I just started getting interested in lore. I have been playing TES since Marrowind. I hadnt really been paying close attention to the lore, until just recently.


Im curious to know if all the lore is documented in the (in game books). Can I learn everything about the lore by reading through the imperial library? Or is there some information about lore, that you can only get through playing the games?

In other words, do I have to buy Arena, Daggerfall ,Battlespire and Redguard? Then play them all through a million times?

TheimperialLibrary.com. ~ every in game book plus semi-canon/basically canon ES lore.

You don't need to play those games, but you should at least watch a let's play of redguard. It's quite memorable. For Arena, Daggerfall, and Battlespire, TiL has extensive plot summaries that should give you a clear idea of what happened in each game. (the later games don't give you enough info to peice together all the happenings of it's predecessors)

Also, Arena and Daggerfall are now free and publically available for download.

Not .com it's .info.

http://www.imperial-library.info/

I don't think there's much word-of-mouth lore there though. As an example off the top of my head, a questgiver in Morrowind directs to you to an argonian medium, mentioning that she has 'a touch of the Sight' and that 'some argonians are like that' (this could just be something to do withtheir in game aptitude for mysticism, but that's beside the point) and so far as I know, this wasn't mentioned in the books. Savants and to a lesser extent, priests usually have loads to say in the game.

That's worth noting. But nigh everything is in print. I guess it's less time consuming, to have some guy type the book. I'd rather hear the song-type stories than read them.

I would like to make one suggestion about in-game books.

Never take them at 100% truth. As they are often written from the authors point of veiw. =3
It can be very easy to get 2 counter points, or find missing info left for your imagination to think of.

www.uesp.net also has books listed, but has info related to the games. So you can actuly zip thru in 5-10mins of older titles and get idea of what they were about.
I keep telling myself to play Red G. and Battlespire... but I spent like 20-30mins on UESP, and get basic idea of what happen.

Like our world, books in Tamriel could be full of lies or truth.
I think history books are mostly all true, but beware authors who write on daedra,races,gods,mythology, for most of the time it is pure speculation.