I, like many who traffic the gamesas forums consider myself a lore buff and an avid TES junkie. While my knowledge base is considerable, it is far from perfect and leagues away from the best. That said, I have played countless hours of TES games for the last 11 years and wholly believe that they are an integral aspect of my life, and unfortunately children/ casual gamers are not given the opportunity to discover themselves in a world of choices and situations that one might not regularly be exposed to in real life as I have. And I believe that these tough choices are what ended up making TES games so interesting. And I believe that tough choices are what truly have been eliminated from the franchise. I have played TES 3-5 and FO3 on both console (Xbox and Xbox360) and PC (although controller preferred, which was addressed in Samyoul's video). Samyoul's video directly compares TESIII: Morrowind to TESV: Skyrim since he believes that this decade has yielded the main acceleration in streamlining the series which cannot be argued as that is perceived individually, although I generally agree.

I believe that all 7 of Samyoul's (I hope you don't mind my abbreviating as Sam) points fall under hard choices.

1) You Can't Fail 1a) Important People Can't Die 1b) NPCs Can't Be Offended 1c) You Can't Fail Quests
Failure includes many development scenarios: time decisiveness, self preservation, resource allocation, leveling systems, replayability, multiroute environments, playstyle favoritism, and the "take nothing away from the player" approach discussed by Todd Howard.

These are all choices that were previously made in TES3 and prior games. Do you want the rare armor, or do you want to complete the questlines associated with the character? Do you want to make friends with some clans before others? Am I going to be a mage or a warrior, perhaps a thief? What skills matter to me? These are all tough choices that have been removed from the series. And for their own reasons.
Sure, it is a pain to reload a game after killing an essential NPC when it took you hours to get where you are. But what gets forgotten is the cannon of the game. Very little is discussed about the player's exploits in Morrowind in later games in the series. Almost no lore can be certain because the player had so many choices. It was shocking when Master Neloth was in DB DLC when I am sure there are at least 2 quests where you are required to kill him in Morrowind's story. Oblivion "dumbed" this area down, I believe for both ease of frustration and for the sustainability of storywriting. In Skyrim we see a plethora of nods at TESIV and history the character was involved in. Had the stories not been explicit, and choices predetermined we surely would be seeing more retcon than we see even now. In TESIII the only choice the player couldnt make was whether or not to stop Dagoth Ur, and that is the only story we really hear about. In oblivion and DG DLC and DB DLC we see nods at Jiub and Bloodmoon locations, but in general there are few stories told about the Nerevarine and those are simple statements. The COC, the guilds he was involved in and even the Mad God himself are all referenced in some way.
NPC's are offended, but only when you kill kin. However even killing the warmaiden wont stop her husband from making a quick buck off me. Choices should have consequences beyond general dialogue, but again this reverts to Todd's main statement from which the game was founded. NPCs cant be offended because there are so many strung along the story quests. Random Encounters and quests particularly make NPC interactions complicated, but also held the most potential for deep NPC interaction.

Failing quests is a big deal for cinematic storylines that Oblivion and Skyrim had. Especially the boss and final battles. These scenes were made to be epic, awe inspiring and made for the casual player prone to rage quits. You only feel awesome when you experience it for the first time. This falls into the division between core and hardcoe gamers. A core gamer/ achievement hunter/ game reviewer/ game renter/ buy and return gamer doesnt exist in the PC universe, it is illegal in many states. This is why I believe story missions are short, easy, and lack development. I also believe that is why they are visually inspiring, action oriented, and ego satisfying. The real joys lay in the exploration of the world. Hard opponents, grueling and exhausting dungeons, interesting items and areas, deep stories and character development, treasure maps, recognition of lore and referencing original games (Mara's Tear), the book series (sleeping tree), and occasionally the spinoffs (DB Neloth's staff quests). The paths to the objectives are short and beautiful in stories, long and challenging in adventure.


2) Faction Memberships Have No Consequences
Again, half true. To specify there are no relational consequences for joining any faction outside of the civil war. However, random encounters, player privileges and dialogue are affected by memberships. These are most prevalent in the TG, as you continue through the main and DB quests your relationships in the thieves guild grow apparent as it is constantly referenced. There are a few other conversation gems that can be discovered if you are a werewolf or vampire in the DB. However, to call these consequential and not just side effects or flavor elements is debatable. You never need to kill thieves, or slay mages, or hunt werewolves as quest missions, and you wouldn't be able to due to their essential nature. People never look at you sideways, or have altered dispositions, or deny you privileges based on your choices.

3) Choices Have Little Impact on The World
Again, mostly true. There are side effects, but in general few things happen. I believe that Oblivion was actually the high point of this situation. Closing gates and proceeding through the story completely changed the landscape and the manner in which the player interacted with it. Statues were resurrected and buildings destroyed. Factions crippled and others redefined by the player's choices.
In Skyrim there exists environmental damage as a result of the faction war, guards change, dialogue changes, and history is defined by clear sets of actions that the player has little choice in. In Morrowind I cannot think of too many choices outside of factions that alter much if anything. You can construct and massacre towns, build a shrine to Malacath and stop the blight storms. The fort is attacked, you can build a town, and you can control the life of a company in bloodmoon, and you can undermine the false gods in Tribunal. These are great on paper, but in terms of "paper feats" the Dragonborn stops the world eater, harnesses the power of the Thu'um, changes the history of an entire people, wields the power of the elder scrolls and defines the manifestation of power through vampirism or defeating the first dragonborn.

4) Quest and Journal Systems
I have absolutely no arguments. This was perfectly addressed. Again though, this removes a hard choice the player would have to make. Do it now, or risk the quest being lost in idle pages. Make the player remember people and places, or show them the way. In my opinion, they didnt need both a guide arrow and clairvoyance. I do like the compass however. That was one thing I wished they would improve from Morrowind and they did.

5) Reduced NPC Conversations
Keep in mind that Morrowind did have voice acting, barely, and Arena had actual acting. The difference is the passage of time. Now in Skyrim time continues despite conversation. People come and go as they would realistically. This is a trait that I enjoy about Skyrim. You get the feeling of wasting someone's time. That being said, I do miss the length of NPC dialogue available in Morrowind, but it comes down again to tough choices. Do I waste time buttering up this person, or do I try to figure it out on my own. How much do I really care about the rats eating your pillows? Just point me towards them and give me my money. There were some points where the dialogue in Morrowind seemed unrealistically drawn out and unnecessary for the situation. I think a happy medium is in order, definitely more than Skyrim. Somewhere along Serana's dialogue path for story characters seems almost necessary especially compared to Skjor. "Hmm, I kill silverhand because I am grieving him? The guy I only talked to in order to become a werewolf? Oh, yeah I guess."

6) Oversimplified Puzzles
YES. Every one a lever, column or door puzzle where all they really are is a waste of time. However, from a lore perspective the locks were made to keep things locked in, not locked out. Oblivion only had a handful of decent puzzles as mentioned by Sam, but Morrowind was how I was introduced to the UESP wiki. As a 10-12 yr old many of those puzzles were deep and hard, but I believe they have made me a challenging thinker as a result. Hard choices: Guess and check. Risk failure. Move on. All gone.

7) Reduced Item Values
Again, I believe the economy is broken just like every political anolyst on TV. Also like them, I am not sure about a solution.
The symbolic representation of hard work being placed in the value of material items discovered on the player's adventure is a cornerstone of the TES series. In previous games rare and powerful things were hard to acquire, not necessarily hard to come by. In Oblivion and Skyrim the difficulty of obtaining items still plays a role in its value, but there exists the problem. Deadric quests find you in Skyrim. Rumors, mourning family members in an iconic location, couriers, wanderers, the plagued, fighters, magic orbs and talking dogs seek you out and call you to their master's bidding. The only examples that don't were thrown into the story quests. There is absolutely no difficulty or value in finding these artifacts with the exception of Volendrung which is the most interactive (good hammer, good story, rough fight and world disposition consequences). Befitting their difficulty in acquiring them, these artifacts have limited capability and limited retail value. In Oblivion, a little hunting had to be done, but there was a topic for nearly all deadric quests. Morrowind deadric quests were difficult, hard to come by and worth the effort. Again, hard choices: Do I want the achievement? Is it worth my time? If I dont like it can I get rid of it? Where am I supposed to put this thing? Will I ever use it?

Thanks for reading!