So I'm enjoying Skyrim somewhat but the thing I was most looking forward to was the promised living world. NPCs were supposed to dazzle the player with awareness and the player's actions were supposed to affect their relationships with the world and change the world *bla bla bla bla bla insert marketing crap here* This was of course hyped and I expected that, but I did expect 'some' improvement over Oblivion. I'm not really seeing that.

Now to fully make my point I need to reference another Bethesda published title (developed, of course, by Obsidian). Fallout: New Vegas, regardless of one's like or dislike for the series or its setting, had DEPTH and a feeling of interconnection and weight to player speech, choices, affiliations, and actions. Even without the over-hyped radiant AI BS almost every character in that game had lines and lines of dialogue. They each had a story. The quests they were a part of felt like they mattered to you as a player. You cared about them.

Skyrim feels sort of like one of those Walt Disney World rides with the animatronic people who have one or two poses and a couple of lines of speech. They feel like cardboard cutout people. They evoke no emotion whatsoever in the player. The quests they send you to complete are very linear, objective-based affairs that generally land you in a cave somewhere. It's getting a bit boring, actually. I'm doing the same thing over and over and over without much feedback from the story elements of the world.

I hate to say it and sound like a total jerk but I have sophisticated tastes in books, movies and yes, video games. I choose to play an RPG because I want to ROLEPLAY. I want to immerse myself in the stories, culture and events of the world I'm playing in by making CHOICES that ACTUALLY AFFECT THE GAMEWORLD.

I'm about 40 hours in and I've dabbled in several of the questlines but everything feels very cookie-cutter and repetitive. I feel like Skyrim is, while somewhat okay to look at and well-designed geographically as a gameworld, a step backward for the RPG genre. It's kind of like playing a linear Bioware action-RPG except I am allowed to complete the quests in any order and I'm allowed to walk in any direction. Also, there are woodland animals...

I'm not saying that I'm not having some fun and I'm certainly not saying that the game isn't above average in its intent or its design. I am saying, though, that the character development, the linear quest design, and the lack of CHOICE for the player in dialogue and in actions that relate to the characters is very shallow, linear, and repetitive and I think it takes a lot away from what would otherwise be one of the best games I've ever played.

I hope that the simplistic writing, the linear and option-less dialogue, and the cardboard quality of the NPCs in this world isn't indicative of what's coming in future Bethesda RPGs. I also hope that next time the marketing and promotion doesn't exceed what the game will actually deliver. There are not seemingly alive NPCs in this world. They are not “radiant.” They're still scripted and predictable (unless they're bugging out in which case they can become interesting).

I'm sorry to come on here busting on it so soon. I have a lot of good things to say about the game too, but so much praise is coming toward it from the industry that I felt the need to talk about this as a fan with a serious concern about the future of the RPG genre and future Bethesda titles. People buy Bioware if they want action-RPG. People used to buy Bethesda if they wanted some depth.

Please stop promising more and deeper features while trimming the game down to little more than Grand Theft Auto in a fantasy realm. You're sacrificing a quality franchise for more box sales and its a BAD move in the long run if you still care about being the premium provider for open-world RPGs.

Don't feel bad because of this feedback, please. Your company makes some of my favorite games. I just want it to stay that way by providing some constructive criticism for you.

Thanks

EDIT: for typo

I would just mark it up as a difference in taste. I like New Vegas, but feel that I'll get much more play time out of Skyrim.

If you realised how difficult it is to do this stuff, you would appreciate Skyrim more I think. I have to ask, seeing as you mentioned you have sophisticated tastes in games, what an example of a good RPG game is.

Maybe you just see it differently than I do, but most characters have a story to tell. If you talk to them they have things to say about their lives. Not only that, but they react to their environments. I made some ebony armor worth 3500 gold and dropped it on the floor because I was too heavy to run. A guy goes over to it and says "Do you want this? If not can I have it?" I can't talk to him fast enough and he takes it. I later catch up to him and I tell him not to take it but he obviously wasn't giving it up.

People and guards say things about the quests I have done, about the items I have, about my skills etc.

I met some people in a daedric prince quest, who would not want others knowing they were involved, and I could talk to them about that quest.

40 hours isn't really a whole lot of time for this game, less than 1/3 of the projected time to complete it.

BTW I don't see any argument for how the game is linear. You actually say it's not.

Also, there are certain repeatable quests, which you mentioned. These are not story driven quests, just simple tasks for your guild. The real meat of the guilds are the story based quests, not the fetch/kill quests.

This. I did enjoy New Vegas but I've already put twice the time into Skyrim and I'm just starting.

Yeah talking to people in fallout was much more interesting. I find myself skipping through a lot of the conversation in skyrim. Oh well everything else is perfect.

Nice Alduin's Wall (of Text).
tl;dr but I get the gist of it.
I'm sure you have valid complaints, but I seem to recall many and more posts of this strain in the days and months after Oblivion's release.
I feel like companies should not promise anything before a game is released...that way expectations built up from hype are not dashed. Personally, after I saw the teaser for Skyrim a year ago, I tried not to delve into the specifics too much. So far, I have not been disappointed. The elder scrolls is not a pure RPG anymore, so I don't expect my choices to affect every character anymore...

New Vegas story and narrative is definitely stronger than any Bethesda games, as it is Obsidian's only strength. However New Vegas actual open world is just no where near as amazing as Captial Wasteland, and definitely not Skyrim. However I do understand the whole choices argument. I love games with decisions that have a huge impact on many things. Unfortunately this is just never Bethsda's strength nor focus. Other than that, pretty much everything else is superb.

Ok, OP, I COMPLETELY disagree with you, and I think Skyrim is amazing, so I have to ask: what is a GOOD example of a non linear RPG (besides Morrowind).

Well Obviously none because Morrowind was the greatest game ever made forever (on the PC of course, everything else just svcks) :spotted owl:

I actually like Skyrim better.

If they remade Morrowind with voice acting (WITH THE FRIGGIN' ORIGINAL DUNMER VOICE. -__-). Better graphics. And took out the diceroll combat..

200 million copies would be sold in a day.

I agree with the OP.

There are no real decisions in the this game which like he said have 'Weight'. This is further illustrated by the ability to join all guilds and partake in any actions/questions leading to further identity crisis's. In the Fallouts you could considerably change the world with your actions and the world felt more alive, ironically it felt more alive in a dead wasteland than Skyrim does in very much a live game world.

However, I still LOVE Skyrim and they have done an amazing job with this world, it is truly wonderful the effort made in this game and the polish! even though it really is a sophisticated MMO... but I still like the Fallout series more, but other than Mass Effect 2 the Fallouts are my favorite games of all time and therefore Skyrim would have a lot to live up to.

Having more choices in a lot of quests would be nice.

There aren't any choices for Daedric quests at all other than doing it or not doing it.

I mean, I don't expect like 500 different paths I could take for every single quest; but having just 2 choices would be better than 0 choices.

That said, I've always felt that the big choices in the ES series weren't in the story lines; they were in how you played the game. They are a lot more action oriented, while still providing good story and excellent lore. So having multitudes of play style choices is what it excels at.

LOL I was making fun of Morrowind & PC elitists. I think Skyrim is their best yet.

You don't have a choice when dealing with the Daedric Princes because they are next to gods and do as they will and get what they want. bliviongate:

Well.. i don't know about the lack of dialog options, they could surely add more but there is no npc AI and lines of dialog should have been better scripted...

Being master at a guild - getting lines like "don't cause trouble here newbie"
Being savior of a town, same npc saying "we are forever in your debt"/"i know your kind"/"get away from me sneaky thief"/"it's a fine day with you around"
Beating a guy to death a second later - "hello friend!"

radiant npcs my ***.

Skyrim has choices, they just are not presented as obviously as other games. It's not like Dragon Age where you get those three dialogue choices of good/evil/neutral every time there is an important decision. You can pick stormcloaks or empire. The game does not present one as better than the other. It's not like New Vegas's Caesar's Legion and the California Republic where the game clearly favoured one side. There are a number of quests with different endings, but you have to find them, not expect them to find you. Here's some quests with multiple endings that I've come across (hopefully in spoilers lol)



The thing is the quests don't have clear good/bad endings. Sometimes its good/good or bad/bad. For example, the civil war quests. Neither side is clearly right or wrong and choosing one over the other does not give Fable-style horns/halo or Mass Effect's 'Renegade'/'Paragon' points. Elder Scrolls just does things differently.

Nicely put together :thumbsup:

my issue with skyrim is that everything feels half-finished. Especially questlines. Each faction line is about ten minutes long, and I guess they were relying on the infinite radiant quests to add length and depth, which isn't really working for me. The main quest feels shorter than Oblivion's which already felt super short. The companions and winterhold quests felt super rushed, and began and ended abruptly with developments which made very little sense. Overall, I love Skyrim but feel like I will only get really into it whenever they finally get around to releaseing the CS.

nah, the one and the only god is Bathesda, pretty sure they can do whatever the [censored] they want.

thats because skyrim is about 5 times longer, literally, then new vegas

I agree, I wasn't too crazy about the Companions or College quests. Very short. Needed some mundane stuff leading up to the action.

new vegas was ok but it kinda stale pretty early on with a real bland world, nothing respawned, everything was predictable, no good places to hide or hunt down enemies ..skyrim has 100 times more content and the feeling of countless things to do and adventure, a lot of the quests and fights are totally epic. it can't even be compared to new vegas, bethesda is the best.

On the plus side, many dungeons are more varied and interesting than oblivion's. Except for the monsters in them. Draughrs are like, in about 60-70% of the dungeons i've been to so far. <_<