It's the freedom you're allowed when interacting with it that matters.
Honestly, was anybody all that attached to Skyrim as a setting? I mean sure it was pretty, but it's populated by mindless drones who all seem to be reading from the same sheet in similar voices. And let's be honest, nothing about Skyrim in an of itself is all that original. It's Norse mythology dressed up with some political commentary about racial tensions. Only really interesting things about it are the things that get explored/discussed the least (The Daedra/Aedra dichotomy, The Dwemer). So all in all, it's a pretty standard heroic fantasy setting.
What makes it so appealing? The fact that I'm not leashed/railroaded nearly as much as in other RPGs. If they got rid of a few character's (and children's) inexplicable invulnerability to death or harm it'd be downright spectacular.
Here's why: every RPG you've ever played casts you as an immortal unstoppable badass with magic powers clothed in artifacts drawn from the hoary mists of legend- who's forced to put up with the nonsense of unwashed peasants, nobly sacrifice himself when prompted and fall in love with whatever perky set of tits first walks on set.
Notice how things took a left turn at the end there? It's because when RPGs pigeonhole you like that it's like being put on a leash by the devs.
"You've got alllll this power, but you're not allowed to use it how you want. No, you're gonna go save the land now. Yes, the land full of racist assholes. Yes, I know you don't like either of the factions you have the choice of siding with. Yes, I know you'd like to kill the smug prick who tried to have you executed. But too bad. I wanna write a standard heroic saga. Now go sit in the corner quietly and wait for the cutscene in which you demonstrate your heroic qualities to finish. Then you can get bossed around by some prick NPCs who've been blessed with plot armor."
And it's *annoying*. Simply because not everybody is wired that way. Not everybody is interested in hearing the tale of John Everyman climbing to the top of the mountain to slay the dragon because he's either got a really tiny cock or an insane amount of self righteousness.
So the fact that Skyrim gives me the option to do what I wanna do? To up and murder the mysterious woman who kidnapped me in my sleep and then go slaughter her whole family? To wolf out and clear the streets when a guard decides it'd be a great idea to pick a fight with the Dragonborn over 5 coins? WONDERFUL. Give me more of that.
The PC in an RPG is the ubermensch. He's a time traveling (by dint of save/load) immortal (by dint of respawn) unstoppable (by dint of persistence) badass (automatically). So stop forcing him to be a good boy and go along with the motions in the name of laziness/corner cutting. Let him off the damned leash already. You're so close as it is... you just need to tweak a few more things...
And besides mods that is the thing I love about those open world games.
You can do whatever the hell you want.
I got 135 hours of gameplay in Skyrim before I got round to doing the main quest line. I've got, literally, thousands of hours put into Morrowind, Oblivion, Fallout 3 and New Vegas. Purely because you can do things however the hell you feel like and then crack around with mods afterwards.
Nearly every other RPG gets about 20-30 hours of my time to complete them then go back to the store to be exchanged.
Here's my problem: why do I want to do any of that?
You can do damn near anything, but the world can't react in a believable way to any of it. Why bother killing a person when it's just a puppet with no identity? Besides, how much freedom do you really have? How many ways can you interact with the world aside from killing people and taking their stuff?
I'd rather a game that restricts my freedom, prohibitively if necessary, but provides a world and characters that react to my actions.
And no, having guards say, "Perhaps you can brew me some ale" when I get 50 points in alchemy is not sufficient.
Oh look, another skyrim has a crappy world thread...
I wanted an epic fantasy game that had towns, quests, dungeons, guilds and large plains and mountains to cross and they delivered. I wasn't expecting the story to be mind-blowing and it didn't need to be. Not every NPC has to have a tragic backstory worth a 1000 words.
Jynthor: My only problem with the world is the characters. Name me one memorable character you met in Skyrim. Yeah, thought so.
Well, I liked the Dark Elf Girl and the Scottish Dude from the Thieves Guild. Granted I can't remember their names but I liked them. The Argonian from the Dark Brotherhood was a pretty cool guy as well.
I do like the fact that Skyrim has so much more freedom than other RPG's, but OP, if every fantasy RPG copied Skyrim's way of doing things, would that just make the formula as dull and stale as what you're complaining about? Different games, even from the same genre, have their own approaches to gameplay and storytelling, and more variety is always a good thing.
Yeah the world doesn't really react to you at all and it is kinda dead but im happy enough with it. Skyrim is all about making your own character and then going to kill things, for me at least.
I found it to be pretty fun and I would say it delivered what I would expect from an Elder scrolls game.
Now if I want a world that feels alive which I can actully get involved in then I can go play Mount and Blade: Warband with the Pendor mod.
Until SureAI unveil Projekt 5 and descend from the fucking heavens to make another total conversion and fucking beat Bethesda and their pathetic effort on a budget of 2 cents and a piece of string.
Nehrim was populated by nameless NPCs that always said the same thing and you STILL cared about the world, because the few main characters were fleshed out and the main quest was engrossing. Thats how you fucking do it, Bethesda.
Jynthor: My only problem with the world is the characters. Name me one memorable character you met in Skyrim. Yeah, thought so.
I dunno, I thought Cicero was pretty memorable. As soon as I was able to, I kept him as my companion for the rest of the game, just because I liked the things he said.
The books in TES have always been very good at holding my attention. Far moreso than the characters.
As for memorable characters from TES in general... Crassius Curio was particularly memorable, as was anything involving Sheogorath, the Mad Prince (Shivering Isles makes up for a lot of the incredibly dull conversations in Oblivion). There's just too much space to fill with generic quests for Bethesda to focus on making characters memorable.
(until the retarded meme-mongers arrive anyway)
Though that's coming from a backlog of lore throughout the series.
Jynthor: My only problem with the world is the characters. Name me one memorable character you met in Skyrim. Yeah, thought so.
Lydia, that "I'm sworn to carry your burdens" line annoyed me at first, but then it grew on me, I then decided to always keep her alive because I like a sassy companion.
Until SureAI unveil Projekt 5 and descend from the fucking heavens to make another total conversion and fucking beat Bethesda and their pathetic effort on a budget of 2 cents and a piece of string.
Nehrim was populated by nameless NPCs that always said the same thing and you STILL cared about the world, because the few main characters were fleshed out and the main quest was engrossing. Thats how you fucking do it, Bethesda.
Was Nehrim translated completely in english? Last I checked their translation was still in beta, still had a lot of lines untranslated, granted I only checked this time last year, but was the translation ever finished?
Jynthor: My only problem with the world is the characters. Name me one memorable character you met in Skyrim. Yeah, thought so.
I dunno, I thought Cicero was pretty memorable. As soon as I was able to, I kept him as my companion for the rest of the game, just because I liked the things he said.
Cicero is no Glarthir, Fargoth or Adoring Fan. Hehe.
Until SureAI unveil Projekt 5 and descend from the fucking heavens to make another total conversion and fucking beat Bethesda and their pathetic effort on a budget of 2 cents and a piece of string.
Nehrim was populated by nameless NPCs that always said the same thing and you STILL cared about the world, because the few main characters were fleshed out and the main quest was engrossing. Thats how you fucking do it, Bethesda.
Was Nehrim translated completely in english? Last I checked their translation was still in beta, still had a lot of lines untranslated, granted I only checked this time last year, but was the translation ever finished?
The English language pack has been released and its finished.
I cant say how good or complete it is though, I always played Nehrim in German. If your internet is decent its worth trying out.
I imagine it's very hard to make such a large world and fill it with very memorable characters. Although, I'd disagree about there not being a single one. Paarthurnax. I love that old dragon. I also have a-lot of scorn toward Delphine, she's kind of a bitch.
Are you just saying you want to be able to kill whoever you want, and you want weaker guards? That's exactly what Morrowind was like, and it was pretty awesome. I literally used to fly around wiping out the inhabitants of entire towns with exploding cold spells (there were lots of Dunmer, of course, so no fire). And that was on a console. I miss that for sure. But, as with all things good, Bethesda got rid of it so the stupids wouldn't mess up their game and get mad. The amount this series has changed just so Glen Beck can get through the starter dungeon is mind boggling when you think about it.
Jynthor: My only problem with the world is the characters. Name me one memorable character you met in Skyrim. Yeah, thought so.
There are a few characters memorable to me, but yeah I know what you mean. I found myself much more engaged with the NPCs in the world of Final Fantasy XI--and none of their dialog is voiced.
What REALLY bothered me was after I killed Ulfric and completed that storyline, everybody went on talking about Ulfric and the Stormcloaks as though we never even took over Windhelm. Really, that is one of the MAIN storylines of Skyrim. You start the game with the decision of Stormcloaks or Imperials then you're practically slapped in the face with it throughout all of your encounters in the other jarls. At least give me something, a changing of the flags and maybe a few more songs that the bards sing in the taverns.
Until SureAI unveil Projekt 5 and descend from the fucking heavens to make another total conversion and fucking beat Bethesda and their pathetic effort on a budget of 2 cents and a piece of string.
Nehrim was populated by nameless NPCs that always said the same thing and you STILL cared about the world, because the few main characters were fleshed out and the main quest was engrossing. Thats how you fucking do it, Bethesda.
Nehrim would not have been possible without Bethesda's work. Not that Nehrim isn't a fucking work of art, but the fact remains.
Until SureAI unveil Projekt 5 and descend from the fucking heavens to make another total conversion and fucking beat Bethesda and their pathetic effort on a budget of 2 cents and a piece of string.
Nehrim was populated by nameless NPCs that always said the same thing and you STILL cared about the world, because the few main characters were fleshed out and the main quest was engrossing. Thats how you fucking do it, Bethesda.
Nehrim would not have been possible without Bethesda's work. Not that Nehrim isn't a fucking work of art, but the fact remains.
True, which is why I am thankful Bethesda made Skyrim. We get a mediocre sandbox game and a canvas for other "more talented" people to paint on. Worth 60 bucks for me personally.
Zhukov: Here's my problem: why do I want to do any of that?
You can do damn near anything, but the world can't react in a believable way to any of it. Why bother killing a person when it's just a puppet with no identity? Besides, how much freedom do you really have? How many ways can you interact with the world aside from killing people and taking their stuff?
I'd rather a game that restricts my freedom, prohibitively if necessary, but provides a world and characters that react to my actions.
And no, having guards say, "Perhaps you can brew me some ale" when I get 50 points in alchemy is not sufficient.
This guy knows what's up. The characters in Skyrim were laughably hollow. It's probably the first thing that that really took me out of the experience and made me go back to playing Fallout 3. Had to remind myself that the genre was capable of being fun. There's no sense of urgency to do anything in the game. I'm supposed to be stopping the world from ending, right? Why does no one care? People know I'm the dragonborn, don't they? Why do they treat me with absolute indifference or seemingly utter contempt? What is Alduin doing while I'm out catching butterflies for the local Apothecary who needs them for... some reason? The game has about 3 huge overarching, possibly world changing plotlines going on, but it doesn't do anything with them. Sure, New Vegas had a Civil War plot, but it did something with it. You saw it through to an exciting climax where you and all your allies battle for control of the Hoover Dam. When you finish the Skyrim Civil War plot, you unlock some new lines of ambient dialogue to have shouted at you in towns and you get to play real estate manager with a few NPCs you couldn't give two shits about.
Here's why: every RPG you've ever played casts you as an immortal unstoppable badass with magic powers clothed in artifacts drawn from the hoary mists of legend- who's forced to put up with the nonsense of unwashed peasants, nobly sacrifice himself when prompted and fall in love with whatever perky set of tits first walks on set.
Not just forced to put up with them. Usually, you're forced to do errands for them.
Still, a world with characters I don't give a damn about and story I don't give a damn about is not one I really want to play. If I wanted to spend hours crafting stuff...Well, I'll never want to do that. Slaughtering towns? Meh. Without some sort of structure, games aren't really games.
I think the biggest problem is the same one Peter Moleneaux(Don't know how to spell it) Had when making fable. Your choices and actions fail to have any meaningful impact on the world. We don't see consequences for our choices or actions. When we kill Ulfric we're just told that we win the war, but it's not something all that visible.
There are two kinds of RPGs, the way I see it: -Those that try and tell you a tight, contained story (most JRPGs, also Bioware's stuff.) -Those that try to give you complete freedom (like everything Bethsoft does.)
Now, some people like one kind, some like the other, and both types have produced both excellence and crap (and if you think that all JRPG stories are automatically crap, have you ever played Earthbound?) But when developers try and intertwine the two, the freedom feels less free because "you have to do this story mission sometime" and the story has its pacing murdered by the fact that you can ignore the anomaly that's supposedly going to kill everything in a few days to go finish all the stunt jumps. And unfortunately, I found Skyrim to fall into this third category.
People constantly saying how bad it is the dragons have returned is no one caring? Those random encounters on the roads with NPCs who claim to have lost everything to dragon attacks and beg for money isn't people caring?
Guards saying "you cant possibly be the dragonborn of legend can you" and "hail dragonborn", amongst other things, isn't evidence that people know who you are?
Jitters Caffeine: Why do they treat me with absolute indifference or seemingly utter contempt?
Why would they not? No one sees you do 90% of the things you do.
Jitters Caffeine: What is Alduin doing while I'm out catching butterflies for the local Apothecary who needs them for... some reason?
Play the main quest for more then 5 mintues, they tell you Alduin is raising all the dragons you fight back to life.
Jitters Caffeine: The game has about 3 huge overarching, possibly world changing plotlines going on, but it doesn't do anything with them.
Because going to the realm of the dead and fighting Alduin along with 3 of the Nords ancient heroes, and raiding the enemies capital city, and killing the ruler there, is doing nothing?
So I haven't been able to get into Skyrim, loved Oblivion though. Maybe I just had too much Oblivion and Skyrim really isn't that different. Anyway, is the world less reactive to you than it was in Oblivion?
Also, Skyrim isn't beautiful. Snow and mountains aren't what I call beautiful, also, ever notice how sometimes the game looks like it's running in black and white?
Zhukov: Here's my problem: why do I want to do any of that?
You can do damn near anything, but the world can't react in a believable way to any of it. Why bother killing a person when it's just a puppet with no identity? Besides, how much freedom do you really have? How many ways can you interact with the world aside from killing people and taking their stuff?
I'd rather a game that restricts my freedom, prohibitively if necessary, but provides a world and characters that react to my actions.
And no, having guards say, "Perhaps you can brew me some ale" when I get 50 points in alchemy is not sufficient.
Basically this. If I want to get revenge on somebody who kidnapped me in my sleep, I want to chop off their fingers one by one, put a leash on them, and parade them around town. I want to tell them to call up all of their friends, all of their friends' friends, and let everybody know that I'm the new sheriff in town, and they'd better respect me, or else.
That's freedom. Putting a sword through someone and stealing their loot? All that does is ensure there can be no interesting plot, no interesting relationships amongst the NPCs, because any one of them could be dead at any given time.
It's kinda realistic how nobody gives a shit about anything you do. In real life the NPCs would gush over your actions for a bit and then be all like "yeah, yeah but what have you done LATELY?"
Zhukov: Here's my problem: why do I want to do any of that?
You can do damn near anything, but the world can't react in a believable way to any of it. Why bother killing a person when it's just a puppet with no identity? Besides, how much freedom do you really have? How many ways can you interact with the world aside from killing people and taking their stuff?
I'd rather a game that restricts my freedom, prohibitively if necessary, but provides a world and characters that react to my actions.
And no, having guards say, "Perhaps you can brew me some ale" when I get 50 points in alchemy is not sufficient.
Basically this. If I want to get revenge on somebody who kidnapped me in my sleep, I want to chop off their fingers one by one, put a leash on them, and parade them around town. I want to tell them to call up all of their friends, all of their friends' friends, and let everybody know that I'm the new sheriff in town, and they'd better respect me, or else.
That's freedom. Putting a sword through someone and stealing their loot? All that does is ensure there can be no interesting plot, no interesting relationships amongst the NPCs, because any one of them could be dead at any given time.
All or nothing.
Unfortunately we don't have the technology to pander to the whims and desires of the depraved.
Crono1973: So I haven't been able to get into Skyrim, loved Oblivion though. Maybe I just had too much Oblivion and Skyrim really isn't that different. Anyway, is the world less reactive to you than it was in Oblivion?
Also, Skyrim isn't beautiful. Snow and mountains aren't what I call beautiful, also, ever notice how sometimes the game looks like it's running in black and white?
considering less then 40% of the map is snow or mountains I dont see how you can make that claim.
The Reach, Falkreath, Whiterun, Eastmarch, The Rift, and Hjaaimarch holds are canyons, pine forest, plains, volcanic steam pits, and a oak/elf forest in perpetual autumn respectively.
Until SureAI unveil Projekt 5 and descend from the fucking heavens to make another total conversion and fucking beat Bethesda and their pathetic effort on a budget of 2 cents and a piece of string.
I love it when people come in and say that the modders make better games than the devs, it's honestly ridiculous. The two games I've seen it the most for are Bethesda games and Minecraft. It's so silly I'm having a hard time phrasing how wrong you are. Wait a minute, let me think about how to say this.
...
Ok. This is going to come out as condescending. You do realize how hard it is to make a game, right? Can you fathom how much time and money it takes to make a COMPLETE game? From SCRATCH? Every movement? Every noise, from footsteps to swords clanging? Every line of code? Modders don't have to deal with that shit. They just take games and make them better, because they have free time. The devs are amazing game creators; they made the fucking game. They probably could make the game better, but they probably ran out of time.
I'm willing to bet my whole bank account that most modders couldn't make a game as good as Skyrim even if they had a whole dev team, millions of dollars and three years.
Ok. This is going to come out as condescending. You do realize how hard it is to make a game, right? Can you fathom how much time and money it takes to make a COMPLETE game? From SCRATCH? Every movement? Every noise, from footsteps to swords clanging? Every line of code? Modders don't have to deal with that shit. They just take games and make them better, because they have free time. The devs are amazing game creators; they made the fucking game. They probably could make the game better, but they probably ran out of time.
I'm willing to bet my whole bank account that most modders couldn't make a game as good as Skyrim even if they had a whole dev team, millions of dollars and three years.
This is the problem I have with many people also.
People always whine and complain "the modders do things so much better then the Devs" and they say that while completely ignoring the fact that modders dont have the time and monetary limitations Devs do.
Had Bethesda had unlimited time and money would they have done a crap of what the modders did? FUCK YES. They would have done so much more, but they can't, and people try to take limits imposed upon them as a sign that they suck at making games.
Its annoying and laughably stupid, because it only works by completely ignore the entire situation the devs are in.
Zhukov: Here's my problem: why do I want to do any of that?
You can do damn near anything, but the world can't react in a believable way to any of it. Why bother killing a person when it's just a puppet with no identity? Besides, how much freedom do you really have? How many ways can you interact with the world aside from killing people and taking their stuff?
I'd rather a game that restricts my freedom, prohibitively if necessary, but provides a world and characters that react to my actions.
And no, having guards say, "Perhaps you can brew me some ale" when I get 50 points in alchemy is not sufficient.
Basically this. If I want to get revenge on somebody who kidnapped me in my sleep, I want to chop off their fingers one by one, put a leash on them, and parade them around town. I want to tell them to call up all of their friends, all of their friends' friends, and let everybody know that I'm the new sheriff in town, and they'd better respect me, or else.
That's freedom. Putting a sword through someone and stealing their loot? All that does is ensure there can be no interesting plot, no interesting relationships amongst the NPCs, because any one of them could be dead at any given time.
All or nothing.
Unfortunately we don't have the technology to pander to the whims and desires of the depraved.
I only went for the evil version because it had already been brought up. I play paragons 90% of the time, so just substitute severed fingers with hiring a bard to follow me on my journeys and then sing about my great deeds in a tavern, so the entire fucking realm can know how epic I am, so I can use my influence to overthrow the evil king and open up some free elections.
Don't have the technology for it yet, all right, that's fair. But that's like setting out to build a game that can be enjoyed purely for its photorealistic beautiful scenery... back on the SNES. You have to understand that what you're doing is impossible, and that you need to pick up the slack elsewhere.
Give me a strong plot, give me compelling characters, mystery and intrigue and plot twists and drama... and everywhere else, freedom. Sure.
Crono1973: So I haven't been able to get into Skyrim, loved Oblivion though. Maybe I just had too much Oblivion and Skyrim really isn't that different. Anyway, is the world less reactive to you than it was in Oblivion?
Also, Skyrim isn't beautiful. Snow and mountains aren't what I call beautiful, also, ever notice how sometimes the game looks like it's running in black and white?
considering less then 40% of the map is snow or mountains I dont see how you can make that claim.
The Reach, Falkreath, Whiterun, Eastmarch, The Rift, and Hjaaimarch holds are canyons, pine forest, plains, volcanic steam pits, and a oak/elf forest in perpetual autumn respectively.
It's the freedom you're allowed when interacting with it that matters.
Honestly, was anybody all that attached to Skyrim as a setting? I mean sure it was pretty, but it's populated by mindless drones who all seem to be reading from the same sheet in similar voices. And let's be honest, nothing about Skyrim in an of itself is all that original. It's Norse mythology dressed up with some political commentary about racial tensions. Only really interesting things about it are the things that get explored/discussed the least (The Daedra/Aedra dichotomy, The Dwemer). So all in all, it's a pretty standard heroic fantasy setting.
What makes it so appealing? The fact that I'm not leashed/railroaded nearly as much as in other RPGs. If they got rid of a few character's (and children's) inexplicable invulnerability to death or harm it'd be downright spectacular.
Here's why: every RPG you've ever played casts you as an immortal unstoppable badass with magic powers clothed in artifacts drawn from the hoary mists of legend- who's forced to put up with the nonsense of unwashed peasants, nobly sacrifice himself when prompted and fall in love with whatever perky set of tits first walks on set.
Notice how things took a left turn at the end there? It's because when RPGs pigeonhole you like that it's like being put on a leash by the devs.
"You've got alllll this power, but you're not allowed to use it how you want. No, you're gonna go save the land now. Yes, the land full of racist assholes. Yes, I know you don't like either of the factions you have the choice of siding with. Yes, I know you'd like to kill the smug prick who tried to have you executed. But too bad. I wanna write a standard heroic saga. Now go sit in the corner quietly and wait for the cutscene in which you demonstrate your heroic qualities to finish. Then you can get bossed around by some prick NPCs who've been blessed with plot armor."
And it's *annoying*. Simply because not everybody is wired that way. Not everybody is interested in hearing the tale of John Everyman climbing to the top of the mountain to slay the dragon because he's either got a really tiny cock or an insane amount of self righteousness.
So the fact that Skyrim gives me the option to do what I wanna do? To up and murder the mysterious woman who kidnapped me in my sleep and then go slaughter her whole family? To wolf out and clear the streets when a guard decides it'd be a great idea to pick a fight with the Dragonborn over 5 coins? WONDERFUL. Give me more of that.
The PC in an RPG is the ubermensch. He's a time traveling (by dint of save/load) immortal (by dint of respawn) unstoppable (by dint of persistence) badass (automatically). So stop forcing him to be a good boy and go along with the motions in the name of laziness/corner cutting. Let him off the damned leash already. You're so close as it is... you just need to tweak a few more things...