Yet another Morrowind purist, sigh.

Most of this can be turned off, or completely avoided, for example:

You CAN still be a pure Mage, it just takes skill and decent spell placement. Not like in Oblivion and Morrowind where you could create one spell to rule them all.

No attributes means no more specific grinding (ie, continuously jumping to improve acrobatics, which improved speed.)

Morrowind also had many simple fetch or kill quests, Skyrim also has many puzzles. Some of them are insanely mind boggling.

Black smithing enchanting and alchemy don't have to be used, you just have to exercise a bit of self discipline.

If you don't want to know how to do a quest, don't use the quest log. If you don't want to know where to go during a quest turn of the compass and don't use the map, very simple.

Skyrim may be the easiest game so far but by the looks of your statement, that's the you're playing it. I, for one am taking a serious approach, no maps except for the one I'm currently drawing, no HUD, relying on journal entries that I write myself. And if you die once your character is dead forever.

Bottom line, the game is as hard as you make it.

Haven't paid that much attention to that, but they do seem quite common. Those just came into mind immediatly.

the exchange was either kill or not, but i wanted to know more, before i decided to axe them. now all of a sudden they want me to go on a crusade with them. problem is once you choose that kind of answer youre stuck with it. its like that on alot of quests, there isnt alot of room for probing. its frustrating.

I'm always suprised by the fact that you are able to hit the nail every time again, and that afterward nobody of the "opposition" has the guts to respond to you. which clearly means "you're right we are indeed whining losers"

you dont have to use half the stuff if you dont want to, its optional....

Well, just the fact that reality mods are already being done witohut SDK because a good portion of players feel the company makes too easy, non challenging games. But thats the company politic so i don t hope it to change. What i hope the company will change is giving more option to the player to callibrate its gaming experience without having to fiddle in simple stuff like .INI and whatever just to have shadows for example a forther draw distance (the game one is really weak)

here s a small list of examples about how this game has been simplifyed, or is non chalenging.

Everyone start with magic, independent of race or pre setting or achtype. Its just pushed throat down.
You don t choose what you want to be at the beginning anymore its just shoved on you, absolutely no trade off. Win win solution.
Mission description are inexistent, not even the basic, it is assumed by the company that you are an illiterate moron, with ADD and others disoders, so reading its excluded because you wouldn t comprehend the sequences of sentences or even one for what matters.
The only clue is on the spoon feeding idiotic pushed up your rear end compass.
Dungeons are so bright torches or whatever other device are useless, certainly to not scare the little childs. If you try to adjust color, backlight, brithgness contrast etc to what it should be you f.... .P the outdoor settings, I totally gave up and assumed the real reason what to not scare childs, Horriblivion must have had so much complain about: Your game is so dark my kid have mightmares...Facepalm.
Dragons have been made weak, i wasn t even doing the quest when a frost dragon came to attack me near the emptyed unimpressive village capital of the nord, 2 female peasants and a guard took on the dragon and nobody died, extreme facepalm moment. Why bother leveling up if 2 peasants can take on a dragon. What-a-terrible-cre-a-ture... in the reverted sense. Instant reward for kids, no skill demanded.
During combat most of the time, you can dance around your ennemies (whith exceptions (at least that)) if they don t have missile or magic backup without tiring ever...probably so people with inferiority complex or childs can feel good and very potent. There s still a fun factor but.... (facepalm)
Some ennemies dubbed killable only with special weapons (at least ingame) can be killed with normal weapon (no spoilers). Thats not a weak feature, its just bad planning as sneak and Hide and AI limitation haven t been contemplated, leading to an easy but time consuming kill. Just a matter of adjustment. But this was probably done so any foe can be killed by any player, no matter what...sad.
Auto regen, calculated so you ll never probably die unless you do cheat and not even an official option to this new held-you-by-the-hand-feature. If healing is given for free why bother with auto regenerate ? One or the other not both.
Skills, there s so few skills thats there pratically no may to screw up, and choices are straighforward. There s not even secondaries effects on the skills. Won t enter the Attributes argument, now that the game is out and perks are so freaking weak, demonstrating how weak the company is in game feaaturing, it should be brought forward again but it won t because the game is already at XBOX limitation in size, and is was planned tought and calibrated for it. Only hope SDK and modders, but i don t believe they will be able to make something really decent. They would have to recode the entire game, not even sure they can add really needed skills like speed perks and others.
LEVELLING too fast in the 10 first levels, when you get to this lvl you usually have a very advantageous perk that for many lvl will give almost an i win button.
Higgest difficult lvl only add HP to the ennemies....so we got the pin cushion factor again, long and boring battles instead for challenge, what wrong with making AI faster and hit harder ?
Crafting couldn t be more simplistic, its fun at the beginning but get a bit borrrrring after some time no challenge.
Imediate almost free money from the beginning, get rich chopping wood, its totally free, dangerless and allow you to buy a lot of stuff. Add this to smithing, and you easely can get to level 5 just doing woodchop and smith. (it ain t bad, just too easy too quick, where s the decreasing valour of goods annouced in the hyping fase?)
You can run like a chicken all day long... without ever tyring...same a Horriblivion....sad.
Ho yeah, you canaxe anything on the game just because its there, onteresting conversation or whatever probing is useless as 90% of skyrim pop outside cities villages or whatever are hostiles...
Mission are given in a dumb shallow way, and your answears have not much results, nor any consequences in the game, its the way so that people won t, no CAN T ever screw a mission, there s was too much complain in Morrowind like: "I killed the quest giver i can t complete the mission, Buaaaaaaa, now i will have to go to shrink for 5 years... buaaa i can t deal with my acts...buaaa please do a no loosing game buaaa.... Skyrim is almost there...90% done so player can t get any kind of frustration... lol frustrating.
I could go on but this give no pleasure, just make me sad.

::Sniff Sniff::

Anyone else smell troll dung?

Yes Skyrim removed attributes, some skills, and your armor never breaks, but it also has an in-depth perk system where you can actually gimp your character if you don't pay attention. Oblivion will always hold the crown for hand-holdingest game ever made. Let us not forget which Elder Scrolls introduced popups, no-fail alchemy, no-fail casting, skill-ignoring mini-games (Skyrim's actually takes skill into account! Imagine that!), quest compasses, immortal npcs, and removed the ability to delete spells or drop quest items. Skyrim maintains a lot of that (and improves in a lot of ways like a less intrusive compass), but all of it comes from Oblivion.

Yes yes, optional map markers and less number crunching is certainly dumbing down. It helps my poor, confused brain.

What is this I don't even...


You start off with a sword early on as well. That's about choice.
I don't see how "you don't choose what you want to be at the beginining" equals "it's just shoved on you." It's the opposite - no more being shoehorned in like a child that needs to be told what to do.
And the bit about reading? Are you insane? Maybe they don't describe every part of your mission because they assume you have a brain beyond the capabilities of a goldfish and can remember what you are doing without an in depth recap. And considering the amount and calibre of books, you're point concerning reading is just... unbelievably stupid.
I'm not reading past that, it's not worth it.

I've yet to see gameplay changing mods.

And of course, it's bad because people are modding it.
Morrowind must be horrible then...

You know, I could go one-by-one but I just don't have the time....

You do know you can break Morrowind combat by running around the enemy, no character skill involved.
Race does matter with starting spells, Altmer and Breton start with different spells. Other than that, same as Oblivion, don't like it, IGNORE IT.
And if you start out the same as the rest you are forced into a character? No, you're not.
And you claim everything on "hurr-durr children" even [censored] DARKNESS?!
Of course they've removed skills because the consoles, MAKES PERFECT SENSE. Also, add more just so you can "screw up"? Because there are no people already [censored]ing how their alchemist/smith/enchanter character cannot do anything... And really, why? MORE IS NOT BETTER! And no, less is not worse either.
Auto-regen makes the game too easy? Yeah, you haven't played the game then.

Start playing the game, then return, please.

Played TES since Daggerfall. Currently playing a lvl 42 pure mage with 100% reduced Destruction mana use and had the same gear since level 20ish.

Oblivion and Morrowind both had about 4-5 times as many spells and ALOT more magic effects.

Morrowind had ALOT of timed things. Not all were quest and alot of em where just secrets (first city in the old tree forexample or eves dropping at the right time to find out where things were hidden)

Spellmaking isnt necessary if theres enough spells to keep it interesting. Currently in skyrim the spells and effects has been cut severely.

Morrowind: http://www.uesp.net/morrow/hints/mweffects.shtml
Oblivion: http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Spell_Effects
Skyrim: Couldnt find a list but it isnt even half the effects of the older games.

Never said you had to be a genious to do things in morrowind but it still required a player to forexample find a book and actually read it. (summoning daedric lords forexample in certain shrines with no info lying around forexample)

Its simplified thats a fact. If its simplified in a good or bad way is up to the player.. but its simplified like hell.

So stop flaming and grow up..

do feel thaty they seem to target the wrong audience, when you look at the rating and what it for you get the ipresion of a rather adault game, but when you play it their are things that i just don't see. (like sixual content or even coments all i have found in that regard is the lusty argonian maid vol. 1 & 2 witch is so burried in inuendo (not necesarily a bad thing) that most youngsters wouldn't get it)

i wount mention the lack of atribute since most seem to have hated them (i felt it aloud you to make a more unique cherecter) instead of being able to make your starting cherecter unique you are stuck wtih every Argonian, Nord, Kahjiit, ect.... being exactly the same as every other Argonian , Nord, Kahjiit, and so on. there is no ability to tweek your stats or skills to give your cherecter personality. the only thing you can do to diferentiate one cherecter of a given race from another of that race at starting is purely astetic, or gender based. it takes any sence of your cherecter having a pst out of the equation, like he/ she popped into skyrim fully formed no past no nothing.


they also stripped yet another weapon from the game. goodby short sword or longesword, now we just have 1 handed or two handed sword , axe, or blunt (mace, or war hammer) i thought they couldn't strip anything else away from melee combat than they did with OB but i was proven wrong, oh ad just like OB only one ranged combat option that isn't some kind of magic..

yes the interface is smother and there are a few improvements (duel wield, lvling without having to sleep.) but this doesn't exuse the fact that its sinking closer and closer to a standard action game and losing its RPG roots.

spellmaking needed some tweeking don't get me wrong but to completely strip it away takes yet another bit of costomization to your cherecter out of the equation as well as giving you fewer options for spells in general.

say i wont one strong spell that will drain all my magica but shuld at least do some seious damage to my oponent. can't do it. you only have like 3 offencive spells for each energy type. it just takes any form of intelegent thinking on your arsenal from the game. (same with melee and ranged.)

don't mind the quest markers and such but the cookie cutter starting cherecter that takes any form of idivduality (other than looks) almost made me put it down right there.

game is great don't get me wrong but there are some glaring issues that can't be fixed with a simple patch.

All this says to me is one play-style was sacrificed for another. Whats-more, Bethesda isn't particularly adept at creating adrenaline filled action games, so we're left with a simplified mediocre action game. It certainly is leaps and bounds over Oblivion, but certainly not DMC or GoW. This is the games greatest flaw and the only one worth whining about. They attempted to simplify any aspect of the game's character customization and combat that would interrupt murder and skull bashing, whilst forgetting to add all those little nuances that make killing legions of bad guys fun. The number crunching in previous games allowed for interesting character builds, play-styles and fun replays.

Still, I feel that Bethesda made a lot of compromises with Skyrim. We're not forced into fast travel (thanks to the carriage), the combat difficulty of Morrowind made a comeback in this game, and the world is as visually interesting as Morrowind was. That was one of the greatest contradictions of Oblivion, despite its vast world and its sandbox environment; the instability of the game and the computer generated design of the world practically forced you into the cities. It was dull and uninteresting. Skyrim has brought back that detailed and exotic world that encourages exploration. So yeah, I'm not nerd raging over how simple Skyrim is or isn't, the developers did a fine job in creating a middle ground.

About combatyou don t get it right ?
That wasn t the point, OK i get it, you don t know what a trade off is. If such i don t think there s any point to continue this.
About darkness, i just will answear 2 worlds but althought you may understand what each is about i don t expect you to get the point when both interact: Immersion; plausibility.

Thanks for the awnser. Unlike Bukee you seem to have constructive critisism.

Im not really a Morrowind purist i just prefer it over Oblivion yet i love played a modded OB.

Yet it bothers me that i planned to make 1 char and play that one concept hard (pure mage currently lvl 42) and i had no idea enchanting was as overpowered as it is. I couldnt avoid it as i had no clue it would just render my mage a god and this game is about using the perks you choose to level.

I agree that attributes where bothersome but in the end it felt rewarding to actually play the type of character and getting those stats that affected you.

Not saying that Skyrim is a bad game i just feel that there are so many things in this game that has been too simplified for being a game of the TES franchise.

Spellmaking here wouldn't work, except, a literlay "bigger fireball" sense, that you can just tweak already existing spells to be more powerful, which seems entirely pointless.


And reading does not take more intelligence.
There's no difference between reading about something or hearing about it from somebody.

Same with the quest markers, it hardly makes any difference if you are told the path step-by-step than showing it on your map. And if the directions are not clear enough, they're useless and the only way to find the target is sheer luck, which again takes no intelligence at all.


Nothing was any harder in Morrowind. You got stronger as you leveled there, you could easily get unfairly strong, you could abuse bugs, AI, anything to get past most problems. Only difference is, there's no voice acting, so you read not hear most information, that makes you smarter, I guess...

First off, use spell check please, reading that was painful.

"instead of being able to make your starting cherecter unique you are stuck wtih every Argonian, Nord, Kahjiit, ect.... being exactly the same as every other Argonian , Nord, Kahjiit, and so on. "

You mean like every TES game where your starting stats are ALWAYS the same? the race choice still effects skills like in the other games so Nords are not the same as Orcs ECT.

"there is no ability to tweek your stats or skills to give your cherecter personality."

Now that just isn't true, The perks do this BETTER then the other games, making you actually different and not just higher number in some spreadsheet.

"it takes any sence of your cherecter having a pst out of the equation, like he/ she popped into skyrim fully formed no past no nothing."

Because a little part of a window that says "Knight" really added so much, nobody ever commented on it, nobody ever knows you before the game, this is no different.

"they also stripped yet another weapon from the game. goodby short sword or longesword, now we just have 1 handed or two handed sword , axe, or blunt (mace, or war hammer) i thought they couldn't strip anything else away from melee combat than they did with OB but i was proven wrong, oh ad just like OB only one ranged combat option that isn't some kind of magic.."

I can't speak for everyone, but there was NEVER a tine when I used shortswords. I liked the novelty of Morrowind's thrown weapons but they were almost useless in a real fight, while crossbows were so much better then everything I can see why not having them would be a good idea, just like shortswords to longswords they would have made normal bows redundant and underpowered.

"but this doesn't exuse the fact that its sinking closer and closer to a standard action game and losing its RPG roots."

Play Fable 3, they tell me this is a standard action game.

I agree with spellmaking, that really should have been in the game but even so i never felt like i was making my own spells, merely putting my own spin on a pre-existing one. Lack of some spells is disappointing but with the new detailed system making spells is not nearly as easy.

The rate of degradation was unrealistic, but the system could have been tweaked instead of removed. overall, not a big deal either way, but it is a simplification.

The perk trees are fun, earlier games did have perks, just less per skill, and not selectable. This one is an improvement.

Attributes, well your paragraph is nonsense on this one. Health and magicka are different, and existed alongside other attributes in earlier games. Saying willpower was turned into an enchantment is slightly more accurate, since you can enchant non-robe armors with it just fine. Speed was not broken (there was a broken speed-related item in morrowind, perhaps you are thinking of that), but a way that a player could lower tedium of slower speeds in return for not raising other more combat useful skills. Luck was a nice 'generalist' stat. Attributes were removed to simplify the game, they arent 'still there'. Some of the things that they affected are still there as they are nessasay for the game. Their removal was done well, and the loss is only lightly felt, but pretending it wasnt done specifically to simplify the game is just denial.

The loss of spellmaking is probably the bigest loss, and spellcasting overall feels much more simplistic than previous games. There are still options, just a lot less than before. Being able to build your own spells allowed you to customize your attacks for your skill levels. Combined with the overall issues with destruction damage scaling, it hurts even more for someone trying to be a pure mage. Yes a mage can get by, so long as they arent trying to use the destruction tree in any significant way. The concept that it was done to prevent abuse is silly when you look at what they did with the smithing and enchanting systems, preventing abusive crafting options was clearly not a concern for them. On top of losing the ability to customize your spells, many good spells were lost along the way. These changes to the magic system all have a definite 'make mage a more streamlined simplified playstyle' feel to them.

Removal of classes was a poor change as well, tho not really a simplification per say. Changing the way skills choose level ups is fine, at the end of the day it winds up about the same, but choosing a class allowed a character to feel a little more connection with their character right off the bat. You arent just 'Nord 476' But rather a nordic shaman or a nordic mercenary or whatever. It does dumb down the feel of character creation a bit. As for changing up what skills you are using midgame, I wonder if you actually played previous games in the series if you think that was going to screw you. Honestly, skyrims perk system is much more likely to leave a character stuck in an unfixable bad place build wise than any previous game.



Definately lots of new content. I dont know that I would say more than previous games with addons, but at probably more than those games before addons.
Fast travel is fine, tho it would be nice if they actually explained non-quest marker directions in quest details if you dont want to use them, that was somewhat of a dropped ball.
New books are there, tho I get more of a 'reuse all the old books with a couple new ones' feel more than anything.

Voice acting and storyline are fun, tho the faction storylines I have worked with so far feel faster than the ones in previous games. The mage guild is a lot shorter, with only one guild location for example.

Radient AI is great, and definitively one of the best features of the new game, but the number of non-random quests feels lower, and the random generated quests lack the personality of fully featured ones, making questing in general feel light and impersonal in a lot of cases. Of course leveling is so rapid it hardly matters, do what you want, you'll level just fine.

Dragons are tons of fun, tho saying 'impossible' in previous games is kind of silly, you should see some of the amazing things modders have done with previous games.

All that said, the game is very well done, enjoyable to play, and while I am sure I will enjoy the spellmaking additions once they decide to release the toolkit, I am enjoying the game regardless. But pretending that the game wasnt streamlined for a newer generation of gamers is just silly. Its clear from the first time you open the console-centric menu.

The problem with this argument is that both sides are wrong. Yes the game is simplified, no matter how much some pretend it wasnt. But no, that doesnt mean it svcks, there were a lot of good new additions in different areas that make this game fun in its own merits.

Does anyone catch the irony in this thread?

There are people complaining that the game has been "dumbed down" because information is not specifically displayed on the screen.

For example: "Why did they take away the classes? Now my Nord is just like every other Nord! This is so dumbed down!" This is dumbing down? My Nord is a former mercenary who returned to Skyrim during the Stormcloak Rebellion to help free his country. You guys see that? I didn't need a class that said "mercenary" to know who my Nord is. Why? Because I used my brain.

Someday, somebody is going to have to explain to me how letting you figure things out for yourself is "dumbing it down".

You are correct, it is deliberate, and it's not the end of the dialogue. Personally, I find it much more interesting that we may have more than one encounter before making any real assessments. With some complaints of simplicity in the dialogue, it seems they are missing the complexity. If that makes any sense. (this is not aimed at Nere-I just didn't quote the person you were responding to) I think some people want things really spelled out from the get go, if it's not then it's because the game is simple. I believe this due to the large amount of folks who would of liked to see story lines along the lines of NV. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the game, but it was not complex. The story line was very straight forward. You can be a good guy or a bad guy-but it's very black and white imo. I did not put as many hours into it as I have Elder scrolls. I enjoyed their story, got my achievements-all pretty straight forward.

I enjoy elder scrolls because it leaves more interpretative inquires of my character and of the world. My character is grey-I may do things to help others and I may be more self serving, Skyrim is a tough place to survive. I love the lore involved as well-also leaves a lot to discuss and can be seen in different ways as well. There is not many straight answers, which feels more authentic to me. Even characters in the game see events that transpired differently.

As far as the dragonborns dialogue-I'm a fan of less is better. I might even go as far as to say he/she is too chatty in skyrim. I like to form the personality and the more he/she says the better chance of it interfering how I would like him/her to react.

As far as old dungeon games-I'm so happy we seem past the point of checking each of the 500 rocks to see if it's a secret passage. It was cool at the time those were made, but I would hope we are past that now. The UI-while I don't think it's perfect and I would be happy if they formed it around my own liking, it's a huge improvement over Morrowind. (not counting those having bugged a bugged ui)

Is the game perfect? No, not possible to make everyone happy. If someone can point out that game that makes all people happy -I so want to play that though.

In my opinion:
Quest markers makes it too obvious and easy and kills a big deal of exploration. I would much rather just get the location on the map. Step by step instructions with markers just feels like someones holding ones hand.
Spellmaking here wouldnt work due to them removing 70% of the spelltypes and with proper balancing i think it would. Oblivions spellcreating was strong but not nearly as strong as Blacksmithing, Enchanting and Alchemy for melee's. Even when not using the alchemy.

don't be silly.....now run along and finish your homework



^this^
i think the balance is perfect in skyrim

Glad to hear that my suspicions were right.

I love most of the quests I've run into so far. They've been incredibly fun and well-told to boot.

first off my PC is simple and cheap so no spellcheck function just a simple word pad program. now with that out of the way.

you seem to have missinterpreted my coment on stats. i never sied anything about classes. (sort of glad their gone actualy) what i meant was yes you may call your Nord a Merc or a mage or whatever but no mater what you call him/ her its still has the exact same stats. what i meant was being able to shift a few stats here and there to say ok this guy is strong but not to smart, or weak and inteligent. to be able to "Tage" a skill or two to say he/ or she has some previous experience in it even at the cost of those pionts in another skill. this is what i meant. creating some cherecter stats that fit with the backstory you come up with.

and in every TES game i've played you could put a few pionts here and there to change up you attributes.

actualy my assasin in Morrowind used shortswords, i'm not a power gamer who goes for using a greatsword whith a stealth buil just because it did more damage. no i used a short sword because it felt right for the cherecter. the cherecter i had the most hours in used a spear and a crossbow, not because of any power or bug usage but because it felt right and i could. crossbows were atrotiously slow to load but made up for it with some extra damage. don't have that option anymore.

played Fable 3 and dind't like it.


like i sied i like the game and i am enjoying it but they made some very questionable desition. and i wish folks would stop blaming it on console gaming i'v seen an even greater trend towards simplistic and boring games in PC realm than i have for consol. its not the consol makers or players but the general trend in gaming as a whole.