I'll be honest, I was one of those guys that used to think that using a player's guide was an accepted form of cheating in video games. It wasn't until I was given an Oblivion player's guide on my second play through of the game that I realized all the little things I had missed the first time I had played. Sure enough, when Fallout 3 was released I picked up a players guide along with a copy of the game. But here I am once again in anticipation of upcoming Skyrim that I am faced with the decision again....A part of me thinks that a great deal of the fun comes from discovering the intricacies of the game on my own...but I also run the risk of missing out on certain details that the Player's Guide would provide.

Alas, I probably will play through the game on my own the first time and use the Player's Guide on my second play through. But I'm curious to hear your opinion on using Player's Guides with video games (in particular with Skyrim).

Whad'ya think?

Ill play around fro a while, just as I did on Oblivion/Morrowind. Then, once I ned help, Ill come here. After a month or so, Ill start getting on the wiki to look for things around the world. I use a players guide for New Vegas and I dont find it very useful.

No. I did the same thing as you OP but I feel that overall I wish I didn't know those things so I could discover more new things with each play-through.So no I'll not be picking it up.

Player's guides are useless. Everything you need to know about the game is on the internet now.

Good point.

I prefer to find everything myself, sure I'll prolly miss some stuff but I'll survive tha. To me, things you discover yourself as a result from some longer journey gives a much more long lasting impression than thing you read in a guide and seek intentionally. SUre it's awesome, but only for a few seconds.. it makes it too easy.

It's hard to find though , I have yet to see a complete archive of Oblivion's quests and walk-throughs for them anywhere.

HELL NO! It's a whole world that's handed to us and I want to experience it my own way.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Quests

I had full 280 page long Oblivion walkthrough in my box :rolleyes:

I get what you mean but its easier to have a book beside you than a pc, also I dunno what it is but I find the wiki very uninviting

Definitely not. If I really needed hep with something I'd just go to the wiki or to the forums.

I know. I think its the colors.

No. I'll just buy the Steam version so i can access the wiki from the in-game web browser :hehe:

Oh how i wish they'd add bookmark functionality to that browser.

No, certainly not. Even ignoring the fact that it ruins the exploration, more often than not they're filled with factual errors, and you'll never get the same level of detail as you will on UESP anyway,

I think the game guides are over priced, un informative, and just flat out wrong incomplete sometimes.

FO NV guide had multiple incorrect/imcomplete parts to it. In one case, it flat out listed multiple locations for the same unique weapon....All this for a guide that cost me 35 dollars. Needsless to say that was the last time I buy a guide. The last one before that was for Morrowind, which was actually very in depth if I remember correctly.

I just use the internet. It is constantly updated, almost always correct, and always gives ways around current bugs/glitches/etc. No guide can do that. Plus its free. Plus, its ony there if I really feel like going to look it up. Otherwise I have to figure things out on my own.

Yes. More so for collections sake.

I will buy one if I can get it super cheap, or hopefully free with some store deal (like I got F:NV guide). But I don't read them until I've done at least one playthrough already.

No. I'd like to play for a while on my own, and as others have said uesp is free and more correct.

When ever I'm in want of a guide, and that's somewhat rare, I just use Internet recources. Plus, I sort of have a rule to never use a guide with my first character or the first several moths of playing; and when I finally do use a guide, it's just for things that would otherwise be impossible to know, like some sort of "under-the-hood" calculation.

I don't mean to say I'm against buying a guide though. I have a friend that has gifted many guides to me and I did use those. There is something much nicer about the presentation of those guides than that of any online recource I've seen. My main problem with buying a guide for a game like this though, is I know the game will eventually be changed and added to by updates and downloadable content, rendering release day guides with outdated or incomplete information in some instances. So I like the internet guides because it updates and is free.

No, the sense of being lost in a brand new world is most important to me, I savior every minuet of that feeling.

No, i like to be as clueless as my character on my first play-through.

Absolutely. My strategy guide for Fallout New Vegas is so beat up that if I sold it used, I could never say Used - Great Condition. I wouldn't sell it though. I got so much more out of the game and the sheer size of it shows you how much there is to the game...and I really haven't come close to reading it all. I love the maps and the descriptions of things I can find, etc. It has a few errors but that's to be expected with something this big and in conjunction with the great Wikis we have online, it just makes it more fun. I try to not look first but then if I get stuck I don't have to be frustrated...I can find the answer I need and move on. In subsequent games, I can find and do extra things I skipped or missed the first time through. I never plan on doing everything the first game - it gives me that re-playability.

And I WISH I could find an Oblivion Strategy Guide for an affordable price but the price on it because of its collectability is just too high for me. I'll get guides on release day now.

So, short answer....YES!

I might get a player's guide eventually. I like using them on games like Assassin's Creed where there are some puzzles and stuff like that. But when role-playing you want to feel like you are having the experience that your character is. In real life you don't have a guide to where everything is and how do do every job anyone could want done, do you?

To me alot of the fun of a game is figuring stuff out. Discovering new things.

I have a brain and its fairly powerful.. most of the time. I like to use it.