Elder scrolls- two steps forward, two steps back?

[Innocent Flower]

I just think that Bethesda kind of... always do some things worse than what they had before.
I can't remember if i played morrowind or oblivion first. I played skyrim soon after it came out. I played daggerfall after i did 95% of skyrim. I couldn't get into daggerfall. you're welcome to skip parts.


Anyways. Most of you haven't even heard of daggerfall. In the short time i played it i noticed some brilliant things

you can moddify your stats at the start of the game.
You can choose to have your magicka or health regenerate only when in the light.. or in the dark... or in water!or not at all. i thought this was a genius idea. The thought of running to a fire so that it's heat and light could regenerate your magic was a good one (strangely matching the idea of witches dancing round the fire) But it also allowed you to cripple your character in order for you to get more points to spend (and to give negative effects to enchantments for more points) you could forbid a weapon type or give yourself sunlight damage or holy place damage...

Morrowind doesn't have these things.Which is a shame because they sound like they should be developed! But i got into morrowind.
Morrowind has a brilliant story. the best backstory in the elder scrolls so far and rarely treats you like a child. The guild quests are grounded and don't require you to save the world. there were more spells and weapons and the dunmer sounded awesome.

oblivion was prettier and had better combat and great quests.
-The back story was neutralised and bland. The main storyline was incredibly generic. Whereas morrowind had grey areas of "did vivec realy kill nerevar?" and had a badguy who actually had a cause other than 'make chaos' (i know its mehrunes's thing, but surely they could have used something else?)
- Less items. Less spells. Enchanting far less interesting. Marksman regulated to a single weapon
- Strong level scaling.
- no dunmer voice! voices in general.
- Bland landscape and architecture

Then we've got skyrim. Even prettier and regions look different from one another. but with more problems!

- Nearly every single storyline has you as the chosen one. Possibly also the saviour of the world. It's both ridiculous and childish. Each quest line is also Highly flawed and predictable and each 'bad' character has an evil sounding voice.
- poor backstory especially in comparison to morrowind. Plus we've got all these retcons that are silly. Like alduin simply being a better form of dragon and akatosh's first rather than an aspect of akatosh and a litteral world eater. Or smaller things like Glass becoming machalite. Perhaps the behaviour of characters that just seem so forced and unnatural.
- the quests aren't as good as the oblivion ones. Far more repetitive.
- Perk system is totaly flawed and in many cases the 'skill' doesn't even affect an ability but is simply something to level in order to get perks that increase something by 20%. it's far less logical than previous games. Furthermore crafting skills haven't been balanced at all.
-Even less items and spells. no spellmaking!
- Armour and weapons apear to be more for fashion than practicality.
-Ui
- Time spent on bullshit systems such as marriage when more time could have been spent on everything else.
- Removal of Acrobatics. I think previous acrobatic skills in the game have been useless. However i think that Building on this skill rather than removing it would have been the right thing to do. It would have been smarter to have allowed the player to climb through ruins and to run away from guards across rooftops (despite the small city size) My point here is to state that bethesda would rather remove something than fix it.

dragonborn looks a little better.

I realy think that the series should develop in an evolutionary pattern... rather than whatever the fuck todd feels like. Shouldn't each game be better in every way than the last?

 

[Terminate421]

The way I look at it is, Elder Scrolls has always been about difference in what you can do later down the line that the developers give to you.

The main reason Skyrim hooked me in instead of Oblivion is because of three things:

Dragons
Sprinting (I mean, more total fluid control of my character)
Rewarded Leveling up system

I have played a bit of Morrowind but I am not in the mood to say what I feel because it was like 6 years ago and I hardly remember it at all besides jumping like 20 feet.

There is also a keen thing known as Accessibility. Some call bullshit on this reason and for good reason, but if Skyrim looked like Fallout 3 level graphics it might be hard for me to get into if I was just an onlooker instead of the gamer I am today.

Simplified can mean both good and bad, to me, Skyrim being simplified enough works in my opinion. The game has it's flaws here or there but I'm too busy listening to epic music while killing two dragons with lightning and a sword in the middle of whiterun to notice.

 

[TrevHead]

It's the same with Fallout too, as the years go by each new Bethesda game becomes more action less about RPGs and questing. The main problem is that the trade off is rather poor as the action sucks and has very little depth to it.

As elitist as it sounds it's still the truth. Beth and Bioware are dumbing down of old school C-RPG gameplay in favor for mainstream FPS console gameplay.

I'm not bitter though since with Kickstarter and indies we are starting to see an renascence of C-RPGs with Project Eternity.

Shame about Stalker though.

 

[Luca72]

I think there are two big forces guiding the direction of the Elder Scrolls. There's technological innovation (yay!) and there are the expectations of the rest of the video game industry (no!).

Morrowind had a beautifully constructed world that was massive and felt alive, and this was due to technological evolution. Oblivion gets a physics engine and radiant AI, as well as a bunch of little details affected by the engine (things like arrows sticking in wood but bouncing off of rocks, traps that function as part of the world, etc.). Skyrim has stunning visuals and gets a radiant quest system and all kinds of random events while you're running around exploring. These are all really cool, and added a lot to the game.

Then you have the other face of gaming. Oblivion is fully voice acted! So. Fucking. What? I like the conversations in Morrowind so much better because I don't feel like the game is talking down to me. Who gives a shit that every character has a voice if the voice acting is stilted and unconvincing? Skyrim improved it just barely, and is still cringe-worthy most of the time. The game has dragons! Look how badass these screenshots are! Did anyone else realize IMMEDIATELY when the dragon dive-bombs the character in first trailer that dragons wouldn't be fun to fight? You know, because they can fly and breathe fire and have NO REASON EVER TO JUST LAND IN FRONT OF YOU?

As you said before, all the quests for major organizations in the game have you being some kind of chosen one who's going to save the world. What a cop out! I'm playing this game specifically so that I can conceive of and build my own unique idea for a character, and then I find out that he's just there so he can blow up a door in a magical cave with a spell everyone in the game could by for 20 gold? I guess they wanted to eliminate any confusion for main stream gamers by telling you exactly where you stand. You mentioned that plot thread about Nerevar possibly getting killed by the Tribunal. When that was hinted at, I searched through all the books the Dissident Priests had and broke into that hidden library in Vivec just to try to find some answers. It had nothing to do with a pre-baked questline, it was just me being immersed in the world. Skyrim doesn't have anything like that.

By the way, I absolutely adore Skyrim. It's gorgeous, lot's of fun to hike around in, and what few spells they managed to retain feel nice and kinetic. And most of my big complaints about it have been fixed by mods (SkyRe is the SHIT). But you're absolutely right that the evolution of the series isn't linear.

 

[WoW Killer]

Anyways. Most of you haven't even heard of daggerfall.

I had to lol. I think that's the most hipster thing I've heard for a while.

Jokes aside. I can only describe how I felt about the changes.

My biggest gripe with the series was always the power levelling. Morrowind and Oblivion can give subtle differences on level up depending on what order you level the skills, how many minor skills you've raised in between a number of major skills etc. And the thing is, you don't have control over when the skills level. Not if you're playing the game organically by exploring, questing and fighting. The only way to have control over when a skill levels is by specifically power levelling it. I could be part way through a ruins, see my next level approaching, and have to stop everything, head back to town, and start the whole spamming cantrips or falling from buildings routine so that I wouldn't lose a few stat points. This was not immersive.

Now of course there is still power levelling in Skyrim. You can take Alteration from 40 to 100 in moments as soon as you've got a full set of spellcost reduction gear just by mousing Telekinesis over an ingot for a few minutes. I'm not on about that. What matters to me is that I don't have to power level. I'm not at a significant disadvantage by not doing so. I can have a rough* plan of what I want my character to be, and then simply play the game. I can fight bandits, explore dungeons, find misplaced valuables for peasants, or whatever else. I can let the skills increase as I use them. That's the whole point of a skill based progression system, or so I think.

*I say rough, but I have every character planned out down to the finest detail before I start. I guess that's one of my things.

So that was a big deal for me, and that's something that's been improved on a lot for me. I'm sure other people have other things they find to be a bigger deal, and they have their own opinions to match. I can't speak for anybody else. Can we please, and I mean please, stop this notion that the series has been dumbed down. This is nonsense. Some things were taken out, other things were put in. So spell crafting was removed, alright, but a proper smithing system was put in. The progression system is in many ways much deeper now (not all characters end up the same, for instance). This is not a casual series, and I hope it never will be. You prefer an older and less popular game; that's fine. Your opinion does not make you a better or more refined gamer than other people. Other people are not worse gamers or less sophisticated for disagreeing with you. That's what's being implied, and it's tiresome.

 

[Verzin]

My favorite game in the Elder Scrolls Series was Morrowind, for the great story, quests, skills, and items.

unfortunately, I've been enjoying the elder scrolls games less with each new release. increasingly...bland stories and quests. less interesting skills, and quests that just feel like they were made with style over substance.

Take the archmage quest chain in Skyrim. That was just so disappointing for me. No magic needed to progress, no arcane secrets to discover, mediocre lore, and WAY TOO RUSHED. They're trying too hard to tell EPIC STORIES OF WORLD SHAKING AWESOMENESS and instead telling over-grandiose stories with no substance.

I wish they'd bring back the lore and get a handle on their quests for the next one, but I doubt that they can.

too much money spent on graphics. too little on other areas. IMAO.

 

[SajuukKhar]

-The back story was neutralised and bland. The main storyline was incredibly generic. Whereas morrowind had grey areas of "did vivec realy kill nerevar?"

Vivec admits to killing Nerevar in the 36 lessons of Vivec. All of Morrowind's supposed "grey" has been answered in lore.

- poor backstory especially in comparison to morrowind. Plus we've got all these retcons that are silly. Like alduin simply being a better form of dragon and akatosh's first rather than an aspect of akatosh and a litteral world eater.

That isn't a retcon. Alduin can eat the world, but the entire point of the MQ was that he gave up that duty to rule the world instead, they say that like 4 times. Also, firstborn = Jesus = aspect of god = aspect of Akatosh. The title of firstborn is symbolic of his aspect state. It's all metaphors.

Perk system is totaly flawed and in many cases the 'skill' doesn't even affect an ability but is simply something to level in order to get perks that increase something by 20%. it's far less logical than previous games. Furthermore crafting skills haven't been balanced at all.

Raising a skill ALWAYS effects your ability, with, or without, perks, always.

Also, Crafting skills are made to be exploitable, Elder Scrolls has always prided itself on letting people make their characters as OP, or UP, as desired.

-Even less items and spells. no spellmaking!

That there are less items and spells is because of how they altered the spell system.

Most spells from past games were just repeats of lower level spells, but with more damage tacked on. With Skyrim's perk system however, the basic fireball spell in Skyrim is actually 15 different possible spells, based on the perks you have. There are less spells in Skyrim because they were able to merge redundant spells into one spell, and give you perks that let you modify the spell in the way you want. 10 destruction spells in Skyrim = 150 destruction spells in Oblivion.

Here's an example
Flame
Flame + dual casting
Flame + dual casting + impact
Flame + augmented flame
Flame + augmented flame + dual casting
Flame + augmented flame + dual casting + impact
Flame + augmented flame + intense flames
Flame + augmented flame + intense flames + dual casting
Flame + augmented flame + intense flames + dual casting + impact
Flame + augmented flameX2
Flame + augmented flameX2 + dual casting
Flame + augmented flameX2 + dual casting + impact
Flame + augmented flameX2 + intense flames
Flame + augmented flameX2 + intense flames + dual casting
Flame + augmented flameX2 + intense flames + dual casting + impact

The basic flame spell is actually 15 different spells based on your perks. Now do that for all 24 of Skyrim's destruction spells. 24 X 15 = 360 spells. Oblivion only had 74 destruction spells. The same applies to EVERY single form of Magic in Skyrim.

Items such as weapons are less numerous because they actually have differences in mechanics now. If you look at how Morrowind's weapons functioned, you would see that all melee weapons, or ranged weapons, were essentially the same weapon, with a different skin. Skyrim has fewer weapons because the fewer weapons do MORE mechanically now. Less weapon = greater mechanical diversity.

Spell-making was removed because it was way to OP, and it couldn't be balanced without nerfing it to the point to where you could basically only make spells that already existed in the game, that and it was largely incompatible with the change of spells from simply glow effects on the body, to all these effects like cloaks and wards.

- Removal of Acrobatics. I think previous acrobatic skills in the game have been useless. However i think that Building on this skill rather than removing it would have been the right thing to do. It would have been smarter to have allowed the player to climb through ruins and to run away from guards across rooftops (despite the small city size) My point here is to state that bethesda would rather remove something than fix it.

Acrobatics would break dungeons.

Also, they don't let you climb on top of cities for the same reason they don't let you levitate, cities exist in separate cells because of limitations on console hardware, and being able to run on the roofs gives players the ability to glitch outside the city cell and be stuck out there.

 

[endtherapture]

I'd have to say I agree. Morrowind was dense and intricate, and Oblivion lost some of that, in favour of being more cinematic, having more items and having more interesting quests. Skyrim was even more cinematic, and more accessible, at the cost of the dungeon design and quests and spell crafting system of Oblivion.

I wish there was a game with the balance of all 3.

 

[SajuukKhar]

The true Bethseda died after Daggerfall when Lefay and Peterson left and Howard and Rolston became project leaders.

The true Bethesda? if pre-morrowind was the "true Bethesda" then why is Morrowind arguably the most loved game in the series? Why is that daggerfall has some of the worst mechanics in the series?

I'd have to say I agree. Morrowind was dense and intricate, and Oblivion lost some of that, in favour of being more cinematic, having more items and having more interesting quests. Skyrim was even more cinematic, and more accessible, at the cost of the dungeon design and quests and spell crafting system of Oblivion.

Actually, spell crafting was in Skyrim. They removed is because it became way to spreadsheety, and made magic not feel like magic, and they very well could it add it back in if they find a way to make it not shit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsY_10xiVAs&feature=player_embedded

Interviewer:One thing that when I was down to see you guys at the studio was stuff related to how spells would interact with each other and that kind of thing. And I would suspect that the results of your experimentation on that would have an affect on whether you have anything like spellcrafting, right?

Todd:?Yeah, spellcrafting is a real wildcard. Something that we?ve done a lot. And there are pluses and minuses to it. We?d like to find? we have some ideas that we really like on how to solve that, and I don?t know where that?s going to go. But the thing that we DON?T like about the previous systems that we?ve done, is it becomes very ?spread-sheety.? It takes the magic out of magic.

You got to see the game, but your listeners haven?t. There?s a bigger emphasis on how the magic physically acts. Just a spell like fire; there are different spells for how the fire moves. Like putting down a rune that explodes when you walk over it. Or fire you can spray that lingers on the ground, like you?re spraying a wall, and you can spray the ceiling. Or fire that travels like a flamethrower out of your hands. Or a fireball that you charge up and throw and it explodes at a distance.

So our main goal is to make magic feel like this arcane powerful thing. And once it goes into a spreadsheet in the game where you can just say I want something at this distance and this power, it removes the illusion of like how this stuff actually works. So we have some ideas of ways around that, but we don?t know where those are going to go yet.

We do have the benefit of, we?re really, really happy with how the magic plays in the game, both visually and mechanically. And then being able to do it with both hands. There are opportunities there for combinations and things you can do without getting into the spreadsheet aspect of it. Which I do know some people like, but it does take away from the impact of the spells that you?re finding and mechanically how they work.?

 

[Tdoodle]

snip

This was a fabulous post and you are a fabulous person.

Might be pushing it with the one spell = fifteen spells bit but otherwise can't agree more.

 

[SajuukKhar]

This was a fabulous post and you are a fabulous person.

Might be pushing it with the one spell = fifteen spells bit but otherwise can't agree more.

One of the biggest fallacies I see with gaming in general is people trying to say "well there were 10 weapons types in X games, but only 5 in this one, so its dumbed down/simplified", when in reality, those 5 weapons in the newer game, do more mechanically then the 10 weapons from past games did.

People have a very bad habit of looking at the sheer "numbers" of things, without looking at the real mechanic behind the things they are talking about.

There are less weapons in Skyrim because you can do MORE with them then in past game.
There are less spells in Skyrim because you can modify them more then past game.
There are less dungeons then in Morrowind because dungeons are more detailed/complex.
There are less skills because in Morrowind you had 3 spells that each controlled one weapons, while in Skyrim you have one skill that has three separate branches, one for each of the skills merged into it.

Sometimes having less things, lets you get more out of them.

a set of 1+1+1 may have more numbers then a set of just 4, but 4 is a higher number.

 

[The_Lost_King]

Also, Crafting skills are made to be exploitable, Elder Scrolls has always prided itself on letting people make their characters as OP, or UP, as desired.

Spell-making was removed because it was way to OP

hmmmmmm. on one hand you say Bethesda likes making things op then you say they remove something because it is op. That really doesn't make sense. If I can exploit crafting skill why can't I exploit spell making?

 

[SajuukKhar]

hmmmmmm. on one hand you say Bethesda likes making things op then you say they remove something because it is op. That really doesn't make sense. If I can exploit crafting skill why can't I exploit spell making?

Because spellmaking exploits, and spellmaking in general, takes the magic out of magic, while smithing/alchemy/enchanting exploits don't take the smithing/alchemy/enchanting out of smithing/alchemy/enchanting.

I'm sure if you take EVERYBODY into account, Skyrim is the most loved ES game based solely on it being exposed to more people.

I meant by long-term fans of the series.

 

[The_Lost_King]

hmmmmmm. on one hand you say Bethesda likes making things op then you say they remove something because it is op. That really doesn't make sense. If I can exploit crafting skill why can't I exploit spell making?

Because spellmaking takes the magic out of magic, while smithing/alchemy/enchanting exploits don't take the smithing/alchemy/enchanting out of smithing/alchemy/enchanting.

Oh no it takes the magic out of magic! that is a bull shit answer in my opinion. The magic doesn't feel like "an arcane force" seeing as in later levels a daedric sword does more damage than your fiireball. Spell making would fix that. Plus I want to be able to make cool spells liek a flame spell that can calm people down. Plus the mages talk about making spells and I can't make one. That is complete bull.

 

[SajuukKhar]

Oh no it takes the magic out of magic! that is a bull shit answer in my opinion. The magic doesn't feel like "an arcane force" seeing as in later levels a daedric sword does more damage than your fiireball. Spell making would fix that. Plus I want to be able to make cool spells liek a flame spell that can calm people down. Plus the mages talk about making spells and I can't make one. That is complete bull.

The highest fire damage a vanilla weapon does is 30, while the base fireball spell does 40, and with perks, it does 60. Even the fire spell right below it, firebolt, does 25 base damage, and with perks it does 37.

Generic Magic Weapons - http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Generic_Magic_Weapons#Fire_Damage
Destruction spells - http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrimestruction#Spells

Plus I want to be able to make cool spells liek a flame spell that can calm people down.

That is exactly why they removed it. Smithing/Enchanting/Alchemy exploits only just take the already existing mechanics to higher levels. Spellmaking allows for abusive new mechanics such a damage while calm spells to be made.

Then it would either be Daggerfall or Morrowind.

Like I said, Morrowind has the more unique setting and alot of ppl love it for that aspect alone.

Most Morrowind fans I know prefer Mororwind's mechanics over Dagerfalls, along with the setting.