I'd like to start off by saying I'm not just referring to violence here.

Morrowind and Oblivion were both quite uptight games in regards to mature content, violence or otherwise. Even though Oblivion was later changed to a Mature rating, I think we can all agree that hidden files aside, it was very much a Teen-rated game. Fallout 3 and in particular New Vegas, however, were much more free with sixual references, course language and the like as well as gore.

Do you think this trend will continue in Skyrim? Or does Bethesda think that The Elder Scrolls should be a more restrained series than Fallout? It's just that Morrowind and Oblivion seem a bit sterile in this regard in comparison to New Vegas. Their attempts at medieval houses of ill-repute (Bethesda's censoring system won't let me use their proper name...) and the like always came off as laughably innocent, and drunken (or drug-addicted) characters generally just existed for comic relief.

Think we'll be seeing a bit more of the gritty side in Skyrim, or back to the glowing sheen of Oblivion?

Fallout 3 amount of gore and swearing does not belong in Skyrim. Skyrim should be an M rated game, but not for the same reasons as Fallout.

The game should have gore (not too much, but more than Oblivion), alcohols and drugs, racism, sixual references, gambling, politics, suffering (poverty, disease, starvation etc.), and hard moral choices.

TES swearing is usually made-up native words, "N'wah" in Morrowind is one example. I also remember that native swear words was used in the Infernal City, I think they was argonian, but I don't remember the exact words. I'd like them to keep up the tradition.

No sixuality, just mild sixual content/themes
No cursing like fallout, it wouldn′t fit the lore
Use of alcohol and drugs (skooma or other)
Gambling
A little more salt on the violence

Daggerfall's level, lets get Azura's shirt off.

When comes to the Elder Scrolls series they have made teen content. But i think in Skyrim we are going to see a more violent and mature gamhttp://www.gamesas.com/index.php?app=forums&module=post§ion=post&do=reply_post&f=118&t=1155660#e than previous Elder Scrolls games. Bethesda should at least tone up the violence add some gore but not like Fallout 3/New Vegas add some decapitations and dismemberment and the like, keep the language the same as Oblivion. They should definitely add some gambling. And also alcohol/drugs, and maybe Partial nudity http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?app=forums&module=post§ion=post&do=reply_post&f=118&t=1155660#http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?app=forums&module=post§ion=post&do=reply_post&f=118&t=1155660#

yes for sixual content (short of advlt content , think dragon age)

yes for realistic violence (NO exploding arms, yes for limbs getting cut every now and then)

yes for alcohol and drugs and racism and slavery and gambling.

M rated please BUT if it is going to hurt sales then 18+ is good enough I guess.

Personally I really think they need to up it.

While gore on the level of Fallout is unnecessary (Fallout is mean to be over-the-top in that regard, anyway) I think it at least needs to be realistic. In keeping with realism, I think Skyrim needs to be more frank in its use of course language (whether English words, or fictitious words dependent upon race), alcohol, six etc. It certainly doesn't need to be over-the-top, but as somebody said, Dragon Age might be a good reference point. I'd much rather feel like I'm wandering through a realistic kinda medieval/kinda Norse with all its dark underbellies as well as its beauty than a shiny, perfect Oblivion-like playground. Even Bravil didn't feel particularly poor/dangerous/wrong side of the tracks.

I think it's certainly possible - Bethesda have shown in the making of Fallout 3 and the publishing of New Vegas that they're not opposed to this sort of thing.

If they allow modding in the game, they're going to rate the game M, just like last time after Bethesda released the skin colors.

It's not the rating that I'm worried about, I just don't think some things don't fit into TES, even if it fit into Fall Out.

I think that swearing should be to a minimum. The occacional "damn" is alright. TES words (S'wit, Nwa'ah) are always appreciated and help with immersion.
Violence should be like Oblivion. MAYBE include a LITTLE dismemberment, but only if they need to. I don't want
six should be kept to a minimum.
We need Skooma and Moon Sugar!
Alcohol is needed. We are talking about Skyrim: home of the Nords. We need Mead.
Gambling should only be in it if it fits in.
Racism to aid quests (that stupid Argonian is running me out of business).
Slavery should be like Morrowind or http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Malacath in Oblivion, where you get to choose to set them free or not (although you don't really have a choice in the Oblivion quest).


I think that six and swearing worked in Fall Out because it took place in an empty, hopeless land. I think that the prostitution and swearing helped display that and made it more immersive. I don't think that it will work out as well in Skyrim.
Being able to chop people into little pieces, I think, also helped there, but I say no for the same reasons. Imagine shooting somebody with a fire spell then seeing the target react like the do in Gears of War. I think that wouldn't fit in.
Slavery should be like Morrowind. I just don't want to be the only Orc in the game because all other NPC Orcs are slaves.

Fallout 3/New Vegas

i think emotive subjects enhance an RPG by evoking strong feelings in the player and allowing for difficult and therefore interesting choices. Slavery, drugs, prostitution and poverty are all things that make a game better. Not liking them is a good thing as it invests you into a quest. The selling of the refugees quest in FO:NV actually made me mad at the characters and driven to kill them there and then. It provided a memorable emotional experience of the type a sanitised game could never hope to emulate.

The gore should be less cartoonish than fallout. Popping heads were overdone but some sort of dismemberment would be fine as long as it's not overly gratuitous. Swearing is fine as long as it's appropriate. It's all very well to say that swearing doesn't fit the tone of TES, same with six but the tone has shifted about so much that i'd be hard pushed to nail down what fits the lore or not.

The game will almost certainly be rated M, however it should only be at the level of violence you'd actually see in the medieval ages. That being while violence was pretty common you'd only really see it on the battle field. In addition there wouldn't be all that much in the way of limbs coming off; while decapitation is certainly possible it was very rare and most people would just die from blood loss and rather undramatically bleed out from under their armor, or a bludgeon to the head which also wouldn't produce all that much blood. Basically I think there shouldn't be massive torrents of blood you see in other games, there isn't a whole lot of blood in the human body and it's not at that high of a pressure so things like spraying of blood or it splattering on the ground is very unrealistic, and in real life only happen under the rares to circumstances

They should be free teo add advlt content, but only when it fits the game.. Some of fallout 3's felt a bit forced, new vegas did a better job.

Daggerfall. I believe, for example, brothels belong to a town in every time period. Gore-wise on the other hand, I would not want too much of that where it is not needed. Keep it as an element of story telling to actually frigthen the player; don't have it everywhere, or it'll lose that effect.

I would want a hybrid of what we saw in Fallout 3/New Vegas, but I don't want it to be overblown. Gameplay should be the most important thing that they need to focus on instead of say an Argonian Brothel.

Something like Morrowind level.

Mature themes, too. Like... moral dilemmas and ambiguity. Complex scenarios with no distinct "good" and "evil." Thought-provoking situations that might make the player re-examine their own prejudices/preconceived notions/etc. NPCs and events with complicated motives, and quests with unsettling consequences. For instance, "doing the right thing" might result in misery and pain.

Cursing in fictional cuss words is fine by me. N'wah! S'wit!

Just like Oblivion, except:

a little deeper content to the combat... no explosive limbs or the like
more heady advlt decisions, aka "good vs. evil", choosing a treacherous moral path, etc....
a little more sixuality, but not much. It would be nice to have a girl/boyfriend or love interest in the game, but I don't need to see the action-ish like ME2.
Cursing doesn't fit in this realm, it worked in FO3, but not here. I think the worst in Oblivion is "[censored]"... I'm cool with that.

I'm probably still under the impression of Oblivion's paradise, but right now I need much more mature content. Especially prostitution and immorality. I'm not very interested in gore and heads rolling, but concerning politics, clan rivalry and assassinations, I'd rather they include more violence.

I think that sixuality,nudity and bad language as well as extreme gore would ruin the game and lore of skyrim.
I'd stick with traditonal style of TES

ma you know they will end up having a M rating anyway.


well maybe


but Fallout 3/vegas and oblvion

I think it would seem a little strange if the Elder Scrolls used real world curses stronger than the ones heard in Oblivion. Now, I'm not saying a fantasy setting shouldn't have some swearing in it, it's something people do in real life, but I just can't see the Elder Scrolls races saying words like the F word or S word without coming off as odd. I'd like to see some Nord-themed made up curses, though, kind of like how Morrowind had Dunmer using words like "n'wah" or "s'wit".

As to violence, I'd like more than Oblivion, not quite Fallout 3 level of violence, I'd say, as that was a little over the top, which I'd say worked well for Fallout because the series has always had gratuitous violence. Indeed, that was the entire point of Bloody Mess, make people die in the most violent ways possible, at least it was until a give percent bonus to the damage of all attacks was added to it, probably because it became a perk and therefore needed to have something other than cosmetic effects. In the Elder Scrolls, though, I want a more realistic approach, or perhaps I should say more believable, as I don't expect Bethesda to actually try to realistically simulate what combat with Medieval weapons would look like in real life, but I want something which looks plausible. Combat in Oblivion wasn't quite messy enough to capture the brutality it should have, Morrowind even more so, but Fallout 3, and likewise New Vegas, was a little too extreme, so something between the two games, I'd say. I'd like a believable amount of blood, and preferably some proper visible wounds on characters, even if they're just decals, but I don't need to see heads exploding everywhere. Also, I really hope that characters who get killed by fire spells in Skyrim will look like they were actually burned to death, just adding a generic burned texture to them would do a lot to make it feel more realistic, there have been mods for both Oblivion and Fallout 3 that can pull off something like this, so I'd say there's no excuse for Skyrim not being able to.

As to sixual content, I'd say six is best left unshown in the Elder Scrolls games, this isn't to say sixual content should not be in the series. I don't mind seeing prosttutes, or people acknowledge that six happens, some suggestive dialog and books are just fine to me, but actually letting the player have six is probably unecessary, unless it's somehow relevant to a quest, and if it is, it's probably best to just use the old fade to black trick. Implied six can be good for creating a believable world, but I don't need to actually see six to know it happens, in the end, if I want to see pormography, I can just look on the internet. I'd say New Vegas handled this issue pretty well, it didn't shy away from adressing sixual themes, and even approached some aspects of sixuality that wouldn't really be considered socially acceptable by most people (Take Fisto, for example...) but it doesn't actually show any of it.

I wouldn't complain if the game brought in some themes like difficult moral choices and such either, but I wouldn't call those things mature themes, at least in the context in which "mature" is used when referring to the ESRB rating by that name (In other words, deemed appropriate only for mature players.) as such content wouldn't really earn the game an M rating on its own, it's things like violence, six and drugs that tend to earn such a rating.

@Selbeth though: You don't witness the six in Fallout:NV. It is all fade to black and I don't think most of the six advocates on the forums want visual aids. From my experience, they just want the fade to black.

I agree with most of what Selbeth has said:
The curse words invented for the game are the only ones that fit. While F*** and S*** may fit fallout, they would sound completely awkward.
Violence could be upped just a bit. Not quite to the fallout level of exploding heads and hacking dead bodies apart, but just a bit more for realism. Maybe scorch bodies if you kill them with a fire spell, cut in the shirt if you slash etc.
As for six, I like the fade to black used in FO:NV. Mods can add visuals (Animated Prostitution is an example for FO:NV)

On a grand scale I hope it is darker than Oblivion. Not as dark as Fallout, but definitely not the comic that was Oblivion. I risk sounding cliché by saying that it should be fairly close the Morrowind.

Hey hey, Oblivion wasn't that uptight, burning corpses handing by their feet in the Plane of Oblivion and let's not forget Lucien Lachance, we knew thee well. And did someone really just say that Morrowind was darker than Oblivion? lol? Darker maybe when because it's always cloudy lol. The gored zombies and the things I listed above. I mean the Dark Brotherhood quests alone had more darkness in it than Morrowind. Dead hokers in the lighthouse basemant. Crazy guy that keeps his mothers severed head and talk to it. Yeah....what a teletubbies special.

:foodndrink:

There are different types of mature -

"OMG six BLOOD SWEARING EVERYWHERE" and "Not afraid to have it where it makes sense".

I don't want a game that overemphasizes "mature" to the point of ridiculousness just to appeal to teenagers is what I'm saying I guess - unless the game has the right sense of humor about it.

Basically I hope they disregard any concerns about rating and make the game the way they feel it should be and let it get rated what they want. Ratings never stopped me from getting the games I wanted when I was under 17 anyway.



Sixth House was much darker thematically and visually than the whole Daedric invasion thing however. The majority of Oblivion, including the landscape, had a much more "shiny happy fantasy" theme than Morrowind, Dark Brotherhood was the exception not the rule.