There is no such thing as a deal breaker for a game this epic. There...I said it :tes: is too [censored] epic to fail.

Bad character animations

Pre-defined and/or voiced player character

Ugly/inappropriate art style

Ugly graphics, bland/repetitive landscape

Limited or no modding support

Extremely linear gameplay

Uh... if it gets cancelled?

For me, Skyrim's pretty much a triumph already; all that remains to be seen is whether it's merely good; great; or The Best Game Ever?.

Will buy, enjoy, and love Skyrim even with any flaws, end of, no discussion required.
And will probably only stop playing, for a while, when Fallout 4 gets released.

Less armor slots, Oblivions' amount almost ruinde it for me completely, and even less will make it so terrible :S

Nothing will ruin Skyrim for me, I've played Morrowind and Oblivion, and even though they are very different, I like them both. So when Skyrim is very different from the other games, I will still love it, because it's an Elder Scrolls game :celebration:

Too casual and mainstream.

But honestly, that wouldn't stop me from buying it anyway, since there will be mods for all these things.

No that's not a fan, that's a mindless piece of [CENSORED]... and if you are a mindless piece of [CENSORED] I suggest not even buying the game... I mean according to what you've written you'd be happy with a game that was just "click this button as fast as you can" as long as it was made by bethesda and was called a The Elder Scrolls game...

Too much mountains so my only exploration is the path between them, I'm playing Nehrim MOD right now and even it having the same size as OB, there's so little to explore thanks to so many mountainous areas.
I'd rather bethesda used a mix between computer generated area and human designed areas, and make it 150km2, not just 40km2, some places REALLY need to feel somewhat dull and boring and LARGE.

Also:
Badly optimized engine for drawing distance. (like oblivion, not probable, as Todd said in an interview)
Graphics that looks like oblivion upgraded only. (it REALLY looks like Oblivion with mods)
Little innovations in combat. (I'm tired of attack, defend or cast generic arrows spells, hundred and hundred hours of oblivion)
Not much dialogue options, and with little to no impact.

if hell freezes over...

no mod support

No spellmaking.
Stepping away even more from its RPG roots into an action game.
Too much reliance on player skills via such things as minigames, instead of character skills.

I played hundreds if not thousands of hours of both Oblivion and Morrowind with all their flaws and Have Skyrim already PreOrdered (birthday gift from my wife) so truthfully nothing will stop me from playing it. I even played Two Worlds a fare bit and that game was really bad so any Elderscrolls game will be far better and always worth playing.

No mod support would mean no buy, but I don't think that will happen.

There are bunch of things Bethesda seem to be doing that other developers have been guilty of, the main one being laziness. Little things like fast travel instead of a decent travel system that wouldn't make you miss fast travel. The no spears thing is pretty stupid. Oh you can dual wield daggers, swords and have a fireball shooting out from one hand whilst the other one stabs duders, but we can't balance spears.

[censored] like that.

I'll do exactly the same as I did with Oblivion, wait 4-6 weeks after release and read all the reviews and forums before I decide to buy, any major problems should be patched by then. (Yeah, I've got major patience & willpower)

But, If I sniff STEAM then I'm not buying at all, that's about the only reason.

Don't think anything would keep me from buying it, but as for quitting midway through and selling it maybe, I would say:

• Terrible landscape/terrain
  
• Game breaking bugs

About it.

I don't think there is a possible dealbreak for me except if the game is buggy to the point where it's unplayable, in which case I can't even play it anyway.

Steam is perfectly good as a digital game store & distribution method. I've used it before, and will again.


However, using an online service that you repeatedly have to access, to provide copy protection for a non-online, single player, purchasable in a physical store on physical media, game..... is somewhat absurd. (Not as bad as Ubi-soft's joke of a DRM system of the last few years, but it's up there).

Copy protection schemes need to be balanced between "inconveniences pirates" and "inconveniences legal users". The true high-level pirates won't be stopped by anything. (Ubisoft's draconian system was cracked within a week). But totally open releases have shown that lazy people will download stolen software just because. So yeah, you need some level of DRM. But even a basic level will stop the "casual" pirates.

Crazy high end DRM systems that screw up stuff for legitimate users only really exist to make the shareholders and company board feel good.

(And then there's the minor issues - like, automatic patching via Steam, instead of being able to install the patch you want. Example, one of the Fallout 3 patches broke modding. At which point, everyone using mods reverted their FO3 installs to an earlier patch. Which they could do, because it wasn't autopatched by some online system. Another issue is the paranoia of "but Steam can go out of business/go crazy/get hacked/whatever, and I won't be able to run my game! I still run decade+ old games on older systems because I just need the disk for copy protection! Someday I won't be able to run my Steam games! " :ahhh: )


So yeah... there's a number of issues there.


Personally, I'm really not a fan, but it didn't stop me from getting FO:NV (which used the stupid Steam system). So it's not a "dealbreaker" for me. Just a major disappointment.


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Yeah, that one would have a good chance of me skipping it. If I'm going to play an RPG that can't be screwed with, I'd rather go for something more linear with a stronger plot/story/acting/etc.

Essentially if they strip out all the depth and make it "Call of Duty with Swords"


Flashy, 4 hours long, and terrible.

- Steamworks as mandatory for physical editions of the game
- no or limited modding ability

Those are the absolute deal breakers I can think of at the moment. Other things just lessen my interest in the game to varying degrees and also lower the price point at which I will spend money to buy the game.

Should rename the thread "1.5x"

Other good games that I have enjoyed playing 1.5 times.

Mass Effect - Limits and story line pretty much stays the same the 2nd time through.

Mass Effect 2 - Same as the first

Dragon Age - Liked what they did at the start, but then it becomes the same story again.
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"2.5" times played.

Oblivion - Hand holding, fast travel system, number of armour/clothing slots, no problem solving and limited ways to play the game.

Fallout 3 - Same as Oblivion
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Still playing "unlimited" times

Morrowind - Pretty much has no limts, you almost forget that there is a main story line after the first or second play through. If I "choose" to use exploits, it just adds to the role playing part of the game. I can be anyone, all powerful god like person or a weathy merchant. I can play the game the way I want to play the game, not how Beth makes me play the game..... Dispite some minor flaws it's a true RPG, chance points and all.

Civil Rev - Go ahead and LOL, but every play through seems differant.

Port Royal 2 - Same as Civil Rev and I love crushing a town economics only to rebuild it.

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At the end of the day "limits" are the only thing that could be the deal breaker for the replay factor. I regret that I didn't buy oblivion for PC, a fully modded Oblivion would of fixed my "limit" issues and I would still be enjoying the game today.

THIS!
And:
-Bad PC game. (cant turn off mouse acceleration,no advanced graphics options,auto-aim,not optimized,etc.)
-No mods
-Game breaking bugs
-Exploring is dull and boring.

Any true fan wouldn't say, "This one little aspect annoys me, so I'm not gonna buy it." If you say that, you aren't a fan. Period.

I would have to be in a coma or dead for me not to play it. Though I would probably rent if they decided at the last second to change the setting to Seattle or shipped the game without textures and models. Not having one of the two would be ok, but both would be a deal-breaker.

Terrible repetitive landscape, terrible repertitive towns and dungeons.

And if there is omnipotent guards I will be so pissed. Ill still buy it but I will be pissed.

No first person, and an "attack" button, instead of controlling when I strike.

Cliff Racers.