The Elder Scrolls games are supposed to be in a medieval fantasy setting but the games look ridiculously clean compared to how people lived 1000 years ago.

For those that have seen Jabberwocky by Terry Gilliam, do you think Tamriel is closer to looking like that? I know Tamriel is pretty civilized now. But even still, people would be covered in feces and filth and have craters and pustules all over their faces back in those times. Life was full of disease, fear, [censored], blood, and feces back then. It was awful.
I'm assuming Tamriel may not be like this now, but surely people lived like this at some point in TES history, right?


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5EGQ0zGwEU&feature=related

You're forgetting about one very important difference between Tamriel and our own world's medieval past.

Magic.

Real, honest to goodness magic.

Most diseases which cause pustules and boils can be cured by potions and spells, except among the lowest classes, and Temple and Church healers tend to them for free in many cases. As for cleaning, who knows? Maybe magic plays a role in this too. Perhaps a type of Alteration is good for dusting. Or for turning human waste into something more pleasing to the senses.

On one hand, I think the lack of "disease, fear, [censored], blood, and feces" could be put down to a failing of translation in gameplay. The diseases you get are difficult to take seriously because of how little damage is actually done. The citizens discuss things they are afraid of, but it's difficult to take seriously because you're the CoC or Nerevarine or whatever and it's supposed to be your thing to take care of problems like ghosts and vicious beasts and the like and, frankly, once you get to a certain point in the games, you become very nearly indestructible. Marauders and bandits and highwaymen and pirates and assasins turn into a source of better loot instead of fear and bloodshed.

On the other hand though, I suppose it could also be said that the presence of the Empie has had a stabilizing effect on the provinces. It's relatively easy to get rid of diseases at temple altars or a potion or a spell. The Legion protects the citizenry from the [censored] and blood part and with that sort of protection, I don't suppose they really have much to fear.

Realistically, it probably would be quite a dirty and disgusting place; but while the basis is medieval, it is still a fantasy. And though there is disease and blood and fear and the like, showing the ugliness you would get in real life history wouldn't do much for the fantastic setting of the games. But no matter what, I would hesitate to draw comparisons between the medieval times of Europe and the setting for the Elder Scrolls games. One may have been the basis for the other, but (and this is obvious, but bears saying) that doesn't make it equal to.

Cyrodill itself is more like the Roman or perhaps Byzantine Empire than the medieval system, true. Other provinces may resemble other times/cultures from our own past more or less but it's all Tamriel and not Earth. Something about Tamriel, whether intentionally by the Devs or as a result of its own infrastructure, causes certain types of maladies and social ills to occur less than in our own past.

Bull. Baths and sponges are not 20th century discoveries.

It's not medieval - we don't have a place, how can we have a time? And there were baths, soap, and, yes, street cleaners in many places in Europe, just as there are now. The main roads were as clean as they are now, and, with the exception of people not throwing their crap onto the streets, the poorer areas haven't changed much.

But this isn't earth, anyway, so most of this post is pointless

Some cities (namely Vivec and Imperial City) even have a Sewer System. Whats important is that this system becomes wide spread in the 19th Century, way past our "medieval" time.

Cyrodiil is based on the Roman Empire, not the Medieval Ages, for one thing. For another thing, that would be horrible. If I want to see filth, I'll go play Fallout 3. TES universe is nice the way it is. They also know how to bathe and their healing methods are very good. They also have a sewage system.

Yes. Tamriel is a filthy, filthy girl. I'd know.

Generalisations like that can never be right, even if there was evidence to back them up. The Imperial City, and perhaps the Imperials themselves, are Roman. But the Ayleids? The other cities? The climate? The weapons? The soldiers? No, they're not.

Well, as recently as the renaissance, people in big cities would empty their chamberpots out their windows, or simply save time by doing their business out the window directly. People in rural areas had the convenience of having holes they could dig (you can't dig a hole in a paved street easily) or vegetable patches they could empty their various fluids into.

Personally, I wouldn't mind seeing some more filth. Maybe chickens and so on in main streets, flies in the air, and maybe a corpse or two lying around since the Dead Collector isn't coming until Tirdas, as well as some... indiscernible stains on the pavement.

Something more like the medieval villages in Assassin's Creed maybe.

EDIT: This is a double post, but it's twin has more useful information...well, it has more information, and, as this post has been deleted, it's just became more useful.

The Renaissance is after the medieval era, you know



It's not really suited to any race in Tamriel, other than the Redguards, or maybe the Khajiit and the settlements of the Deshaan Plain.

Yeah? Go do research on people in medieval europe. The water was just as filthy as the people.

Exactly. Tamriel doesn't have garbage men driving by every Wednesday to pick up their trash, so it just collects around the cities and towns. Nor do they have a sanitation crew to filter out the lake, so the lake water gets dirty and full of waste, trash and god knows what else.
And even the Romans and the Greeks were filthy people, despite their plumbing system. It's only been in the last like, 100 years, if even that, that civilization has become concerned with germs and being clean and bathing everyday.

Thanks, fixed my typo.

And I know the middle-east setting doesn't really fit with most of Tamriel, but it's the only medieval game I could think of that has towns that look like the towns in Monty Python and the Holy Grail (ie filthy).

You lost me, which towns were you saying remind you of this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grbSQ6O6kbs

I'd have to reinstall the game to be able to pinpoint the exact towns, but the English/French/otherwise European towns in Assassin's Creed seem pretty similar to the Dead Collector village (or the Witch trial village for that matter) IMO.

You don't think that there are a lot of places in Tamriel that are like this?

Oh, there would be, without a doubt. Leyawiin comes to mind, definitely.

I just meant the Redguard/Khajiit towns that Gallowglass mentioned are probably middle east-inspired, and the arab towns in Assassin's Creed were a lot cleaner than the european towns.

I haven't had my coffee yet, if that excuses my nonsensical postings.

In many cases, it was cleaner than during the industrial revolution. The idea of constant filth was a Victorian one, made to make themselves feel better.

Nonetheless, I believe Orsinum is supposed to be a complete Dive, and while I imagine the major cities would be kept relatively clean, the smaller settlements should probably be quite dirty at least. Akin to Crucible in The Shivering Isles, really.

This.. is a realllly pointless thread.

For one they have M.A.G.I.C.

Besides, Cyrodiil IS based on the Roman Empire, which had baths and used aqueducts.. and it is the heart of the Empire, in essence it is what Rome was to the Roman Empire. Sewer systems, baths, etc etc. In the places where this isn't the case there is more grime, for example, Bravil.

We also seem to be getting our info on how clean they were from another videogame.

Yeah, I think what it is mostly is that people don't want to buy a computer game that has towns that look squalid with its denizens covered in filth, so the devs don't make them that way. Plus, it'd just take more time and money on something that really isn't that important.

I think even the Imperial City would be dirty as well. Just because there is a sewage system doesn't mean that people will want to go down to the river to take a dump. I'm sure, if Tamriel were real, that people would be emptying their chamber pots out onto the streets.

The French had access to baths back in those days but they never used them. We have garbage cans now, in the 21st century, but as you can tell, people don't use them.
And magic doesn't keep people from living in filth.