I believe the answer is yes.

Not sure if this has been discussed before, but everyone should watch the following video. It's a long one, but worth the watch. I'd really like the devs at Bethesda to see and respond to it...

Here it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JweTAhyR4o0&list=PLjeh5MaFvzeSRylyuXowSfscHoW6eqVmn&feature=c4-overview-vl

What do you guys think?

They certainly have been simplified to some extents.

Another one of those? Great. ill bring my popcorn.

This is a very difficult question for me to ask... Because i generally disagree with the whole 'dumbing down' argument. Modern computer interfaces are absurdly 'dumbed down' from the original binary inputs, but does that make them worse? No, not by a long shot.

TES games have streamlined extensively. That is impossible to argue against. They've cut things. Again, you can't argue with the fact. But have they 'dumbed down"?

If we assume that the basic premise of TES games hasn't changed, then yes, they have. If we assume that the premise has evolved over the last (almost) 2 decades, well... no.

The second question, though (as i feel there are, in fact, 2 questions being asked here) is whether or not they have less depth... Again, yes and no. Does Skyrim come with less features and options than Daggerfall? Yes. Definately. However, when you take into account the CK, and what can be done with it, you have more options than you had before.

Really, i don't think i can say yes or no to either...

Some things are improved and some are simplified. This is all a matter of your personal views and interests. Things I see as improvements may be dumping down for some people as well as their improvements may be dumping down for me. Also there are things in both improvements and simplified things which doesn't matter to everyone because all we have different way to roleplay TES and we have different interest leading our gameplay and joy.

Yes I think it has. I don't care so much if it's been simplified for casual gamers or for some "creative" reasons, the final outcome seems to me diluted on the RPG mechanics side.

I think most of what Skyrim did better than the predecessors (and it did improve in quite a few departments) fall into the "natural evolution' category and has more to do with graphics, voice acting, animations, feel of combat, stealth, npc life simulation... all the things that tend to be better in every game series, more lifelike and more complex from one generation of games to the other.

Where I think Skyrim lost some quality is unfortunately in the exact fields that brought me into the traditional RPG genre (rich stats for character definition, compelling writing and characters, in-game incentives to replay via different consequences for different character builds and choices).

I'm referring to the points made in the video I linked above. Judging by the quickness of these responses I can tell y'all didn't watch the vid… (It's 32 min long)

Sorry if I sound like an ass, but I'd really like to know what you guys think of the points made in the video. I'm not talking about removing the class systems or getting rid of attributes or the interface or anything like that. I view that as streamlining. I'm a fan of that stuff... I'm talking about the gameplay. The video revolves around the following main points:

You can't fail. (half the NPCs in the game can't be killed)

No consequences for faction membership, (you can become Thane of every hold somehow… and leader of every guild)

Your actions make little consequence on the world. (you can assassinate the emperor and then join the legion)

The quest and journal system has been stripped. (basically impossible to play with quest markers turned off)

NPC conversations have been massively reduced.

The value of items has been reduced. (Deadric artifacts are less valuable than stander weapons??? They should be hundreds of times more valuable…)

One day baby we'll be old... the stories we could've told

Sad as it sounds I think there's no turning back to more complex rpg's, they all get simplified to sell more. Well, except the Kickstarter dinosaurs but I've never been into isometric things with a circle beneath the feet of your char. The Witcher is next, that open world thing will sell them more copies all right, but will eventually bite them in the ass because you can't make complex and focused stories with no control to where the player goes and what he does.

Trust me, the video is old and everybody and their mother have seen it already.

The point has been discussed 1000 times.
That entire video has been discussed 1000 times.

The forum has a search function

Agreed. The video has been debated several times over, and at this point is just spinning its tires. It also ignores several problems, such as the fact that Oblivion actually has 1 more essential character, that even in Daggerfall you could join every guild (though it was tricky to make it work) and that prior to Oblivion and Skyrim, there were a handful of NPC's who had anything meaningful to say anyway.

While the discussion may still be valid, and informative (if anyone at Bethesda actually reads these things) the video has been beaten like a very, very dead horse.

Somebody's a litte snippy because they're not a planet anymore...

I only jest! Haven't been here since before Skyrim was announced. Just stumbled upon that video and wanted to know what people think. My bad.

It is not so much down as it is features being cut or simplified without a real need.

* Removal of spellmaking

* Quest markers you are expected to use due to a lack of directions

* Removal of attributes

* Removal of spears

* Armor consisting of fewer parts every installment

...

Skyrim has way too much handholding and there's only one way of doing everything. Doesn't give me incentives to replay quests with different characters.

Hell, Fallout 3 was made by Bethesda and that had many choices. I even made three characters so I could explore all possible options in quests and dialogue. Not sure what went wrong in Skyrim. Maybe they focused too much on the world and not enough on the characters.

I like the perk systems in FO3/NV and there are many perks from these two games which I would want to see in TES. Sadly, Skyrim perks are rather shallow in comparison.

I for one have watched that video - not this time when reading this thread but couple times since I first saw it about a year ago linked on another thread.

The video have made some points which are true but in other hand it left many things out of it - especially the improved ones. And the changes on item prizes I do like - now they only need to reduce the amount of coins going around and to make unique items to be more hard to obtain. Only item prize reduction I wasn't happy about was book prizes reducing between Morrowind and Oblvion, but that one could be explained by founding of printing press between the games.