You've literally got no idea. They will port it. Other multi-platform games are ports, and some of them do have issues.

Jeez mate, that post alone got me worried

Yes it is me!!!

I do not believe your worries are warranted and here is why: either we get consistent lore or we don't but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. Consistency is good for world building among fans but it doesn't bring people in the door. Very few people look at a game they have never heard of and say, "Well the lore is consistent so I'll get it." The reverse isn't really true either. Few people don't buy the game because of inconsistent lore although that is more plausible. Plus experience shows that many gamers are willing to ignore such things (i'll get back to this). If the lore is changed then yes, they should have in-game explanation. Changing the lore can actually be a good thing because it creates two distinct time periods that the elder scrolls games can play in. Pre and Post skyrim. If Bethesda is smart they can now tell the story of the beginnings of the 4th Era. We will see the repercussions of events in Skyrim but how did we get there? These are things that can be explored. A cheesy idea is that maybe throughout Skyrim we may overhear stories of some legendary battle a century into the 4th Era but this battle was ended suddenly with the appearance of some strange powerful being. This powerful being annihilated the armies and then vanished. Bethesda now has the opportunity to let us, perhaps through dlc, undergo some time warp where the PC becomes that strange powerful being. We would get to shape our own pasts. Perhaps we, in the past, somehow destroy the Labyrinthian. Although jumping two centuries into the future does make it more liable to have lore inconsistencies Bethesda has the benefit of creating the reasons why. Thus, I don't think you will have anything to worry about. It's a different world than we're used to. Things will be different. That may take some time getting used to and if things are explained initially, give Bethesda some time. They have two centuries to play around with.

Now, if they do what they did with Sheogorath, that may be cause for concern. They changed his appearance, voice, and even a little of his personality for Shivering Isles and no explanation has been given. The best explanation I have seen is that he was aging due to the Greymarch.

Hate to do this but I'm going to have to resort to quick answers. Concerning attributes, I get what you are saying and to a degree I agree but I will advocate for Bethesda. Let's say class "X" is a heavy melee class. In real life you would focus on two main ideas: physical threshold (health) and energy (stamina). A warrior needs to have the body to withstand constant lifting of heavy weapons as well as taking a beating, plus they need a strong supply of energy to maintain a fight. With attributes, a warrior would need strength and endurance. With the new system, all a warrior needs is health and stamina. They are the same thing, as Bethesda has said. The strength and endurance attributes often coincided with what they altered. Now we choose. Okay, so now your player wants to switch over to a heavy magic dependent class. They will be penalized for it as you want. Again, what are the two main attributes for a mage? They need mana reserves to cast spells and the energy to keep casting, much like energy needed to swing a weapon. That is it. Power does not mean much because power resides with the spells. If you follow Harry Potter, the most powerful wizards are those who have the stamina and magic potential (see:mana) to cast high level spells. The problem is class "X" has just spent a ton of levels working on health and stamina. The magicka bar is low. They won't be able to cast powerful spells (willpower) because their magicka (intelligence) level is low. The attributes are all still there, just hidden. The only one I can't really see any sort of resurrection for is Luck, which I personally don't think should even be an attribute. How does one increase luck? You can't really except maybe through potions.

Birthsigns are still in the game too. When they showed those stones Todd said that those three were some of the basic primary stones and the benefits they give are increasing skill growth within those fields while the other stones seemingly do different thing. Instead of being tethered to one sign we now have the option to pick whichever one we want, whenever we want. How is that not more customization and freedom? When I first played MW, I picked The Lord and didn't realize it came with Trollkin. I regretted that decision and would have loved to change it. Now I can. However, it added depth to my character and forced me to think ahead. Guess what? I am willing to bet you can do the same in Skyrim. Pick a stone that is aligned with a birthsign and keep it forever.

I guess it doesn't matter from a sales standpoint, and most journalists aren't that deep into the TES lore so they won't notice. Let's just hope they (even the newer devs) are well acquainted with the lore and dedicated to keep it consistent.

Which ironically is also a likely factor in a decision that would lead to a combining or reducing of slots.

Okay, I missed that part about the other stones. But that is the least worrying thing to me. I'm fine with putting my own rules into the game. That's what role-playing is all about. So I would have limited myself to choosing only one stone anyway. But the attributes are still a bigger concern. I don't think there is a heavy enough penalty for class changing.

Your first point I agree with. The inclusion of finishing animations, I think, is a good idea. Adds more to the combat department. A better set-up, I think, would be to simply activate the finishing move if the opponent is low on life and the player holds down the attack button where upon release the blow would kill the enemy.

Your last point I will contest though. If a game is going to have a feature it should implement that feature to the best of it's ability. Skyrim contains first person combat. That has to be of quality, which they are striving for. Skyrim has an open map, which is of quality work. It has physical and cosmetic customization which are seemingly of quality. Animations are good. AI is good. Graphics are good. I use good as an encompassing term meaning a fulfillment of that category. Does this game seemingly have as much customization and traditional RPG elements as Daggerfall or Morrowind? Not even close. Does it have better combat, AI, animations, graphical effects, and macro/micro detail? Yes and I compare them to the skill they should with the technological limitations of past games. Morrowind had terrible animations for the time it came out. Bethesda has always had weak animations. Now though, in comparison, their animation has improved for Skyrim. They have retained more RPG aspects that many RPG games even have and bumped up other aspects that have always been weak in ES games. What I predict Skyrim will be is a game that has no real major strengths that people can always call back to and say, "Remember when Skyrim had this awesome thing but svcked at this thing?" That is how it is with every ES game. Instead, Skyrim will be a game that people say, "Skyrim was a well-rounded game." Is that so wrong for it to still be good in all areas instead of excellent in one and terrible in others?

Could you give an example of a penalty for class changing? The only other thing I can think of is having certain skills connected with certain attributes like traditional RPG's but that has not been a feature of ES games for as long as I have played them. It does not matter how low the strength attribute was, you could always swing a beastly axe. Skills always determined what a character could do while attributes determined the reserves with which a character could do said things.

I gotta go now and if anyone cares, I will continue this tomorrow night once I have gotten some more rest. My reasoning skills began to deteriorate at the end there and started using too much opinion instead of factual support.

LMAO fail

Wow..thats real classy. Perhaps you could man up, be a little knowledgeable, and present something useful in the forums?

Good job Rag.

I'm a little tired, so I'll be blunt. What concerns me the most is how lore accurate the Skyrim will become. Cyrodiil was supposed to be like Venice and jungle filled, but turned out to be a copy and paste of an open field with some mountains and snow to the north. Also, every province have werewolves and well as (correct me if I''m wrong) another one of 7 lycanthropes.
Skyrim features werebears primarily, but it's yet to be revealed whether or not we'll even have werewolves, which should've been around every province to begin with. I'm ok with the team changing the lore a little, as long as they more books to bring reason, but a little consistency would be nice.

I hope they fixed the 400 hour game save problem, I know that the pc had an unofficial work around, but nothing for x360 and ps3... Apart from that nothing really worries me about skyrim, I am ok with details we have had so far!

I've seen some wierd threads on this forum, but I think I found a winner. Please continue with Dr. Phil, err Dr. Forum.

I wonder if a mod could Lock this...you know save it from spam until he comes back and request it being opened again.