I thumbed though the info about Skyrim and could not find what this fellow meant about an active inventory screen. Where you drop down and open up your pack to look at your inventory. While doing so time still passes and you can be attacked. I don't have the mag and I have only seen 3 scans. Can you guys confirm this or is this guy talking out of ass?

I never read anything like that from what I was shown.

However, that's a quality idea. Didn't Todd say something about wanting to make inventory/map screens more interesting and fun?

I liked that it never paused in Demon's Souls when you checked your inventory or stats, that was pretty exciting at times. Far Cry 2 has a very cool map system that would be nice in Skyrim.

I don't remember reading that.

Only thing I remember that could be described as and "active inventory" is where you see the 3d models of all the items that you can rotate, and you can look at, open up books and read them right in your inventory.

I don't think that would work in TES.....Hell, in Oblivion, I often have what feels like hundreds of items in my inventory.

Why not? They have to make a 3D model anyway. Fable 2 did it.

I had over 50+ things on me at all time in oblivion.

It'd be sweet to be chugging along on a horse, and whip out a map ala Farcry 2 and have to look ahead, look back at map, look ahead, look back at map, put away map, and chug on.

Yup that is correct.

the 3d models could work. remember ,you nay sayers , that we workin with a new engine here.

I hope going into your inventory "pauses" things.

I don't think the 3D models would affect performance as much as you would expect. You probably won't be able to see too many on your screen at a time anyways. There might be some problems with memory but there are ways around that. Hell, 100+ items is nothing for Oblivion to render on screen at a time during actual gameplay.

I'd rather the menu botton be the only pause button.


I would like real time inventory checking/swapping.


Makes combat challenging and to make sure you have the appropriate equipment in use.

Active inventory is explained http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1157211-skyrim-information-explanation-and-compilation/

that could work in ES, I always hated how it told me that you cant do that while enemies are near, even though it is something stupid, so if they do it like that I can just open my inventory

This OT after reading the posts, but I interpreted the title as this, so I'll say it anyway:

I think real time conversations, inventory, lockpicking, opening chests and everything like that, would be awesome. It would make hotkeys much more important, and if you needed to drastically change tactics during a fight, it would add the excitement and real challenge of somehow having to create enough time for yourself to rummage through your inventory and equip what you need.

For me, this is mostly a realism element, but it definitely adds another element to the gameplay that can be wanted and enjoyed for more reasons than simple realism.

One menu, the magic menu, should still pause time, for both realistic and gameplay reasons.

Oh goodness, I hope not.

It would be the worst idea in the history of video games period. I would rather have the Adoring Fan be the Avatar of Akatosh and be Immortal before I accept active Inventory Screens. Its been tried before in other games and it has failed every time and it will continue to fail if it's in included in Skyrim. A terrible decision if it's true, I can't even express words on how terrible this idea is. :facepalm:

wihile i wouldnt mind that, the hot keys would need to be very responsive and should be lik two worlds 2 (where u can map multiple things to one key: armor and weapons)

Demon Souls - drooool. I have spent too much time with you.

Page 54.
Menu; Up - your character looks to the stars and sees his Skills as constellations & Perks as stars in them.
Menu; Right - opens the inventory, multiple "tabs" for your herbs and relics, detailed zoomable images rather than the simple item icon, three dimentional books.
Menu; Left - spell list.
Menu; Down - your character looks to the earth... camera pans up and out showing you all of skyrim as a huge topographical display of the mountains and forests and tundras.

So, I presume the game still pauses in each of these features.

No, it's not like you described, I described active inventory in the Skyrim Information thread I linked above. Active inventory means that you can see the items as they would appear in the game and you can zoom in on the item and rotate it to see it from every angle.