An excessively cramped yet random and unimaginative world is the exact thing the developers are trying to get away from in Skyrim. Daggerfall was huge and random, but that doesn't mean the dungeons were fun. Oblivion also had loads of dungeons, which while not randomised, were still very dull since 1 guy had to do all of them. Ido not like your idea at all.

From the look of the above post, it sounds like the "lead dungeon artist" built all the dungeons and the others designed the art or something.

This. Handcrafted and far away from randomized thanks!

I definitely prefer quality over quantity! Give me more unique, varied dungeons and less, dozens of exactly copied replicas (most of the ayeleid ruins in particular were soooo similar) and I'll be more than happy!

I think he meant that there are 130 different dungeons, but they can start in 2000 different places (as long as the outside matches the inside. Some might have to stay the same each game because of this)

Think of it like the oblivion gates in OB. They can pop up in a bunch of different places, and if one pops up in the same place twice, the inside might not be the same as it was last game

I think it would be pretty interesting, as long as the names (and some outside props) are associated with the dungeon and not the entrance. Imagine going into a nuka-cola factory in FO3 and finding a cave :facepalm:

Problem with Fallout 3 was that all the top items was at fixed locations or quest rewards, this was also a problem in Morrowind but less as Morrowind had more items, on the other hand many high end items in Morrowind like ebony swords or glass armor was just to steal.
You know lots of the locations the second time you play, first if you use a walkthrough. Yes people do and then complain that the game is to easy.

Let enemy equipment be random, yes let the bosses has nice stuff also named items but you don't know where it is. as you say it does not have to be on a enemy it might just be in a potential location.

Have a feeling quest rewards from radiant story will be scrambled, instead of getting a named levelled sword you get a named sword from a levelled list, do the quest at level 10 you get one item do it at level 20 you get another. Some comment in the podcast indicated that quest giver does not know that he gives to you.

Don't agree with the dungeon entrances, it would be a lot of work as you has to place the entrance. however with load doors they could potentially scramble who dungeon is inside but it might be confusing .

This. They had one guy designing the meshes/textures Ect. and and then the rest of the team just put those pieces together.

You could be right but that's actually the opposite of what I said.

"The replayed game" - look at the perk system. It's pretty well suggested that if you want to see what you can do with this skill, you have to create a new character and start a new game to see it in action. Whereas "The endless game" meant you could play only one character and maximize him.


The perks system mentioned above, and how radiant story will give you challenges based on who you (ref Todd interview or podcast) are and what you have done, suggests they *want* you to play it more than once. Different mechanic, but how many played FONV only once? How many visited every dungeon in Daggerfall? Or town for that matter? The ability was given by size and randomly generated dungeons, which is no longer there. But it was still an underlying mechanic that drove you to just push on. At least I experienced it that way.


So a game designed with replayability in mind should give the exact same experience in dungeons every time? As I said, I agree on the crampiness, so I want to enhance the replayability with something else.


It can still be handcrafted even if portions are randomly hidden. Have some imagination.


Like the forts in Oblivion. There could be a dozen around. But only three random ones had access to the door, the rest was blocked. Finding such a fort, you'd still have to investigate. If you can get in, you'll notice the interior is pretty much the same as one you did in another playthrough, but something is still different - you won't find known items placed in the same places, a wall is collapsed where you could enter previously, and the old stone is removed revealing another passage.

I just want more in each playthrough to feel more unique than the last one. FONV had factions that did this, but the dungeons/exploration became boring. I want "no stone untouched" also in succeeding playthroughs. Even if I find a list of 1000 well hidden outdoor locations that can be a unique item location, I'm still forced to explore rather than go fetch. Lack of roleplaying ability on my side? Maybe. But I find it impossible to simply "unlearn" all the stuff I learned earlier. Some things are impossible of course, but any move that increases replayability value is a good one in my opinion.

if every dungeon will be at least twice the size of Oblivion dungeons, im all for it

I would rather have 130 unique dungeons than 200 generic places.

That I don't care the numbers as long as they're all unique, or mostly unique. After having played Oblivion since release to Nov-10 (I had definitely quit by that time), I'm sure I've left about 40% of the vanilla dungeons unexplored, out of total lack of interest.

P.D: By dungeons I doubt he was referring to camps, settlements, inns and shrines. And I don't understand why do you think Skyrim's dungeons will be based exactly like Oblivion' ones, neither your reasons for wanting that.

I just hope they have more than 3 tilesets, 4 if you count Oblivion gates.

A cave is a hole in a mountain,and a mine is a hole in a mountain that you created from mining ore . So its not really called a mine you just do mining inside of it.

While this was true, Daggerfall remains the most ambitious game in the series for what it tried to do, dungeons included.

I loved that there were several truly epic dungeons, especially among the main storyline, and they gave you a real sense of fear and dread as you descended farther and farther into them. They just needed some more moderate sized ones mixed in.

Also important was that the main dungeons in DF (and Arena) were populated by set enemies that were placed there with a purpose, and not randomized to your level. If you weren't ready to handle the tower inhabited by ancient vampires and liches, oh well, you had better adventure elsewhere for a while and prepare for it. There was no going to the powerful places in that game at level 3 and just having them automatically and ridiculously scaled to an appropriate challenge. It added so much more menace and personality to these dungeons that they were the same daunting challenge no matter what.

I hope they make some similar style epic dungeons in Skyrim and that some are obviously more elaborate than others, and that ones where high level things exist are visually more impressive and differently designed than dungeons with lower level creatures. Which sadly cannot happen if every dungeon in the game is more of a variable placeholder (or template) that is just waiting for a quest to be assigned to it, based upon when the PC arrives in the area or local quest giving center that is tied to that dungeon.

I do not want the game to be like Oblivion. My main concern was content. Generally, since there are less dungeons does that mean there is going to be a lot less to do and explore? Don't misunderstand me here.....I think 130 dungeons is a lot and I know the game is going to be great and even if they only had 50 dungeons it would not change me getting the game or anything like that.

I like to explore every single dungeon and inch of the world and to me having less of them means less exploring and time I will put into the game (maybe can't really say yet since the game is not out).

I just hope there is as much if not more to do in the game than Oblivion had and with 130 dungeons it APPEARS that may not be the case.

They were hand made in Oblivion, too.

Don't make outrageous statements if you have no idea what context they pertain to.

I hope that the 130 dungeons are split across forts, caves, mines and ruins - quality is infinitely preferable to quantity in this area.

Personally, I would rather have more forts and ruins then caves and mines.

The amount of dungeons will probably feel much higher too, since most will be beyond you're level to go running around them all like in Oblivion.
They'll last longer and be designed better, sound good to me.

Oh yeah I agree. I'm just saying that I hope the '130' figure is the amalgamated total of forts, caves, ruins and mines rather than just ruins. Otherwise the map is going to be too cramped.

As much to do in the game? And you think that exploring the same type of dungeon and gaining the same type of random loot every time is to do anything?

For me, after 4-5 of each (quest-dependant ones apart), it was boring to hell.

Yeah, I can agree with that for the caves and mines but for some reason I could keep going through different forts and ruins all day.

Also keep in mind that a lot of caves/dungeons will probably be on/around a lot of the mountains which will free up space for the flat land areas. This should bode well for the map not feeling too cramped.

Probably said before, but Oblivion actually had only a handful of different dungeons when it comes to layout, meaning that the total of unique dingeons in OB was around 40 or maybe even 50 at tops. I also don't thing taverns and inns will count as part of the 130 dingeons, it will be places like mines, caves, ruins, abandoned forts etc.