That's what I meant by "assets." Game developers often license ready-made mesh and texture work to save on production time. gamesas did this for Morrowind, and so when that project came around, they transferred those licensed assets to a new game, and violated the EULAs for both games in the process. The terrain maps are generated by the SDK, though, so as you said, I don't think there would be a problem with those (but there still might be).

I really don't think the Imperial City would be ruined, by the way. It might be an considerably more disrepair than in Oblivion, but I think it would still be standing. Cities don't die off easily.

The TR team gets a lot done... maybe a group of modders could do it within a couple years.

It's amazing that the Tamriel Rebuilt project (not a very accurate name right now, since they're only working on the project for TES III: Morrowind that adds 'only' the Morrowind main land) is still going after all this time, so it's definitely not impossible to have a large project go well.

Still, for every large project that succeeds, a hundred fail. The fact that the TES games are getting more complex every time, with Radiant AI, physics, higher quality graphics, voice acting, etc. isn't helping either. It adds even more work. From what I've understood one of the bigger problems with the Tamriel Rebuilt project for Oblivion was getting the new required architecture models done.

It would be interesting to see a large modding project for Skyrim, but it's so damn hard to control a large group project.

Even if we couldn't use them, we could easily just make new heightmaps based off the old ones. It would just take a little tweaking. Right now I am taking the Tamriel Map posted here and breaking it into a grid. It is a 42x30 grid (using 20x20 pixel squares), meaning there are 1260 gridpoints to work on. If you discount open ocean there are only about 1000 gridpoints to do, and if we could use old heightmaps we'd be about 50% of the way done as far as heightmaps go. It definitely seems possible, and more importantly, completable if we got a good team.

I think it'd be more interesting if someone rebuilt Solstheim with Skyrim's engine. All the proper materials are there to make Solstheim look great, and it's a small territory so more effort could go towards making it detailed.

DUDE!!! Awesome idea! If they make Morrowind compatible with xbox 360, they should Sell Morrowind and Oblivion in a set! And have something inside the Skyrim game with a 20% discount code for buying the game set. i dunno... It sounded more exciting in my head. haha!

It would be a good place to start. It is close to Skyrim, Easily accessible, and from there you head south to Vvardenfell.

As much as I think Phitt's Sheogorad project is the greatest thing since sliced bread, there has to be a point where enough's enough.

HOWEVER, I wouldn't mind seeing a mod that extends Skyrim's eastern border just enough to give us the northwestern corner of Morrowind. If you look here, you'll see what I mean. http://www.uesp.net/wiki/File:TamrielMap.jpg
It's actually a pretty small stretch of land, and I'm kind of surprised we aren't getting it. It's hardly even worth cutting out.

It's mainly because it isn't Skyrim I would say. By your logic Oblivion should have included the Northern tip of Valenwood right?

Hey, I wouldn't have complained!

I'd like to see this begun with a Solstheim recreation first. Then a Morrowind recreation. Solstheim first because it's small (compared to an entire province) and it will share a large number of resources with Skyrim due to the extremely similar climate region (though a bit of liberty will have to be taken in depicting the Dunmer refugees and what became of them).
Morrowind is mostly destroyed/ there's a giant crater shaped bay/lake thing where Vivec used to be, so it's not too hard to create (i.e. no need to add in all the cities because most are gone). Also, many models from TR could be (with their permission, of course) ported and modified to fit the Skyrim quality. New models don't infringe on the game's copyright.
A project like this needs to be planned for now, so that concept art (and hopefully tons of it ) can be developed in anticipation for the game. That way when Skyrim comes out, besides some info that we'll get from the upcoming book/new lore in-game, everything will be ready to dive into the CS.
Those are just my thoughts, but eh, I thought I'd share them.

Agreed. I am purely a meat and potatoes type of modder. If you give me the tools and supplies I can craft something awesome, but I am practically useless at concepts. The best I can do on that front is organize a pecking order on what to do when.

For games as large as modern elder scrolls games, I always feel like it's a waste that when they release a new province and update the engine that the old land isn't reverse compatible to be automatically updated into the new engine to be a part of the game world. That made since with the short time frame between Morrowind and Oblivion, but obviously not with this 200 year difference and major geological and political changes.

A huge world would be great. If the height maps can be used almost immediately that would be a huge advantage for getting such a project started, as people who want to add content have a built space in which they can add content.

Even if the extra world space is mostly empty for the first year or two, that's fine. As long as people keep modding and adding to it, it will fill out.

I wonder... How do you host a site? Does anyone in this forum that already does do think that they can set up a small forum/site to begin planning for work on a rebuilding project? I can't mod very well (I plan on learning on Skyrim's CK), but I feel pretty confident in my drawing/storytelling abilities. I could start contributing as soon as there is a place to contribute in.
Hell, if we can't get a site, someone (I guess I'll try if no one accepts) could set up a thread with detailed information/prerequisites/w.e. and we could use that as the "official" Province Recreation thread.

I actually considered doing this, we can get a free forum from a number of different sites. I just don't know how to organize it well. Oh but I DID do this:

http://img837.imageshack.us/img837/7670/tamrielmapgrid.jpg

If we used something like this and start on Solstheim (A30,A31,B30,B31,C30,C31) it would be a good way to get into the swing of things.

Well thats not always true... it just depends on the developer. Valve for example doesn't care if you use models from one source game in another, and Bohemia Interactive even encouraged its users to bring Operation Flashpoints content over to Armed Assault. So it does in fact happen.

Bethesda however, are a bunch of stiffs in this reguard. Its a shame that its all about business these days for most developers... and not about gamers having fun.

That grid map is a very good idea, actually. I'm going to look for a zoomed in version of Solstheim and Grid that.
If you can get a forum, I can write whatever it is that needs writing.

They may not have a choice. We know that they licensed models for Morrowind, and I wouldn't be surprised if that was true for Oblivion. It is generally easier to just blanket ban migrating models rather than trying to police which ones are ok, and which ones aren't.

Tamriel Complete is now officially underway. Here is a link to the forum if you want to help out. I am currently working on organizing the forum.

http://z15.invisionfree.com/Tamriel_Complete/index.php?act=idx

Thanks! I've just registered and will begin fleshing out the forums wherever I can.

I'm going to make an "official" topic on here tomorrow to try and build our numbers. Glad to have you, and shroomin, where ever he or she may be at this time.

LOL I'm right here (was trolling without logging in), but headed to bed now....

Povuholo speaks the truth.

I've been around in the modding community since Morrowind came out (my old account was lost). I was a naive little kid then (literally, I was in 6th grade (dear god I'm getting old))

There's a reason very few of these projects ever get off the ground, or anywhere near completion.

Tamriel Rebuilt originally planned to remake ALL of Tamriel in Morrowind. But as you can probably guess, they overscoped. Massively. Disputes about quality over quantity broke out, and quality won (thankfully). The team fragmented as people disagreed- the original Silgrad Tower project was a part of TR, but split due to differences (Silgrad was practically it's own project long before the split).

They have currently only released two segments of even mainland Morrowind, which is now the scope of the project. By contrast, Bethesda is about to pump out their third full game in that span.

In order to do it properly, you need massive amounts of support. You need artists. That includes modelers, 2-d artists, animators. You need designers. That means level designers, quest designers. And you need a lot of them. Dedicated. Bethesda is able to put out three games in the same timespan it takes TR to do a fragment of mainland Morrowind because they have over one hundred dedicated employees spending six or seven hours on a project. Modders don't mod for a living. They work, sleep, eat, hang out with friends.

Morrowind modding projects were more successful for two reasons- 1. Morrowind has been out for ten years. 2. No voice acting. Say what you will, in order to make a good quest mod in Oblivion, you need voice actors.

I've been overly ambitious in the past. I've wanted to build total conversions, massive quest mods, everything. But overscoping kills everything.

Start small. You're not going to be able to get the manpower to match even half of what Bethesda can do. Aim for what Phitt or somebody did. A small, isolated segment. Perhaps Solstheim or Bruma.

You are correct - to do an entire "game" mod would be insane. However, if you start with the premise of just making the landmass and dungeons, leaving cities and NPC's for later, you are essentially back in Morrowind in terms of modding. That's why I suggested the first release be just that. Then, you can get smaller teams of modders interested in filling out that huge world you have just released.

I could be mistaken, but I would think that by this time, there are enough landmass resources that a fairly modest team could cobble them together into a realistic landmass in a year or two. It's building on previous work where possible.

With land under your feet, you can focus on the harder stuff - like the voice acting, creating new models for cities, etc.

Doing vvardenfell should be a fairly solid start, not to over the top plus the landmass is already designed, we would just have to remodel the architecture and replace everything.