I would like to know why players think that something is not well written. Or what is important for you to say it is well written?

Because I rarely saw any explanation to it, so it is hard for me to imagine what other players do have on their mind - what is does represent for them when they say that?

I have my examples of what it could be (not in the order of priority):

1. the right kind of language fitting the speaker's background

2. richness of choices or some sort of feel - like how many options, what is left out etc.

3. connection to the quest - dialogue in an interesting quest

4. connection of the quest to enviroment - does it feel like it does belong to the surrounding, if you would be exploring, would you expect the quest there - so not only what it is about but also how often it is there.

5. connection to the world - escalation of the story - like you don't know anything at the beginning, then you slowly start to be dragged in

and also examples in other games:

I do like writing in Skyrim - that is why I wanted to know reasons of others. I can see, that it is not as detailed like Witcher 3 dialogues - it is more simple, because that is what I guess was the goal of Skyrim, but still I do like it I feel like I would be in that world, it does fit for me. And I did experience games, where they tried hard to have the top quality dialogues and it was boring for me after some time anyway - so what is that for you?

And this is in Skyrim topics because I don't remember the other TES games so well to talk about them. And I wanted to ask about Skyrim specifically

Characterization is important to me. I like vivid, engaging characters. if a game (or book or movie) does not have characters that interest me it is unlikely I will be interested in the plot or story for very long either. That is my number one criteria.

Plot and story are second with me. An intriguing story is a bonus, but not essential. Pacing is a consideration as well but, as with story, I can ignore poor pacing if I am interested in the characters.

For me, "good writing" comes down to the characters.

I agree. Depth to characters and their backstories is what makes the world seem real and can turn the most basic "Hero's journey" into an epic.
For refrence: see any BioWare game ever

One of the first things I think of with bad writing is predictability. If every next step in the story is easily predictable, I see it as either bad writing, or at the very least, unoriginal or uninspired writing.


Then dialogue and how organic it feels. When a dialogue in any game or movie or any medium has me thinking "nobody would ever say that in this situation " or "come on, what a cheesy line" or "that doesn't fit this character at all", then again I see it as bad writing.


Then there's the characters. While I definitely need good characters to stay interested, I don't necessarily attribute bad characters to bad writing. Sometimes the story is about a boring or bland character put in exciting situations. There can be exceptions to this, but I personally prefer interesting and unique characters that I like.

It's like game of thrones. I think the show and books have pretty good writing, but I hate 95% of the characters, even those seen as the heroes, and that's why I personally am not interested in the franchise. The characters push me personally away from the story.


I see elements of bad and good writing in skyrim and the elder scrolls as a whole. The main story for the most part has bad writing. Predictable plot, hero rises from the unknown and saves the end of the world from a giant dragon because he's so bad ass.

Then you got the dragonborn story, the original dragonborn returns to take over the world. Hero comes out of the unknown and stops him. But then plot twist, you're just a pawn to an evil demon and no matter what you did, you fell right into his hands and did exactly what he wanted. It was a bit more original than the main story and was slightly better written.


One reason I think the elder scrolls storyline and bethesda in general aren't the greatest of writers is because they usually try to keep the main story playable by as many different types of characters good or evil as they can (with maybe oblivion abd arena as an exception to this ). But I get that and give them a pass.


Fallout 4 however, got rid of the role playing aspect and kept the story mostly on rails for the first two acts and pre made the characters motivation and life for story purposes. They wrote it more like a movie for an attempt at better writing, and honestly I think it's one of the worst written bethesda games. So many plot holes, terrible dialogue (with even worse voice acting for at least the male main character), bad character motivations, dumb predictable plot twists, bad bland characters etc.

Fallout 4 is one where bethesda threw out freedom of choice and more dialogue options for story purposes, and screwed up on everything. No choices, bad plot, bad dialogue, dumb twist, bad skill interaction with dialogue (compare skill checks in dialogue from fallout 4 to new vegas), etc.

I agree... To me how well the NPC's lives come across is more important than the "quest-lines"... The little quirk's that give them personality. Enough dialogue to make them interesting. For Quest-lines, writing that makes the story seem important, paced in such a way as to seem epic... While the Main Quest of going after dragon's is pretty strait forward, the Companions has a nice twist, that is very interesting...but the whole "story" is ruined by pacing, their isn't enough dialogue to make them all ( NPC's) seem interesting and unique.

Each of Skyrim's quest-lines has up's and down's... the "bad writing" is subjective.... some people want every part of the story spelled out, how their own character behaves as well as all the NPC's and the story as a whole... these are people that are not happy with the writing. I like the "loose" writing that gives me the ability to Role Play differently than someone else...

One man's trash is another's treasure... Some people like Death Metal and others Classical. What I consider "good" writing someone else may think svcks.

To me, their is good story writing decisions and bad in Skyrim, but what I might consider good choices someone else might not.

I love the fact that the story is not so automated that you can't ignore them.. I hate the fact that reguardless my character is always referred to as "Dragonborn"..

Example of "bad writing"... "Keep your hand's to yourself sneak Thief"...just because the character as a high sneak...

I don't think the writing in Skyrim is "bad," so much as incomplete. Many of the characters have memorable lines which evoke their characters perfectly, but they have so few of those lines, and repeat them so often, that it destroys the illusion that they are "real people." And the dialogs between NPCs and player-character are adequately written from a stylistic standpoint, but are frustratingly sparse in terms of player choice. Very few dialogs offer branching choices, and those that do tend to leave no real choice; it's either do the quest or refuse (leaving it unfinished in our journal.)

In terms of plot and setting, Skyrim lacks the depth of the earlier Morrowind. There is less tension between factions, and there is less subtlety to the way the factions are presented. Opposing factions, like the Vampires and Dawnguard, are presented in almost comic-book style.

The NPCs have their back-stories, but too often their motivations are cloudy and unconvincing. NPC actions seem forced to the plot, rather than flowing from their personal needs and motivations.

All of this, to me, makes the game seem rushed and unpolished, rather than being badly written. I think the development of Skyrim needed more time to be done right (it is quite a massive, complex world), and that the publisher forced the premature completion of the work, in order to hit the release deadline.

Great topic, op, thank you.

Statements from various developers at Bethesda contradict this conclusion, and no statements by the developers support it.

So all the cut quests like the bulk of civil war quests that have the voice dialogue and files for these quests still in the game was just for the hell of it? The civil war being a bland chain of fetch quests and probably the most half assed quest line in all of the elder scrolls was a deliberate design choice?


And the 11/11/11 release date had nothing to do with it?

For me pacing is a fair size factor. If the build up of the characterizations and plot are well fleshed out, adding to the story, then at least the start of the story IMO is usually pretty good. Now you have some stories that do great right up until the climix and then just rush the end of the story which pretty much kills it for me. i.e. Waterworld by Kevin Costner. Some decent story build up, but then the ending suddenly gets rushed because he was running out of money to shoot the film, IIRC. Of course pointless filler that doesn't actually develop the story along is no good either. That being said, content that is suppose to develop the story also needs to be understandable without having to explain why it's there and how it adds to the story. Although it can make for interesting plot if a good reason for the content of the story is revealed later on as a kind of plot twist.

It has to be even and consistent pacing the whole way through and preferably not rushed the whole way through like the Companions quest line.

A lot of it is subjective when people say its "bad" they often mean that it is not their preferred style. But there is some legitimately bad writing in Elder Scrolls that just makes no sense. That is the kind of thing that bugs me the most about Bethesda's writing.


One example from Oblivion that sticks out in my mind is the quest involving the bust of Lathassa Indarys, where you are supposed to "expose" an informant who has been ratting the thieves guild out to the guard, but the quest is so poorly written that your "exposing" of her doesn't make any sense.


And I am like what? No! He didn't do anything of the sort, you just exposed yourself. The whole thing really did not make any sense and was a huge disappointment since the premise of "exposing" an informant had a lot of promise, but it ended up just being a simple "frame" job. There is nothing wrong with a simple frame job, but calling it "exposing" an informant and trying to portray it that way when it is in fact just a frame job is bad writing.


This is an extreme example, but there is a lot of stuff like this in Bethesda's quests that just doesn't add up.


Edit: Of course the whole plot to the Matrix -- that humans could be used as batteries is completely nonsensical too, since it takes more energy to keep a human body alive than they could possibly generate in electricity -- but people love that movie, so maybe Bethesda's nonsensical writing is enjoyed by a large segment of the market and I should stop applying any sort of rational thinking to entertainment.

This should be in section of forum where spoilers can be because people talking about what happens in the skyrim main quest plot and dragon born DLC plot here. At the least the title or first post should say that the discussion of 'bad writing' may include spoilers. It is an old game but for myself I haven't done the DLC yet.

Yeah, it should probably be in the spoilers forum since it's hard to have a good discussion of writing without getting into specifics. For what it's worth I added some spoiler tags around the part of my post giving an example of bad writing from Oblivion.

hmm yeah... probably.. the OP should ask for a move... I try to be very careful about spoilers, but sometimes it get's hard... plus good solid examples are hard to do...when you don't want a spoiler.

"There never was a client that commissioned the guild to steal Llathasa's bust. Armand used you to flush out an informant that infiltrated the guild."

Myvryna Arano is eavesdropping when Armand gives you the quest. She tells Lex, who searches the Waterfront, looking for Armand Christophe. Lex has a personal vendetta against Armand ("Two years ago I made a fool out of him when he tried to arrest me. Lex has never forgotten it.") and seems to know that he's in the Thieves Guild. Armand has been charged with stealing the bust, so if they find him, he'll be arrested, obviously, which would disrupt the Guild's business.

Armand suspects Myvryna is a traitor. Putting the bust in her house gives Lex two options: either arrest his informant, or exculpate her despite her being the supposed thief, which would, of course, reveal that she and Lex have some kind of arrangement. Myvryna is upset with Lex because he walked right into it. It's a good bit of characterization because it suggests that Lex is willing to uphold the law, even if it ruins his plans. It subtly foreshadows his acceptance of his reassignment, despite his suspicions that the Gray Fox was behind it.

As Lex says, "...If what I heard is true, you're the thief. If what you say is true, the Gray Fox knows you are my informant."

It still makes no sense at all and is really bad writing. The bust was stolen (so Lex didn't need any confidential information from Myvryna to know that) and the fact that Lex has a vendetta against Armand makes him Armand an obvious choice for a suspect, with or without any help from Myvryna.

The mere fact that the bust was found in Myverna's cupboard does nothing to connect the dots with respect to her being the informant. It is a simple frame job and does nothing to "expose" her.

There is an obvious third option here which is to arrest the guy who suspiciously happened to know that the bust was in her cupboard . . . How did the PC know the bust was there if he didn't plant it? The only way to get these types of situations to work is to have the bust found by an independent third party, not by the guy who planted it there in the first place. As frame jobs go this one was pretty lame.

With a little tweaking it could have been a really good quest, but it suffers from incredibly bad writing in my opinion.

I also don't agree it shows Lex as someone who was willing to "uphold the law" even if it ruins his plans, since he was so willing to throw an obviously innocent person in the dungeons. The frame job was so lame even Lex doesn't sound convinced she is guilty, but it isn't worth his time to sort it out so he just locks her up and throws away the key. If anything, this quest tarnishes his reputation in my eyes. Makes me think the Fox should have just killed Lex rather than relocating him since Lex has no loyalty and no real sense of justice.

I think that people just like to jump on the "bash the devs" bandwagon and automatically say it's bad writing.

Police informants are often criminals who provide information in exchange for leniency. Either Myvryna was caught, or her activities are quasi-legal at best. Have you never spoken to her? She's not clean herself.


Armand suspects Myvryna. Armand fakes job and Myvryna tattles. Imperial Watch show up with alarming alacrity as soon as the bust goes missing (which suggests they were waiting rather than reacting). Armand doesn't need to know who the informant is, he needs to get rid of 'em. Lex stubbornly walks into the "trap," but Lex doesn't care because the Thieves Guild has already determined who his informant is.


Lex is continually portrayed as a morally steadfast man who has skewed priorities. His committment is what inspires the Gray Fox to reassign him to protect Countess Umbranox, remember.

A lot of people say this, they say "Bioware does it right," yet both the Bioware games I've tried so far (Dragon Age: Origins, the other was one of the Mass Effect editions) bored me to pieces. What should I do? Maybe I'm just easily pleased because I've hardly had a problem with the writing in Skyrim?

My only prob with Skyrim's writing actually is that some of those quests / stories are too short. My character shows up in Skyrim and two weeks later (literally, if I don't diversify and do other things) he or she is the leader of X guild. Mages College and Companions are two examples here. I need more. I need to see a real reason why my guy or gal is now at the top. I want to see others challenge my newfound leader too.

But up that that point, I didn't really have any issues with the way storylines are written.

The police typically have some concern for the well being of their informants. The one's like Lex who use and abuse them without any degree of care about their safety are typically the cops that are painted in a bad light. And that's why my character walked away with a very bad impression of Lex. That may have been intended or not, I don't know and this part of the story was not why I was criticizing the writing. This part of the story actually may have been the only decently written part since it can lead to people with different world views arguing about whether Lex's handling of the situation makes him seem like a better person or a worse person. I'd argue worse, but you seem not to agree about that and that's fair.


My complaint was the way the writers tried to make a simple and somewhat clumsy frame job into this subtle "exposing" of Myvrvyna. It was a simple hack frame job, nothing more. Although it could have been so much more if it had been written better.

None of this refutes my earlier point that the quest was poorly written. If the purpose was simply a frame job of Myvryna, then it would have been better written to just call it a simple frame job and be done with it, rather than trying to make it into some type of subtle plan to "expose" the informant and than muck up all the details of it so bad that in the end its just a simple frame job. Bad writing all around. With a little tweaking it could have been so much better.

Play Leviathan and Tresspasser DLCs

Murder Hobo Adventures 5: Vikings vs Dragons is lost potential. It is a high fantasy universe where pretty much everything is magic, there was a god that creates the world and then destroys it as his own evil alter ego. Other god-like creatures messing with mortals.
And they make medieval brear wrestling simulator

And don't get me started on Murder Slum Lord Adventures Post-Apoclyptic 1: My Baby! My Baby!
I haven't played any BGS games since that, though there's more to it than just the game

"Bad writing" is what makes The Elder Scrolls special. The stories are so vague and open to interpretation that we get to fill it in any way we like. Our heroes can be cowardly, even pacifists. We can wander around and ignore the quests, and still have fun.

I hate being railroaded by "good writing".

Yeah, I have to agree that the vague and sometimes contradictory accounts you get from the various NPCs in the game add to its charm. Like how the guards say Ulfric shouted Toryyg to death but Ulfric says he actually killed with the sword after only knocking him down with a shout. All the ambiguity and contradiction in the game generates lively debates and also leaves room for some good roleplaying with different characters who have different points of view about things.

Grammar and Spelling top my list. With regards to video games, I can only think of various stories not complimenting each other.

I don't really care if something is predictable or not. I don't really care if it is full tropes and cliches. The big thing is, "Does it fit?" Some players think of "plot holes" as terrible things, and I usually agree. But then I try to think in a different way from my own. Sometimes, that can help fill those plot holes in

So what makes video game writing bad?

- Shallow NPCs. These are our doorways into this fictional, digitized world.

- Contradicting stories or segments to stories.

- Faux or illusionary decisions in dialogues. If I am offered a decision, please allow it to matter.

Other than the above, I can live with most video game writing

Game-wise, I dislike hand wavy rationalizations and "rule of cool" reasons for inserting things. I don't need things to be realistic per se, but I need them to be consistent within the setting or rules first established.

This is the only thing I could say that is "bad" on an objective level. The rest is subjective. I may not like some plot points or characters, but it may not mean that they're "bad" -- unless they were included for the reasons above.

edit: And as far as Bioware goes, they're full of hand wavy crap. At least lately.