Is TES5 Completely Missing the Point?

[Ensiferum]

Are you worried about this game?

Because im sure as hell not.

This.

Now /end thread.

 

[voetballeeuw]

The article was talking about things they were fixing, mainly the combat and the leveling system. You're just making assumptions, assumptions I pray to be false. I'd wait to see more info before saying anything though.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

I recently installed Morrowind again to see if I was remembering it wrong. Turns out, I was not. While the world is interesting and varied and the narrative is often fascinating, the actual mechanics involved in playing were some of the worst in video gaming.

While Oblivion might not have presented as good of a world to the player to explore, they made the acts inherent in it's exploration actually interesting.

 

[badgersprite]

I think that five really rich and deep, detailed cities is a lot better than 43 copy-pasted cities that feel stiff as cardboard.

Agreed. It seems like an expansion of the concept that each city should feel distinct, unique and have its own culture, bringing more variation into the world. And besides, five massive cities doesn't mean there are now no towns. There are probably loads of little towns tucked away in various places. Just because they don't mention them in marketing doesn't mean they don't exist.

Anyway, as someone who absolutely loves both Oblivion and Morrowind, I'm glad they're doing something different. I would be bored as Hell if Skyrim just copied and pasted all the mechanics from the old games. I want my game to have a learning curve. I like starting off a novice and gradually getting better as I learn my way around the system. Sequels that don't change anything or don't introduce anything new become quite boring really fast to me, because they lack what made their predecessors feel special - the fact that they were doing something new and different.

I know it seems scary now that things are being shaken up, but, honestly, I think everyone would be greatly disappointed by Skyrim if they just released "Oblivion, but MORE so".

 

[Phlakes]

*Sigh*... No, TES5 is missing YOUR point. And really, every change that's been announced has been an improvement. For all the others, you're just making assumptions.

 

[Chal]

What's been included sound like much-needed improvements. If they combine the strengths of Morrowind's world with the strengths of Oblivion's gameplay (and then some! No more goblins taking hundreds of slices to slaughter) I'll be overjoyed. I don't mind skills being streamlined as long as there is some compromise. For example, they're taking out mysticism, but I'll bet the effects will still be in the game, just in another school. From what I hear, they'll also be including smithing and better enchanting as well. Throw in a few perks and it will actually be worthwhile to try out multiple accounts.

By this point, I'm just joining in the choir, but there is no reason to assume that the improvements are at the expense of everything else. I have high hopes for this installment.

The thing most important to me, however, will always be the level design. If they can return to an inspired setting, I'll be happy no matter how ridiculous the main plot gets. The Elder Scrolls have always been about exploration to me. I want to get lost again.

If you want it phrased in a concise manner:

I recently installed Morrowind again to see if I was remembering it wrong. Turns out, I was not. While the world is interesting and varied and the narrative is often fascinating, the actual mechanics involved in playing were some of the worst in video gaming.

While Oblivion might not have presented as good of a world to the player to explore, they made the acts inherent in it's exploration actually interesting.

Thank you for the great observation. Morrowind is my favorite game, but it is absolutely right to say the mechanics of it are heavily flawed. If Bethesda can refine Oblivion and combine the improvements with what they've already done so well with Morrowind, I'll be playing Skyrim for a long time to come.

 

[Lord Legion]

I am damn excited about this, and take it from a person who just delivered 30 gallons of sujamma to a glass mine, there are alot of fetch quests in Morrowind.

What I really want is for limbs to fly when I hack at them. And for the magick system to be fixed up a little, ie. more magicka to spend.

 

[Mcface]

How can a game miss it's own point?

It's missing whatever you think the point is, when in reality, you sir, are missing the point.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

I guess we no longer feel obligated to wait for a game to come out before we start whining about how it ruined the series forever.

But in FO3s case they were right.

I take it you never played Fallout Brotherhood of Steel on the X Box and PS2.

Saddest part is that it has more in common with FO3 than FO1-2. 0-o

 

[Dys]

Besides, not all of us want a game that's all about story. You've all heard my rant about how story should only exist to move the player from one set of things to kill and break to the next set of things to kill and break.

Either I've missed something major or 'some of us' should look to games other than TESCs series for our 'break shit' gaming mentality. Not that there's anything wrong with wanting to break shit, but buying TESCs to hit shit around is a bit like buying halo to race the vehicles...

OT: I liked morrowind more than oblivion, but I'd certainly buy oblivion again. The only thing that could really turn me off TESCs 5 is if they remove the modtools.

 

[silasbufu]

stuff

I think you're just having a nostalgia attack. Not that it's a bad thing. I've been having alot of them lately, with all these new games having 5 hour single-player campaigns because they're based on multiplayer and killer graphics.

 

[BrionJames]

the reason why daggerfall and morrowind will always be better, in my opinion, is because of the amount of character customization that was involved. Since Daggerfall, they have continued to scale down the amount of skills and customization options available when you create your character.

 

[Azure-Supernova]

If it really turns out to be that bad (which I doubt it will, have you seen the fucking screen shots!?) then I'll just wait a year for the modding communtiy to shape it into the game it was meant to be.

What Bethesda fuck up the modders can fix; and in some cases improve. Right now I've not seen any indication that the lore is getting buttfucked and that the world is going to be shallow. I wouldn't know because I haven't played it yet. Though I'm the type of guy that can easily immerse himself into a puddle... so take from that what you will...

 

[CD-R]

I guess we no longer feel obligated to wait for a game to come out before we start whining about how it ruined the series forever.

But in FO3s case they were right.

I take it you never played Fallout Brotherhood of Steel on the X Box and PS2.

Saddest part is that it has more in common with FO3 than FO1-2. 0-o

Really? Because I don't remember Fallout 3 having a heavy metal soundtrack and replacing Nuka Cola with shameless product placement. Usually a game series never recovers from this kind of raping of it's source material. See the last Turock game made.

 

[Ramin 123]

I guess we no longer feel obligated to wait for a game to come out before we start whining about how it ruined the series forever.

But in FO3s case they were right.

I take it you never played Fallout Brotherhood of Steel on the X Box and PS2.

What the fuck was that.

You couldn't have summed up my reaction any better haha

 

[Erana]

I just hope its actually fun to explore Skyrim- its Morrowind's million little touches, like a daedric claymore found only by levitating 30 feet through a hole in the ceiling, or a few special arrows found in a small stump in the wilderness that made me love the series. Oblivion and even Daggerfall were kinda cookie-cutter, and only very fun if you do the quests. Which I usually couldn't care less about.

Of course, Skyrim is like Next-Gen Solstheim, but not as "Generic cold place," right? Hell Yeah!

 

[SimuLord]

Besides, not all of us want a game that's all about story. You've all heard my rant about how story should only exist to move the player from one set of things to kill and break to the next set of things to kill and break.

True, but if all you want to do is kill and break things, then TES and Fallout 3 do not seem to be your style of game.

Speaking as someone who's spent hours on end just shooting animals in the Imperial Reserve and Great Forest, doing alchemy and otherwise playing the game all day without interacting with a single NPC, I'd say TES works just fine for a kill-and-breaker. Well, maybe not breaking stuff, but shooting a deer with a bow from clear across Lake Rumare (if I had to guess, I'd say my best shot was about 200 yards!) NEVER gets old.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

I guess we no longer feel obligated to wait for a game to come out before we start whining about how it ruined the series forever.

But in FO3s case they were right.

I take it you never played Fallout Brotherhood of Steel on the X Box and PS2.

Saddest part is that it has more in common with FO3 than FO1-2. 0-o

Really? Because I don't remember Fallout 3 having a heavy metal soundtrack and replacing Nuka Cola with shameless product placement. Usually a game series never recovers from this kind of raping of it's source material. See the last Turock game made.

I don't recall Fallout being a dumbed down action game(which is what FO3 is sadly).

 

[JUMBO PALACE]

From the looks of it, absolutely nothing you've mentioned as causing you so much trepidation has anything whatsoever to do with the story or the richness of the interaction with NPCs. They would just seem to have massively improved the combat and leveling systems.

Damn it the first post took what I wanted to say

Don't jump to any conclusions yet.

 

[YawningAngel]

Besides, not all of us want a game that's all about story. You've all heard my rant about how story should only exist to move the player from one set of things to kill and break to the next set of things to kill and break.

True, but if all you want to do is kill and break things, then TES and Fallout 3 do not seem to be your style of game.

I have a good question for the OP: How the hell is improving the actual gameplay of a videogame going to make it worse? There is no shortage of story and lore to Oblivion. While Morrowind may have been bigger and had more stuff, the actual gameplay was downright horrible. Combat was my main problem - it fucking sucked. Oblivion's nor Fallout's should win awards, but they were both much more entertaining than Morrowind's. The combat in Morrowind ruined the entire game for me. Skyrim is supposed to have better combat, and if they put that into a game that's as big as, or bigger than, Morrowind, then great! If it's streamlined to be a smaller, but more entertaining world, then that's even better. 150 hours of pure entertainment is better than 300 of trudging through boring quests.

I'll answer this, because it dovetails neatly into what I wanted to say and, to boot, it's near the end of the thread. Going from Morrowind to Oblivion, the approach was basically "make it shinier, and cut the world to fit". The reason this didn't work for me was because the gameplay was never really what made the games for me: it was, in many cases, actually pretty poor. Morrowind's graphics weren't bad for '02, but they weren't pushing the envelope either; I've played worse games, but I've also played ones with a load more in terms of good action gameplay; and I'm bound to say I've certainly played less bugged games. My issue is that, while Oblivion as a game is undeniably more polished, it's also more limited: the bad gameplay has been diluted, if not removed, but so too has what made Morrowind brilliant. I just can't help but feel that, if Bethesda do what they did in Oblivion and cut down on content to improve gameplay, they're going to end up with what they ended up with in Oblivion: a game that still has buggy and arguably lacklustre gameplay, but without the vast scope that made up for this in previous titles.