I can't get lost (Skyrim related)

[Shirastro]

Just turn off the quest tracking, stop whining as well.

Think about how much bitching we would have to put up with if there was no quest tracking, how about no compass?

If you see a thread that has reached 3th page DO read them through before you post you enlightened comment.

 

[Firia]

By adding the compass mark do we add or take away from the game?

I spent a stupidly long time with all the compass markers turned off. For some reason, I thought the Misc section of missions weren't worthy of markers, so I couldn't turn them on. To borrow from your phrase; I got lost. I spent easily an hour circling a town for a dog, and encountered abandoned towers, monsters, and a hidden away assassins entryway that I have granted its own private marker.

You can STILL achieve the same result you want by turning off markers. I can't really help you with the dungeon thing though. I like Skyrims dungeons more than Oblivions. They're easily better thought out and less samey. Linier with some expectations (I actually appreciate the shortcut at the end), yes, it is that. But some Oblivion dungeons were copied and pasted like a Diablo (1) dungeon.

 

[Private Custard]

Compass mark is optional, you can turn it off.

Skyrim's not set up for that though. In Morrowind, they'd give rough directions (East of Ald-Ruhn, a small island south of Mzanch, etc etc..). You get nothing of the sort now, they just assume you know where everything is.

EDIT: I loved the Morrowind method, but have just finished Skyrims main quest and didn't find it bothered me. I guess I'm less patient now than when I sunk 4000 hours into a single character in Morrowind........on the XBox!!

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

You're missing the point: those "outdated" features aren't outdated to the people who enjoy them. What you're saying is we need to do away with them so people who don't like them won't have to deal with them. What I'm saying is they're rare to begin with, so please don't make them nonexistent and take them away from the people who enjoy them completely. Just because you can't comprehend why people would find it fun doesn't mean they don't honestly find it fun. I have a hard time understanding why people prefer watching sports to playing them; that doesn't give me the right to force them to turn off the TV and make them play a pickup game with me.

But you are making the same attack on modern features. I even defend some old-school gaming features, but I used the phrase "archaic". Lack of direction in a game is an "archaic" feature. You can simulate it by doing what most of the players have recommended in this thread.

You are in this thread under the assumption everyone is out to take away the features you love in games. I even left my argument vague, while saying we can have both. On topic, you can find these locations by simply getting lost, and some npcs give directions. Especially looking for NPCs in towns, since most other NPCs are talking about relevant topics to your quest.

Huh? No. I'm in this thread with the understanding that this particular series, which is one of very few examples of its genre, has done away with those features, leaving people who like them essentially out in the cold. There are plenty of games that have those new-school features; I dislike the fact that the last holdout of the old-school features is giving up on them, and people are supporting it by saying "I like these newer features. If you don't like them, mod the game" when the more logical thing would be "I like these newer features. I'll play a newer series that has them, instead of praising an older series for selling out, and laughing at the loyal fans of the series who are now left with nothing that scratches the
itch."

But there are long-time fans that like them as well. Think we finally hit the middle ground here: I enjoyed Morrowwind and Oblivion, but love Skyrim, while you are in the Morrowwind and before crowd. I know of very few new series that delivers on the level of ES. I love the lore and established world in these games, and until they go Dirge of Cerberus on me, will probably keep playing them.

Though, what features are you arguing for the most?

Mainly the huge world and the number crunching RPG aspects; I'm actually in that minority who doesn't like the way Oblivion did away with the whole "sword clearly connects, but you miss anyway" thing. To me, an RPG is about the character's skill, not the player's. Morrowind had a smaller world than Daggerfall or Arena, and that's where the altered fast travel and quest finding mechanics come in; it gave the /feel/ of a huge world, even though it's technically one of the smallest games in the series. Oblivion felt like I was Peter Pan and Cyrodil was Never Never land; it only existed when I was there. Morrowind and earlier felt like an actual world that I inhabited, but still existed whether I was there or not.

 

[irani_che]

try looking for the lost knife cave site
i had the compass and the marker and it still took a long time of hiking up and down mountains to find the campsite

talk to the argonian woman at the docks of the stormcloak city

 

[MarlonBlazed]

I like the fast travel system....at least the one we have in Skyrim/Fallout 3.
First time you have to go somewhere your self, after that fast travel is completly fine with me.

I also like this and another feature that I think happens but I'm not sure, when fast travelling in both games you have a higher chance of triggering random events like how in Skyrim 9 out of 10 every time I fast travel to places in the open I end up fighting a dragon... If I haven't fought one recently. Also there's things in fallout 3 but it's been awhile since I played it so I wont comment on it.

This could just be a glitch in the coding that the devs decided to leave in or I'm wrong but either way it keeps me from abusing fast travel and I'm grateful for that.

 

[NotSoLoneWanderer]

There's nothing wrong with not wanting to spend hours looking for someone to talk to or something to find. I'd imagine most people wouldn't want to. I like exploration and hard work but I don't want to spend hours in a dungeon because I missed a book lying on a shelf.

 

[skywolfblue]

Personally, I hate getting lost.

I play open world RPGs for the choice and the scenery.

Not to go left instead of right in a labyrinth only to discover it was a dead end, or to head to the opposite side of the map because I forgot where the quest was. I find that frustrating, not fun.

 

[Snowblindblitz]

Mainly the huge world and the number crunching RPG aspects; I'm actually in that minority who doesn't like the way Oblivion did away with the whole "sword clearly connects, but you miss anyway" thing. To me, an RPG is about the character's skill, not the player's. Morrowind had a smaller world than Daggerfall or Arena, and that's where the altered fast travel and quest finding mechanics come in; it gave the /feel/ of a huge world, even though it's technically one of the smallest games in the series. Oblivion felt like I was Peter Pan and Cyrodil was Never Never land; it only existed when I was there. Morrowind and earlier felt like an actual world that I inhabited, but still existed whether I was there or not.

I've always had mixed feelings on number crunching. I can live without it, but like it when its there. I can live with the more action RPG feel when I'm not in a turn-based game. Skyrim's lack of stats outside of the 3 resources is odd to me, which is my real major complaint. The world feels much better then oblivion though. They always knocked out fast travel at the beginning, and added carriages similar to those bug things in Morrowind.

I do agree that the quest arrow needs to get knocked down on quests in the book finding category, as that is a huge issue with quests in skryim: I like knowing where I'm going, but thats a bit much to basically go

----->READ THIS<----- In a search the post quest.

 

[The Heik]

By adding the compass mark do we add or take away from the game?

Depends on why I'm exploring. If it's with a specific goal in mind, knowing the destination is useful, as Skyrim is friggin' gigantic. However if I'm exploring just for the sake of exploration, compass markers are annoying because they seem to act like Na'vi, continuously reminding about things I haven't gone to yet.

 

[Azure-Supernova]

By adding the compass mark do we add or take away from the game?

Sure it's great for newcomers and more casual (I hate using that word by the way!) players. Skyrim would benefit from a 'Hardcore Mode' like Fallout New Vegas did. All the way through playing all I could think about was what haven't I cleared off on my map, I had a pretty neat idea too.

I was in the middle of exploring a cave and came across a nice piece of enchanted loot, but my carry weight was almost full and there wasn't anything I was willing to give up. But seeing as I don't fast travel (on principal) and I wanted to get the main quest done, I thought it'd be really neat if I could add a little annotation. Maybe just a mark or a note on my map to remind me there's a piece of loot I wanted there! Kind of like in The Legend of Zelda Phantom Hourglass.

I'm waiting for the mod that removes the compass and simply allows me to use my map to navigate, maybe with an equippable minimap I can bind to a hotkey to bring up as I walk.

 

[Denariax]

Skyrim would benefit from not having a shoddy-as-crap control scheme for PC. It would be enjoyable if it wasn't the same game shot out again. People told me its different, and yeah its different because I was legitimately more bored than the last two.

Why are there so many goddamn topics about this game? It's like people enjoy being fed the same game year after year OH WAIT MW3

 

[Woodsey]

Morrowind's idea of navigation: here's a blank fucking map, and a not-brilliantly-written journal, now go. Which is wonderful, if you want to spend the entire freaking game lost.

Just turn the marker off in Skyrim. Problem solved.

By adding the compass mark do we add or take away from the game?

Sure it's great for newcomers and more casual (I hate using that word by the way!) players. Skyrim would benefit from a 'Hardcore Mode' like Fallout New Vegas did. All the way through playing all I could think about was what haven't I cleared off on my map, I had a pretty neat idea too.

I was in the middle of exploring a cave and came across a nice piece of enchanted loot, but my carry weight was almost full and there wasn't anything I was willing to give up. But seeing as I don't fast travel (on principal) and I wanted to get the main quest done, I thought it'd be really neat if I could add a little annotation. Maybe just a mark or a note on my map to remind me there's a piece of loot I wanted there! Kind of like in The Legend of Zelda Phantom Hourglass.

Prepare yourself, because I'm about to get old school in this shit: use a pen and paper.

New Vegas' hardcore mode was a complete farce, by the way.

 

[Antwerp Caveman]

Aahh Morrowind...the only game where you have to find a rock near a bunch of other rocks <3
Yeah, I do say, it is kinda easy here. But hey, nearly all games are easy these days!

Well yes but why, why are games being dumbed down so much?

I guess it's the price to pay for becoming a more mainstream form of entertainment :/

Well, it could be that developers want to make their games accessible to a wide audience. Thus making it easier to make sure everyone "can" enjoy it. Because, let's face it. I doubt many people want to look hours and hours for a rock in a mountain range.

But that doesn't matter, by that time, the game will have been bought and paid for already!

 

[SnakeoilSage]

Compass mark is optional, you can turn it off.

Also, Oblivion's dungeons complicated? Big, perhaps. Not complicated. They were as bland and generic as it's possible to be. They are the plain porridge of dungeons.

Still better than Dragon Age II's. Same map, different entry point...

 

[Tigurus]

Aahh Morrowind...the only game where you have to find a rock near a bunch of other rocks <3
Yeah, I do say, it is kinda easy here. But hey, nearly all games are easy these days!

Well yes but why, why are games being dumbed down so much?

I guess it's the price to pay for becoming a more mainstream form of entertainment :/

Well, it could be that developers want to make their games accessible to a wide audience. Thus making it easier to make sure everyone "can" enjoy it. Because, let's face it. I doubt many people want to look hours and hours for a rock in a mountain range.

But that doesn't matter, by that time, the game will have been bought and paid for already!

True but if the developers hear in Morrowind (lets take that as example) that people totally could hardly find their ways to objectives. Then they could be like "hey, let's improve that in our next game."

 

[ChocoFace]

snip

You can play it by simply turning all quests into inactives and just look at their descriptions.
There are still quests that you can get lost with, such as that Red Eagle one.

My first 10 or so hours in game was purely exploring and doing/finishing any quests that i happened to run across. So much fun.

 

[shrekfan246]

I guess the first couple of times it was mentioned here didn't take so let me try again this time with CAPS:

SKYRIM DOESN'T SUPPORT PLAYING WITH COMPASS MARK OFF. NPC GIVE YOU NO DIRECTIONS TO WHERE YOU HAVE TO GO AND YOU ARE EXPECTED TO USE THE COMPASS MARKER.

Also i never mentioned anything about fast travel.
I like the fast travel system....at least the one we have in Skyrim/Fallout 3.
First time you have to go somewhere your self, after that fast travel is completly fine with me.

Let me get this straight: You're complaining that you can't get lost while searching for quests and stuff because of the compass, but you're also complaining that if you turn off the compass, you'll get lost?

The actual quest log does usually tell you the area you need to find to continue the quest, and worst comes to worst you can turn the marker on for a second to find the spot and then turn it back off and amble in that general direction. Yes, NPC's don't give you exact locations and landmarks to search for, and the quest log usually simply tells you the name of the location, but is it really that detrimental? Honestly, there's so much content that I've stumbled upon that I typically get side-tracked from what I was originally doing and end up halfway across the map before I remember I went to Falkreath for a reason. In fact, sometimes I can get so turned around while traveling that even with the compass marker, I need to bring up the map just to make sure I'm still going the right way (also, having fifteen different markers all up at once can get confusing).

Is marking a quest, looking at the map, and unmarking it again really so different from bringing up the quest log every ten minutes and trying to memorize the location it's telling you to go to, oftentimes with only vague or out-right wrong directions? The quest log in vanilla Morrowind is a jumbled mess, and half the time NPCs didn't actually know the right direction to send you in.

 

[DarkRyter]

Really? I fucking love how I never get lost. Linear dungeons are fucking boss.

Go into room, kill some dudes, solve a puzzle, go to next room. = Fun.

Go into room. Kill some dudes. Find fork in path. Get Lost. Back track to beginning, try path again, find nothing. Get headache, stop playing game for a while. = Not fun.

Spending time trying to find something is not fun. I'm happy a game developer finally realized that.

 

[Choppaduel]

1. You can deselect the quest in the journal so the waypoint won't show up and just read the quest.

2. Instead of entering the cave the boring normal way you can try to find its exit and reach it, won't always work, but it sounds like somethings you'd like.