblivion that I never encountered. Maybe that’s true. But in Skyrim you trip over them constantly.

[Pogo]

Skyrim pulls off effects like HDR with much subtler hand (apparently they learned from Oblivion, which had ridiculously overdone HDR/bloom effects), and also has better art.

This confuses me. The HDR in Skyrim easiliy bothers me as being way too overdone. Just swinging your view past a nearby torch makes your intended visual target look dark as hell momentarily.

There’s nothing subtle about the HDR in Skyrim.