I'm not sure if this has popped up on the Forums yet. Like in Fallout every quest was determined on how you played it out, and the choices you made. This created many more new opportunities every time you replayed the game. In my opinion that was great, I lost count of how many times I played Fallout. Sure you may be "prophesized" to defeat Alduin. But we've seen from time and time again people change their destinies. The main question: Will Skyrim have the same choose as you go sort of feature? Or will it be more like Oblivion's Quests.


Would like to hear peoples thoughts! Thanks!

I like games with just one ending, so im hoping Skyrim will be like Oblivion in that there is only one ending for the main quest.

There were no different endings in the last two previous TES games (Oblivion and Morrowind) but I think there were some in Daggerfall. Considering the fact that pretty much the same people who made Fallout are making Skyrim then I think multiple endings is a thing we might get.

I wouldn`t mind if they did make multiple endings but I`d rather have it so that their time and resource is spent on making some quality quests.

Main Quest should have just one ending in my opinion, maybe u can complete it in different ways but just one..

Despite having many stats, if you can't shape your story, it's not a roleplaying game.

While I agree there should be one single story ending for lore coherence, I would really really like Bethesda to give us more freedom along the main quest. This series is about all kinds of freedom and it's frustrating to have such linear main quests. Let us join the "evil" side if we please even if that means we choose to fail in the end alongside the vilain. More branches in the main quest that allow us to change our allegiances (even multiple times, not just once).

How can you have different endings to this main quest?

Either
A: You successfully stop Alduin from "eating" the world or

B: Everyone dies.

You're prophesized to defeat Alduin, there's no other way around it.

Multiple endings would be great, but expensive since it's multiple OPEN endings to make.

C: You befriend or tame the dragon, Alduin. You then go from town to town, pretending to be hunting dragons. In fact, you`re pulling a scam on them by faking your pet friend dragon`s death. You shoot a measley arrow, Alduin flies into a lake and keeps his breath untill the villagers look away and you get your bag of gold. Then you run to the lake, jump in. From the lake bursts out a flying dragon with you riding it and being like "Thanks for the gold! Seeya svckers!".

Sure, your pet dragon might be phropecised to eat the world. But he doesn`t have to do it RIGHT NOW. He can wait just a couple of thousand years. I imagine dragons live quite long so where`s the hurry?

Does anyone not know the plot of this story? You're the Dragonborn, you either stop Alduin or die.

I say one ending. I'm fine with multiple paths to get there, but I want one ending, otherwise, you either have to undermine the outcomes other players got by just picking one canonical ending, or we'd have to account for another Dragon Break (not too farfetched considering we're against Alduin) and have multiple endings occur all at once, which is messy and just asking for plot holes.


Was this a serious suggestion?

This.

The basic "Destined Hero Saves The World" plotline doesn't really lend itself to alot of variety in endpoints.

(The Beth games I've played have been less about the Main Plot, than they have been about the world that happens to contain that plot.)

try... alternative casualties?

if npc casualties are going to be unavoidable, at least allow us to decide who gets to bite it?
like using DA:O for example, we can choose to have logain deal the final blow instead of the grey warden or alistair do it. or you can just have a good time with morrigan.

let say, in skyrim, there are multiple characters that would help us throughout the main storyline, 1 could be a crucial npc that is the key to a prophesized way of defeating alduin and the other could be a npc that the player can bond with over the course of the mainquest but is essentially powerless when it comes to the final boss. at a certain point, there would be a choice where only one of these 2 can live on and depending on which one lives, the difficulty of the boss and quest(s) that is made available by the surviving npc will vary.

basically, same ending but different scenarios. it's like the chances of either baurus or jauffre accompanying martin in the final quest except you get more control over who lives/dies and the surviving npc will do a lot more than those 2.

Alduin... tame? As much as I may like to have a pet capable of eating the world, I think I'll pass.

Well, if you don`t want to ride a dragon then that`s just your choice then. :mohawk:

See, I don't like that scenario one bit because it detracts from the main story itself when you include so many changes into it that you can make, that it begins to look like it's not a handwritten main quest at all, just a "chose A or B to continue."

Hell, I'm all down for changes/variables in other quest chains, like factions, but leave the main story as it is.

One ending but multiple paths inside the MQ.

Riding a dragon and "taming" the God of Time who is hellbent on literally eating the world are two entirely different things.

So far, Bethesda hasn't said anything about multiple endings, but I suspect we'll get only one ending to the main quest, because Morrowind and Oblivion were both like that, and Bethesda hasn't said they plan on changing it. Now, Fallout 3 may have had multiple endings, but Fallout 3 is Fallout, not the Elder Scrolls, just because Bethesda does something in it doesn't mean they'll want to do it in Skyrim as well.

Of course, I could be wrong on this, but I think Bethesda will probably want to keep it down to one ending, after all, when you're dealing with a god bent on eating the world, there isn't much room for alternatives, either you win and save the world from becoming Alduin's latest meal, or you lose and everything gets destroyed, and I think we can safely say Bethesda likely has no intention to do the latter option.

i think multiple endings for side/guild/faction quests would be cool but for the main quest a single ending would be best( multiple endings could also lead to confusions in the lore)

THIS.

And I hate the whole having different paths to finish the MQ, screw that. I want the MQ to memorable in a way much like OB, where I can say "Remember when I had to get the Armor of Tiber Septim? That was awesome!"

SPOILER.




Just have minor changes like what they did for OB, where you can chose whether to save Baurus or not in the Sewers, which Daedric artifact to get for Martin (which leads to one of the mini quests for one of the Daedric princes) etc.

and following an essentially static MQ is fun? in oblivion, no matter what you did, you always get the same pre-determined results which gets boring quickly. really quickly.
besides, with what i came up with, there doesn't even need to be that much change to the MQ. it's like basically a choice for the player if he wants to fight the final boss the hard way or to take the easy route.

personally, it is the main story being static that kills the replay value. if someone wants to experience all the different sidequests and various faction quest chains, just make a save after finishing MQ.
however, if the MQ itself is pliable, the player would be more motivated to clock more hours in order to get their money's worth. How is a role playing game fun if you don't even get to decide what you want to do on YOUR big adventure?

Okay, I don't want Skyrim turning into DA when it comes to the MQ, that would be a terrible idea (In my opinion.)

What I'm saying is that the final ending where you get to stop Alduin should always be the same, we are talking about Lore here.

Sure, I don't mind some subtle changes/variables in the MQ, but not too much where it comes to a point where there seems to be multiple MQs, which doesn't make sense in my book.

Oh, and since when is the MQ a replayable factor? It never was before, why should it be now? You have guilds for that reason, and I even stated that I'd love to see drastic changes that you can make when doing the Factions quest line. You can also make new characters, follow new play styles, RP, etc. Bethesda shouldn't take the time to put in a bunch of variables into the MQ for your replay factor, when there already is a bunch of stuff to do that can cause you to replay the game a lot.

What I'm saying is this;
MQ - Minor changes/variables
Factions - Major changes/variables

I'd be up for multiple endings. Gives us more to see in different playthroughs. It wouldn't bother me if they have one official ending, since these games come out so far apart. By the time I'm playing Skyrim I'm not going to be thinking about my Oblivion characters and whether or not the official ending matches up with how I played that. And if they do need to do some kind of "dragon break" ending, a game where we literally have to break the time dragon will probably be their best opportunity to do it.

I'll have to disagree fully on that one, I've replayed Morrowind and Oblivion many times, despite their linear main quests, and there are RPGs which have more choices during the main quest that I never bother to replay. And mostly it's because there's so many other things I can do besides the main quest. The main quest being fully linear might hurt replay value if it were a linear RPG with very little content aside from the main quest, but it isn't, in the Elder Scrolls, many of my characters never do the main quest at all, the other content provides enough to keep it interesting, and I have no desire to do what you suggested, that would be annoying and boring, it's much more enjoyable to create another character, different from my previous one, to do the factions I didn't do last time.

In any case, multiple endings is, at least for me, not as effective a way to add replay value as people seem to think, because usually the story is basically linear even in games with multiple endings, it's just that a few quests made at key points can change the ending, and why should I bother replaying the game just to make one different choice for results that won't be seen until the very end? To add replay value, you need to deliver a different experience throughout the game, and what you're suggesting is not enough to do that.