I'm pretty close to finishing up the main quest line
but I'm almost certain there isn't enough extra content to keep someone playing long after all the main quests (+faction quests) are completed.
I've noticed that tons of people are creating several characters to do multiple play-throughs
but other than that, I don't see how someone could truly play this game nearly forever.

edit: obviously I don't mean forever quite so literally.
still playing regularly after a year or two after finishing the main quests or
playing once in a while for longer than three years would be "playing long after all the main quests are completed".

Mods.

I doubt it. Without a main quest looming over you, it all feels rather pointless. Even if you can go around doing those Radiant AI quests, you know nothing really matters anyway.

No game can be played forever, but large amounts of time can be invested.

if you're talking about quest mods..
I don't really fancy those. to a certain degree skyrim should be kept the way the designers of the game intended
and a whole slew of people putting in their own styles and designs into the game in the form of mods (however interesting or creative they are)
kind of turns skyrim into a weird mash-up of a game imo.

you could try to gather a lot of gold and try to create a castle with all the gold that you gathered, that would take you about 100 years, most people only live up to 65, maybe 70ish.
to tell you the truth i don't think that i would want to play a game for more than two months, then i would feel like i'm getting nowhere, like playing an mmorpg.

I disagree. After the epic world-threatening stuff of the main quest, there's a nice wholesome feeling to returning to little things like helping someone retrieve some lost family heirloom or even just cooking.
This may sound strange to some, but as much as I enjoy a good meaty quest, the biggest pleasure in Skyrim for me comes from just being able to wander, explore, craft, progress, discover and help people out with little things, a dungeon crawl here, mixing a potion there... Just enjoying being part of this awesome fantasy world. That's what I enjoy most, really.

Did you really expect to play this game until the day you die?
Mods are great for extending the lifespan of a game.

I'm also hoping for some great expansions, not only this horse-armor crap.

My favorite character is a level 18 Khajit, lives in Riften, and mostly just explores. Oh, he also has ADD and always gets distracted picking flowers/catching butterflies. Also, he will go 30 minutes out of his way to avoid getting wet.

Ive got an Orc I want to play with too, against type as essentially a Paladin.

My Redguard is pretty true to form though. Just explores Dwemer ruins, doing DB and Thieves with him.

Been playing since launch, never gotten past meeting Greybeard, only completed Thieves guild, never done any civil war, did Molag Bal's daedric quest but felt bad about it and deleted the character who did it.

Oh, dont you worry... people will STILL be playing this game for a LOOOOOONG while... again PC mods. Enough said.

I can't hardly WAIT for a mod big enough like "Nehrim" for Oblivion... Look up Nehrim oblivion and you'll see exactly what im talking about. I can't believe that is a straight up almost downloadable content quality mod.

Now i can't hardly wait till someone pulls something like Nehrim off for Skyrim. wow.

that's how I feel. there's something to be accomplished and a real sense of purpose when you're in the middle of a main quest line
(even as you're doing side quests, you know you're still in the middle of something big that you'll eventually get to).
I don't want to play a game to have a normal day-to-day life where all I can do is craft some items or talk to some people about getting them an item :/

I'll switch back and forword with battlefield,NV, and skyrim.

Cheers

I clear different dungeons and go to different areas on different characters. On my Nord hunter, I spend a lot of time in The Pale hunting horkers and ice wolves and living in Windhelm so I've cleared all the dungeons there. On other characters, I might not even go to the Pale. My Dunmer favours the Reach and Haafingar but rarely spends time in Eastmarch or anywhere else.

If you make new characters to explore other areas, it makes the game last longer and makes it so that you still have stuff to explore and what not. I've been to every region of Skyrim but I have yet to truly dig into the riches hidden in the Rift, I've only been to Riften and Ivarstead but nowhere in the surrounding forest there. I don't think I will ever complete the main quest until TES VI is announced, I already know what happens in the main quest: Alduin is defeated! That's not really a spoiler btw, because it's pretty predictable.

Ah, not familiar with mods I assume.


Mods can do so much more than nvde textures and quests. The largest lifespan-enhancing mods for Bethesda games have been gameplay mods, which for example add new things to kill and make combat/leveling/economy/etc. more difficult. They don't push the end further, but they make sure it takes longer to get there.

And lets not forget some of the area mods for Oblivion, the Elsweyr mod was abosulutley amazing. Imagine what places modders can make for Skyrim.

I do see that there is a great deal of unexplored areas and dungeons to be cleared.
with games belonging to a series I do try to not finish one until the next in the series is out already
just because I like the game so much that I don't want to feel like it's ended :cryvaultboy:

Now that I can relate to :cryvaultboy:

While not wanting to get into platform wars you HAVE to take Mods into account. I'm on PS3 due to lack of internet access atm but plan on going PC when the CK drops and I'm back online.

I still play Oblivion thx to mods and I imagine Skyrim will be no different.

Waiting for mods to come out that fix 4GB texture issues & just generally cleaning up all of Bethesda's poor coding.

I am aware of the sort of mods that exist..
but then again my primary reason for playing skyrim is to enjoy skyrim for the world that it is as much as possible
so while I might install some graphics mods to improve how the water looks, etc
I don't want some other fictitious place or creature created for the sake of making new content by someone else

I'll be playing this for awhile yet.