From the scratchy handwritten fonts in Arena to the serif Kingthings font in Oblivion, I am still kind of upset over how Bethesda seems to have developed some obsession with using sans serif fonts in Skyrim. But you know how it is! Minimalist art deco Apple-esque hipster fonts are just so clean and modern and professional! Skyrim is clearly a maturation of the series, and it would simply look embarrassing if it were to partake in the juvenile pseudo-medieval theme that all of the other games had.

Maybe it's just for legibility on TV screens, but considering how Oblivion had flowy medieval fonts and since less and less people (like myself) have been hooking their consoles up to muddy Mitsubishi televisions from the 1990's since then, if anything Skyrim should be the game with the elaborate and overly garish fonts. So what's with the art deco fonts? I have an unhealthy obsession with every element of American culture from every decade before the one I was born in (that seems to be how nostalgia works in youth nowadays), but frankly this seems to be Bethesda taking the Apple and Bioshock inspirations a little too far. I don't need to see location names scroll out across the screen like the Fallout 3 intro. Nor do I need even more reminders of the Mac OS X default borealis wallpaper whenever I pull up my perks screen. Seriously Bethesda, I know we've been hard on you over how medieval Oblivion was, but Skyrim's interface reminds me heavily of Fallout 3. Just in the listings and minimalist fonts.

Granted these will be the easiest things to mod out, but really, am I the only one who's kind of appalled by their decision in choosing these modern fonts? I was expecting something fancier, with chiseled silver text and runic inscriptions. We kind of have the former adorning the edges of stat bars and other UI elements, but still. For those of you defending its legibility, you could read Oblivion's fonts perfectly fine on a television screen. Games should make a point to try and make their UI integrate as naturally into the world as possible - after all, isn't that what Todd was aiming for with the perk constellations? Having these sleek all-caps fonts and gradients materialize on the screen to me is like an Xbox Live notification or the Steam overlay. It just removes you from the game somewhat.