The Next Elder Scrolls Game, what should it have

[MrDumpkins]

4. Coop play, One glaring weakness of skyrim is the lack of multiplay, At least give us the ability to have a few friends join in on big quests.

Nononononononononononononononononononononononononono!!!

Bethesda games are one of the last bastions of single-player focused triple-AAA games out there! Watch http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/6718-Only-The-Lonely to put my opinion into better words. There are games that exist to play with a few friends (Team Fortress 2, COD, HALO etc. ) and games that exist to immerse you in a world (Skyrim, Fallout etc.)

I agree completely, the amount of resources they'd have to put into getting working coop in those games would just detract from everything else. I think coop play would ruin the series completely, especially considering how many bugs get through to final release because of their scope anyways. It would just be a disaster.

I'd love to see a more deserty/jungle oriented experience, so somewhere in the world where that region exists. I'm sure they could do some cool stuff technologically with sand and water with the new generation. I really hope the story is about taking down the aldmeri dominion.

But the thing I want the most is for old forts or ruins to not always be populated by bad guys. How can you tell me that there is nobody but bad guys outside of cities and towns, it's ridiculous. I would feel so much more immersed if I could travel into a cave and have some friendly explorers or miners in there, that aren't always hostile.

 

[Voulan]

Well, I'll tell you what - after beta testing ESO, I'm really wanting a game to be set in either Hammerfell or Elsweyr. Those were easily my favourite locales. It would make sense as a continuation of the Great War as well. I'd also love to get to go into another deadric realm.

Back to things from the main series though, I'd love to have the hot key menu from Oblivion back instead of the favourites menu from Skyrim. I like being able to change spells on the fly instead of having to pause combat to switch things around. You could only hot key two things at a time as well, and it was really confusing as to what you're switching to and in which hand.

I'd also like to see medium armour make a comeback.

One thing I'd also like is more ability to have a say in quests. How about actually giving the player an option to say no? Or do the opposite to what they're required? Perhaps they could turn down the option to lead certain factions, or can only be a leader in one? Or perhaps if there's an opposing faction the option to choose them instead - I know I had a character in Oblivion that I wanted to join the Necromancers instead of the Mage's Guild. I loved that in Skyrim you can actually choose to wipe out the Dark Brotherhood (but I wasn't impressed that the same couldn't be done with the Thieves Guild). Just little things, even, like turning down becoming a werewolf or killing Parthunnax.

And I'd like followers to have proper back stories too. With the DLCs in Skyrim they took as step in the right direction purely by making those followers have far more dialogue, and comment on the environment they're in more often. One thing TES lacks in spades is NPCs that I actually care about. Just making them more dynamic would go a long way.

 

[Gamegeneral]

Do you understand how incredibly hard it would be for co-op in TES? That would probably break the game world. I'd enjoy it too, but lets be realistic here.

Honestly, if you build up the engine from the base up, co-op in skyrim is no harder than co-op in borderlands.

Quest syncing is trivial, and the weapons in skyrim are less complicated than you might think. If Mount and Blade can have large scale conflicts on the internet using melee weapons and arrows,
Bethesda has no excuse besides not wanting to invest in the architecture to set up internet co-op for consoles. P2P would work fine for PCs and maybe a server browser, but console online play is a bit more complicated.

BUT with the current generation, given its place in fourish years (If the release schedule for Elder Scrolls games is consistent), the architecture and required power will be more than enough to handle online co-op of two to four players.

If modders can do it (Albeit roughly, but they lack the source code), Bethesda or whomever has the TES license in four years can definitely have it done.

 

[hexFrank202]

~Expand on the nature element.
The visuals and atmosphere of Skyrim is really the only thing I love about that whole experience, so I wouldn't mind to just have an Elder Scrolls survival/hunting simulator thing. Where you can get ropes and climb mountains, climb trees, take elemental damage from frostbite in the snow, ext.

~Reconcile the problems with the first person perspective.
Swordplay and the first person view don't work together. Either ditch it and go for a traditional action game layout, or make a completely new kind of 1st-person mechanic structure where you actually have peripheral vision, can see your body like in real life, and everything has momentum and weight to it.

~Get worse voice actors.
Hearing the same busload of professional voice artists drone out their lines in the same boring voices made it impossible to tell everyone apart. I say screw quality, just bring in dirt cheap nobodies from around the globe to fill your game. That would make the characters more memorable, alongside more varied designs like others have said.

~Create an NPC system to simulate social inertia.
It's surreal to walk up to some random guy and have him immediately tell me about his nagging wife and absent father before we even say hello.

~Gender
Skyrim is one of the most sexless worlds in all of human imagination. Nothing has a penis or tits anywhere you go.

 

[The_Echo]

A foreword by Todd Howard confirmed Elder Scrolls Online as definitively noncanon.

Right now, that's all I want.

 

[The Feast]

Another discussion on how the next Elder Scrolls needed to be? This will also be a feedbacks and rants to the current Elder Scrolls. Okay, here I go:

1. (QUEST) First, the most important aspect of an RPG is the "quest" and Bethesda have become too common with the idea that they prefer quantity over quality, and Skyrim quest become boring as hell. The side quest feels like an errand instead of a story, and you're to put some layers of reason why you wanted to do that quest instead of a fetching errand and sending letters, just so you could get a small coin or an increased skill points.

The main quest feels like it have been put aside and focus on other side quest which feels annoying. Why bother putting the main quest at all? They could easily combine the Civil Wars quest and the main quest easily and it probably become more epic, but instead, the reason to finish the main quest is to get a dragon companion. The Civil War quest is merely attacking the fort and taking the main city, no story there and no consequences either.

The guild quest feels like a movie instead of a series and when you reach the top as the guildmaster, you get to do more errand quest...yay. There is no guild management or the feeling like you are the real leader of the guild like Morrowind and Oblivion. It sucks.

What I want for the quest for the next Elder Scrolls is to contain layers, meats, a story for every quest you are doing especially important quests. Bethesda able to make amazing lore but lazy at making engaging quest is just absurd. Guild quest need to combine both jobs and stories at the same time to make you actually care about the guild you're joining, and the addition of interesting guild management after you become the leader.

The main quest, PLEASE make a very engaging, emotional and long main quest. I Just hate watching the speed run of those main quest that Bethesda always held as a contest. IT IS ATROCIOUS!

2. (PLAYER) The perk features is cool but after implementing a better perk mods, Skyrim becomes stale when comparing with the work of modders. A deeper, balanced leveling and attribute system needed to be put in a game like the Elder Scrolls and not a very fast overpowering character that could easily beat everything in the game f you know how. Finding the alchemy enchanting ingredients and you could care less about the giants and dragons.

Having to wield the same type of weapon can get boring real easily and variety is important for RPG. Implementing the pros and cons of different weapons can make battles have more tactical excitement. The difference of armors need to have a good reason on why you wanted to wear ONLY that type of armor such as Dwarven and Orcish, which have different attributes to them.

Food needed to have long beneficial importance when compare to potion that gave immediate effect but short duration. Oh, and put some eating or drinking animation instead of the quick gulp from the inventory menu. Finding the right time to consume food or potion can give an adrenaline experience.

3. (ENEMY) More enemy and a lot more re-skins would be nice instead of watching the same looking monsters and NPCs over and over again. Plenty of enemy faction you have to face that have different method of fighting and loot. Giving different type of enemy the strength and weaknesses would also give better tactical challenge.

4. (COMBAT) What I was hoping from the Elder Scroll is that different people or faction have different fighting style and they also have pros and cons to them. This will give the combat a better experience instead of watching the pattern of attack every time. Of course, you could master different kind of fighting style and techniques, giving a good reason to strengthen yourself. These ideas could also be implemented with projectiles and magics.

Different weapons provide different fighting styles, marksman provide different way of shooting and magic user use different method of unleashing spells. They could also be combine with each other if necessary instead of just using two hands. Oblivion can shoot spells and attack, why not do that?

5. (CHALLENGE) There are enemies that will leveled with or higher than you no matter what because Skyrim is too damn easy. Western RPG have always implementing both charisma and combat together to complete a confrontation and I like that. Skyrim, however use speech very lightly and usually the best experience to get from the game is just fighting and not talking. I don't like that.

Of course, better AI and always better AI.

6. (FEATURES) Able to climb objects, cliff and building and the NPC can do it too. There are horse combat between the player and NPC. Multiple followers and better follower management such as command (ARMA style, Republic Commando or any other group tactical games), bigger cities, socialize, interesting NPC and not the annoying talking whenever you get closer, populated world, a much lovely reason to get married rather than an income payment, implement the whole Hearthfire features rather than DLC, and so on.

7. (CONCLUSION) But what I really want from the next Elder Scrolls is to have a HEART because I'm done hearing "You can do tons of quest and explore." or "You can play this game for 200 hours." or "The NPC have radiant AI". I want the those best feelings when I play Morrowind and Oblivion or any other RPG that have a heart.

The rest, Bethesda and Todd Howard need to get ready with the concept and think to themselves on how to execute it or the Elder Scrolls will always be bested by The Witcher, Dark Souls, Dragon's Dogma and any other RPG that can beat Bethesda's vision and mission.

 

[putowtin]

more factions, I had a great idea for a bandit faction.

You run into a few bandit camps, destroy them, then as your leaving the last one a bandit is found on his knee's begging for his life. You let him go. A month later (in game) he finds you and offers to follow you. More time later he mentions another hidden bandit camp, you go take it out and set it up as a base. He can arrange any new furnishings (you want a forge? he's the man to see) Other bandits will join you there and offer quests (bandit in jail, free him/ caravan to raid/etc)

Once you've done enough quests and upgraded the place the first bandit will give you the factions big quest (just like the main quests from the other factions) which could be to take out a rival faction or warn you that the hold's Jarl has put a bounty on all of your heads, this could lead to a massive ruck and the first bandit lead hold!

 

[gyrobot_v1legacy]

I kind of want to see brothels in the game if we are going to high rock, something like the Blooming Rose so to speak.

Also, an atheletics/Acrobat (Fitness) tree that grants bonus health and stamina would be interesting, although mages will need something as well.

 

[rutger5000]

Return many of the lost elements of Morrowind, especially in the magic department. Return the schools of magic, the ability to create complex spells, and most importantly flying, teleportation and telekinesis are cool too. The later two really add something to those who want to play as a Night-blade.
And I think it would be really great to have interesting events that happen regardless of what you do, but you can affect the outcome. Say that there is a war in elder scrolls 6 (or something like that), then the game ought to make the fractions at war actually clash and let every clash impact the results of that war. The player could influence the war by siding with one or both of the fractions and help win key battles either by intel, sabotage or being on the battlefield. After a certain period of time or after a certain few key battles have been won by one side, the war would come to an end. And there would be clearly visible and significant change in the balance of power in the game world (new fractions and quests emerge, other are lost)

 

[rutger5000]

9) cliffracers

Please, no. Not again. Never again.

One of the greatest feelings of power I had in any game was when I flew across Morrowind with great speed (boots of bliding speed and strong levitation spell). Attracted a billion (more or less) cliffraces, than fly upwards beyond the height cliffracers could reach and than bombard the pilar (at that point it really did became a pilar)of cliffracers with devastating area effect spells, and see them all die one by one.

 

[Mobax]

Oh boy, the things I want! And the things I don't want. I suspect this will be a long post. For a summary just skip to the bottom.

Things I want:

- deeper npc characters, more dialogue options, more npc's that can converse
- I want npc's to act more friendly if I'm a guild mate, or through conversation over time
- conversely, I want npc's to be cooler or even rude if I've insulted or harassed them in the past
- I want deeper lore within the game, just little un-quested things. Like the rumors and secrets from Morrowind, just little misc. tibits that lead to a cave, a lost story, etc. Not great treasure, just little bits of depth.
- I want improved combat systems, the skills should matter more
- I want something like the vampire guilds from Morrowind again, NOT Dawnguard again!
- I want more groups I can join, and some rival/competing groups that I can join one or the other(s) ie: Morrowind's great houses
- I want to be able to play instruments/music in game, make being a bard a real class
- I want animations of reading/eating/drinking, so I can look like the npc's do when sitting in the taverns
- I want the different guilds to play to their respective strengths, it was stupid imo that the climax of the theives guild was a combat based conclusion, I'm a thief, not a fighter.
- extension of above, I want it to be extremely challenging or impossible to beat some guilds/misc quests w.o the right skills. ie: no sword swinging brutes will be arch-mages
- I would like to see longer quest lines, the Companions was a joke, you did like 3 quests and were brought into the inner circle, and then a few quests later you're the leader?!? Seriously?
- I would be in favor of the leadership of some guilds being unaccessible to the player initially, or at all, ie: you can't become patriarch of a temple.
- I want to be a highwayman, I want to approach travelers and demand their gold
- as above, I want to see more practical uses for speech/barter skill(s)
- bookstores, is all of skyrim illiterate? I want a big improvement in shops and game economy as a whole
- more ways to complete quests, and maybe some options if you fail a quest
- the ability to fail a quest, and have repercussions for it
- co-op mode, NOT an mmo, I want to be able to play in a world with 1 other person, maybe 2
other people.
- more skills again and bring back attributes!
- more magical spells and effects
- more/worse diseases, and have a disease get worse if left untreated. Have some be fatal

Things I don't want:

- a barter system where you can't ever profit through buying and selling
- the game leveling with you, it was better in skyrim for oblivion, but I would like to see it improved further
- mirrored questlines, stormcloaks/legion or vampires/dawnguard. If they want to have the player pick a side, at least make both sides different
- armor being heavier as it gets better, especially for light armor. The elven and mithril armors should've been lighter then leather armors
- cookie-cutter cities, same shops in every place, same goods, make different parts of the land feel distinct. Not just look different
- bugs, so many bugs in skyrim and broken quests

That's all I can think of right now, I think really what I want is Morrowind 2. By this I mean I want almost everything from Morrowind but dressed up in sharp new graphics. I want the rich dialogue, I want the deeper story and the lore within the game world. I want npc's to like and hate me in more obvious tones. I want the different areas to feel different. I like most of the changes to the combat and magic since Morrowind, but I feel the game's are losing their soul. If you took Morrowind as a foundation and added the best pieces from Skyrim and Oblivion that would be a great TES VI in my opinion.

 

[SajuukKhar]

Expand the game world to beyond Tamriel. I'm not saying we actually need to visit Akavir or anything but encountering some of it's inhabitants would be nice. Akavir ruled Tamriel for several centuries, so I find it strange you never find any holdouts of Akaviri peoples still in the Empire.

Akavir never ruled Tamriel.

One of the Taseci snake-men, who came over as past of the invasion centuries before, was eventually made Potentate of The empire, but that was just him.

Tamriel was never ruled by akavir itself.

 

[sanquin]

-Graphics...no, they're good enough. A new game doesn't need better graphics. It needs better aesthetics.
-No multiplayer...bad. Not every game needs multiplayer.
-Better and longer main quest. Make it at least better than the side missions.
-And for that matter, less 'go into cave and kill stuff' quests.
-More varied environments. I'd especially like to see jungle or forest-like environment.
-Better combat. They could take a pointer or two from Witcher 2.
-Don't make a console game and port it to PC. Make the game for PC first, then port it to console. So we don't get crappy console UI and other such things.
-Make some of the armors and clothing look less dull.
-No monster leveling with you leveling up! If an area has strong monsters, too bad! Die and come back later.
-Make factions/guilds mutually exclusive again. Like the thieves and mercenary guild. Or fighter and mage guild. So you actually do have to choose your path a little instead of being able to do EVERYTHING.
-Less 'streamlined' skills and stats. Part of the earlier games' fun was that you had to pick a little carefully.

That's what I can think of right now.

Captcha: rent-a-swag. I feel dirty just typing it...

 

[Trunkage]

Wait.. fast travel is an issue. I could accept limiting the fast travel to lets say 20 points otherwise you'd have to have the ridiculous short circuiting system from Dark Souls. Fortunately the areas in dark souls are so small that it doesn't take too long to get through. But all fast travel gone.. that would be god awful

 

[Fijiman]

Well one of my biggest complaints for Skyrim was the complete lack of an oanization system in containers. If they at least fix that I'd be happy.

 

[SmallHatLogan]

Wait.. fast travel is an issue. I could accept limiting the fast travel to lets say 20 points otherwise you'd have to have the ridiculous short circuiting system from Dark Souls. Fortunately the areas in dark souls are so small that it doesn't take too long to get through. But all fast travel gone.. that would be god awful

I like fast travel in Fallout where you have to discover the place first, but that doesn't make much sense with Elder Scrolls where methods of travelling apart from walking are readily available. Morrowind was cool where fast travel was limited to boats/silt striders and there were a couple of teleport spells that were useful but not overpowered.

 

[el derpenburgo]

Everything that was in mrbtongue's video. I don't know dick about making a good video game but he sure does.

edit: since I know bethesda is reading this 3rd page post from a person with like 20 posts, I would also like to say adding co-op is a bad idea. TES is a solo experience. As Ma'iq says, other people just get in the way. Also, get rid of companions, the Dragonborn's story isn't about the Dragonborn and his mate, it's about the Dragonborn's personal accomplishments. If I wanted to have a party I'd play a Bioware game.

 

[Dandark]

I think the most important thing they add is some greaves for the NPCs. The game was so easily exploitable and easy to win simply by using a bow and shooting people in the knees, it was a major tactic in the civil war too and you often heard officers shouting "Forget the uncovered head! AIM FOR THE KNEES!".

Alternatively I would love for them to expand on the marriage options, I liked the idea for it but it needs more effect. Other than that just the standard improvements people suggest I suppose.

It's probably going to be a long while until he see it though, I imagine they will release a new fallout first, we will at least be on the next console generation or near it.

 

[spartandude]

I would really like Obsidian to take a crack at it like they did with fallout New Vegas... but with a good QA team. Really imagine all the complaints made about the factions and writing in Skyrim and then imagine what would have happened if Obsidian had written it instead.

 

[Directionless]

Companions. Not animated sex dolls with 20 words of dialogue, actual companions with things to say and do.

Just bring character to your characters Bethesda. Take at least one thing from Obsidian.