A little gore, politics, slavery, torture, and maybe a some conspiracies would be great additions to the game. Nudity/six, extreme gore, etc. are all very juvenile and unnecessary, and would ultimately ruin the game. However, the first few things I mentioned would add realism, immersion, and also a lot more content for possible quests and roleplaying.

I think most of those suggestions could be developed in a tasteful way to build a more believable game world. Its all a matter of approach, so I'll trust Bethesda with their decision regarding the implementation of controversial subject matters. I think they'll probably ignore them as they have done so far if they can't do a good job integrating them to the game, due to ratings or any other concerns. It is a better alternative, in my opinion, to a mediocre or juvenile effort.

You have to admit that you would love, as a stealth character, to get behind someone, grab him by the head, slit his throat and see all the blood spill in every direction or just stab them in the kidneys and watch them slowly die :shocking:

Drugs, slavery, politics. These are the most important ones.

More gore, and torture... yes.

six and forced six... but I don't want anything graphic, you should not be able to go around [censored] people and having six with anyone.
I want quests involving six, like the quest in Oblivion where there was a female gang that would lure men to come to their hut for six and then rob them.
A quest containing "forced six" would be investigating a rapist and getting him arrested, nothing graphic, but forced six would still be a theme in that quest.
So... I don't want actual six, but quests where six/forced six is part of the topic is okay.

I want no hardcoe six.

The first 'six' I encountered in a mainstream game was in an Ultima 6 (or 7 I can't remember) at the town of Cove IIRC, twas reasonably within bounds of good taste, 16-bit graphics don't do much. Next was Deus Ex, where one could hear some 'activity' in a locked off room. The most Oblivion ever did was through the books and not much of that, as well as the name the Anvil quayside boarding house. Bethesda can go farther without going beyond good taste. PG13 taste anyways.

I did not find any of the options to be mature subject matter. If you put in political espionage, faction betrayals, morally ambiguous quest objectives, etc. then ya I would want it to be more advlt.

Not really, no.


Anyway, to make things clear, most of what he's got in that list are not themes but motifs because by themselves, they don't mean anything significant. This is important, because we have no idea what the story will be like and if it will require any of those motifs to make its themes clear. I think suggesting "moar blood!!!" is just stupid (no offence to anyone), Bethesda's writers and visual artists are the only ones in a position to judge if this stuff should be in game in whatever quantities and qualities.

Yes they could, and sixual references are fun... But I mean, come on... Whether it would be implemented that you could actually have relations with NPC's or not it would probably be something like "Interact with girlfriend/[censored] victim - > Have six" and then you could watch a 10 second animation of pixel sodomy... Why, oh why would anyone want that in and Elder Scrolls game?

Sorry I forgot to multiquote, but someone further up talked about wether bruises, cuts, and more blood was needed so...
No, it is not needed. In fact, I'd be perfectly happy with a game completely identical to Oblivion in engine and graphics, but with a new setting, storyline etc. But now that they've gone ahead and developed a new engine and there is a thread asking wether or not I think it would be a good idea to have more blood in it? Yes, I think it would be a good idea. The whole idea of developing and, hopefully, improving an engine must be to make it look more realistic. And I think, a bit more realistic combat on the visual side would do some good there.
Not talking about organs and blood splattered on the ground or being able to do a Monty Python and chop arms and legs off a dude and leave him to rot, but a bit more blood and perhaps some visual cuts and bruises would be a nice addition.

advlt themes and humour here and there is fine with me, along with relevant gore. Drugs and slavery are already present in TES. But hardcoe six and forced six? Thats a disgusting concept for a game, seriously. If six was included I'd rather it be simular to Dragon Age Origins -- we know its happening but we dont see anything really.

But really, six shouldnt be there, its awkward. I mean, even NPC's shaking hands looks strange in TES.

Everything except the six related options and perhaps extreme gore.

Edit: Unless it was handled in a similar way that Bioware does it. Then it'd be fine.

As a number of other people have said, I would want the game to be advlt and mature - not juvenile and puerile. Slavery and drugs, yes, fine. They were themes in Morrowind, and since they were handled in a reasonably mature way (though without any great depth) they added depth to the game. six... references to six as a powerful motivating force for people's actions is fine. A romance plot with a companion (which pretty much requires at least implied six), fine. Even (as one person stated above) references to forced six, so long as it is handled in a mature and advlt way (rather than a titillating, shock-value treatment) might be alright. Implied and referenced torture, again, can be perfectly reasonable if handled properly.

Explicitly portrayed sixual activity would be almost impossibly hard to do in an advlt manner in a computer game. It's hard enough to do in a book, and even harder in a film, and there the authors have complete control over the introduction of characters, the portrayal of their motivations, and showing their reactions and the emotional consequences. In a freeform game like the Elder Scrolls I think that handling this in a mature manner would be impossible. For the same reason I'd be strongly inclined against nudity. It can be done well enough, but is very tricky to handle, and the risk of making it cheap and sordid is too high in this context.

Any suggestion that the player should be able to inflict torture is, I strongly believe, exceedingly childish. There is no reason for this except to give the player an illicit thrill. Yes, to an extent this applies to any violent or criminal act that the player can carry out in a computer game, but I think it's a matter of degree. A line has to be drawn somewhere, and that is where I'd draw it.

Agreed. Torture is just too Freudian to put in a roleplaying game... A choice between criminal lifestyle, legitimate, or in between? Roleplaying. An option for torture? No, which is the same reason I don't watch Saw movies.

I'd like six, slavery and drugs to be issues of major cities. Simply because it fits. I don't care for actual sixscenes, but maybe a questline revolving around protitudes. Also I'd like wounds on my character in battle, l4d amount of gore would just be silly

I'd like TES-games to have a bit more mature feeling in them, kind of like Age of Conan and The Witcher have, yet not so dark. Thus game world would become more realistic, allowing plethora of possibilities in creating atmosphere, quests, and interesting political and moral thinking and maybe even decisions. In this regard, Daggerfall was better than MW and OB. To say that mature themes are childish is just plain ignorance. Of course they can be made with a very bad taste, but really, do you think BGS would do so? :nono:

Politics. Nothing else...

Only voted for more political subjects and intrigue. A game can be more advlt without being about six or drugs, but be much more intelligent and deep in storyline and general theme. While I love Oblivion, it was a lot more, well, there was some lack of intelligence among the NPCs, always talking about standard Mudcrab stuff. I'd like people to sit down with a mug of Mead and discuss not just common town folk things, but also lore, I wanna hear a NPC bard talk for minutes in a row behind me about Skyrim heroes of times past, wanna hear laughter, or in places where things are bad, I wanna hear general conversations about their troubles, as a matter-of-fact, not a 'oh hero, please help us cause we can't do anything alone'.

Politics and intrigue are great points too, wanting to hear from NPCs, preferrably without even talking to them, but overhearing them, discuss general details about what they -think- is going on. Not a 'oh hero, hint hint!'.

So, lore, history, discussions, politics and intrigues being discussed, would be what I'd like to see as examples to make the game more 'advlt' due to it's depth of story and theme.

Treat the gamers are intelligent advlts, and you will see the game becoming more advlt, and intelligent too.

Yes to everything except perhaps forced and hardcoe six.

six, gore, drugs are in and of themselves not going to make a game feel more "advlt". Possibly make strong opponents and NPCs who you are strongly against (quest based perhaps) die in a more dramatic fashion to enhance the experience. Including NPCs that display actual disabilities and the threat of violence from combat or accidents would be a better use of showing the horrors of physical injury than gratuitous gore. Drug addiction could be used as a tool for quests, exploiting an NPCs weakness to gain power or trust over them. Prostitution, consorts, concubines, etc. can be wrapped into quests as well. Touching on topics of human sixuality would be a nice addition, but actual six and/or nudity is unnecessary.

I am a wee bit sleep deprived.... so I might have just typed a bunch of incoherent ramblings.......

I like the levels of 'advltness' in Oblivion, Skyrim could include a teeny bit more blood, nothing major. I think adding gore and six would ruin it slightly. That is just my opinion though.

If you want more six and violence then you could just get a game that includes these things, there are more games out there than the elder scrolls series.

No... keep this away from a good game series like TES.
Drugs is already skooma, and that should stay that way.
six should not be in a game, never.
Gore/Extreme gore should not be in TES. The battle can be A LITTLE more gory, but not much.
Torture has an obvious answer.

That depends on how it's done. If it's going to have advlt-themed minigames then yes.
But six in general is just a part of being human, I don't really see the problem when roleplaying game acknowledges the fact that children do not grow on trees and that people do it for fun.

Same thing goes with drugs, cruelty and gore.
It's not that anyone is saying it should be the main focus of the game, but a broad palette of themes is what makes the difference between a mediocre RPG and a great RPG.

Oblivion had slavery. Malacath's quest?
And it had drugs- Skooma.
And six references. What about that Dunmer asking about Necrophilia.
Sure, I'd like more gore, but not as much as Fallout 3. Fallout 3's gore was just stupid. Arms randomly falling off, and it looked rubbish. If there will be gore, make it more realistic. Anyway, if Skyrim is going to get an M rating, it needs to deserve it this time.

This.

Nudity can be modded in, as can six. So I really don't see the need to include them in the vanilla game.
Forced six though? That's a bit sick if you want to do that in a video game. :unsure:

Judging by recent trends... possibly. Oblivion seemed to be edging into the 'lots of combat, little humanity' comfort zone that so many action game makers like to occupy. And interestingly, this was the first of their RPGs that could best be described as an action RPG rather than simply an RPG. Fallout 3 upped the violence, but it's social/political setup still had far fewer of the subtleties and complexities of Morrowind, which itself (by reputation) was more socially sanitised than Daggerfall.

Part of this is that with more realistic graphics issues such as nudity become more sensitive. But that doesn't apply to books, quest lines, or dialogue. I cannot help but fear that Bethesda have lost some of their taste for mature complexity and subtlety, and perhaps some of their talent. And if that is so, then there is a risk that they could exhibit bad taste or immaturity if they tried to make the game more advlt.

I think it's encouraging that this thread shows a lot of TES fans still understand what the word 'mature' actually means - and it's worth reminding Bethesda that many of their fans do still want genuinely mature themes, rather than buckets of gore and peep-show nudity. Perhaps if they know it would be well received, they will consider it - for the next game if not this one.

I’m cool with more “advlt” content, so long as by advlt you mean more seriousness, thoughtfulness, and sophistication.

briasts wouldn't offend me, but boobies would be boring.

Realism would be great, but gore could be corny.

Know what I mean?