Skyrim

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Don't know if this is OT or not since criticizing TES may help the OP...

Anyway. Played Oblivion some years ago. It was fun. But a TERRIBLE RPG. Completely inconsequential and, after a few hours, repetitive. How can an RPG NOT respond to the player's decisions? I might as well "role play" NBA Jam and imagine conflicts in between matches.

About realism, it is absolutely necessary. Not real world realism, but a consistent, believable world. In Fallout people actually die from shooting them in the eyes (maybe not Fallout 3, another TES). In IE games a critical shot (ie to the head, etc) blows a person to shreds, so do traps (fail vs petrification? ;)).

In any case, people play games for different reasons. Some may be fun because we can fool around, flick fireballs and wave a sword like a feather duster. Others are fun because they provide challenges, strong narrative, etc. To each his own.

I play it because the inconsistencies do nothing to the main core of the game, which is exploration and roleplay. Making my own story. People are too nit picky, looking at the quality of the shading instead of the whole picture.

edit: That's actually the perfect analogy since even the graphics resemble this. Some people who look real close at objects in the game, like the trees and rocks say the game is ugly. Others that look at the surroundings from afar and as a whole say its fantastic. You have to look at Skyrim's whole picture or not at all.
 
I guess I just don't get how people "role play" in TES. You pretend your in-game character has motivations and does things like complete generic quests only to hear a generic thanks... and then what? Pretend the world changed, even though noone in the game noticed or cared?

I am sure Skyrim has redeeming qualities. I did have some fun with Oblivion, riding a horse, arriving in a new city late at night, seeing the different architecture, exploring the first dungeon and closing the first oblivion gate. After that, it was all the same for hours. To top it all off, you can become the top of your guild and still people call you novice. And how many times can you save the world in just one province :p? The thing is there are some severe core issues. Like the way combat is resolved and damage determined. And the complete lack of world and character reactivity, choices and even committing to a set of skills (eventually you can master everything).

Anyway, moving on. Different styles for different people.
 
Indeed. I can't really teach you how to roleplay. It'll just sound silly to others, but my character Bodolf Stormblade has a background complete with motives that drive what missions I play and why he chooses to do what he does. I create reasons for doing certain missions and not others, and he has a goal to accomplish. That's what sets characters like mine apart from the average player that comes in skyrim completing every mission in daedric armor.

Fallout 3 and NV is no different. You have to roleplay to decide who you're going to side with in the Mojave. Your choices are made from a roleplaying perspective. It's a little easier to roleplay in that regard as far as what you're doing and why, but Skyrim gives you more options just with race and class, which in the elderscrolls is actually important.

Make a story, even if it's just in your head, be your character and it'll take on a life of it's own. It's really simple to me.

And you're oversimplifying things. The guild quests do change the world. Hard for me to say without spoiling it for the OP, but just in the civil war, you can kick out the Thalmor with the Stormcloaks, but yes, most of the effects are in your head because the game can't show long term effects in the present when the implications can't be shown till much later. This is not much different from table top rpgs that expect you to use your mind and imagine things. People might call that lazy, but I call it liberating, personally.

It allows me to hold onto what I think will happen with my character, rather than the game forcing something on me and my story.
 
As for how many times can you save the world in one province, as many times as something bad crops up. It's a world created on chaos and mountains and mountains of dead gods. The place Tamriel was named the Arena. Chaos is expected. No discrepancy there to me, when literally everything is magic.
 
Indeed. I can't really teach you how to roleplay. It'll just sound silly to others, but my character Bodolf Stormblade has a background complete with motives that drive what missions I play and why he chooses to do what he does. I create reasons for doing certain missions and not others, and he has a goal to accomplish. That's what sets characters like mine apart from the average player that comes in skyrim completing every mission in daedric armor.

Fallout 3 and NV is no different. You have to roleplay to decide who you're going to side with in the Mojave. Your choices are made from a roleplaying perspective. It's a little easier to roleplay in that regard as far as what you're doing and why, but Skyrim gives you more options just with race and class, which in the elderscrolls is actually important.

Make a story, even if it's just in your head, be your character and it'll take on a life of it's own. It's really simple to me.

And you're oversimplifying things. The guild quests do change the world. Hard for me to say without spoiling it for the OP, but just in the civil war, you can kick out the Thalmor with the Stormcloaks, but yes, most of the effects are in your head because the game can't show long term effects in the present when the implications can't be shown till much later. This is not much different from table top rpgs that expect you to use your mind and imagine things. People might call that lazy, but I call it liberating, personally.

It allows me to hold onto what I think will happen with my character, rather than the game forcing something on me and my story.

I think @.Volsung. understands some of the frustration I had while playing TES games. They have a lot of the base components in place to make a great sandbox RPG. However, they do almost nothing with what they have in place; they essentially let it go to waste. Everything is so oversimplified that it lacks the depth which other cRPGs have. It's seeing a game with all the necessary components to make a great sandbox RPG (a large open world to explore, freedom of choice and not being tied down to one particular path, etc.) not being utilized that makes TES games such a disappointment. If a player has to imagine everything in their head (because the cRPG is lacking in almost every area) then what is the point of playing a cRPG in the first place? A well designed cRPG doesn't require a player to pretend the game has depth since the depth actually exists in the game itself.
 
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Like I said, I don't consider the fact that certain things are implied to be a flaw in design, but rather a game feature. You can tell that they do this on purpose. That's why you never have a background, pre made family, etc. I don't have to pretend that the legion are kicked out of Skyrim, or that the Thalmor are. That's something that you can see in the cities and holds immediately. The rest of the missions I can go into detail but won't for spoilers, but if you look at the missions themselves, it's not like the end result is supposed to change maps of Skyrim from huge destruction or anything. Whiterun gets invaded, and things indeed are on fire, things are destroyed, even houses, so you do see that. You're oversimplifying things again in the game. Nothing in those missions is so drastic that you're like "What the hell? Nothing changed!" When it happens. The only thing you don't see are things that happen later in time like the Moot for High King, or the war with the Thalmor. In fact, the only thing that doesn't change when it should are the dragon attacks at random when you finish the questline, but that's even explained, because not all dragons follow paarthurnax in the end and he may not even be alive.

The problem here is that the game doesn't end after the main questline like they did in FNV or Fallout 3 before broken steel. Games all end before you even expect to see results in the world. Normally you expect that to be shown in the next game, or in a slideshow at the end. Skyrim however never ends. It ends when you decide it ends. So that is the only, only difference here.
 
Perhaps if I 25 years younger and I hadn't yet played any cRPGs which actually have depth (Planescape Torment, The Witcher 1 & 2, Baldur's Gate series, Sui Generis, etc.) then I wouldn't mind the cliche, generic and oversimplified mechanics used in TES games. However, considering I'm an adult that has experienced games which actually have depth, it's hard to overlook the lack of depth in TES games. A comparison would be like listening to the song "Mary Had a Little Lamb" as opposed to an orchestral piece composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart; after listening to Mozart it would be hard going back to the oversimplified "Mary Had a Little Lamb".
 
That's incredibly condescending. I too have played Witcher both, and it doesn't offer for me what Skyrim does. I'd recommend watching this for a better explanation of why people really like Skyrim:

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...=NjG0x5WqJMRgFlIcsRW6vg&bvm=bv.74649129,d.aWw

One could easily say that your age is why you just don't get Skyrim, but I know better. A friend of mine is in her sixties, Ashleyclark, and she loves it. Another friend of mine, @veleda, is a grown woman and she loves it too. I may only be in my 20s, but I still am an adult, capable of thinking like one, and if I do say so myself, outsmarting many of those older than I.
 
Lol that's a dance mod I see on a lot of videos on youtube:


[video=youtube;zNr-Vfy3eXU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNr-Vfy3eXU[/video]


Maybe you downloaded something that improves characters and it makes him more crazy.
 
That's incredibly condescending. I too have played Witcher both, and it doesn't offer for me what Skyrim does. I'd recommend watching this for a better explanation of why people really like Skyrim:

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...=NjG0x5WqJMRgFlIcsRW6vg&bvm=bv.74649129,d.aWw

One could easily say that your age is why you just don't get Skyrim, but I know better. A friend of mine is in her sixties, Ashleyclark, and she loves it. Another friend of mine, @veleda, is a grown woman and she loves it too. I may only be in my 20s, but I still am an adult, capable of thinking like one, and if I do say so myself, outsmarting many of those older than I.

I was not comparing you and I. I was saying that in my youth I could have overlooked the gaping flaws in TES games because I didn't know any better. I had not experienced anything better. However, now that I have experienced games with depth it's hard to appreciate games where almost no depth is present at all.

I was not saying that age equals experience, simply that as I've aged I've played more games thus broadening my horizons and experience. I was comparing myself as a youth to myself in the present.
 
It still sounds rather condescending either way, because you make it sound as if a gamer can't enjoy Skyrim if they haven't experienced other, what is in your opinion, deeper games, when I actually have. I've been playing games since my father could put a controller in my hands and since I could move a mouse and press WSAD. Your implication is indirect, but the implication regardless, is indeed present.

Skyrim isn't deep in particular areas no, but it is deep in lore, it is deep in exploration, it is deep in possibility and character creation. Skyrim is not a game meant to be specifically focused on swordplay, or archery, magic, potion making, so games like Dishonored, or games like the original Thief games will always appear "deeper" because they are specialized. Skyrim is rare in that it is so vast and large that it has something for almost everyone. And even though individual buckets are not as deep, when you combine them all and dump it all together, you're left with a very deep pool of a gaming experience. It's up to you however to explore, try new things and see just how deep of an experience you can have. If you choose to stop pouring, then it's on you that you didn't have a deep experience.

That's all there is to it, really. Some people are okay with skyrim having shallow pieces because altogether you're left with something massive like a themepark of exploration. It's not something that's hard to grasp, it's simply how willing someone is to see all that Skyrim has to offer.
 
It still sounds rather condescending either way, because you make it sound as if a gamer can't enjoy Skyrim if they haven't experienced other, what is in your opinion, deeper games, when I actually have. I've been playing games since my father could put a controller in my hands and since I could move a mouse and press WSAD. Your implication is indirect, but the implication regardless, is indeed present.

Skyrim isn't deep in particular areas no, but it is deep in lore, it is deep in exploration, it is deep in possibility and character creation. Skyrim is not a game meant to be specifically focused on swordplay, or archery, magic, potion making, so games like Dishonored, or games like the original Thief games will always appear "deeper" because they are specialized. Skyrim is rare in that it is so vast and large that it has something for almost everyone. And even though individual buckets are not as deep, when you combine them all and dump it all together, you're left with a very deep pool of a gaming experience. It's up to you however to explore, try new things and see just how deep of an experience you can have. If you choose to stop pouring, then it's on you that you didn't have a deep experience.

That's all there is to it, really. Some people are okay with skyrim having shallow pieces because altogether you're left with something massive like a themepark of exploration. It's not something that's hard to grasp, it's simply how willing someone is to see all that Skyrim has to offer.

Being condescending isn't my goal or objective. I agree with you that Skyrim is a game that requires a player to imagine and create their own depth because it simply doesn't exist in the game itself. Imagining things is required in pen and paper RPGs since there is nothing to actually interact with; things only exist in the player's mind. However, in cRPGs things do exist: NPCs, locations, weapons, armor, world interactions/events, etc.

The problem I have with Skyrim is that things which do exist are done very poorly and in a shallow manner (a.k.a. lacking depth). Just because the game is large does not mean they have to create everything in a generic or cliche fashion. As @.Volsung. pointed out previously:

I guess I just don't get how people "role play" in TES. You pretend your in-game character has motivations and does things like complete generic quests only to hear a generic thanks... and then what? Pretend the world changed, even though noone in the game noticed or cared?

This is a perfect example of a shallow mechanic which lacks depth. Having a large quantity of shallow things in a cRPG does not equal a cRPG with depth. The saying "quality over quantity" definitely applies here.
 
Quality over quantity would work, except that there is quality here. Just not in what you are looking for specifically. The combat system is simply the pass time you have while exploring the game and making your story. That's where the quality is, and they give so many options, shallow as they may be, to not only fit more people, but to provide you with as much chance for story and creativity as possible.

We'll argue in circles forever, and I'm late at the moment, so I'll end my point for now in saying that Skyrim simply doesn't have the quality in what you in particular seek as a gamer.
 
Quality over quantity would work, except that there is quality here. Just not in what you are looking for specifically. The combat system is simply the pass time you have while exploring the game and making your story. That's where the quality is, and they give so many options, shallow as they may be, to not only fit more people, but to provide you with as much chance for story and creativity as possible.

We'll argue in circles forever, and I'm late at the moment, so I'll end my point for now in saying that Skyrim simply doesn't have the quality in what you in particular seek as a gamer.

So you're saying that the game being more generic, cliche and lacking depth is a good thing because it allows more people to use their imagination and pretend it's something that it's not? I'm not sure I follow. If you could please list some examples of quality in TES perhaps there's something I overlooked. I've played the games for many, many hours and did not find anything that impressed me or stood out as being deep or of high quality (like in previous cRPGs I've played).
 
I'm not saying that at all and I already listed the lore, the exploration (the many dungeons in the game are very unique, hand crafted and have their own special missions attached to them, such as an abandoned lighthouse home near dawnstar) and the potential and many possibilities of story to create with your character through exploring. The quality is in the tools that the game gives you to write your own story as you play. It's the perfect sandbox rpg.

If you don't agree or understand, that's fine.

It basically allows you to be your own indiana jones in a magical world with dragons trolls, elves wizards, etc. Someone said it was an adventure simulation game, and what's wrong with that?
 
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Again, I do understand why you play TES but you can't call it a proper RPG simply because the game does NOT care. It is open, it is large, but it doesn't respond to you except in predetermined, scripted events. You cannot transform your quest goals based on evidence or observations, you simply do it and there's but one outcome. You pretend things matter because the game does not react and that's fine, I get it. But that's not what an RPG does.

Pen and paper RPGs respond to your actions, because the GM tailors everything specifically to what you choose. You have infinite dialog options and infinite tactical approaches, and all of them change the world and determine what comes next. The alternative would be completing the same dungeon crawls over and over, imagining your motivations but not communicating them to the GM, and him not giving you choices so he may slap you in the face with another generic quest. Where's the role play? Imagining is fun but a different game altogether. RPGs create worlds and stories.

Anyway. As I said people play for different reasons and I expect RPGs, both paper and computer, to offer real decision making scenarios to which they actually react. Otherwise I would just play any action game and imagine what I do responds to some unspoken motive and even though the game world does not respond, I will pretend it does.

Recently completed Shadow Warrior. Lets say my Lo Wang was a recovering addict dealing with withdrawal. He doesn't want to work for zilla but oh well, can't complete the first assignment differently. He doesn't want to kill people but they won't negotiate. His recovering background affects nothing. And so on. I'm just imagining an alternate story to the events already happening in the game. TES is open and lets you do passive things like sitting in a cabin, but when you go out you're only confronted with options like completing a quest or not.

If you don't care about this and power play, you still have to deal with the atrocious combat and broken character progression. In Oblivion for instance you are encouraged NOT to use your archetype's basic skills because you'd underlevel. If you want to level up with some planning, you grind (game breaking) and spam spells at the air or jump around like an idiot. Best way to have control over your own training? Create a class with skills you'll never use! Not like it matters, you will master everything eventually.

Don't get us wrong. We respect your preferences and game choices. But you gave to be objective, TES doesn't actually offer an actual RP experience. It offers a sandbox where you pretend things happen. And that's absolutely OK.
 
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RPG means Role Playing Game, and Role Playing is exactly what Skyrim is all about. The idea that it's not an RPG to me does not compute.
 
And what you described is more akin to what an MMO RPG is like, and while Skyrim is much more detailed than an MMO, notice MMOs are still called RPGs. Hence the name MMORPG.
 
And what you described is more akin to what an MMO RPG is like, and while Skyrim is much more detailed than an MMO, notice MMOs are still called RPGs. Hence the name MMORPG.

MMOs respond to nothing. They're the archetype of generic.

Let me give you an example from a balanced cRPG, Baldur's Gate II. There's a quest in which you are asked to protect a shipment of ore and deliver it to an artist. You find out a few things which you can actually use to affect your quest. You can commission a forge and deliver fake ore, keep the original and use it yourself, keeping both ore and payment. Or simply deliver. Or keep it. Another example from the same game: you find a man buried alive and your investigation takes you to an individual who reveals the location of a group of kidnapped people. Upon your arrival you can extort them and get a unique item or let them go. You lose or gain reputation which affects how people respond to you. And this is from a game that is not heavy on the role playing! In Arcanum you can convince a group of mercenaries you are one of them if you are good enough at manipulation and wear the right clothes! In Fallout you can convince the final "boss" to kill himself if you research into his experiment and show him he's mistaken! In Planescape Torment your character definition affects what you can do, say, experience, etc., from beginning to end.

What @freakie1one meant about being older means if you didn't play the cRPGs of the golden age you don't know what you're missing, which is why you can enjoy Skyrim. We can't.
 
RPG means Role Playing Game, and Role Playing is exactly what Skyrim is all about. The idea that it's not an RPG to me does not compute.

So, is writing a book role playing if it's written from the protagonist's PoV? I think not. You make up all the characters, events, 'quests', reactions, motives etc, but it is not role playing.

Role playing requires context. It requires some entity that interacts with your character - be it a DM in a PnP RPG or the computer in a cRPG, or other players in LARP. You have to be just one part, one character of a world - not make up the entire thing as you go along. Something has to react to who you are and what you do. If there is no such thing, it's just fantasizing. What difference exactly, would it make for your way of playing Skyrim if you were not playing at all, but just writing it down?
 
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