Since the days of Arena which made (at the time) ground breaking use of procedurally generated terrain, dungeons and quests to present players with the entire continent of Tamriel across which they could romp, the elder scrolls games have always been the epitome of open-world RPG design, with their sandbox features and freedom of play.

Much of this design was secondary to the original development goals for Arena, and while the approach was initially met by gamers with limited sales, the game itself became a cult classic with month on month growth in units sold.
Melee combat itself used a novel active movement approach, which had players slashing side to side with the mouse or using thrusting and blocking movements.

Arena contained a magic system that encouraged emergent game play, with spells like Wizard Lock, Passwall, Pitfall, Earthwall and Levitation, which all could be used to limit or enhance your freedom to move about in the world, making the terrain a non-static affair. In addition to this there was a “spell creation tool” that allowed players to combine up to 3 effects in one spell and modify the parameters of those effects which gave literally thousands of spell options.

Whilst game play in Arena was primarily about dungeon runs, the game also included a modest set of systems for town/city adventures, with thievery and village gossip.
The novel sandbox approach had won over many fans.



In the elder scrolls follow-up, Daggerfall, the world itself was physically smaller, though still enormous and the game systems had been refined and built upon.

Daggerfall featured 34 skills, from combat (weapon based skills and special skills like dodging, backstabbing and critical strike) to skills with magic. Movement based skills (swimming, stealth, running, jumping and climbing) and utility skills (medical, lock picking, pickpocket) conversation skills (streetwise, etiquette, mercantile). There were even a range of skills in dealing with various monster factions (Draconic, Nymph, Centaurian, Daedric) which were used to simulate language, lore and handling.
The class system had been enhanced with the feature of players designing their own class along with choosing its major/minor skill combinations.

The magic system had the spell maker that existed with Arena, but built upon this with enchantment of items and player alchemy and doubled the number of spells to 100.

A reputation and faction system was designed, and both vampirism (with vampire hunters) and lycanthropy (two forms, werewolf and wereboar) were included.
Daggerfall whilst smaller geographically, was more developed than Arena in almost every way.

The main quest story, whilst there, could effectively be ignored and the player was free to play hundreds of character concepts within the regions of Highrock and Hammerfell. From a scum of the earth rogue, who stalked the streets of the cities looking for a mark, to the classical knight that completed quests and parlayed diplomatically with the nobles, from a nefarious nosferatu, stalking the land at night with supernatural strength, to a scholarly sage, that studied arcane lore and nature alike to craft ensorcelled artefacts and dubious brews.

Both Arena and Daggerfall used 3d graphical engines that were for their time quite advanced.

Battlespire and Redguard were both non-open world games. As standalone adventures, they drew upon the lore and many of the systems used in previous TES games, but were not designed as open world games.



The next TES game to use open world design was Morrowind which had many critics, and yet many more fans.
Morrowind, set on an island off from Tamriel, maintained true to many of the systems and design principles that made Daggerfall. The game world had again shrunk in size, with a focus on creating more hands on environments rather than the heavy reliance on procedurally generated terrain. Procedural generation was still used, but development tools allowed touch-ups and more intentional design. The graphics engine itself was a step up in realism, and to this day continues to be enhanced by community members to present a visually stunning world.

The number of skills in Morrowind had been reduced down to 27, which still granted players some considerable flexibility in character concepts, however made several skills much more generic in nature. Most notably Speechcraft, Security and Athletics. Combat skills around armor/weapon types still existed, but gone were skills in backstabbing and critical strikes, becoming a sub effect of the stealth system.

The stealth system had been somewhat enhanced and while Morrowinds social/societal setting was vastly different to that of daggerfall, there were still stories and non-scripted opportunities to play the social miscreant or dubious thug.
Magic in Morrowind had some minor tweaks, enchantment, spell creation and alchemy still existed, though the system for alchemy had been expanded upon greatly. There were 139 different spell effects that could be combined and tweaked, however by this stage some spell effects such as those that created or removed walls were gone due to the new engine that was being used.

Vampirism and multiple vampire factions existed and Lycanthropy (werewolves only) was added with the bloodmoon expansion.

With Morrowind, gamers were given a modern take on the elder scrolls open-world design, with the tools to customise characters and play in a culturally unique and breathing world. Most importantly Morrowind was released with a development toolset which allowed players to tweak or completely re-design the game world and many of its systems.

Morrowind did receive criticisms of poorly scripted events and having a main quest that could be effectively completed within minutes. However most agree that the open-world design of Morrowind was solid and the scale of character concept options were largely maintained from Daggerfall.



In 2006, and after two expansions to Morrowind, the next chapter of the elder scrolls was told with Oblivion.

Oblivion again presented an improved graphical engine however the province of Cyrodiil failed to capture much of the high fantasy feel of its predecessor. Where the geography of Cyrodiil was smaller again than the landmass of Morrowind, the attempt at blending the diverse cultures of Tamriel also didn’t quite work, and most of the province felt generic.

In addition to the art style, the 3 dimensional freedoms previously exhibited in level design of Morrowind was lacking in Oblivion, primarily due to the removal of all forms of levitation. Dungeons became much more linear and “on-the-rails” in their design. Matching this design shift, quests while largely optional still, were more limited in the ways they could be completed.
Choices with character design were once again reduced with a reduction to 21 skills. Weapon and armour choices were reduced and weapon/armour skills streamlined with the long and short blade skills from Morrowind being merged into blade and spear and medium armour removed altogether.

The magic system was re-worked with only 62 spell effects, compared to the 100 effects in Arena and 139 effects in Morrowind. Enchanting was limited to items only, and spell scrolls could no longer be produced by players. Though scrolls still existed in the game, players could not reasonably role-play a scribe.
Lycanthropy was not included, and there were fewer factional conflicts that the player could engage in. Radiant AI, which was intended to provide more lifelike action from NPC’s provided little more than pathing/animation schedules, making the promise of less wooden NPC’s a hollow one.

One area where Oblivion did build upon Morrowind was with the stealth system, which had its mechanics much improved with regards to light and noise sensitivity.
Overall, even after the shivering isles expansion and several DLC, Oblivion offered less freedoms than Morrowind, and whilst popular in its own right, Oblivion received a wide range of criticisms from fans that were use to successive TES chapters expanding upon the scope of the open world RPG design.

After defining open world RPGs as a sub-genre, was Oblivion removing some of the sand from the sandbox? Or was it just the case that fans were so use to growth in scope that less of anything or even failure to enhance felt like less freedoms?



And now comes Skyrim.

Whilst unreleased, it is not reasonable to directly compare the open world or RPG features of Skyrim to the previous TES chapters. However, at this point quite a bit of detail has been confirmed around Skyrims design.

We know that the graphical engine has again been vastly improved.

We know that the land mass of Skyrim is comparable to Cyrodiil in Oblivion, but that it has been designed to “feel” larger due to obstacles of terrain.

We know that attributes, which affected various sub-attributes, have been removed. Does this make some character concepts un-buildable? Can we play a fast(speed) weakling(endurance), can we build an ugly/offensive(personality) sage(wisdom)? How do we tell the game world what our character is, will the AI know how to react to my role-played character?

We know that skills have been reduced to 18, however there are now perk trees attached to each skill. Many of the removed skills were merged but some appear to not exist at all, particularly the mobility skills. Will this affect freedom in how we interact with the world? Can we still play the character of an agile acrobat, or a healthy soldier that is use to fast-marching across the continent without rest? If there are less mobility options will this mean dungeon design is more linear again than Oblivion? Is their less choice in dealing with the world in non-violent ways?

We know that classes, either predefined or custom no longer exist in the sense of primary/secondary skill focus. The new design implies that you are what you use. Does this mean role-playing a character concept requires more intention from a player? Without a class name, and set of primary skills to remind us of the characters concept, will characters require more attention to define? Will sequential characters be doomed to becoming defined only by those skills we gravitate towards each time we start with a new character?

We know that weapon/armour choices are limited types that were present in Oblivion, however they can now be dual wield. 3rd person perspective has been polished and killing blows take control of your character for cinematic flair. Whilst demonstrations of general combat appear smoother, will the abrupt “killing blow takeovers” interrupt immersion? Will there be sufficient weapon/armour choice to make melee characters feel fresh or will each melee character just feel like a variation of the last?

We know that unarmed combat is no longer a skill, but not what this means for bar-fights or the feasibility of unarmed combat as a fighting style. Can monks and brawler character concepts still effectively be role-played, or are they no longer an option?

We know that NPC interactions are now affected by Radiant Story, which purportedly introduces much more flexibility in the manner NPCs react and interact with the player, as well as make quest designs more dynamic. Will this work, or will we get results similar to Radiant AI, which promised us a breathing world and delivered windup mannequins?

We know that magic use has been fully redesigned, with spells being wield in the casters hand like orbs, and there is some interaction between the left and right hands for some spells. We also now know that Bethesda do not expect there to be a system of spell creation in Skyrim, at least not at launch. Will there be enough variety to satisfy players with magical options to interact with the world, is it more choice or less? Does the inability of players to design spells that combine multiple effects limit the player or set them free?

We know that birth-signs are not set at the birth of the character; rather characters can switch to the sign of their choice at any point by visiting locations in the game. Is this freedom to evolve our characters or a lack of definition on whom our character really is?

We know that skills of crafting have been expanded upon. Alongside Alchemy, Enchanting makes a return to the series and artisan crafting of weapons and armour is now a skill open to players. Are we making items only for our own use or can we establish a business? Can we affect the world’s economy by producing items as well as loot-[censored]?

We know that Relationships with NPC’s are intended to be more evolved and meaningful, with the design of companions and romantic relationships. Will this be a more mature type of interaction than mannequins on auto-follow, will our characters be able to interact physically in more ways than simply taking a sword to them?

We know there are child npc’s populating the world. Being an often asked for feature, will this new feature make the world feel more real, or will arguably necessary limitations on player interaction with them break immersion or make negatively affect the aspect of choice that open-world design heavily draws upon?

We know that the main story-quest requires your character to be a “Dragon-born”. Is this a carrot, a stick or a rail that we cannot remove ourselves from? Will we constantly be called “Dovakhiin” by NPC’s who expect us to save their world, or will we be able to re-play the game as an anonymous beggar, or travelling merchant for whom the dragon attacks are nothing more than dangerous disruptions to their trade routes?



From my current perspective, Skyrim has some obvious improvements along the lines of open-world RPG design, there are some design choices that may or may not work out, and then there are some obvious gaps where the design of Skyrim will reduce choice and openness of play.


At this point, months from release, there is a fair amount we know about Skyrim, and there is even more that we do not know. Will the game be a more open and free RPG than Oblivion, or Morrowind, or Daggerfall for that matter, or will it feel like a more restrictive, smaller and less flexible world to role-play in? Until release we will not really know. What are your thoughts?

Hmm abit long? If u want sandbox go play minecraft

tl;dr

We didn't know how this game could turn. there's only little info revealed

and no, they didn't removed the sand. they just make the sand more smooth so anyone could play in the box.

just wait till around december and the 'whole' score for Skyrim will be scored

That is waaay TL;DR.

Whilst your free to not read the post, it would be polite to refrain from responding to something you didn't read. :rolleyes:

I read it.


I think you're worrying too much. Skyrim will be the best TES games yet. Yes, I'm sad about everything that's been taken out -- armour slots, spells, even attributes. But I actually think it will be better this way. Plus if they can pull off Radiant Story... :ahhh: OMGOMGOMGOMG!!!

I think this will be the greatest TES to date.

I read it. I agree that roleplaying might be a tad harder and if people call you the dovahkiin that limits who you're character is. BUT: I don't think NPCs will adress you like that until they know you are the hero, thus a little later in the story. So if you don't start the story, maybe they'll just call you N'wah or sth like that.

The "be who you play" is not really a restriction on roleplaying, it's more realistic. In Oblivion you could be good in alchemy without ever using it, simply by selecting it as major skill. Now, you aren't an alchemist unless you spend time performing alchemy. In real life you aren't an alchemist because you chose to be an alchemist when you're young. You are an alchemist because you spend your time with alchemy and gain experience by doing so.

:tes:

I guess alot will depend on how/if Skyrim can be developed after release, either via DLC/XP or via the community.
Still, its dissapointing that after Daggerfall, improvements in gameplay has had to come at the expense of choice and/or world design.

The history and scope you presented in covering it in your post (It seems a lot of people think the series started with The Elder Scrolls III, for some reason.) is impressive and it's nice for someone to have a clue on what they're talking about in relation to the series, as a whole, but I do have a few points of contention. For one thing, Oblivion's world was practically a replica of what you seem to believe are the "high fantasy" worlds of Arena and Daggerfall... albeit in a more Morrowind-style design. I don't know why you believe it somehow failed to capture some level of fantasy present in past Elder Scrolls games in comparison to Arena and Daggerfall. Medieval forest with magic = medieval forest with magic, so... :shrug: In addition, while Daggerfall had a 3D game engine, Arena's was more 2.5D. Anyway, I don't believe they are removing the sand. They're changing the color of some of the sand, perhaps, but not removing it except in a few sporadic cases (the lack of spell-crafting seems odd)... and no, I don't believe Oblivion removed any sand. Anything it featured a reduction in, some past game did the same before it, or did something of even lower magnitude. I say that because you have this wonderful post just praising the great things of the series, but then you get to Oblivion and start throwing some unfair criticisms at it (setting is the same as Arena and Daggerfall's, skill merges have been made with Morrowind while Arena had absolutely no skills, etc.). If one was satisfied with and loved all Elder Scrolls games, to date... I would find it strange that that person notices differences with one game that existed in another, but doesn't seem to realize they're in that other.

In real life, you are an alchemist because you had an education as one - another alchemist introduced you to the art, or you at least did quite some reading on it. Simply throwing stuff together without any background knowledge is not the way to become an alchemist, it's a way to become a corpse.... While of course you can gain experience practicing something, practice alone isn't everything. And especially with dangerous activities, without someone telling you what to do, practice alone isn't a very effective way.

On the other hand it could be said to be strange that you consider doing something several times over as not being indicative of a trend and has having a more significant effect than only doing it once. You say they don't remove the sand - fair enough. But given the increasing lack of granularity, it could be said they turn it into bricks. Instead of being able to really shape your experience yourself, you get a bunch of building blocks. It's fun to play with Lego, true, but the shapes you can generate with sand are much more varied.

Thanks for youe reply,
I guess what I was getting at with this is to ask, will this mean the way we roleplay will need to change? Role-players are use to thinking out the concept of their character at character creation, and then playing in a way to match that concept, with the systems helping them to stay in character. I mean, if you started with-out chosing alchemy as a major skill in most TES games, you would find it very hard to accidentaly become a master alchemist, yet this is entirely posible with Skyrim. You could intend to play a rogue, and end up being more of a berzerker, simply because you didn't find opportunities to use pick-pocket/sneak/lockpick skills.
I don't really have an answer, its just a prompt for discussion.



Thankyou,
To be fair, whilst there were things I disliked, I did enjoy Oblivion. What I was inadvertently exemplefying was my closing question on Oblivion, " was it just the case that fans were so use to growth in scope that less of anything or even failure to enhance felt like less freedoms?"
For sure Oblivion was leaps and bounds ahead of Arena and Daggerfall in many areas, but in some hard to define ways, it felt less. Yes Oblivion was high fantasy, but many aspects of the province felt as wooden as Arena, where procedural generation made the world expansive but hollow. After Morrowind, which was a evolution in realism and open world design, Oblivion failed to match my, and many others, high expectations.

If you remove the sand from a sand box you are left with a box... and cat poo.

Too Long, Didnt read.

On a purely physical level, I could then argue that bricks are more stable and make for a better foundation, though.

A very well thought out and written post. Excellent.
I agree with everything you say.

To my mind, yes. Yes, they are removing the sand from the sandbox.

P.S. If people are unable to read a text that isnt as long as a page in a book would be and then post very aggrevating comments as: tl,dr..
Well, I dont think I can express the sentiment in a polite manner.
Possibly I should interject a abbreviation of my own : LTR (learn to read).

Very thoughtful post, OP! :foodndrink:

We do know some facts about Skyrim, and we can make some comparisons, but it's still way too early to make a definitive judgement as to whether Skyrim gameplay, on the whole, will be more restrictive or provide greater freedom of choice, more complex or less complex, on the whole, than Oblivion.

And it is Oblivion that is the benchmark by which Skyrim should be judged, not Arena, Daggerfall or Morrowind. Each new chapter in the Elder Scrolls series is an iteration on the previous game. There are certainly influences and traditions from all the games, but the starting point for Bethesda's dev team is always going to be the game that immediately preceded.

For example, if there has been a steady reduction in the number of skills with each TES chapter, and Oblivion had 21 skills, no one in their right mind could reasonably expect that for Skyrim the devs were suddenly going to hearken back to Daggerfall and increase the number of skills to 34.

Obviously, the open world sandbox aspect of the game is not limited to the terrain you can traverse or the number of magical ways you can transport yourself. The more layers to the game world, layers of activities, complex organizations you can join, complexity of the economy, complexity of the interaction with NPCs, complexity of the quests, all those things add up to more choices, more freedom and a deeper role-playing experience - more ways to play the role, take the actions you feel your character ought to take.

Certainly there are some of these layers of gameplay that have been removed in the transition from Oblivion to Skyrim, but even within the context of the very few details we already know, there are other layers that have been added to the game, for example it seems likely there will be greater complexity in the PC's interactions with NPCs, more joinable factions:

The Companions
The College of Winterhold
The Thieves Guild
The Dark Brotherhood
The Riverwood Tavern Clan
The Stormcloaks
(and it would certainly seem odd if you can join the Stormcloaks without being able to join the Loyalist side)

Each of the Nine Holds will comprise a separate, unique location faction with a more complex reputation system than Oblivion's slight disposition boosts for closing Oblivion gates near a city.

We have numerous crafting mechanics in the game, far more than Oblivion, including, for example, six different stages of preparing materials for smithing.

There are quite a few new features and details that suggest greater complexity and more layers of gameplay in certain areas, even as certain layers of gameplay (such as attributes, athletics, acrobatics and spellmaking) are removed.

On the whole, we certainly cannot yet definitively call Skyrim "streamlined," "dumbed down," or even "less complex than" Oblivion. There are far too many details we still do not know about the gameplay.

On that level, I can use the sand to make cement, and eventually concrete, out of the sand

ok

Why not? That would suggest that it's impossible that something doesn't work out - essentially postulating infallibility. In fact, your own post will show that this isn't the case.



Which is essentially a return in that aspect to a more Morrowind-like gameplay.



That is your opinion. On the other hand, it could be argued that the question how good the stereo in your car is, how many buttons it has, if it has a panorama roof, aluminium wheels, two, four or five seats, a trunk worth that name etc. are all secondary to the question "How does it drive?" No amount of bells and whistles is going to redeem a car that's totally clunky to drive. Likewise, if my character in an RPG consistently appears like a strange to me, there is no help in giving me plenty of people to interact with, factions to join if in doing so, I lead conversations my character wouldn't lead in that way, I need to do things my character wouldn't do or, on the other hand, am precluded of choosing those options that my character would choose.

I'd make glass. It's prettier and more open to artistic design.

Anyway, there is something do feel I should strongly criticize (one thing concerning a feature not exclusive to Skyrim, anyway). While people may jest about people overreacting to a lack of spellcrafting and the way people claim it, among other things, is a staple of the series, there is actually some truth to that claim. Back in 1994, when Arena was released, one of its most prized points was the fact that it had spellcrafting. Spellcrafting was, as far as I know, something very rarely, if ever, seen, before. It was a high point that some of the game's reputation was built upon and it was the snowball that started the avalanche, so to speak. That one shining aspect of customization in Arena, an otherwise RPG-lite dungeon-crawler/roguelike, was one of the earliest indications of the series' future customizable glory. To this day, there are still few games outside of Bethesda's that have attempted to allow spell-crafting. So, in a sense, it is a major, core part of the series and it is perhaps one of the most prominent examples of a beloved feature that spanned the entire series... up until now, anyway. I will be highly sad to see it go and I'd urge Bethesda to do whatever they can to make sure that fate is avoided.

You make a very good point about the often un-acknowledged layers of choice, however i would make a counterpoint, that while there are many indications that skyrims social systems may offer more choice and superior open-word design to Oblivion, Oblivion had taken a step backward in this aspect from what was delivered in Morrowind.

Obviously I disagree that Skyrim should only be compared to Oblivion, hence why I included context of all of the TES series, but if we were to look at oblivion alone, assuming the hype comes to fruition it may indeed be overall more rather than less. When we look at something like Radiant Story however, we see something that is tainted with the misfortune of having Radiant in its name, which harkens back to the promise of Radiant AI, which was wholly over-hyped, and this makes me cautious.

It's completely unreasonable. Oblivion was their starting point, not Morrowind, Arena or Daggerfall. They finished Oblivion and they drew up a laundry list of what they would like to do differently, what they would like to improve upon, from Oblivion, not Arena, Daggerfall or Morrowind.


Morrowind, Arena and Daggerfall do not even enter into the equation. The devs are attempting to make a better overall game than Oblivion. That is their ground zero. Adding any particular feature that may have been in a previous game does not equal a any sort of attempt to return to Morrowind.



You are certainly free to make any judgements you like about Skyrim, but obviously it is quite impossible to evaluate the relative merits of Skyrim vs. Oblivion, on the whole, if we do not yet know all the elements that comprise that whole.



I really don't understand what you're saying here. Perhaps you could explain this in a different way?

If this is indeed the case, then I would suggest this represents short-sightedness.

Thank you Seti, for saying something I wanted to say, but couldn't find the words. :rock: