I read all of the reviews. And this one pointed out the dilemma, and there was one other that put it much more bluntly. All o fthe other ones gave little or no detail at all. things like, "We took them both out," or, "they were dead before they knew it." not actual quotes, but not far from the truth.

That explains it better, G4 must've put in the wrong word or something.

Here is the second one that I read that said they reacted. http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/elderscrollsvskyrim/news.html?sid=6308882&mode=previews&page=2

"However, we would soon see it again before long. Inside the temple, we encountered two of the thieves who had robbed the Riverwood shopkeeper. We weren't sure what they were discussing, but it mattered little after we blew one of them away with a headshot from our longbow. The second jumped to her feet and began frantically searching for our hiding spot in the shadows. Stealth in Skyrim has been tweaked from previous games so that the transition from the alert state of enemies (where they are looking for you) to their danger state (where they are attacking you) is more gradual depending on what you do. For instance, if our character were to run out in the open and attack, the transition would occur very quickly. However, if we remained hidden, it would be a much slower process. The transition itself was represented by an opening-eye icon in the center of the screen. "

Also, there was an earlier situation described in the article: "Compared to previous Elder Scrolls games, combat in Skyrim seemed much more involved. Our Nordic-looking hero was constantly sidestepping around his opponent to better position his shield against oncoming attacks or to find a way around the enemy's own defenses."

"Once the first bandit was dispatched, a second appeared to avenge his friend's death. "

So that's two against one. I haven't read every single article so I don't have any more to corroborate but I'm fine with two articles saying similar things.

Edit: gah, ninja'd by Redguard king.

Nope I interpreted it as such too.

What about some skill check for the PC. and a failure means some sort of cry [from the target] that would put others nearby on the alert?
(And what about automatic failure for those times when the target is in conversation?)

Here is a source from VG24/7, although I don't believe it's very accurate:

"We head in to the temple and Dovahkiin switches to crouch mode for stealth. Inside we see a female character, and Dovahkiin’s creeping skills are shown up as rubbish.

“I know I heard someone,” says the NPC as she spots him and takes him on. Big mistake: she’s immediately loses. Afterwards, Howard loots a nearby chest, but insists the dungeon crawler bits won’t just be based on combat."

I'll continue going through articles, as I know one of them actually explained this part in detail.

This statement from gamesradar seems to show an improvement in the AI:

"Inside the temple, we find two thieves standing near a fire. Todd crouches hidden in the darkness and listens to them discuss how their comrade has taken the claw deeper into the temple. He then silences one thief with a single bow shot. The second thief takes notice, but by the time she’s picked us out of the shadows, she too has an arrow in her throat."

stuff.co.nz implies that the NPC was aware of the noise of the arrow being shot:

"Upon encountering enemies, there's a gradual progression between total invisibility, and being completely sprung - shooting a couple of errant bandits in an underground cave results in one crying "I'm sure I heard someone!" before receiving an arrow through the head."

Ultimately, there is just a lack of detail. What we do know is that the AI becomes aware of the arrow being used. The question is did the NPC say the statement before or after the companion was killed? Even then, the NPC clearly goes into an awareness/search mode to search for where the arrow came from.

Obviously I'm not the one with text comprehension problems. Like everyone else I'm hoping this won't be a problem. One of the journalists thought he noticed a problem, and you're stating definitively that it didn't happen. It's not my fault someone said there might be a problem with the most anticipated game of your life, so stop acting like it.

Do you realize the game is still in alpha?

It's pretty amazing how you've gathered all of this from one line from a reviewer of a prototype demo 6 months before release.
Your insight is outstanding.

It seems to be the case with all the articles that the second bandit found the player almost immediately. I don't think there's anything wrong with the system, I think there just needs to be a more alarmed response than "I know I heard someone," when another NPC dies. That's a fine reply if you bump a cup off of a barrel, but when someone dies, they should scream or something. Some kind of alarmed reply. Like when you took out one guy in a group in Arkham Asylum.

If this game were still in alpha, I guarantee you we wouldn't see any screen shots or have a game play trailer. This game is definitely in beta. BGS is just actually filling the game with content now.

Still... In Fallout 3, you could incense the entire town of Megaton, then pop a stealth boy (for some reason its edible), and immediately the town flips mood on a dime, and its like you were never there. They chat away about raiders and gossip (while you are standing in their midst).

I blame 100% chameleon for this immersion-breaking, game-breaking fiasco!

"To arms... to arms"

February 12th
"it's pre-alpha and far from done"
http://twitter.com/#!/DCDeacon/status/36455029074432000

You know the games not finished and it comes out in 6 months right?

The game IS still in alpha, more than likely. And if it's not, this demo certainly isn't beta. Probably a pre beta prototype build. Not even the entire game. Just one little part, which is what the entire demo is.
They are not done, remotely. 6 months is a long time. Heck, 6 months is enough time to make 3 Fable games. They've got a hold on this. :goodjob:

I hope the Dialoge in combat from the enemies is more interesting then what they said in Oblivion.

"Jump on my Sword while you can"

"You move like a Pregant Cow"

"You know I've been holding back"

"Why won't you die"

"You humans are all the same, weak and worthless"

"By Ysmir's Beard we have a live one"

"To arms to arms"

Yeah they definitely need to upgrade the enemy combat dialoge lines for Skyrim and I have a good feeling that they will.

Wow then anything we see of this game should be taken with a grain of salt. Heck, we may as well not even bother with this topic, as many variables in the game are still subject to change.

Clearly though, the demo itself was old as BGS showed this exact same demo to Game Informer back in December.

..why would you think otherwise in the first place? There are SIX MONTHS left until the game comes out. That's a very long time to get things done.

Well I wasn't under the impression this game was still in alpha...

At this point, I thought BGS was only adding in content to fill up the world (factions, mounts, transformations, etc). Clearly though, BGS has a lot more on their plate than I thought. This also means a lot of what we already have seen will likely improve in the coming months (visuals, combat, radiant AI, etc).

Yeah, there's actually been a lot of things they have said they are not sure about how it was going to end up. Some examples I recall include

-Horses/mounts
-Dagger sneak kills
-Arrow availability and damage
-Companions
-Dragons
-Final number of dungeons (has been said they are still working on and adding more)
-Perks

That's just off the top of my head from what we've heard.

Visuals have been said to be top notch already.

Yep. I knew a lot of stuff was still in flux, but I guess I just didn't realize where BGS actually was in development. It looks like these next few months will be extremely busy indeed.

Perhaps. The only reason why I say the game may improve visually is because a lot of games improve visually from alpha to beta. I'm not expecting the graphics to become exponentially improved, but I'm sure the scenery will be better polished.

Two sources state to the contrary to "goofy AI", so I would think it's basically /thread.

PLZ no! Not the sliding models like in Oblivion and Fallout 3