How so? The main quest in both Morrowind and Oblivion, assuming you STICK to it and don't wander off doing other stuff would only take roughly around the same time. Not to mention the fact that the main quest is only a fraction of the actual game. Whereas most games main story only lasts around 8 hours these days.

Haha when I said "be high in fantasy" I didn't mean in that sense. But I agree with you nonetheless. Morrowind was pure utter glory

I was having a pitiful birthday today, I am sick (had to cancel my weekend party with friends the day before) and I am at work (I had to for a mandatory HOT job) . Then at my lunchtime I read about how Bethesda will be adapting some of my archery game mechanics for Skyrim.

wow....years of consuming all my free time (and not so free time) that I could have been using to actually play instead of modding. Loss sleep, loss money in some cases like buying sound effects or a drawing tablet, secondary monitor (things I would not buy if I was not modding) or because I did not "clock in" for my on-line business, struggling with programming language that is out of my comfort zone, feeling like a dim wit asking dumb questions/pestering those with real technical and artistic skill. Using my holidays and vacation time to learn how to use modding tools, hundreds and hundreds of hours of tedious trial and error.... ALL TOTALLY WORTH IT!

I was not going to do this as I wanted to see what my media options would be first, but now I am a pre-order customer for this game.

Best Birthday Ever!

People, this isn't Morrowind it doesn't have to be high fantasy maybe its better with low fantasy who knows?
Also I beat the Morrowind MQ in under 20 hours easy and not rushing.

haha ooo but u know...

its like here's morrowind with some dank

'woah dude...this paper lantern...and WTF IS THAT ORC WEARING, IS THAT GLASS ARMOR OMG I WANNA KILL THAT BEEZY AND TAKE IT!'

heres oblivion with some dank

'woah...cool trees *spins around the speed-trees for 15 minutes*' lol

Don't like the size of the map, that is, if it's as boring as oblivion's forests.
That's it though. To much speculation/unverified info on the rest.

I VASTLY prefer low-fantasy, it is much grittier and more hardcoe - which seems to suit the new combat and cold environment.


I'm not a big fan of the whole "fruity","twinkly", fairy-ish colorful fantasy... so I'm biased

I am glad to see that the main quest is ~20 hours since Morrowind feels almost the same time (Best guess is maybe like ~12 hours) IMO but NOT like Oblivion, which to me felt like only 2 hours

If all this new info is correct I won't buy Skyrim until it hits the "used game bargain bin" for ~$3.99. I'm not even betting on a goty edition this time, there are some really good looking games coming out this year.

20 hour main quest means the first used copies of Skyrim will show up at GameStop on 11-13-11. You know it's true. The ones "who don't get it" when it comes to TES will still feel like they beat the game when they finish the main quest and get it back to GameStop for best trade value. True rpg fans who want a really long detailed story will still feel like it's too short. I'm one of the people who wants a MQ 3x longer than 20 hours, not games made for those with the attention span of a gold fish, fail for me.

I cannot convey how intensely I dislike the idea that whatever level I am when I enter a dungeon makes a static boring place in the world for later. According to other info random quest givers are going to send you to any dungeon you haven't been to yet. So because I like high end content I have to stay out of dungeons and not talk to people for as long as possible. Simply put: Game Breaker.

Dragons as fairly common enemies. :facepalm:

Lastly we have a game that will be produced and marketed to the PC users of today yet built to run on six year old console hardware. If I had typed the last sentence and posted it on a forum ten years ago absolutely everyone would've lol'd at me and told me I was high. Now it's sadly true.

I have some question about Magic:
Is new magic system will not allow create new spells in-game?
Since enchanting is back can we customize enchants or only premade enchants like sigil stones, will be here chance of failure when enchanting, slow restoration of enchant overtime, fast recharge with Soul Gems, permanent enchants, enchants on strike, spell adding enchants.
Is scripted effect is still present in game?
Powers and Greater Powers is still in game?
Scrolls and Staffs is still present?
85 spells not spell effects?
I will understood if old spell making style will not present in game (for protect player from creating 100 pts of Charm on 1 sec for example and make present in game magic more unique with no cluttering spell book with old outgrown spells) and only will available in CS, but can we still create new spell by combining different spell effects ? Elemental Fury for example thats strike with all elemental damage effects, or combining not so large and much costless fire damage spell effect with elemental vulnerability to fire that make spell strikes stronger overtime, and other awesome spell effect combinations that was before in TES series, without such customization roleplaying mage will be very limited.
If custom spells gone that will be much more horrible problem then deleting of Mysticism school.

I still don't get it why people keep saying the mainquest being 20 hours long is short / bad.

Clearly, no one has played either Oblivion or Fallout 3. Or replayed Morrowind after a couple playthroughs.

I could finish Oblivion's MQ in 6 hours, Fallout 3 in 4 if you knew what you were doing. Morrowind was a long one, but only because of the lack of the compass markers and fast travel, that could make it last a lot, but no more than 15 hours.

Personally I'm really happy to hear that Skyrim is a step in the direction towards less bizarre art direction and settings, with more realistic, flawed characters and story. I couldn't get into Shivering Isles and I don't enjoy JRPGs for this reason.

Congrats man. I really hope they liked your 'missed shots and fresh corpses alert nearby NPCs' too. We'd have the holy grail of archery mods then.

Congratulation to you and Happy Birthday!, I'm thank you for thats brilliant mod you done for community, they add awesome role-playing experience to Oblivion, let me wish you best regards Duke Patrick.

Glad to say I finally got the magazine. Some nice info. For some reason I am a lot less worried now that I have read it myself. :shrug:

Can you confirm that it's actually Bethesda that said Skyrim's approximately the same size as Oblivion, or is it just the author guessing, as claimed in the first post?

MQ: The fact that Morrowind's and Oblivion's MQ were of the same length does not mean much to me. At least Morrowind's was unique and intriguing, Oblivion's was bit meh. There's no reason to limit yourself to 20 hours however, and though in previous TES games the MQ wasn't really the point I'd have loved to see a much longer, ambitious and well written and MQ. But I've come to expect this from most "modern" games, it's like they're all created for people with the IQ of a sewer rat and the attention span of a goldfish.

Dungeons: If leveled dungeons are based on Fallout's system, with certain improvements, then great. Not all of them will be leveled anyway and I am glad to see they were reduced in number and will be less generic.

Fast travel: not at all happy with this. Fast travel and generic dungeons made me not want to explore in Oblivion, wich was really quite dissapointing after Morrowind. And please don't give any "it's optional" arguments, there is no in game transport system like in so many other games have (including older TES games).

Spells: It all depends on how it will be implemented. I am certain I will miss the diversity and degree of freedom we had in Morrowind, I'm just hoping they don't make it too restricting.

Combat: Pretty much everything mentioned is welcome, especially the archery bit (congratulations to the creator of that mod)

Stealth: I was expecting more, but I won't be too dishartened before I see the AI for guards and the like. They could at least add some stuff that was implemented in Thief back in 1998, the way stealth was described (oblivion, only better) is too simplistic.

None of the above is terribly important to me however. I care a lot more about the detail and depth of the world, how well written the dialogues and quests will be, and the art.

Happy birthday and CONGRATULATIONS!!! Goes to show how high quality the mods you produce are! :thumbsup:

I agree. I liked some of the info but alot of it worries me, especially the low-fantasy. World size is also something im dissapointed with. Dungeons Level Locking seems like it ckuld be a catch 22. When you first get there it's equal to but if you want to go back and explore it, it'll be too easy

What do you mean "that's good?"

PC version gets gimped just to keep console players happy? That's awful!

PC version has access to an extra 5 years of technology, including DX10 and 11 support, and Beth seem to think that if they use this tech to make the PC version look better then console players are going to cry and [censored] about it. This is insulting to both PC and console players imo, and shows that Beth are forgetting their roots. I'm betting the only reason they kept the Construction (Creation) Kit is because it helps to drive sales, not out of love for their PC community.

This is bad, bad news. How can you possibly see this as good news?

That's not what it says... :facepalm:

Probably the only thing I'm REALLY disappointed about... I was seriously hoping for DX11 or at the VERY least DX10 support... I mean I thought by now it would be kind of a staple for any game released on PC by 2012... :confused: Here's to hoping they at least release a patch. -_-

Yeah, but that's what it implies.

I'm not actually fussed, but I would rather if the PC gets better textures and stuff which would only be available on higher graphics settings (which would not work well on consoles). I only say this now because I have a computer which is capable of running the most graphic intensive games (finally).

What are pop-up issues?

That's when you see something pop up, right in the middle of your view. In most games this is grass and others, in this engine we are used to see since Morrowind, it's also buildings that suddenly appear when you come closer. But it has improved considerably since Morrowind.