I have given this a lot of thought. TES series seems to be heading towards a more action oriented direction rather than trying to be an action RPG.

The first three games were very much RPGs they had stats, tons of skills, and you could do so many different things.The worlds were massive, so massive in fact that if you didn't use Daggerfall's fast travel system you wouldn't be able to get anywhere.However they did not have much emphasis on combat.

Then there's Oblivion, in my opinion the best of both worlds, it had lots of stats and skills and it had a great combat system. Slightly smaller world and slightly fewer quests then Morrowind.

Last is Skyrim, It had fantastic graphics, a heavily focused combat system, but as result it lack quite a few RPG elements such as stats and it had less skills than Oblivion. Skyrim's questlines were fairly short at best. The landmass was fairly small in comparison to oblivion. I tried traveling on foot from Whiterun to Markarth, it didn't take that long at all.

So my question is do you guys think TES will remain an action RPG? Or will they become all about action?

Skyrim's perk system makes it a deeper RPG than Oblivion, in my opinion. Oblivion's system was a cruel mockery of a RPG, with no sense of progression or balance.

But this is mostly because Oblivion's mechanics were bad. Skyrim still demonstrates a move towards action, or as some have put it, 'sword and sorcery simulator.'

Considering that Skyrim sold 11 million copies, my guess would be yes.

What does that have to do with TES remaining as an action RPG?

With each game, we see less emphasis on character stats, and more emphasis on action.

While I don't ever see them scrapping RPG elements altogether, if the current development trend continues, future TES games will effectively just be action-adventure games, where the player-character is nothing more than a customizable avatar for the player with only brief/shallow progression that doesn't really have a great impact on their interactions with the gameworld at all.

If they want to turn the trend around, they should really look at something like Mount&Blade. That for me is the epitome of how an action-RPG should be done. Combat is engaging (unlike Morrowind which is just click, click, click), and the player has plenty of control over how their character fights; but how well they perform in combat is still very much weighted on their character's abilities.

I think Todd Howard will suddenly realize that in order to bring more cash he hit rock bottom with the simplification and the next game will feature more stats, weapons and spells variety, more emphasis on culture, factions, religion and character reputation, better questlines.

The action is already very predominant but I am not sure that's the reason why the RPG elements are getting weak, I mean you can have both with no penalty.

And where precisely would this 'instant revelation' come from? The sales figures of Skyrim surely won't help.

He's been more or less the man behind Morrowind and Oblivion, I don't think his dream RPG is having an action game with 3 weapons, 3 skills and 5 spells. I suppose the actual direction has been staged by the suits @ Bethesda in order to penetrate more market, but at some point they'll hit the bottom and have to develop horizontally (put more quality and creativity instead of reaching to all the categories of non-rpg-ers).

As Skyrim and its dragons and killcams show, these days Todd Howard is more focused on EPIC ACTION than making a good RPG. The new perk system could work wonders if done correctly, but too many of them are effectively useless (lockpicking, anyone?), and the idea of a perk "tree" is limiting, as it forces players to choose perks they don't want to get to the useful ones.

EVERYTHING!!! Because these new action oriented games are more appealing to the casual gamer, and there are more casual gamers out there than RPGers. Therefore, there is more money to be made by releasing an action game

Nice avatar, Jixx. Daggerfall dungeon exit

But the first three games were not "pure" roleplaying games. Elder Scrolls games have always been hybrid action/roleplaying games (i.e. a fusion of player skill with character skill).

Granted, it feels as though Oblivion and Skyrim tipped the scales toward the action half of the equation. I won't agrue that. But it's misleading to speak as though there were ever a mythical "golden age" in which the Elder Scrolls series was a "true" or "pure" RPG. The seeds of the current trend toward action were sown in the very first game.

As long as they keep the 10 races, keep letting me use any skill I want, and keep letting me do what I want when I want I couldn't care less what genre it's classified as.