I'm here to point what Skyrim has of Best...and what there is to chance in the next series of The Elder Scrolls. This is all observed in the game and compared to some other games (even if some were not popular....but the part of those games that will be mentioned here as good are what is closest to reality as ever created). The score of each part goes from 0 to 10, and dependes on the number of amazing(+) and flawed(-) parts and importance of each one, and the overall score is a average of all the topics.


The World of Skyrim:
- Amazing world; (+)
- Non-tiring landscapes; (+)
- Well placed dungeons/citys; (+)
- Wind currents are just a BLAST, never seen anything like it! (if you haven't seen it yet...buy a new hardware and boost your graphics); (+)
- The top of the mountains are not what they seem to be (ever climbed a mountain and entered inside a rock?)....but that dosen't affect the gameplay in any ways; (+-)
- Minning spots are well placed;
- Citys are well disigned, included its defense system (walls, gates, towers and bridges gives you a perspective of how the middle ages castles were designed...really nice); (+)
- Water is more realistic then any other game out there. There is even the waterfalls "pull effect", that drags you towards it; (+)
- Creatures are placed and on the right environment, including dragons. (+)
- Atmosphere and climate is a live system; (+)
***SCORE: 10

The Races:
- Important differences between races makes this choice very important in a way that you will depend on it for the rest of the game; (+)
- Character customization on skin level is not exaggerated (like The Sims), and are not missing anything that makes you you, so its just perfect for the game; (+)
- The diologue of npcs differs depending on your race; (+)
- Each race has a history which you can learn along the game; (+)
***SCORE: 10

The Quests:
- Distance and difference between quests make them non-tiring; (+)
- The majority of side quests rewards become unimportant as you level up, most because you will have so much unused money and...in most cases...will be able to craft some of the most powerfull items in the game...that those rewards will seem non-important for you, and you will get bored with them (like the thieves guild side quests); (-)
- Main quests are immersive and makes you really live the game; (+)
- Quests are connect to each other, which means when you go to a village...take and complete all the quests you find...there will be some more available as continuation of the previous quests that you completed; (+)
***SCORE: 8,5

The Interact With NPCs:
- Guards talk to you differently depending on what you have done of good/bad in the city; (+)
- Variety of voices makes for a non-tiring game, where you can differ soft from strong character on the npc, whit a non-repetitive voice (of course you hear the same voice on some npcs, but there is no point in paying 5000 people to do voice acting...that would be totally unecessary); (+)
- NPC's form of reffering to you differs from work time to rest time, which means...even if you are his/her best friend...he will send you out of his home if you break in it; (+)
- NPCs have a day routine, they are not standing zombies; (+)
- You can get married (the amulet thing was quite genius, so that the marriage conversation dosen't disrupts your main goals during the game); (+)
***SCORE: 10

Skills, Perks and Leveling UP:
- The ultimates one/two-handed weapons perks are hardly useful (you have to do a backwards power attack to activate it...with one-handed weapons its inconceivable doing that...actualy its only more or less useful for warrior-like creatures that goes towards you when attacking you), when it should be something more of all-times useful; (-)
- The lockpicking's perks are mostly unused for they are not necessary, saved by the Treasure Hunter perk that is interresting; (-)
- Thieves can steal even the very weapons and armors of their enemy (friend as well), making them easy targets. Besides that, thieves can kill their enemys from stealth without breaking a sweat as well, which makes the thieve class very interresting; (+)
- Smithing is quite useful (you can't create arrows...but still), and serves not only for Heavy, but for Ligth armors aswell (like the Dragon armors). The material collecting/smelting system is quite immersive and realistic, aswell as the forging animations; (+)
- The mages skills have a huge number of possible combinations, which makes them varied and unique (on the first few levels it will seem that you can cast only one spell and its all good...but as the game progresses, you have to combine them, after all, this is not Tibia); (+)
- The Ligth/Heavy armor skills are very well balanced and they combine with the type of class that will be wearing it; (+)
- The Bow skill is very well desingned, which makes hunters very powerful, as they dont have (or shouldn't have) other means of doing damage (of corse that a good hunter will have conjuration....but still); (+)
- Shields are quite useful and can be used for damaging aswell; (+)
- Leveling UP with your skills is quite ingenious, as it makes novice players explore other options and keeps you interested in evolving your skills, BUT, I think its necessary to gain experience from important quest too, which would be a away of minimazing the quest problem cited above; (+)
***SCORE: 9

Combat (this will hurt):
- The difference of weapon swing between a "warrior" and a mage class is?...NONE...if you are a very smart but weak and unskilled mage, you WILL swing in the same way and JUST AS FAST as a "warrior" will...which implies that strength and agility are two thing that dosen't really exists in this game. The ONLY difference between a "warrior" and a mage swing is the damage, which makes the player be uninterrested in increasing its weapon skill further then his perks need to, and also very boring same-type attaks during all the game; (-)
- The way your character moves to make its attack is quite interresting (on a mechnical way), as do the way that your horse moves aswell; (+)
- Dual-wielding anything is revolutionary, but the two-handed way of swing makes it inconceivable to use (it looks like you are a farmer that have grabbed your two-handed weapon for the first time...you never swing differently), so it brings you the question...is this game only for dual-wielding/one-handed+shield?; (+-)
- Dual-wielding spells or combining them to make them more powerful is stunishing; (+)
- The way you can climb mountains its World of Warcraft-like, I mean, really?; (-)
- Dragon fights are cool, but have much to evolve, as it is easy to kill a dragon even on the Master difficulty (I don't even need a companion to help me...for crying out loud), and they get dizzy when you do a power attack, just like any other creature...dude, look at his SIZE and SKIN...really now?; (-)
- All small-sized creatures have a interesting way of fighting, as they don't stand still in front of you all the time; (+)
- Resistances to any type of magic are unbalanced concidering the armor resistance to meele weapons (you can have a lot of health and 60% of resistance to shock....still you die in 2-4 hits of a master mage, whitout having any negatve effects on you); (-)
- You can't dodge or roll from incoming frontal attack, which separates the game in to 3 classes: Stupid Ogre, Coward Thieve and Mages. There is no fighters, no ninjas, no bards; (-)
- If you want to prevent a hit...shield is your only option, as two-handeds are inconvinient...oh that remind's me...WHY IN THE SEVEN HEAVENS I can't parry with DUAL-WIELDING?...Assassin's Creed and Prince of Persia are wrong?...don't think so; (-)
***SCORE: 4

Skyrim's AI:
- Creatures have a different type of detecting and attacking you then the humanoids do, which makes for a non-repetetive type of engagement; (+)
- When creatures or humanoids see that you are much more powerful then them..they flee in search of more help (if you don't kill them in 3 hits of course). That dosen't happens with dragons, as they are superior then any other creatures and for that they don't fear anything; (+)
- Dragons land on city's walls and houses (just like you would see in any decent dragon movie), and when you look at that you get stunished, because you know that if you don't kill them quickly...they will probably kill many NPCs that you would be able to have a conversation; (+)
- Enemy mages know what spell to cast and when to cast it, they are not some fireball cannons; (+)
- Companions only fight for themselfs, they don't cast a magical shield or taunt the enemy in order to help you (sure they heal you...but its better to have a shield when their mana runs out), which means they don't anylize the enemy to see what you need from them; (-)
- Wolfs hunt in packs...Giants take care of Mammoths and their "precious" cheese, which puts order into chaos and make them dependent on each other, making them stronger as a group; (+)
***SCORE: 9,5

Economy & Items:
- As you level up in the game, money is something you don't really need so much, and still you keep getting it from quests and selling items into a point where you see no need to get more of it; (-)
- Items are well designed and balanced, including bonus from item sets; (+)
- Hammers are heavier then Axes that are heavier then Swords, which makes for a very realistic weight system, both on inventory and swing speed; (+)
- You can have a safe house to store your items, and you can upgrade the inside of you home with more fency stuff (you can even put weapons on racks for war decorations...you can put silverware ontop of things too, but that is a little silly); (+)
- Items durability dosen't exists, which could be a very interesting system that...lets say you have upgraded your weapon to Flawless, and have used it for a time...the right thing would be for it to decrease the upgrade gradually until it reaches its initial state (and it would be an incentive for players to smith and search for materials all the time, keeping the system constantly alive)...but it wasan't implemented; (-)
- Heavy armor, light armor and robes makes for a perfect difference between warriors, hunters and mages; (+)
***SCORE: 8,5

Graphics:
- Stunishing shapes of landscapes and mountains makes for a never-tiring view; (+)
- The way the mechenical creatures and chests behave as you view it is ingenuing; (+)
- Hand-maded scenarios gives you the feeling of a unique place on a unique world; (+)
- The skin and the way a dragon dies is just...overwhelming; (+)
***SCORE: 10

Language:
- The NPCs voices are well interpreted (that is the reason you need a few...but experienced people on voice acting) and gives you the notion of the importance of your quest, tells you if the guy is lying to you, and even shows the mood of the NPC; (+)
- The Dragons language are so well implemented that you get the feeling that its so real that you can even translate it (which it true...you can translate it); (+)
- Shouts...nothing to say other then: OMG THIS IS UNBELIVABLY AWESOME AND CREATIVE!!!; (+)
***SCORE: 10

Interface in General:
- Quick access menu (TAB) is very handy, almost everything the player needs; (+)
- Inventory is well organized in sub-categories; (+)
- You can access the Quests menu at any time while your Map is opened, which makes it very easy to track quests; (+)
- Load times are very short and have an text+image that tells you something about the game, and you can rotate-zoom the image while loading...crazy huh?; (+)
- Glitches when you finish loading (it tells you are carring too much weight when you are actually not, sometime it keeps the sneak icon on the screen when you are not sneaking) makes for a little inconvenience (but if you don't die too much..then it won't be a problem); (-)
***SCORE: 9,5


OVERALL SCORE: (10 + 10 + 8,5 + 10 + 9 + 4 + 9,5 + 8,5 + 10 + 10 + 9,5) / 11 = 9,0

Conclusions:
Skyrim is a great game, aswell as its predecessors, on the world, quests, voice acting, the choices, the interface and the graphics, but just like its predecessors it lacks on combat (even Gothic 2 had a better combat then Oblivion for example), and that makes one of the most used parts of the game flawed. Here is my opinion...hire more engineers (preferential for those who knows something about middle age war mechanics) or, if you already have them, PLEASE ask them to make the combat techniques evolve with the player, for them not to feel like a mage is just as good as them on meele, with the ONLY difference being the damage.
Currently you don't have that enthusiasm of playing the game all over again with another class...because you know how it will outcome in the end (as the way that I hit with 16 of one-handed is the same as if I had 100). And that is the focus here, everyone want the next The Elder Scrolls to be a game that you play it during 3 years, and each time you restart it you discover something completly new along the way.
Still 9,0 is a very good score (it gained that score on sites like GameSpot and such too), so keep up the good work, but always trying to be better (that's my slogan).

Feel free to comment about this evaluation, I will be replying any questions you have about it (sooner or later), and I would apreciate it if the ones that thinks the world is perfect and that santa claus exists didin't commented on this topic. Thank You!

Glad that we finally have a thread for "TRUE" feedback. All the other couple hundred threads and posts were obviously made up from charlatans.

The AI is rather flawed as well as NPC interaction just isnt cutting it like it used to be. A lot ofthe NPC interaction has been dumbed down in the game.

I think you heavily underrated combat. but there were good points on combat. The lack of a parry ability is rather odd and weird but there is significant damage in melee between what a mage and a warrior can do late game if you invest in the perks. A 2 handed warrior is going to club unarmed fellow much more quickly then a mage will as well the opportunity for criticals is much higher. As well, almost your entire criticism on fighting is based oin duel wielding. If I were to give a score to each combat type I would go:

Melee: 6
Magic: 7
Stealth: 9
Ranged: 7

Again, combat, highly underrated based on one fighting style.

Just wanted to chime in on this a little. The number of possible combinations may seem huge but that's only if you go into the game with no expectations based on the former games about the magic system.

I made a thread about this here.

http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1291357-a-small-observation-on-the-amount-of-spells-in-the-game/

Skyrim on average has 23 times less spells than the last game and even with the changes in other things such as attributes and skills it still has 15 times less spells than the last installment.

I'll comment mostly on this section.
(1) - Agreed.
(2) - Disagree. Items follow an entirely percentage based system that lends itself to where items are either mediocre and unimportant to incredibly powerful or necessary (mana reduction for mages, as an example). I don't think the item system is better than Oblivion or Morrowind's system.
(3) - Eh, I guess. This isn't really something that seems all that incredible to me.
(4) - Agreed. Houses are awesome, I just wish there were more of them and a home that had enough bookshelves to store even 1/8th of the amount of books within the game.
(5) - I agree here but it's definitely a preference thing. It seems most people believe you should be a walking demi-god as soon as you create your first decent item, though, and to have them break seems like sacrilege to them.
(6) - This I absolutely disagree with. Armor type means relatively little in this game, especially since magicka regen doesn't work in combat. There are zero reasons for a mage to use a robe save for aesthetic purposes.

To further comment, there is relatively little about an economy in this section. It might be in part because the game really doesn't have one. To me, that's something that's always been really unbelievable about the TES games is the economy. It'd be nice to see trade wagons going from town to town selling goods. Each town apparently houses the exact same materials or items found everywhere in the world, though.

Just wanted to say a bit about that section in particular. I don't know why.

Thanks for the thread, it goes to fav and when i read it throughly I answer.

These scores are way too up for what they should be.

The Interact With NPCs:10 ?!?

"You like magic? you should go to the college", says the mage of winterun to the arch-mage of skyrim. (everytime)

"Hi! Im new here too. We should be friends", says the argonian after fist fighting me almost to the death.


Theres a serious problem with the AI on this game, at least the main NPCs should have more options designed to recognize the progress of the player. Also, theres a severe lack of options on
the dialogue.

Skyrim is a great game, but the NPCs are a real let down.

I totally agree with the OP.

Finally someone posts a Thread, putting effort and time on what you are writting..

Those feedbacks were on of those 2 options:
1 - OMG THIS GAME IS BEAST, EVERYTHING IS PERFECT !
OR
2 - THIS GAME svckS BALLS, I HATE IT !


i mean, finally someone came to a conclusion that is a TRUE feedback... putting all the details into question. The game isn't perfect, but it also don't svcks.. I agree, the game should have a 9/10. The game is great, but like any other game, it have its lacks...

I've encountered a feel bugs and i don't like the combat system that much, they could've improved it, but even with this, i'm LOVING the game !

Some people keeps complaining that the UI svcks, so the game svcks and its game-breaking... omg, really ? You are going to stop playing Skyrim because the UI ? These people need to tkae their time to think and come to a smart conclusion like you did.

Good review OP and you even broke a long thread up with proper spaces and bolded to make it easier to read! :celebration:

mine, but it is most liekly skewed based on expectations from oblivion and aspects that were supposed to be in be were excluded

Hey guys...Here to comment on your comments about my topic:
- First of all...Damage isin't all there is to be in a weapon...if you want to end the game in a week then...well...its undertandable that only the damage is just fine (stamina is not speed...its how many power attacks you can land);
- As for the mages...have to agreed that robes are really not what they should be, and they have to turn to ligth armor, which is silly really;
- And as for all the ratings that you guys say its too high in some spots...this evaluation was maded comparing Skyrim with the current RPGs, and even if it dosen't look good...if it has a high score is becouse there is no other (or less then 2) game that has something better on that spect...which its not true for the combat system, that only those 2 games I cited are a fine example on things to be added (it shouldn't be like it...but it should take the good parts on it);

I can see that the ones that have posted so far are mature people...that is very good to see;
Please...keep giving your ideas. Thanks!

Keep in mind, my review is in comparison to previous TES games.

Here again...

- Quest DO have multiple choices (most of them dosen't, but still), and I think Skyrim has a quest system that none other RPG has reached yet (there still points to be added, but as I always say...smart people learn from their previous experience, and I think that will happen with TES, or hope so at least);
- As for interface...this should be the least of a player's worries (the favorite system is something I have never seen...so I think if the TAB menu is big it dosen't matter that much...cause you won't use it that much with the favorite menu there);
- Combat IS important (you spend most of your time doing it on the game, unless you are the type of player that only explore places cause the quest told you so...), so evolving combat IS evolving the game itself for a number of players (most or less...that I can't say);

Guys, you can't ask them something that no one has created yet (actually you can...what you can't is criticise for not being there), but meaby you know some game(s) that HAVE a better system in a particular topic, so please point it out so we can totaly agree.
As for they way of making a totaly different game...I think what they should do is change what didn't worked out, and IMPROVE what has been successful in the series, that is the recipie for a ascendent grow of the series.
Keep up with the ideas...meaby if by a miracle a developer reads this, we will have done our best to feedback the game.