I will be honest here and say I've never had the privilege of playing any of the Elder Scrolls games before Oblivion. I got into them when Oblivion came out, and currently play Skyrim. I was thinking about starting from the first one, which I think is Daggerfall if I am not mistaken, all the way back up to Skyrim in chronological order. My question is do the games sort of take after one another as far as story, and time goes? Will the end of the main quest in Daggerfall lead into the main story of the next one, etc?

I find my self lost, and confused in a lot of the lore when it comes to the Elder Scrolls world and think this would be a fun way to learn the lore (provided they chain from each other), aside from just reading wiki articles, which I have also done. This will also give me a chance to play the other games, and not miss out!

So please let me know folks! Is Daggerfall worth playing and would playing all of them in order be fun? Worth it? Thanks!

Eh, I havent played them myself yet, but if you go to Bethesda's website, they have the old ones downloadable for free (Arena and Daggerfall IIRC)

No, they're not in order like that. They do take place after one another, but (lore) stuff happens in between. The first game is Arena by the way. Both Arena and Daggerfall are available for free, just check their main site's download section.

Excellent I will take a look. I think it would be great if the games sort of follow after one another and progress thru time from Arena all the way up to Skyrim. Would be fun to live and play in different times of the Elder Scrolls world. Maybe meet characters in the earlier games that are dead in the newer games, but talked about in books and by NPC's

Warning, you'll probably never get past the beginning areas of Arena or Daggerfall they're so hard. Also, Arena and Daggerfall have both been retconned pretty heavily anyway (Arena especially).

You're better off just going with Morrowind fully decked out with all the graphics mods, code patch, etc etc IMO. Unless you're really into retro games that is.

So it doesnt go from Arena being the earliest years of the Elder Scrolls world to Skyrim being the latest years of the world? Pardon me for not knowing exactly how they manage their time and years but using an example I can relate to, and I'll use random dates, it doesnt go like Arena 1900, Daggerfall 1910, etc, etc, Skyrim 1999. I know it sounds funny using dates like that but its simple numbers I can relate to

I do not mind retro games as I find it very intriguing, and entertaining to see how a series progresses from its earliest games all the way up to their most recent games. Seeing graphical changes, mechanical changes, etc.

Words of wisdom. I got super confused in Daggerfall, the graphics were something a youngster like me just isn't used to. Morrowind is awesome though, to build on what moose said, get the Morrowind Graphics Extender (MWGE) as soon as possible. A quick Google search should point you in the right direction.

Edit:
Roughly it goes like that, but for example, Skyrim takes place about 200 years after Oblivion. That's why you see the Dominion in Skyrim and not Oblivion.

Well arena starts in 3E 399, Daggerfall begins in 3E 405, Morrowind is 3E 427, Oblivion is 3E 433 and Skyrim is 4E 201.

Alright. Kind of disappointing to hear I suppose. Will playing from Morrowind up to Skyrim give me some decent background as to what is going on, and what has BEEN going on in the Elder Scrolls world then? I struggle with literature, and always have so trying to read all the wiki articles on lore makes it hard for me to get a good idea on the whole story. Especially with all the different names, factions, locations, etc. I just thought actually playing thru what those articles spoke of would paint a better picture for me.

EDIT: I've never actually felt the desire to learn so much about a game worlds lore but with how deep the stories and lore seems to be with this series it really makes me wanna go the extra mile to get as much joy out of the entire series as I can. I think its quite rich and interesting.

To understand the Morrowind story, it'd help to read about the Daedric lords and the Tribunal. Pretty sure there are a few books on them. The rest will unravel before you. Look forward to some cutscenes, too! It's a shame they didn't have them in Oblivion, and Skyrim's live-action style lead to a couple bugs that just broke the cutscene altogether - but that's all beside the point.

I disagree with the others and, if like you said graphics don't bother you, I'd definitely check out Daggerfall. It is easily the best from the whole series from a role playing perspective. It's got a lot of features which are just plain awesome.

And you can try it out for free.

Thank you all for the replies so far, very much appreciated. That said I apologize if I keep asking the same questions, I just want to make sure I am understanding all of what you folks are trying so hard to help me understand, heh. Here is another example. Lets say in Skyrim an NPC says something like "hundreds of years ago when ruled here, or did this or that" will these be names and people I will get to encounter during Morrowind and/or Oblivion so that when such names come up in Skyrim I can go "oh hey yeah I remember him from Morrowind/Oblivion"

I disagree with your objection and challenge you to a duel.

One of the main keys to learning the lore is reading the in-game books.
They give many clue about the lore and things to come.

I am quite excited to go ahead and load up on the Elder Scrolls series and have just one more follow up question to my last one (see above). Steam has a pretty solid package that includes Morrowind, Oblivion, the expansions to both, as well as Skyrim for $70. Great deal if you ask me. I did some googling to see if the steam versions are mod-able and found contradicting answers, and most were pretty old sources dating back to 2008, so I want to make sure. Will I be able to easily install mods for Morrowind, and Oblivion with the steam version or should I go out tomorrow morning and try to find some hard copies? (I'd rather have the steam version as its my preferred method of keeping all my games together and easily accessible.)

I suppose I'll give this a bump as its kind of important considering I am about to make a purchase. Short version: google turned up mixed results and old sources when trying to find out if the steam version of Morrowind and Oblivion are mod-able. Can I mod the steam version of these two titles or should I go hunt down the box copies?

Yep, you will. In daggerfall you meet Barenziah and Helseth, who you will meet again in morrowind. You may know barenziah from the books in all the games. You also meet the king of worms in daggerfall, who you meet again in oblivion(I think that's actually him...).

Also if you read the in game books, you will hear names of towns that you won't get to visit until skyrim and such. An example is "The real Barenziah" books talk about skyrim towns such as riften and whiterun 10+ years before they were introduced into the actual game.


I would just skip Arena, honestly. Start with daggerfall for sure. That is when the lore really starts. All you need to know about arena is that the imperial battlemage jagar tharn imprisoned the emperor for 10 years and pretended to be him during that time, then was destroyed.

If you're after Elder Scrolls Lore, check out the http://www.imperial-library.info/...it's a rich source of knowledge and information, and a must-have for all Lore fiends!

You are going to find that Arena, Daggerfall, and Morrowind are very different when compared to Oblivion and Skyrim. The first three games in the TES series were RPGs and RPGs (real ones) are not common or popular. Oblivion and Skyrim have carved out just about the last of the RPG elements and are pretty much full-fledged Action/Adventure games with some features that are normally associated with RPGs (but are not actually RPG elements in and of themselves) left in them.

Because you are looking to learn about the past, you will probably still enjoy the earlier games, but don't expect them to be anything like the TES games you are familiar with.

Blasphemy!

To add to this post;

If you don't feel like searching for every single book in-game, you can read them at the http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Books_by_Subject.

What about this folks?

I'll pitch in my opinion. Get a box copy of Morrowind - it'll be $5 or $10 at the most; heck, I picked up a GOTY edition for $2.50 (equivalent) here in England. You could probably find it on Amazon or eBay if you don't have any shops nearby. Plus, there'll be no modding conflicts, and reinstallation (something you might do a few times when modding) will be a breeze.

Oblivion, Steam or disc it, I'm not that familiar with it's structure.

Nonetheless as has already been mentioned Oblivion and Skyrim are very different beasts to their predecessors. You will enjoy them, but in a different way. Saying 'I put 500 hours into Morrowind' is like saying you took a five minute walk to the shop.

You can install Oblivion mods on the steam version. Not sure about Morrowind.

That said, my 2 cents is read the UESP. THat has the entire summary of those games. I too started off with Oblivion, and wanted to play Morrowind to get to understand some of the history. I also downloaded and played Daggerfall.

What i realized was that while Morrowind was a superior storyline (thanks to UESP, I knew the story), it was a worse "gaming experience" due to combat, and older graphics (compared to Oblivion). However much did I try to like it, I never really could get used to those stiff walking animations and kooky combat where you hit someone but it does not connect if your skill is low! I gave up on Morrowind's gameplay, as coming from Oblivion, the technological chasm is too wide!

I tried Daggerfall too, and these same issues were present in a much magnified form, so I quickly gave up.

My suggestion is to read the story, delve into the lore by reading sections on The Imperial Library (another wiki website like the UESP), and just stay with Oblivion and Skyrim for gameplay.