What made Skyrim so good?

[mattaui]

I appreciated the immersive quality of Skyrim, as I did Oblivion, Morrowind and Daggerfall before it. They certainly reduced the complexity of the systems involved, but I felt it was mostly for the better. I quite enjoyed the storyline and most of the key NPCs, and I never felt like I was at a loss for things to do and explore.

After completing most of the initial content I haven't felt compelled to return to the DLCs, but after putting in an enjoyable 90+ hours I consider it a very solid game, what I've come to expect from the Elder Scrolls franchise.

 

[fezgod]

I loved Skyrim because its one of the few games where I don't feel like I have any obligations. In Skyrim you can have hours of entertainment just wandering around exploring random dungeons, running into random quests and so on. In some aspects, Skyrim is almost like Minecraft, you have to create your own experience in the game. If I just did major quests, I probably would have gotten bored pretty fast with the game.

Skyrim is definitely a flawed game, and hardly even an rpg, but its a good game when I just want to sit back and burn a few hours away. Because Skyrim is such a simple, easy to play game, I never feel as though I need to actually concentrate while I'm playing. I may not play Skyrim a lot anymore, but its still fun to return to Tamriel once every few weeks.

 

[Gorrath]

Having been a long standing fan of both the Fallout and TES games, I found Skyrim to be a fantastic edition. I don't think there is a game that doesn't have its weaknesses, and any and all complaints about Skyrim's issues are valid. I think what it comes down to is; do the things Skyrim does right out-weigh the things it gets wrong? For me, that answer is a very easy yes.

The combat system takes a lot of lumps, but I'm not sure why. I know some find it rather clunky to sword-fight in first person, but I'll take that clunkiness over the combat systems of most any other RPG in a heartbeat.

As for the main story being a let down, I wouldn't know, as I have over 700 hours in the game (On one and only one character) and have yet to do much of it. Like someone else mentioned, it would feel hollow saving the world from the big bad dragons and then going back to being a traveling potions salesman. I do advance the main story, but only when I run out of other things to do, which is not often.

It can be a buggy mess at times, but having the power of the console commands has saved me many a quest breaking bug. I realize the "you can fix it yourself" thing isn't exactly a great answer to "this is the 14th broken quest I've tried to do", but at least it is do-able, and on top of that, the console can help you do lots of other interesting things that help you experience the game the way you want to.

Lastly, I often see the argument that the world feels hollow because you have no real effect on it, and this I can totally get behind. I wish they would, and will, make the world far more dynamic with the next installment.

I think all of these complaints though, when put together, don't faze me much simply because I don't see anything else that does this sort of game-play better, except for perhaps New Vegas. I'd call Skyrim a great game. The parts it does do right it does really right, and the things it does wrong, well, I have the power to change many of them. I can't say the same for nearly any other game. I suppose there is a reason it is my second most-played game of all time on Steam.

 

[zzkill]

As others have said, the open world made it good, the fact that it is Elder Scrolls, and the hype created. BUT, I do find it lacking. Very lacking. I became the archmage of the Mage Academy after a very short quest chain, and what did the world or the Academy have to say to that? Nothing... I used a Shout in the middle of a town, how did the town react? Nearby citizens "Gods, what was that?" "Are you the Dragonborn?", and after that, they walked away and didn't give a rats ass about me, nor did they say anything about me being Dragonborn in subsequent conversations, nor did the town "mayor" say anything about me going rampant about his town with my shouts. Really, rumors travel faster than a ship, but here nothing is known even in the same town.

Also, a friend of mine joined the Dark Brotherhood and killed the Emperor and the rebel leader(forgot his name). What was the worlds reaction? Well, what do you think? If it was that they went crazy and everything went to hell, you are dead wrong. Nothing, is right answer. This lack of reaction from the world made Skyrim a disappointment for me, all of the nagging my friends had for me when I didn't play Skyrim and wasn't planning to created expectations from this "awesome RPG, one of the best there are". Not to mention that I am an RPG fan.

 

[Haukur Isleifsson]

I think "overrated" is the most overrated word in our vocabulary.

 

[carpathic]

I absolutely loved Skyrim and I still do. I think the game is fun, immersing and is my choice for working out on the treadmill because I feel like I am running somewhere other than my basement.

The world invites you in and says "Come on and stay a while, we've got this neat little thing over here for you to look at" then you breathe again and realize seven hours have passed you by...

 

[MDSnowman]

Ahhh Skyrim. On it's own it's NOT all that fun. The main story bores me to tears, the countryside of boring and occasionally repetitive, and the dungeons get pretty samey after a while.

The fun lies in making your own fun really. My Sneaky Imperial character stumbled upon the Dark Brotherhood quest-line and I got obsessed over it. I could play that game forever. The thing is that Skyrim has so much soul crushing depth that there are hundreds of little corners like that throughout the game. You stumble onto one corner that happens to speak to you, and next thing you know you lose three hours trying to save the Thieves guild, or getting over a bought of lycanthropy.

 

[Phuctifyno]

But by that logic, can't we basically pass any story, in any game, a free pass card and say ''use your imagination''?

Not at all. It depends on the style of game. A game with story as its focus, that aims to fills in all the blanks itself and leave little to the imagination, should definitely be good enough to hold up. Skyrim provides pre-existing characters and scenarios, but the focus of the game is your character creation and freedom to adventure how you choose; imagination is absolutely key to enjoying it to the fullest. With open world games, I find that the more specific and structured the stories get, the more it hinders my experience. If anything, I think the game's flaws lie in the quests being over-written and not open enough. Essential Characters, my ass.

I'm not against creating your own scenarios, if anything, that's fun, but you must also hold the game by what it makes itself. Really, that's not much of an excuse, if they want me to do that, just give me tools to do so and get rid of the stories and be done with it.

Like I said, I'd still enjoy Skyrim as an exploratory experience with no story at all (though, like I also said, I wouldn't play it nearly as much because there wouldn't be much to do after I'd seen everything), but a huge portion of the audience wouldn't at all because they expect a bare minimum. Characters populating the world with problems that need fixing is what drives the adventures forward, so including at least that much is appropriate.

When you have them in such high volume as in an Elder Scrolls game, quality of writing will naturally vary from quest to quest - I thought the Civil War was particularly well written, the Thieves Guild questline so-so, and the College of Winterhold boooring. The stories are only there to enrich the world and provide motivation; they don't need to be masterpieces, or even any good. Even if you crack open some of the books lying around, some are great and some suck. I think if every single story in Skyrim sucked entirely, that would still be enough, so that even a little of it doesn't suck is more than enough.

Complete zero story? Sure. Play Minecraft. People love it.

 

[King Aragorn]

The combat is only lame if you choose to be lame about it, mix and match, I am currently going as a Dark Elf who uses Destruction magic for close combat and Bow and Arrow for long range, I also use my scrolls to get out of hairy situations (raising the dead is fun in crypts) and make potions for useful effects for my arrows and so far, it has been really fun, I haven't even touched a one/two handed weapon yet.

I love Skyrim, the combat is fun if you really mix things up, the world is fun to explore, I like the multitude of quests and much more, but the game could have used a bit more variety.

For example, you can choose to destroy the Dark Brotherhood or join it, but destroying it yields very little in comparison to joining it. I wish destroying the Brotherhood could have been its own quest-line, to stop assassinations, to hunt the Brotherhood down, culminating in saving the Emperor from being killed.

Bits like that would have made multiple play-throughs more unique.

EDIT: Also, it was released on 11/11/11, ya can't beat that!

I did try mix and matching, but it's still boring, and unfun. It's a core problem in the actual combat system, with it's clunkyness and what not, and repetitiveness of it, even with mix and matching, it just feels tried. Also, the magic combat is not all that engaging either. It feels so...boring, it's basically hold the two trigger buttons and keep pulling back.

Epic snip of doom

There is a difference between giving you choice, and being bare minimum. Bare minimum is when it gives you something that's of low quality, while giving you choice, as you described, is a kind of freedom. I would love if there was no essential characters, if you could do things such as killing Brynjolf for example, and having the game appropriately react to that within the storylines, taking it to different twists and turns.

 

[Evil Top Hat]

If you press escape, there's an option to go back to the main menu. On the main menu, there's a bunch of text, but it's all pretty pointless because the good one's right at the bottom. The one called "exit".

That part of the game was pretty rad.

 

[bartholen_v1legacy]

A few things

Because no two players ever had the exact same experience playing the game. That is literally true in the case of Skyrim, not just some hype bullshit.
Because if you wanted, you could just stop at a high mountain and gaze at the northern lights. Helps with the immersion.
Because the combat felt at least somewhat enjoyable.
Because the quests were a lot easier to bump into, and every time you went somewhere, it felt like something was going on, at least on your first visit.
Because it had variety in locations and visuals, as opposed to Oblivion, which was just one forest and one field copypasted 30 go to 10.

Sure it's got flaws aplenty, but most of those can be fixed with mods on PC. And no game that can have me playing it for 187 hours can really be bad.

 

[SonOfVoorhees]

Afraid I'm with the OP, I found Skyrim really, really dull and nowhere near as absorbing or fantastical as Morrowind. Preffered it to Oblivion, but still not a game I'd highly recommend.

I can't understand how the mods add much depth to it either? I play offline 360 so have no mod access anyway, but all the mods I have seen don't seem to add anything of substance to the game?

I agree. I played Morrowind and Oblivion multiple times but with Skyrim i cant play it again. Just to dull and has no charm. Now i wish they would just release a new addition of those games with all the PC mods already added. Morrowind Mod edition. Id buy that.

 

[TheRookie8]

It has style, but little substance.

The feeling of being in this massive, detailed world with all these people doing all these different things is a breath of fresh air from games where the people stand in one location as if they were rooted to the spot, waiting for someone to talk to them. The fact that Skyrim is also open-world gives it amazing freedom from other, slightly more linear, RPG's. I can also do more in this world than I can in any other RPG I can think of (smithing, hunting, adventuring...but with feeling).

But look to close and you see the cracks. NPC's behavior is reminiscent of the Truman Show, where they all walk in their own day-long circles before starting again. Also like the Truman Show, when a bug occurs, it breaks the illusion of the show...er, game.

...come to think of it, a Skyrim-Truman Show parody would be hilarious.

 

[vasiD]

To me it's the engine.
Say what you will about Bethesda's writing, reuse of voice actors, and weightless combat system: They know how to make one hell of an engine.


Oblivion, Fallout 3, Fallout New Vegas, and Skyrim all ran on the same Gamebryo engine each with incremental updates, and all of them were great games to just plug yourself in and get immersed. A rich sandbox in which to adventure, and usually in whatever way you wanted to. Even the glitches were fun and interesting (One day I'll make a game that works glitches in to the plot, as acts of god, or perhaps flaws in the very nature of the game's reality).

Skyrim was simply the most advanced form of that engine with the best graphics and added mechanics (duel wielding spells, shouts), and as such was more than enough for most gamers to get excited (and for me to invest yet another 100 hours in the engine).


I'm trying to think of even one engine that compares, that can create such open wandering spaces populated with so many objects and people, and I'm really struggling to think of even one other game that does it.

 

[Woodsey]

The world design is exquisite. Mountain ranges, a crisp and muted colour-palette, interesting architecture. Loved it.

Plus, I was a sneaky-sneaky archer, so combat was fucking glorious.

 

[Zeraki]

Skyrim is just 'okay' for me. It's something I play when I have downtime and nothing else to do to fill my time with. I'll play it for a bit, and then lose interest a little while later. Skyrim is actually too big and becomes boring rather quickly.

 

[gorfias]

Skyrim's good, but not great.

However, those mods. Ooooh, mods ... after installing over a hundred gigs of mods, the game got really entertaining.

I'm frustrated that I used a mod that made me invulnerable, which was fun until I was in a story line in which I'm supposed to lose a fight and end up in jail. I think it edits the ini file. You know of a way to temp. disable it?

I used a mod with extra hi res. I had the Death Star rather than the moon in the back ground. (Couldn't get the light saber, dang it!) all sorts of powers.

The story was not on par with Fallout 3 and its DLC, but with the mods on, this was a very unusual and different experience. I've never had one just like it before or since.

 

[Risingblade]

I don't understand why people ***** about the combat. ES games have never had great combat besides I've yet to see any first person melee combat that plays really well.

 

[Alexander Kirby]

It's rather hard to explain really. Sure, speaking from a technical perspective it's not very good. The setting is also quite clichéd and the emotions of characters varies between vague depression and errr, well that's about it.

What it is, as has been mentioned before, is the atmosphere. It's the combination of the stunning scenery and beautifully subtle music that just... just...

 

[Bad Jim]

Although I sank 120 hrs into Skyrim before I realised it was boring.

If you've spent 120 hours playing then I think it's fair to say you've got your moneys worth. In a lot of games you'd be on your tenth playthrough after 120 hours.

I don't mind mods and think a lot are cool, but it does annoy me when I keep seeing all these gimmicky ones, and then sites like IGN rating them as "top mods". I'm frankly bastard sick of people thinking it's cool to dick about in games at the sacrifice of any real core plot or campaign. "Here's Skyrim, shallow as a paddling pool but if you use this mod you can change the moon into the deathstar!!" Really? Great, thanks - I'd no intention of wanting to feel like an epic fantasy warrior involved in world changing events *facepalm*

What's wrong with dicking around? Why does it need to have narrative? Why does it have to be art? Why can't we have games where we can just have some fun?

Plus, I think you should recognise that writing an epic fantasy story that's actually good is a lot of hard work. Too much work for most professional game developers in fact. It's not a big surprise that no-one is doing it for free. Changing the moon into a death star is achievable and entertaining enough to be shared. Especially if there's a way to fire it.