I'm reading my eyes red, at the UESP and Imperial Library. There's enough lore, official and otherwise, to create a solar system. An "Empire of the Sun," because galactic civilization is hokey and unnecessarily complicated. I think sci-fi is Tamriel's future, but what do you all think? If you do want a robust sci-fi theme, would you want to keep the mystical world or is Star Trek your flavor? Discuss, shoot me down, etc.

There's a colony on the moon established in the Second Era.
We've had space travel for forever (sunbirds, mannanauts, moonsugar, etc.).
We also have internet (well...hyperdimensional telepathic afterlife hacking, but same difference really).
Science Fantasy is already upon us.

EDIT: I can find sources if you want.

TES will always be mystical fantasy, it's just that we aren't used to having these kinds of things in fantasy (like internet and spaceships).

I'd rather explore the rest of Tamriel. There are plenty of sci-fi games out there already if we want to vist strange planets via space travel.

i think sci-fi and TES should stay apart


FAR apart


although cutting up a cliffracer with a lightsaber would be fun, it just doesnt fit the bill

I doubt Bethesda will exhaust the potential of Nirn or even Tamriel any time soon, but if they do, I guess I wouldn't mind a bit of Spelljammer in my Elder Scrolls..

But really, I'd rather they elaborate on the world they've already created, rather than expand in a completely new, uncertain direction.

There's been a "sci-fi" (for lack of a better word) touch in the Elder Scrolls since the start, but it's a light touch of purely mystical and magical nature. Outer space is the Void. The planets are the Aedra. The moons are Lorkhan. The Sun is a giant hole leading to Aetherius, the realm of magicka, and the stars are much smaller holes. Space travel is a common event.

Divayth Fyr practiced genetic engineering. Direnni Tower is the spaceship Akatosh came down in. And clearly the Dwemer demonstrate the potential of technological advancement in the Elder Scrolls universe.

I don't think an Elder Scrolls game will ever be called a sci-fi game, but those characteristics are there, lying underneath all the fantasy.

This.

We have this dumb notion that fantasy=medieval stuff.

When in reality fantasy=fantasy; that is, stuff that doesn't exist.

These things still make TES fantasy, because Sunbrids and Mannanauts and Dreamsleeve and Aedric Planets don't exist in reality.

So much this!

I think the "sci-fi" aspect of TES is just another thing that makes that world really unique. It's not just your typical sword and sorcery fantasy. It pulls from so many other genres—sci-fi, steampunk, horror, mythology (wait, that's not a genre....)—and it does it well. It's not just a mish mash of all these unrelated elements forced together. It all feels natural to that world.
Besides, if space is good enough for the Muppets, it's good enough for TES.

Now, I don't think it should become completely sci-fi with everyone flying around in Star Destroyers while talking on their iPhones, but what's in there now fits quite well. It's a little more "magical" and not quite as "science-y."

No "we" don't. I don't think medival, when I think Tamriel. And when I think sci-fi, I don't drift into lightsabers and blasters. Dune (the book), the Starkiller draft, Alpha Centauri, Firefly, THX, and Morrowind have my heart.

I haven't played Arena, but, like I said, I've done some reading. Arena's bereft of sci-fi, and mysticism isn't a genre or a setting, Velorian. No story is told without REAL magic. We could never remove the fantasy from TES, anyhow.

By the way, I love Daggerfall, Morrowind, and Skyrim. I entered the series with Oblivion - I'm not flaming anybody's favorite toy. I just believe the series is a closet science fiction. Anyhow, I have one of the answers I came for, so I won't drag this topic along.

By way of comparison, Star Wars is fantasy of the swords and sorcery type. TES have their own unique blend of various fictional elements. If any of the games was more sci-fi than the others, it's TES III MW, with all of that dwemer backstory.

TES and Sci-fi? You mean something like the old Might and Magic series with spacemen crashing in the sea? Gives me a warm fuzzy feeling just thinking about the Overthruster, the Heavenly Forge and an endless supply of futuristic weaponry. At the time MM VII For Blood and Honor gave Daggerfall a good run for my play time. Sounds like fun but on second thought I like The Elder Scrolls just the way it is.

I've always liked the spacefaring aspect of the setting's background. I remember scouring in-game books (on TIL) looking for more information than a single mention in... was it the Monomyth or one of the Anuads?.. the Twelve Worlds of Creation. Apparently there was a cataclysm (Padhomey swung his sword, or something), the twelve planets were... destroyed? Thrown out of alignment? And so bits and pieces of all of them were combined to create Nirn, with a large chunk of one of the Twelve, Ehlnofey, crashing more or less intact, while the only other survivors from the Twelve were the Hist. Dreaugh are different somehow, as well, I think.

It's fascinating, and I really wouldn't mind a story that involved getting into a spaceship and... going somewhere. But I don't think the other planets support life any more. I think everyone who still lives a mortal life lives on Nirn. Maybe there are survivors on that Second Era moon colony... but somehow, I doubt it.

We have the dwarven ruins


Steam powered robots and such=steampunk

steampunk=a type of sci-fi

Skyrim has Dwemer flash drives that interface with your brain. Parts of Battlespire take place on an Imperial space station. Morrowind's main quest is about a robot. It's still not sci-fi, but people like to A: pretend all the pre-established space lore is sci fi and B: pretend it somehow breaks the tone to... continue having it be there.

Excuse me, professor Toppa, but Akulakhan is not a robot. You can also drop that derisive, high handed tone. You read like those crotchy, 14 year old "dinosaurs," in Fallout general.

Now, if you want to read my op's two questions and participate, please do Can we leave the lectures, now?

A: Numidium, and therefore Akulakhan, are called by the official designation "stompyrobot." That's exactly what they are.

I am just responding to a post that is rooted in assumptions that are dead wrong (That space makes TES sci fi and that continuing to include the space stuff will somehow break the series tone). If you're gonna pretend to be witty at someone, do it to flabber, please. And if you're assuming a topic that in any way brushes on lore (and Space TES does) is going to stick anywhere near it's OP, well then you ought to go look in TES Lore and think about that again.

EDIT: And trust me, that wasn't me being derisive, or lecturing. If I was, you'd know.

There are a variety of interpretations as to what all this stuff is... but it's a pretty common theory that there is "science fiction" going on behind the scenes. Numidium and Akulakhan are gundams. Pelinal was a Terminator. Vehkships and Sunbirds and Mananauts. Akatosh's giant crashed spaceship. The impression I get is that "alien astronauts" theory behind gods and magic is basically true in TES... but the world in TES works in a manner sufficiently different from our own that it isn't basic science fiction. It's fantasy... but it's a very well thought out fantasy.

I consider "hard" science fiction to operate under the assumption that everything works more or less the same as it does IRL... with one or two assumptions about how things work that we don't yet understand. It's generally written by people with an actual professional background in the sciences. "Soft" science fiction genres, such as Space Opera, are basically traditional stories told in the kinds of settings originally described by science fiction authors ("In Space!"). Most fantasy is similar: "swords and sorcery" are traditional stories told in fantasy settings. But there is a fantasy equivalent to "hard" science fiction.

Just as you need practicing scientists to originate hard sci-fi, the writers of what might be called "hard" fantasy also have academic backgrounds. Anybody can write in a swords and sorcery type of setting (what I call "Elf Opera"), but it took a guy with a PhD level background in medieval languages and mythologies to originate the genre. I don't know the backgrounds of the writers for The Elder Scrolls series (particularly, but not necessarily limited to, Michael Kirkbride), but some of them have got to have some kind of academic and/or religious backgrounds that differ from the usual.

"Hard" science fiction generally involves settings that metaphyisically conform to the world we assume we live in, but can be radically different due to differing levels of human understanding and capabilities. "Hard" fantasy, on the other hand, involves settings that are deceptively similar to the world we live in (or at least settings we are comfortable with)... but are radically different at the metaphysical level, which underlies both the magic we think is the usual, AND the weird outlandish stuff that crops up and surprises us. Tolkein's work operated this way. So do, I believe, The Elder Scrolls.

Why the hell don't we just have a damn like button? Good one, Tarvok.

Kurt Kuhlmann has a degree in History. So... yeah.

Ballin', point proven.

didnt we send the cliffracers to space?

or was it that slave? here not to long ago..

I think maybe a DLC where the player gets to rebuild some sort of Dwemer exploration vehicle capable of space travel might be a cool idea, if there's ever like a TES: Hammerfell or something like that (although it was explored in TES2). I just don't think a full game revolving around space, especially in the TES series, would be a very good idea.

Why? (Almost) every culture has spaceships, and there is an Imperial colony on the moon. There is no mention of Dwemer ever going into space, while Imperials and Altmer accomplish this feat regularly. Some people need to learn that TES =/= what you saw in Skyrim. (Though I can see from your join date that you most likely have played earlier TES games.)

Well all of TES =/= what we see in any one game. "'t's only a model" and all that. Instead of space we get Dwemer-brain flash drives from Avunchundzel. I can imagine that when you have to pick, you go with the one that's cheaper to animate.

If you think about skyrim is a bit sci fi since its a different planet than earth. There are bits and peices of sci fi around elder scrolls games. But I believe bethesda needs to keep space and aliens in the fallout category.