owned

I am wrong at least once a day . I just prefer to give these posters the benefit of the doubt. It just does not make sense to me if they are not being paid to sit here and spam with the repetitious pro-Beth posts.

Honestly, it doesn't make sense to me why you'd pay someone to spam pro-Beth posts. It isn't like any of the non-pro posters ever change their position.

Ever met a diehard fan before?

I think your argument is directed at the wrong place. Ratwar made a valid point that Bethesda DOES listen to their fans. There is no logical reasoning to illustrate that they do not, and significant tangible evidence to the contrary. His statement directly pertains to the notion that Bethesda evaluates fan concerns, and creates game-worlds that they believe are more balanced, than previous titles, and have significant improvements concerning fluidity and immersion.

I did not read anything in his post suggesting that persons here or abroad actively sought the exclusion of any game-play elements. To suggest there is a significant population doing so is nonsense. It is obvious that Bethesda took the courses of action they did for a reason, Not only with Skyrim but with every new installment in the series. Whether I agree with the changes or the specific sentiment that reasoning exhibited, is beside the point. The reasoning is there for anyone willing to consider the issues objectively.

I'm just a bit tired of the contentious discussion that not only plague Skyrim but most RPGs. The Term Dumbed Down has be overused to the point of being meaningless, i know people like to point at DA2 but that game's problem that kept it from greatness was not where it was dumbed down, but where it was half assed. The streamlining would have worked if they had properly balanced it, they took the lazy way of having enemies spawn out of no where and the level design's laziness was inexcusable.

People seem to just find a bullet point that was removed and latch on, not caring what the context, rhyme or reason are. I can get Attributes, they go back to D&D, though they have little to do with roleplaying but instead were there because D&D was born out of a War game. The stats were there to tell people what a character was capable of, to prevent the school yard arguments of: "I shot you! No you didn't I dodged it!" Attributes were used with dice and classes to determine that so there would be no argument. As for myself I've found such stats to be too limiting, to force characters into cliches, warriors with great strength where a warrior that uses finesse to not really work as well as the muscle head. I'm really curious to see if it will work and I think that jumping to conclusions helps no one.

WRPGs are big now because they've been willing to change, we can have the companies just cater to fans but then the genre would stagnate, like the JRPGs. Those games still have their complexity, it's hallow and shallow but it's complex, filled with weird symbols and grids that you have to study for a while to figure out what to do but once you do it, the characters really don't change and there's one best way. We can get ourselves stuck with pointless gray plotlines where the only message is the nihilistic: everyone svcks and will screw you over. We can stick with obtuse systems that serve to waste time more than to allow character customization. The genre needs to change and evolve and some good things come with the bad but it's hard to say what's good or bad. Games have limited resources and sometime features have to get cut from a game or it becomes vaporwear due to feature creep, and instead of getting the next great RPG, we wait a Decade for the next Duke Nuke 'em Forever or the Next Daikatana.

awesome post^

thank you for taking the time to write it. a few of us here enjoy real input

How much traffic does the forum get? Particularly as the release gets nearer? This is a multi-miliion dollar product being developed. No offense, but it would not make sense to leave the monitoring and control duties of the public forum of such a high profile project left to just a group of volunteers.

One more thing: Streamline and "Dumbing down" are not the same thing at all, regardless of how some people love to try to equate them. When you are streamlining something, you are simplifying it. You seek to simplify something when you feel that its unecessarily complicated. Its completely possible to streamline a process, and still maintain its complexity. You are just re-arranging and organizing a complex system or process in such a way that it increases speed and efficiency. It is meant to make things "flow" better.

So the real question is whether or not the previous system was unecessarily complicated, and if the new system improves that. That is the real debate.

Of course, I'm from Pittsburgh.

While they still support they are the first ones to beat up on "their" team when they things going the wrong way.

No offense, but this is really getting off topic here....

the potential validity of a concept doesn't always add weight to its plausibility. nor does logical reasoning equate to accuracy.

as an individual i recognize the fact that knowing the true nature of individuals i cannot actually see or observe, is in fact impossible. anything could theoretically be said under the guise of a specific character or adaptive perspective. being objective has many applications...

that said we as humans must try to remember that we are human, and hope that the rest of humanity keeps that in mind as well.

but the idea that ZENIMAX or Bethesda would control the responses of a fan-base, attempt to infiltrate and through subterfuge influence the course of a conversation in a public forum is in my opinion inaccurate.

specifically because of the fact that any and all individuals will formulate an opinion independent of this medium, when the game is actually released. And attempting to control the course of topics, on a public forum such as this would be a waste of a valuable resource. Feedback is worth quite a-lot in today's market...

Generally I would agree with you. Especially considering the atmosphere of Skyrim will be vastly improved over the complete blandness of OB. Handcrafted dungeons, ect. But I would also add that they are doing many things the wrong way by patching in half-formed ideas to make a buck. Todd made the statement "If we can do it right we will put it in the game". I've taken a look a horses and read the reviews and by all intents and purposes they sound exactly the same as in OB wich is to say terrible. I kind of lost some respect in that aspect... especially since they are giving a strong appearance of having no interest in the core fanbases concerns and are moving forward trying to attract more "mainstream gamers".

You are absolutely right. For example:

- you don't need a pointless 3D map of the world when a simple paper map is sufficient and more realistic.

- you don't need a redundant quick menu if the original one is designed right the first time

- having a skills menu that allows a quick glance at all skills if preferable to a time-wasting scroll fest where you can only see a few at a time

- having a single attributes system with an unlimited number of attributes that are linked to all aspects of character to handle interskill interactions is preferable to dozens-hundreds of separated and unlinked perks that handle some things and separate stat bars that handle some others...and maybe others that are not linked to anything....very disorganized...

:unsure: I need to find out where my paychecks are going.


Ok, enough of accusing moderators of being paid to post mushy posts about our love for Bethesda. Actually you might be surprised to see us when we don't agree with something they do. We express that as well.

Never the less, this topic isn't about moderators and if you want to know more about us as individuals you can further discuss in in an open "ask the moderators" thread in CD.

In this thread we are discussing "streamlining of TES" which always tends to be a hot topic because folks basically disagree about what streamlining means. They also tend to ignore that many things that are changed are a direct result of complaints made about previous games.

Never the less, this is like discussing a "real rpg", that nor "streamlining" have definitive definitions that can be agreed on much less agree on every aspect of either. :shrug:

Back on topic then I guess.

While I agree with you on your preference with the map, the idea of it feeling more "realistic" doesn't have much to do with a discussion on streamlining.

How well the skills menu works is yet to be seen in my opinion. Yes, there is some "scrolling" as it appears, but its quite obvious that Beth is going for visual flair with this one. I'll wait and see how easy or cumbersome it is when I play the game.

About the options menu, I believe that the community has said enough about the previous system's tediousness. Oblivion's menu interface was one of the most complained about features in the community. Not sure why this is even up for debate.

Also, I don't know how many options one will have with the new system, and how viable each build will be when compared to the next. We will have to wait until we have the game to see how well it works.

Attract and please are two different concepts. No two people have the same interests or beliefs in what makes a game top notch. All Bethesda can do is take in comments and develop the game as they see fit. These "mainstream gamers" have just as much right to be heard as anyone else. If TES is tailored in part to please a different set of people than their core fan base, then thats just the way it is.

Sure. Everyone has a right to be heard. My concern is the balancing act between who you are attracting. My difference of opinion is that it has wildy swung out of balance.

But horses are more useful.... now that running speed is locked.

No but seriously, now that your character can't break the land speed record barefoot, horses will be much more useful. And I don't oft use fast travel so I'm in favor!

Would've rather had mountable giant goats, though. Good for scaling steep surfaces.

The "mainstream gamers" are just as important to Bethesda as is the "core fanbase" (is that what we are calling ourselves now?).

The game is still true to its roots. Its still an open world RPG, still has a progressive character system, still has depth of story, and still has all the elements that make it an amazing game. Bethesda isn't going THAT far out of the way to attract gamers, they've won several game's of the year, and are one of the biggest companies in the market today, they could sell Skyrim on reputation alone. What little they ARE doing to attract//please people is to be expected. They ARE afterall a company, that's purpose is to turn a profit. No profit, no more TES, period.

Strange I didnt hear beth barking out accessibility and gaining a wider audience when FO3 was made, why is TES taking the fall? sorry as I see it their just riding high on the money train, lets forget about "core" fanbase for a moment.

when they made Daggerfall and Morrowind. neither games were tailored for a "market" or demographic, they made the games purely on their own vision independent of "what sells" to say Skyrim resembles a buffed up Fable would do it a discervice, but thats what it -looks- like. they had every oppurtunity to stanch most concerns and grips about the past games and they effectively didn't and those concerns like weapon variety, armor, skills, revamped attributes (seriously pickpockets a skill? yeah...) these things do not detract in the least and would have added more to the world. what people like to forget is that NPCS are in the game too and they can use those features against you too no?

And making a very solid attempt to attract Both would sell just as many copies. Period.

Just note that there are people who like the direction that Skyrim is taking (for the most part), and some of them are actually part of this special, super-important, all-that-matter, "core" fanbase, that you mention.

Eh... Morrowind was indeed tailored for a certain demographic. The pure fact that it is a completely different game from Daggerfall should be enough to show that, but you really can't lump the two together. Morrowind needed to sell well. Following Daggerfall, Bethesda made what may be seen as a huge mistake by, instead of creating TES III, creating the two spin-offs Battlespire and Redguard. Due to the commercial failure of both games and Bethesda's already small and poor stature, Bethesda was pretty much ready to declare bankruptcy. They were literally on the verge of going bankrupt. So, ZeniMax, a company founded by some of the same people who founded Bethesda became the parent company of Bethesda and their success as a company was literally riding on Morrowind's success. Morrowind was drastically, DRASTICALLY different from Daggerfall and it had to be for where Daggerfall was still a relatively-unknown game, Morrowind needed to be a commercial success. So, Bethesda really did change the formula from everything from the general design (randomly-generated, huge dungeon-diving roguelike turns into small, detailed, handcrafted sandbox game) to the setting (romanticized medieval setting turns into mushrooms and giant crab shells).

Fans did most certainly rage over it... although that fact seems to have been lost as people now seem to think the two completely different games were brothers while Oblivion is now blamed as the sell-out game... much to my own frustration. Anyone who has ever played both Daggerfall and Morrowind should know the two games are a textbook example of a series changing course. Anyway, Morrowind was completely different and, as is evident by the overwhelming majority of Morrowind fans on these forums, it did indeed hit the commercial mark Bethesda needed it to in a way that its predecessors never could have. There you have it. Morrowind is the first mainstream Elder Scrolls game and the introduction to the modern generation of Elder Scrolls games. Both Oblivion and Skyrim have actually followed the formula of Morrowind pretty closely while Oblivion, in particular, seemed quite reminiscent of Arena and Daggerfall, in quite a few ways... perhaps in an attempt to quell some of the old angry fans or perhaps simply to pay homage to the series' roots, but it still did maintain much of the design Bethesda aimed for with Morrowind. To this day, and unless Skyrim topples it, Morrowind is the most out-of-place game in the series, really.