Now the last I checked, just before writing this, it seems that twice the people who have played Dagger Fall and Morrowind prefer Morrowind than the other way around. The same can be said for those that have played Morrowind and Oblivion. I'm curious as to why Morrowind seems to have been the most popular out of the three....

Morrowind is, for whatever reason, the first Elder Scrolls game for a majority of people on these forums. I'll assume that's the reason why it's so popular.

Daggerfall was a more niche market when it came out, and was only on the PC. Morrowind being on PC and Xbox made it more accessible to a larger base of players (plus playing nerdy games was starting to become a little cooler than it used to be).

I know that, but I wonder why there are more people on these forums who started with Morrowind than people who started with Oblivion... which was even more accessible to a larger base of players (PC, 360, and PS3).

There are legitimate complaints, but there's also A LOT of nit-picking going on.

Oh, yes. No spellmaking has huge ramifications for character builds, but is one less armour slot really going to affect role playing and combat style?

if you want to play a bare chested barbarian it does. and of all the games where you would want to play a bare chested barbarian skyim would be the one.

Maybe they'll include a quest specific to Nords where you encounter a witch along the road...

If you look at what they have done with Skyrim, I'm in awe that people can complain about some stuff that just didn't make sense this time around. Just look at the combat overhaul alone. How much time do we spend in combat? A lot. Just look at a quick list here of all the improvements:

Dual wielding of ANYTHING. Torches, swords, maces, spells, fist, you can smack with your bow, shield or weapon bash that sends enemies reeling back (can knock off cliffs to send them to their doom). How FN cool is all this? I want to light bastards on fire and then stick em with my sword, or use chain lightning to bounce down tight cave hallways and hit my victims when they chase me. I don't have to train some stupid skill like blunt to use the cool axe I just found. I'm a sword kind of guy, but for some reason this kickass axe only does 4 points of damage in Oblivion. Now it's a one hand skill, which just seems better.

Shouts you can upgrade. Each shout has 3 levels, and it seems to be unique stuff, not just some other variant of a spell.

Magic combat you can combine two of the same spells to make a buffed version. Awesomeness.

You can lay down trap type spells which hurt enemies when they walk into your trap.

You can light the ground on fire then people walking through it catch on fire.

Finishing moves for added immersion and satisfying kills. Especially for stealth lovers to stick someone in the neck like a pig from behind instead of the same old generic slash every time is going to be epic.

PERKS which improve our combat. Bleeding damage, extra damage, skull crusher to name a few...

Bows do loads of damage now instead of a mudcrab being a pincushion with 50 arrows in him before he dies. Combat looks more lethal in general too.

Enemies flank the player, and even throw rocks on your head from above if you go under a hostile bridge.

Look at all that stuff. Thats just ONE area they improved. How is that dumbing down? You couldn't do any of that in Oblivion, which had the best combat of any elder scrolls game to date. SO we gained ALL that, and endless combinations and variants of it, and much more we don't know yet.... and all they took out of combat as far as I know is weapon/armor degradation, and the associated skill. H2H is still there, just not a skill any more. Woopee, you can't kill ghosts anyway without magic weaponry so H2H is useless in some scenarios... correct me if I'm wrong, I never advanced my H2H skill past 50 or 60 in Oblivion because it was pretty useless. A fun gimmick to punch people out, but you can still do that in skyrim, so what are we missing out on? Not much IMO, and look at what we gained? A hell of a lot of fun. And thats just combat.

No classes, no attributes, equipment never degrades, no spellmaking, health regen, merged armors, fewer weapon types, merged skills, and Steam is required for PC owners even when they buy the game in disc format. Yeah people are just nitpicking. :rolleyes:

Que the never critical fans: Perks are better, I never used this skill/feature anyways so I'm glad it is gone, and last but not least the game will be good because there is MARRIAGE AND DRAGONS!

When I look at what ES has become it makes me very depressed. My favorite series is now shallower than a shot glass.

From this post, I will assume you think Skyrim is dumbed down. well if you think this then you must have played it, have you???? I am going to answer this and say no you have not.

in regards to no classes, they have said why they haven't and that is so you can play as who ever you to play, for example in Skyrim when you start if you want be a mage you can be a mage, after about 4 hours you may realise you have made a mistake and want to be a thief. In Skyrim you can do this, you could not before instead you would need to create a new character.

No attributes, they have said why and that is because so if you want to do better in sneaking then can upgrade this, with other TES games you would have to upgrade agility which governs Block, Light armor, marksman and sneak (Morrowind). If you only used sneak out these then it is pretty pointless upgrading the others isn't it?

No spell making, the have said why and that is because there are over 85 unique spells with unique looks, so with so many different spells is it really worth complaining that you can't make a few of your own.

Health regen, this happens SLOWLY overtime. If you fell over for example you would get hurt, overtime the pain would go away and whatever you hurt would heal, so really isn't that more realistic and immersive.

merged armors, it is only the cuirass and the greaves. they did this so that there could be more types of armors.

Merged Skills, they did so they could bring back Enchanting as a skill also to have cooking and smithing as skills, the merging of skills is a good thing IMO.

I haven't played it either and have only played Morrowind for about half an hour (could not get into it) though I have put many hours into Oblivion (which is my favourite game of all time) so I believe my self to be a critical fan. I understand that there are going to be things removed which will annoy, but if you care to read and do research on the game (as a fan should) then you would see that there will many new things as well old things which have been improved and been made better which will make this game an EPIC game. Is this Really Dumbing Down??? Think before you jump to conclusions
Oblivion, take him away bliviongate:

Wanted to counter that with some opinions of my own.

-Pre made classes that gave your character a background are still gone.
-Health regeneration. Pah. Stamina shouldnt even regenerate.
-No attributes is removal of a layer of complexity.
-Spellmaking. It is a mathematical impossiblity that the new system is as varied as the previous.
-Merged skills. Pah. 21 skills was already too few to create effective unique builds.

There you go.

I understand where you're coming from but is this enough to say that it will be dumbed down???

Well in the months since I joined this forum I have seen a trend in comparring what we know about Skyrim to the previous game(mostly Morrowind) and statements that these games will be better than Skyrim no matter what(I'm not saying they are necessarily wrong since each game stand on it's own).

I also think that when people say they are not going to buy SKyrim becuse of reason X is also based on nostalgia(since that feature was/wasn't in their favorite ES game).
So, yes, I think the negative reactions towards Skyrim is based first and foremost on nostalgia and secondly on other reasons(which I have rarely have seen).

Since you brought in Fallout fans and what ES game you have I can say that I hated DA2, but the reason I hate it rather than dislike it is because it's predecessor was so much better.

From this post, I will assume you think Skyrim is dumbed down. well if you think this then you must have played it, have you???? I am going to answer this and say no you have not.

I understand where you're coming from but is this enough to say that it will be dumbed down???

Saying that all of this is a good thing, and then mentioning that you only played a half hour of Morrowind because you couldn't get into it tells me more-or-less what type of player you are, and why you like OB and most of the news about Skyrim. You're an "action gamer", not a RPG'er, and that's the direction the series has been heading since DF, much to the dismay of those of us who ARE RPG'ers.

For the RPG player, the loss of character background, the merging of skills and armor, and the overall removal of "consequences" in favor of gimmicky "finishing moves" and "dragons" is all for the worse. It's like saying "we removed the turbocharger from your sportscar, along with the anti-sway bars, the disc brakes, and the rear spoiler, BUT we made the seats adjustable and added air conditioning, so it's an IMPROVEMENT!" Sorry, but if I wanted a land-yach, I'd have bought one instead of a sports car. Why does Bethesda keep turning my RPG into a FPS, and then everyone tries to tell me that it's a better RPG because of it?

Taking away the character's starting background options, and then trying to tell me it's better because you've prevented me from building my character wrong, is insulting, on top of being a major step backwards. In the previous games, many of my characters started out as one thing, or a hybrid of two, and then became something entirely different over the course of the game. Contrary to the arguments being presented in favor of the new system, the old one worked fine for that. It was only an issue for "min/max" players and other "powergamers" who wanted to play some sort of "uber" character who couldn't lose if you tried, and who felt they had to restart because the character couldn't reach 100 in every stat.

"Dumbing Down" is a perfect name for removing the possibility of failure, putting up big arrows and signs to tell you that you're going the right way, and showering you with rewards for not being totally stupid rather than actually EARNING them. If this game plays the way I'm afraid that it will (just another mindless and forgettable hack & slash title to "beat" and then discard), then I may just have to keep playing Morrowind for another 5 years until somebody else decides to make a decent RPG, because Bethesda is no longer in the RPG game market.

I see that your mind is set on this and that you wont budge, so I see that it is pointless trying to reason with you.

Though to say I am not an RPG'er is insulting, just because I like playing
an Action game on occasion does not mean I don't know what an RPG is (my favourite genre of game) I love an RPG, this is why I was disappointed with Mass Effect 2 for taking away RPG elements in favour for better Action. See where I am going with this. I never said that the game wont have problems and will be perfect in every way, I simply am say that what they are doing is a major improvement. So don't act like you know me.
Oblivion take him away bliviongate:

Anyway it must be amazing, It has DRAGONS (being a so called Action gamer)

I honestly feel Skyrim is way less dumbed down that Oblivion, seriously last time they used "Stream-Lining" in place of "Dumbing-Down" I feel like Skyrim truly is streamlined. It has almost everything the other ones had in one form or another. They made things more accessible is all...

I LOOOOVE Morrowind, I have logged COUNTlESS Hours into that game and it is my favorite gam of ALL time, but I when Skyrim comes out I may just be saying it is better than Morrowind.

I think there is also a third group who, in all honesty, would actually prefer a much greater emphasis on graphics and action but don't want the label dumbed-down.