Skyrim hopes

[weirdtexan]

And while we're here, how about what we hope Skyrim already has in it.

 

1. NO need for body mods, clothes mods to fit bodies, etc. God willing, Skyrim will have a great body creation set, with jiggle physics, decent faces, and all the other stuff modders have had to put into oblivion themselves, along with clothes that, instead of being one size fits all, stretch to fit the model they're on.

 

2. Marriage. C'mon Bethesda, even Fable has this. Hell, follow that up with the ability to have affairs, ruin marriages and get divorced.

 

3. Big-ass dragons. Not a lot of fantasy games actually have dragons. The one in the trailer is pretty great, but i'm hoping we get some that are near Godzilla sized.

 

Any other hopes?

[Guest Loogie]

Bethesda is excellent at building worlds, and that's where it ends.  The writing, game mechanics and everything else in both Oblivion and Fallout 3 are amateurish and lack soul.  The only way the things you're hoping for can get done and get done well is if Todd Howard and Emil Pagliarulo don't have anything to do with the game.

 

Not to be a dick about it, but those two have run two franchises into the ground by trying to turn The Elder Scrolls and Fallout into shooters where all the dialog is is noises people make while you're killing them.

[ail]

Not to be a dick about it' date=' but those two have run two franchises into the ground by trying to turn The Elder Scrolls and Fallout into shooters where all the dialog is is noises people make while you're killing them.

[/quote']

 

That's sort of where my main hopes come from - very limited minigames and a simple combat system.  I flat out stink at FPS games, and when playing FO3, I pretty much could not kill anything without using VATS (unless I emptied whole clips into it, which is not conducive to long-term survival due to needing to scrounge more ammo).  And similarly in FO3, regardless of my characters skill, a locked door pretty much screwed me due to not being able to do the minigame (heck, even in Oblivion the way I get past locked doors most of the time is 'player.additem a 100.  *spam autoattempt button until door opens*').  So, main hope for FO3 is:

 

Player and Character skill will be divorced, and low player skill + high character skill will be able to get you through the game. 

[Guest Loogie]

Character skill over player skill was what the first two Fallouts were about.  It used probabilities for all the calculations; even if you had almost no lockpick experience there was a chance you could lockpick a door, even if that chance was one in a million.

[tomfoolery]

Bethesda is excellent at building worlds' date=' and that's where it ends.  The writing, game mechanics and everything else in both Oblivion and Fallout 3 are amateurish and lack soul.  The only way the things you're hoping for can get done and get done well is if Todd Howard and Emil Pagliarulo don't have anything to do with the game.

 

Not to be a dick about it, but those two have run two franchises into the ground by trying to turn The Elder Scrolls and Fallout into shooters where all the dialog is is noises people make while you're killing them.

[/quote']

 

Yeah, kind of agreed. I love exploring the worlds, but damn, you'd think they would hire some actual writers

 

I mean there are some quests/moments that are just amazing(Whodunit? being a prime example), but those are just so few and far between...

 

As for me, I'm hoping for a half-way decent story. Characters without seams on their necks(oh gods this would be amazing), and just NPC's that don't look so bad.

 

Oh, also, more than 8 voice actors for every NPC in the world. That would be nice to.

[Guest Loogie]

I don't know if they use many more voice actors in New Vegas than they did in Fallout 3 or Oblivion, but the acting was leaps and bounds better for minor NPCs, and for major NPCs they made sure they got big name professionals.  I think Bethesda just shoves piles of copy in front of actors without telling them what the character is or what the context is, so all the actors do is read copy.

 

Obsidian showed Bethesda up so much at their own game that I don't know how Bethesda can release Skyrim without being embarrassed.

[tomfoolery]

Yeah, New Vegas was so much more better it was stupid.

 

Granted the bugs and interior level design needed much work(entering vaults are scary. Not because the game itself is scary, but because the thought of navigating those labyrinths is just terrifying). But overall I'd say it was better. Much better.

[DocClox]

Bethesda is excellent at building worlds' date=' and that's where it ends.  The writing, game mechanics and everything else in both Oblivion and Fallout 3 are amateurish and lack soul.[/quote']

 

I'm not sure I agree with that. In fact, I  think the writing in Oblviion and FO3 was very good, within the constraints of the game style.

 

The trouble is that Bethseda specialise in - let's say "egoless" - player characters. You play a character who has no personality at all. That's good, in so far as it allow you project your own backstory and motivations onto your guy or gal, and this in turn build very good immersion. The downside is that the player character has no dialogue, except for maybe in the phrasing of some player choices. It's a very difficult style in which to tell any sort of story.

 

Now in Morrowind, Bethseda got around the problem largely by throwing NPC dialogue at the player. The trouble with Oblivion, and then Fallout was the decision to have everything voice acted. This greatly increased the expense of every line of NPC dialogue, which meant that conversation trees had to pruned to the minimum.

 

Like I say, within those constraints, I think Bethsada do an amazing job at story-telling. Certainly they could do a lot better with a format like (say) the Witcher where the player can take an active part in character development ... but then they'd lose a major part of what makes the game so appealing to so many people.

 

That's my 2 cents on the subject, anyway.

[Shantotto]

Having voiceactors could limit the amount of text in the game to be sure but shouldn't affect the quality of the writing at all. Nor should the fact that you play a blank slate character. To be sure, the writing have to be a bit different of course then if you were to have a set character. But there games that have excellent writing and still feature blank slate characters. Hell, New Vegas is the most recent example. The older Fallouts are two others.

 

I'd say that,at least in the earlier days, Bethesda were good at fleshing out the lore. There is a lot of rather nice cultural depth to the Elder Scrolls, it's just that a game like Oblivion didn't dive deep into it at *all*. I'd say that's probably the nicest looking change for Skyrim so far, it looks to have far more identity and sense of culture than Oblivion ever did. Oblivion was about the most generic fantasy gameworld I'd ever seen. Fallout 3 was a travesty in terms of how it handled the Fallout lore, rehashing of plots and ofttimes hindering the player's freedom (possibly one of the most care design goals of the Fallout games) by rather stupid decisions (let's have a town run by kids!).

 

But yeah, I'd say Skyrim is looking pretty nice. As I said above, the biggest positive change is that the world just seems to have a lot more identity and sense of culture. Making use of the well-written lore of the series. My biggest fear of the game is that they will continue the "dumbing down" trend but that's far too early to tell.

[Guest Loogie]

In fact' date=' I  think the writing in Oblviion and FO3 was very good, [i']within the constraints of the game style[/i].

 

The writing was terrible by any standard - the game style doesn't constrict the writer to anything.  A half an hour of playing New Vegas shows this to be false.

 

The downside is that the player character has no dialogue, except for maybe in the phrasing of some player choices. It's a very difficult style in which to tell any sort of story.

 

If you have good writers, there is no downside.  Bethesda doesn't have good writers.

 

The trouble with Oblivion, and then Fallout was the decision to have everything voice acted. This greatly increased the expense of every line of NPC dialogue, which meant that conversation trees had to pruned to the minimum.

 

No, that's not what it means.  Again, look at how they handled this in New Vegas.

[DocClox]

The writing was terrible by any standard - the game style doesn't constrict the writer to anything. 

 

Perhaps my point would have been clearer if I'd said "format" instead of "style". The restrictions define the style/format.

 

A half an hour of playing New Vegas shows this to be false.

 

I'm sorry' date=' but I really don't see that at all.

 

I'll grant, there was a lot to like about New Vegas. The main quest showed a little more imagination, and the game generally was far closer to Fallout lore. Nor was FO3 entirely without it's faults: most notably to my mind, the whole "waters of life" theme was badly undermined by the oblivion mechanism of sleeping to regain full health.

 

On the other hand, having played both quite games, I still find FO3 to be much more enjoyable. Much as I appreciated Obsidian's efforts to bringing Fallout back to its roots, I think a lot of Bethseda's changes made for a game that worked better in the new format.  I can see how some people would enjoy FO:NV more; I'm sometimes a little baffled as to why I'm not one of them. But to say that the FO3 writing is terrible in comparison, let alone "by any standard" - is just silly. It's a ridiculous exaggeration.

 

And to be honest with you, I didn't think the New Vegas MQ was that much better than that of FO3, either. And the whole New Vegas setting smacked horribly of a retread of New Reno from FO2, which was the major problem I had with the game.

 

The downside is that the player character has no dialogue, except for maybe in the phrasing of some player choices. It's a very difficult style in which to tell any sort of story.

 

If you have good writers, there is no downside.  Bethesda doesn't have good writers.

 

So you're saying that all formats are equally suited to all tasks? In which case, presumably, Romeo and Juliet would have lost nothing had Shakespeare been required to write the play purely in form of dirty limericks? I can't agree with you.

 

The trouble with Oblivion' date=' and then Fallout was the decision to have everything voice acted. This greatly increased the expense of every line of NPC dialogue, which meant that conversation trees had to pruned to the minimum.[/quote']

 

No, that's not what it means.  Again, look at how they handled this in New Vegas.

 

So tell me what you think it does mean. I understand that don't agree but you're offering nothing in support of your point here. Certainly. I don't recall New Vegas conversations being noticeable more extensive than those in FO3.

 

I get that you didn't like FO3, and you're obviously entitled to your opinion. But it was far from amateurish.

[Guest Loogie]

So you're saying that all formats are equally suited to all tasks?

 

No' date=' I'm saying if Bethesda had good writers their fanboys wouldn't have to make excuses for their lack of talent.

 

I don't recall New Vegas conversations being noticeable more extensive than those in FO3.

 

Then you're remembering Fallout 3 conversations with rose colored glasses.  Go talk to a character like Magnificent or Caesar then compare their quality of writing and complication of their speech trees to characters like Megaton's sheriff (whose name I forgot because he was a one dimensional character) and President Eden.

[DocClox]

So you're saying that all formats are equally suited to all tasks?

 

No' date=' I'm saying if Bethesda had good writers their fanboys wouldn't have to make excuses for their lack of talent.

[/quote']

 

So then you do accept that some formats are better suited some tasks than they are to others? I mean except in so far as it gets in the way of making childish insults for no good reason, obviously.

 

 

I don't recall New Vegas conversations being noticeable more extensive than those in FO3.

 

Then you're remembering Fallout 3 conversations with rose colored glasses.  Go talk to a character like Magnificent or Caesar then compare their quality of writing and complication of their speech trees to characters like Megaton's sheriff (whose name I forgot because he was a one dimensional character) and President Eden.

 

Well' date=' only as long as we're comparing apples to aardvaarks. Lucas Sim had maybe 10 lines in the whole game - hardly a pivotal character like Caesar. A better comparison would be with James, or Moira Brown. President Eden, on the other hand, I thought was [b']very[/b] well written. Not so much for his dialog with the player: (he gets fewer lines than Lucas Sim) but the radio broadcasts were very well done. Nicely manipulative, subtly political, and in retrospect quite plausible for something an AI might devise if it wanted to emulate past presidents.

 

I'd love to talk about Magnificent, but I don't remember meeting any such character, so I can't help much there. I checked one of the fallout wikis and didn't find an entry for "Magnificent" there, either, so it's clearly not just me. Perhaps the character goes by another name?

 

Also: All this is getting way off-topic for a Skyrim discussion. We should probably either agree to differ, or start a new thread under General Discussion.

 

[ail]

To get back to Skyrim, found another thing I really hope gets fixed.  Its a little thing, but...

 

If horses/mounts are in (and I hope they are), I really want the NPCs to start using the stables.  The sheer number of horses which get dropped off outside of city gates is just annoying, especially when the stables are right there!

[Guest Loogie]

Let me start off by saying I got confused - when I said Magnificent I meant to say Fantastic.

 

So then you do accept that some formats are better suited some tasks than they are to others?

 

You're arguing Bethesda's format is best suited to terrible writing and minimal talking.  I'm arguing that is not the case and is the product of laziness and lack of talent

 

Well' date=' only as long as we're comparing apples to aardvaarks. Lucas Sim had maybe 10 lines in the whole game - hardly a pivotal character like Caesar.[/quote']

 

You're right Lucas Simms isn't a pivotal character - which is why my sentence was constructed to make him analogous to Fantastic and Eden to Caesar.  Simms and Fantastic, while not pivotal characters, are essential to making the areas they are in work, and are also infodumps.  Simms is a walking cliche that isn't even at home (a western sheriff in a DC junk town?) while Fantastic is hilariously out of his depth.

 

A better comparison would be with James, or Moira Brown.

 

I'd say James would be comparable to Benny, and Moira Brown's whole spiel was so idiotic there's no real comparison to be found in NV.

 

President Eden, on the other hand, I thought was very well written. Not so much for his dialog with the player: (he gets fewer lines than Lucas Sim) but the radio broadcasts were very well done. Nicely manipulative, subtly political, and in retrospect quite plausible for something an AI might devise if it wanted to emulate past presidents.

 

His monologues were okay.  This discussion isn't about monologues - it's about discussions.  His speech tree had no branches, the player was presented with no choices while dealing with him, and the player dialogue options were pathetically written.  The character had a charming veneer, but it had no depth.

 

I'd love to talk about Magnificent, but I don't remember meeting any such character

 

I got confused and pointed it out at the beginning of the thread - I meant Fantastic.  He's the head engineer in Helios One, I haven't been around there for awhile so I forgot the name.

[DocClox]

Let me start off by saying I got confused - when I said Magnificent I meant to say Fantastic.

 

Thought it was probably something like that.

 

You're arguing Bethesda's format is best suited to terrible writing and minimal talking.  I'm arguing that is not the case and is the product of laziness and lack of talent

 

*sigh* Three things:

 

1: I was arguing that there are other formats which are far better suited to deep characterisation' date=' complex plotlines and writing with "soul". The Morrowind format was better, since it allowed the NPCs to say more, and have more complex speech patterns, for instance. But if the writing is [i']important[/i] you're probably better off with a VN rather than an egoshooter. I'm not saying you can't write well in the format. In fact, I'm saying that both Bethseda and Obsidian did write well in the format. I just happen to think both of them would have been able to tell their stories more effectively with a format that allowed them a bit more elbow room.

 

2: Why the big hate-on for Bethseda writers anyway? Did a Bethseda writer run over your dog, or steal your girlfriend or something?

 

3: I'm increasingly uncomfortable hi-jacking this thread for what it in danger of turning into an Obsidian-vs-Bethseda fanboy war. You ignored my previous point about agreeing to differ, so I going to have to go unilateral here. I hereby agree to differ with you on this point. Feel free to have the final word in this thread, or start a new thread in General if you really want to continue.

 

I'm going to ignore the rest of what you posted, because otherwise this will go on and on, and it really is the wrong place for the argument.

 

[edit]

 

Oops. Fixed the quote tags. And the half finished sentence. I really should make sure I'm fully awake before responding to things like this ...

[jinsanx]

Let me start off by saying I got confused - when I said Magnificent I meant to say Fantastic.

 

Thought it was probably something like that.

 

You're arguing Bethesda's format is best suited to terrible writing and minimal talking.  I'm arguing that is not the case and is the product of laziness and lack of talent

 

*sigh* Three things:

 

1: I was arguing that there are other formats which are far better suited to deep characterisation' date=' complex plotlines and writing with "soul". The Morrowind format was better, since it allowed the NPCs to say more, and have more complex speech patterns, for instance. But if the writing is [i']important[/i] you're probably better off with a VN rather than an egoshooter. I'm not saying you can't write well in the format: I'm saying that you're unlikely to get

 

2: Why the big hate-on for Bethseda writers anyway? Did a Bethseda writer run over your dog, or steal your girlfriend or something?

 

3: I'm increasingly uncomfortable hi-jacking this thread for what it in danger of turning into an Obsidian-vs-Bethseda fanboy war. You ignored my previous point about agreeing to differ, so I going to have to go unilateral here. I hereby agree to differ with you on this point. Feel free to have the final word in this thread, or start a new thread in General if you really want to continue.

 

I'm going to ignore the rest of what you posted, because otherwise this will go on and on, and it really is the wrong place the argument.

 

This was a pretty well written argument on both sides .

 

But yeah...from a more simple point of view, Morrowind felt like the depth of character was more substantial on almost EVERY npc you spoke to. Oblivion, Fallout, and Fallout NV characters were half assed personalities typically with very little in character depth of any kind. Now, maybe voice acting is a reason for the writers being cramped on what they could do, but I don't accept that as a valid excuse to make their writing what it turned out to be. They should of either worked hard to make it work or NOT of done it at all. Maybe that's not the writers fault, but the men in charge, who knows. Point pretty much remains, the writing needs to be better, whatever it takes. That may seem unfair, but both series had previous games with much better writing, it makes sense to demand a level of continued quality in that area.

 

This shouldn't be assumed that for some reason, I don't like either series, I just accepted that I don't play them anymore for their written plots. They have great features and have large mod communities, their writing is sub-par and a weakness.

[TalMaheRa]

Since Howard has already said they'll reboot the Elder Scrolls, I'm hoping that Skyrim isn't it.  We haven't seen Black Marsh or Summerset yet.  Nords either don't know or don't care about the Hist; and I've yet to walk the halls of Crystal Tower or sight the Psiijic isles on the horizon.  I fear that lore and the consolization of the series however point to exactly this; that Tiber Septim 2 is the end of this iteration.  The old towers have fallen, the K'Sharra has come true!! :panicking Khajiit:

 

Skyrim better kick so much ass that Rated M for Manly is a vast understatement.  My hopes will be expertly dashed.

[Symon]

Well, more stuff is leaking out:-

"You'll still get to pick from one of 10 fantasy races, customize your physical appearance, and select a gender, but after that it's right into the game you go. The eight attribute categories from the previous Elder Scrolls game, Oblivion, have been cut out. Now you only have to worry about your Magicka to cast spells, Health for your hit points, and Stamina, which serves as a limiting factor when pulling off axe slashes and mace bashes in combat."

Read that again. No Attributes. Talk about aiming firmly at the console! Still, it will go nicely with the Ipod style interface that they speak of and certainly meshes with their thoughts that 90% of their market is now consoles.

[Guest Loogie]

But if the writing is important you're probably better off with a VN rather than an egoshooter.

 

If the writing isn't important' date=' a game should never be branded Fallout.  No exceptions.

 

In fact, I'm saying that both Bethseda and Obsidian did write well in the format.

 

The former didn't, the latter did.

 

2: Why the big hate-on for Bethseda writers anyway?

 

Because they make shallow games with bad writing that appeal to the lowest common denominator and almost drove the final nail into Fallout's coffin before having the good sense of letting a real RPG developer make New Vegas.

 

Bethesda is good at world building, but their stories are so devoid of personality that you can project anything you want into it - it's the same reason Twilight is popular, because Bella is such an insecure twit that the reader can project anything she wants into her.  Fallout 1, 2 and NV accomplish this same withing while having charm, oozing personality, and having stories that stick to an internal logic - what's Fallout 3's excuse?

 

I really do want to genuinely like Oblivion and Fallout 3.  There are a lot about the game concepts, areas to explore, over-arching stories and game mechanics that seem great at first glance, but once you actually try to get indepth with the systems you realize they're shoddily constructed and all the angles don't add up to 360.  I fear with Todd Howard running the show - he's a racing game and shooter guy, not an RPG guy - Emil writing it, and Pete Hines firing up his PR machine, Skyrim is going to be another mess that's only good if you pile a ton of sex mods on top of it.

[Symon]

"Bethesda is good at world building, but their stories are so devoid of personality that you can project anything you want into it"

They used to be better though. Morrowind had a much better story than Oblivion.

"it's the same reason Twilight is popular, because Bella is such an insecure twit that the reader can project anything she wants into her."

Well, yes. Moonlight was much better 'Vampire TV'. Probably why it got canned after one season. Inspired timing there! Canning a series just as vampires become the big thing.

[snarfies]

I have exactly one hope the rest of my hopes are predicated on:  NO DRM.  Not even Steam.

 

I refuse to buy New Vegas because it requires Steam, I refuse to buy ANYTHING that requires any sort of outside permission for me to use my software.  Also kept me from buying Civ V, GTA IV, and Dragon Age II.  At this rate I'll probably wind up switching over to Linux full-time, since my main excuse for keeping Windows around was for gaming.

 

Assuming my first hope is met, my next hope is that they'll figure out a way to include chocolate elves into the official canon, because who doesn't love 'em?

[marrow12]

I know what you mean about the Drms I still regret buying Assasin's creed 2 since I didn't have a permanent internet connection back then, so I ended having to crack my retail copy so I could play which is just ridiculous.

[snugbug]

I have exactly one hope the rest of my hopes are predicated on:  NO DRM.  Not even Steam.

 

 

I only ever have Steam online when I download the game and install it. Otherwise it's always offline. Steam doesn't need online confirmation beyond that initial install.

 

Like Oblivion, I'll probably hold off from purchasing Skyrim until the mod scene gets under swing. Like the leveling system in Oblivion, I'll wait and see what Skyrim is offering. The only thing I can say I want changed so far is a different menu style.

 

There's just too little information out to say more at this point.

[DocClox]

\"The eight attribute categories from the previous Elder Scrolls game' date=' Oblivion, have been cut out. Now you only have to worry about your Magicka to cast spells, Health for your hit points, and Stamina, which serves as a limiting factor when pulling off axe slashes and mace bashes in combat.\"

[/quote']

 

Oh good!. "Now improved with added stupid!" That is such a relief: I can't tell you how much I was worried about managing all those pesky attributes. Suddenly waiting for November just got a whole lot easier.

 

And, seeing as how no one seems to much care about off-topic posts elsewhere on this board...

 

In fact' date=' I'm saying that both Bethseda and Obsidian did write well in the format.[/quote']

 

The former didn't, the latter did, In My Humble Opinion.

 

There, fixed that for you

 

Seriously, I think this is the core of the problem here. There's a distinction between "I didn't much enjoy that character" and "that character could only have been written by a congenital idiot who scrawled the words in crayon on the walls of his padded cell". I'm not sure it's a distinction you always acknowledge.

 

Because they make shallow games with bad writing that appeal to the lowest common denominator and almost drove the final nail into Fallout's coffin before having the good sense of letting a real RPG developer make New Vegas.

 

I'm still unconvinced that there's any substantial difference in quality between NV and FO3. In fact' date=' if you set aside the fact that NV was a lot more faithful to Fallout lore, I'd have said FO3 was the better written. Personally, that is. But even if you're right, that's call for saying "I don't think Bethseda did justice to the Fallout franchise". As opposed to finding cunning ways to embed "All Bethseda Writers Suck!" into every single sentence you write. I guess it just seems a little excessive to me.

 

Bethesda is good at world building, but their stories are so devoid of personality that you can project anything you want into it

 

That's not a bug. it's a feature.

 

I really do want to genuinely like Oblivion and Fallout 3.  There are a lot about the game concepts' date=' areas to explore, over-arching stories and game mechanics that seem great at first glance, but once you actually try to get indepth with the systems you realize they're shoddily constructed and all the angles don't add up to 360.

[/quote']

 

The thing about that ... Fallout 3 and  New Vegas share about 95% of their game mechanics. They have a common engine, the same narrative format, the same stats, the quest management, the same lock-picking and programming framework... the list just goes on. Against that, you have what? Survival skill, iron-man mode, magazines as well as books, and some new guns. If FO3 sucks as much as you say it does, if every single game mechanism is as badly broken as you suggest, then so is NV since it shares the overwhelming majority of those rules and mechanisms.

 

I suppose I should also add that NV did apply the Gamebryo levelled lists concept a bit more intelligently. You can't just pick a direction to run in and expect to survive. Which is is kind of no-net-gain to my mind. On the one hand, the way challenge scales with level in Oblivion irritated me, as it did many people. It's not so bad in Fallout 3 - try wandering into Fairfax or Bethseda Ruins at level 1 and see how long you last.

 

Still, Obsidian took it to the far extreme with the radscorpions and deathclaws. The result is a lot closer to Fallout lore, true, but at the price of turning NV into something of a rail-shooter at the start. You can't go north, you can't go east, there is no west (on account of not being written yet). So every playthrough starts the same, and I tend to find myself losing the will to live about the time I get to Vegas.

 

I fear with Todd Howard running the show - he's a racing game and shooter guy' date=' not an RPG guy - Emil writing it, and Pete Hines firing up his PR machine, Skyrim is going to be another mess that's only good if you pile a ton of sex mods on top of it.

[/quote']

 

Well, I don't know any of the people you mention, but the "now improved with added stupid" press release rather suggests this may be a valid concern so far as Skyrim is concerned.