If you learn anything from posts by Bethesda or GI guys, let us know.

Twitters:
Bethesda's Elder Scrolls Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/elderscrolls
Pete Hines from Bethesda: http://twitter.com/DCDeacon
Andy from Game Informer: http://twitter.com/GI_AndyMc
Andrew from Game Informer: http://twitter.com/Andrew_Reiner


There's a lot of really good tidbits on Pete Hines' twitter. Let's keep an eye on it. Someone feel free to type up the details this confirms/hints for/hints against.

Pete's Twitter:

@DCDeacon I have a question.In Oblivion level scaling made adventuring not dangerous. In Skyrim, will some region be too dangerous at first?
@KenjiSenpai Some are certainly tougher than others. Some you may have to leave and come back later when tougher.

@DCDeacon Will the skins be changed of the Argonians again, Like from Morrowind to Oblivion was a big change.
@Frequentie If you had to guess, what would you say, given our track record?

@DCDeacon So any word on when we're gonna be able to hear the full Skyrim theme? cause i can't wait
@TheUpperfist Good question. Shouldn't be too long before you get a larger sample in a video or something. Will let you know.

@DCDeacon Pete please answer, I beg you. Will fasttravel be optional and will there be a "hardcoe mode". Please dude answer!
@MMAMIKEYMIKE When has fast travel ever not been optional? Don't want to use it, don't. Can't answer your 2nd question.

@DCDeacon what kind of speakers does your sound director Mark Lampert use?
@SamuelBacklin I dunno. Good ones? He's got an amazing ear for sound and music.

@DCDeacon Fallout 3 - Annoying Man, Oblivion - Adoring Fan. What's next? Perhaps a Pedophile Priest?
@AGiesing I put nothing past our designers. I don't know what they have in store for us...yet.

@DCDeacon In your honest opinion, do you think that Skyrim will look better than the E3 2005 Press demo of Oblivion [self-shadowing, etc.]?
@MattMcCarty007 I don't think it's close. Skyrim has so many improvements, beyond graphics. e.g., our dungeons are amazing and so detailed

@DCDeacon Hey Mr. Hines, can you say if we'll be able to see out of windows in Skyrim or not? From interiors that is.
@MasterSamson88 Pretty much the same as always. Insides are insides. Outsides are outsides.

@DCDeacon The GI screens suggest an over the shoulder 3rd person camera for Skyrim! Is this the case? Would be awesome!!!
@charlesadamst Yup, 3rd person view def looks improved.

@DCDeacon Um, and the dragon perched upon a pillar on page 47, is that art, or a screenshot?
@MrTissueBox Straight screenshot. No tricks.

@DCDeacon The mountains on GI's page 48 - screen or artwork? Can't tell but looks awesome either way.
@faulgor Screenshot. Pretty great huh?

@DCDeacon Will there be a Construction Set or something like that for Skyrim?
@Scharesoft Haven't announced anything yet on a const set.

@DCDeacon hi,wahts up? Skyrim Soundtrack: Did you already heard the whole Soundtrack? is it as good as the oblivion Soundtrack?
@Bearfist I think the soundtrack is awesome. Far better than oblivion, IMHO.

@DCDeacon Have any of FO:NV's aspects such as RPG mechanics have any influence on development of ESV?
@MrTissueBox Any game you make always has an impact on future games you make. But as I have said, this I TES and so we do what works for TES

@DCDeacon Thanks! 1 more clarify if you will: Does 85 spell effects include all separate numerous summon spells or just "summon" in general?
@MrTissueBox Dunno. I haven't examined the list to see what it contains. Plus, it could change between now and release. Don't stress.

@DCDeacon Clarify in mag: Do dialogue choices auto appear when near an NPC, or just an option to enter into the dialogue choices when near?
@MrTissueBox Only when you enter dialog.

@DCDeacon Pete, please answer this. In GI article, it mentions 85 spells, isn't 85 effects? I still want to create a fireball with 100 area!
@Silvade14 Right, more like effects.

@DCDeacon Oh, could you also tell me, will there still be hand-crafted side-quests, or are they all this radiant story random quests?
@Silvade14 If you think Radiant Story is "randomly generated quests" then you misunderstand what it is.

@DCDeacon I understand it, but that's not exactly what I asked. I asked, will Skyrim have side quests? Or just factions and MQ quests?
@Silvade14 Yes, of course we'll have side quests. Lots

@DCDeacon Hi Mr Hines, can you confirm, that we will be able to customize height and muscles of our characters body in TES V?
@rpgRAINER We haven't gone into detail on that yet.

@DCDeacon Fallout like armor system w/ 2 slots, or Oblivion like w/ 5 slots or even better, Morrowind like slots in Skyrim?
@Silvade14 multiple. You're officially done with questions for a week.

@DCDeacon Will the armour system work like it did in Oblivion/MW where there are multiple slots for our apparel or like Fallout's 2 items?
@Rhysuzaki Multiple. We aren't making a Fallout game. We are making an ES game. What works in one doesn't necessarily work in the other.

@DCDeacon Any chance we will see another 5 chapter preview with todd like we did Oblivion? Would be bloody awesome if we did.
@MMAMIKEYMIKE There's always a chance. . We have plenty of video content planned.

@DCDeacon Could you perhaps give us a time frame for when we will se some gameplay?
@SatanicM3chanic First one will be out in a month with an "r" in it. Does that help?

@DCDeacon Did you guys realy remove abilities such as strength intelligence and luck from the game?
@KenjiSenpai Make sure you keep asking over and over again till you get an answer. That usually works pretty well with me.

@DCDeacon Seriously, I'm sorry i was assuming my questions were sinking in less than 5 minutes since you probably get like 1000 tweets/hours
@KenjiSenpai I got lots. But it gets old saying "can't answer that right now" over and over again. So if I don't answer, I'm not ignoring u.

should be next update on monday america time. reiners twitter

You should provide links to their Twitter's (Reiner's, Bethesda, etc.).

Good idea.

Peeps, just bookmark the twitter link. click it every time you go online, or follow the tweet.

chirp chirp

well i posted these on another topic but oh well.
i asked pete hines when we could hear the full skyrim theme, and he said "Good question. Shouldn't be too long before you get a larger sample in a video or something. Will let you know."
i also saw that some asked him "Will the skins be changed of the Argonians again, like from Morrowind to Oblivion was a big change" and he replied "If you had to guess, what would you say, give our track record?"

haha I hope for blue frost argonians with furry, feathery frills that they adapted so they could survive the cold. lolz.

Whoever is MMAMikeyMike, you are borderline psycho-stalking Pete Hines. Let the poor man relax on his vacation.

He's in better graces than soMe people! This was Pete's best response:

@KenjiSenpai Make sure you keep asking over and over again till you get an answer. That usually works pretty well with me.

Anyone know of other Twitters? Does Miller have one?

Hahaha maybe it's an elaborate strategy to get Pete to feel bad for him and respond to all his questions? He just got a REALLY good answer to a question we hadn't got a clear answer to until now:

@DCDeacon I have a question.In Oblivion level scaling made adventuring not dangerous. In Skyrim, will some region be too dangerous at first?

@KenjiSenpai Some are certainly tougher than others. Some you may have to leave and come back later when tougher.

I know they'd mentioned Fallout 3 scaling, but we didn't get any details about it. Good news!

There's a lot of really good tidbits on Pete Hines' twitter. Let's keep an eye on it.

Someone feel free to type up the details this confirms/hints for/hints against.

EDIT: moved the list up to the top.

Please someone ask them if like "Syltstriders" in Morrowind, there would be critters/monsters that we could hear their call from long distant, maybe echoed multiple times in the mountain sides.

This might be reading too much into it, but Pete's choice of words for his answer regarding the hardcoe mode implies he knows the answer to the question but can't disclose it.

This suggests to me that either (a) the devs are considering including a hardcoe/survival mode, or (b ) they will definitely include one but they will release the information at a later date with screenshots, dedicated press, etc.

Of course, it's also possible that they have already decided that there will be nothing of the sort and simply don't want to discuss it, but there were other questions that he responded to by saying I don't know, or simply no.

Pete's slightly more hopeful responses to questions about the construction set and a hardcoe mode were more along the lines of "hasn't been announced yet" or "I can't answer that question"

I agree. Pretty sure he'd just say no if the answer was no. That's the best way to deal with us crazy fans, so we don't hype something that doesn't exist.

Some of the things he has said no comment for have been good guesses after stuff was revealed. Generally a no comment has to mean they are at least considering it, if not that they just can't reveal it yet.

When it comes to a Survival mode I think they are probably still working on these features, figuring out which can be implemented, and deciding whether they will be in a separate mode/difficulty level or included in the vanilla game. That's probably what's going on. I know we've come up with lots of awesome suggestions for them on how all this can be implemented, and maybe they are still figuring out what to do. I know the system from NV wasn't quite polished yet, and not all of it would work in Skyrim.

But I think there's definitely something to be said about the cooking, mining, and woodcutting skills tying into alchemy and enchanting, resulting in a system where you need to use ingredients and skills to build up resources to support your adventuring. Like, needing to cut wood to build a fire and cook, needing to cook your food or you get diseases, needing plants to make cures for diseases, needing to mine for ore to forge weapons or armor, etc.

So are we able to get jobs in the game and work for a living?

That would be amazing, and much more realistic. Rather than having to do some life threatening quest for like 50 gold, you could have a steady job, or maybe you can sell wood you chop, or sell metal that you mine. That seems pretty likely to me.

This is such a great topic--it totally deserves a sticky

I know there are a bunch to add to this topic today, but I wanted to add my question to Pete and his answer. I asked "18 seconds into the GI Sounds of Skyrim vid 1, is that a screen shot of Skyrim we see a part of? It would be spectacular!"

I thought I'd kinda get made fun of, 'cause that shot looked too good, and a few here on these forums commented that it probably couldn't be a screen shot and left it at that. But I had to ask!

Anyway, his response was: "I think it's a screen he made his wallpaper. Pretty sure it's the mega wide mountain screenshot that's in the current issue."

Not having the Game Informer issue in front of me I can't be sure, but I don't remember trees in that mountain scene on page 48, so I don't think it is. Either way, if he thinks that's a screen shot... zomg.

https://twitter.com/#!/elderscrolls5 has a great list of bethesda developers.

:whistling:

There wasn't, so that means it was another screen and that means the wide open environment is gorgeous.

Is it possible that Pete was talking about a different mountain screen shot than the one on pg. 48?

I've only flipped through a subscriber's copy of GI and maybe stumbled across some scans (guilty), but my local Gamestops still didn't have the Feb. issue in over the weekend so I haven't been able to buy a copy yet.

Maybe they are the same. In the video you only see the lower part... maybe the mountain on page 48 is in the upper part of the screenshot..

Nice piece of information you get here! Thanks a lot man! ;D

but PLEASE, someone ask them about the Clothes! Is the clothes and robes animations dynamic (like havok cloth), or just like oblivion?

It would be awesome the clothes interacting with the wind, and player′s movements...

I think that makes the most sense. The pictures in the GI weren't full screens. The makarth screen certainly demonstrates it because we only get about 2/3rds of the actual screen within the article.

Thanks! If anyone knows how to get it made into a sticky, feel free to try!

Also, if anyone wants to update when they see something on Pete's Twitter I'll add to that list.

Sorry to triple post, but...

HUGE KEY UPDATE: Pete and Andrew are GETTING DINNER! THEY ARE TALKING! THEY ARE GETTING THREADS WRITTEN about them. THEY'RE SUPERSTARS!

@DCDeacon If we keep talking we'll probably get a thread started about us.
@Andrew_Reiner I'm coming up your way next month. Where was the nice place we went to dinner where we talked about doing Skyrim?

Thoughts? Concerns? Are they friends, or are they just pretending to be friends? Where do you think they'll go to dinner?

EDIT: Apparently I am behind the Twitter curve and missed the party