This is not a discussion about the general rating system and Skyrim's Mature rating, this is about what "Mature" means to you, the player. I think Skyrim lacks some mature content (quests that bring you to face very strong moral decisions, storyline branches that lock/unlock special events based on your previous choices so you have to live with serious dramatic consequences and know that what's happening now is your fault only, etc...).

Skyrim gives me this impression that it's designed to aim @ teenage public with all the simplistic dialogue, black and white choices (when you actually are given a choice and not forced to be good or bad), lack of swearing and sixual content, lack of blood when someone dies, lack of horror aspects that creep you out not only with cheap hollywood techniques (ie spider jumps on your back), but with things that you didn't expect to happen, atrocities, extreme violence and graphic/audio representation of extreme fear or pain...

In this game (and oblivion suffered from this too) there is a perceivable concern to be "politically correct", to be as appealing to the crowd as possible, at the expense (at least in my opinion) of credibility and atmosphere. Beggars are healthy and athletic, not dirty and crippled. Nobody dies in front of you from hunger or infected wounds. There is no domestic violence for the player to witness. The prison is clean and quiet like a hotel, not full of tortured prisoners, blood, swarming flies, corpses, rats and screams. The whole story and atmosphere is meant to make us believe there is a serious civil conflict and a world breaking threat going on, but the towns and especially people are way too calm and ignorant to make it authentic, to make you really empathize for their suffering. I think the storytelling and the dialogue play a major role in making this game comfortable to the player, and I think too much comfort hurts credibility.

My question is: are you satisfied with the maturity of Skyrim? What would you like added/removed so it feels and play more mature for you?

Bethesda doesn't do mature. The Witcher does mature everything (storytelling, dialogue, choices and consequences, boobs....)
If anything, the rating for Skyrim should be C (childish).
I won't give you a list of what mature content I would appreciate because we all know it won't happen. Especially now that Skyrim made the series successful.

Welcome to your first truly mature game.

Sorry it wasn't the foul-mouthed pormography fest you believed advlt life to be.

A significant quest in the game will affect the lives of practically everyone in Skyrim.

You'll spend your adolescent life wishing you were a grown up and the rest of your life wishing you were a kid.

Go figure.

Az

I love it!

I understand your desire for a more "mature" game that faces you with moral dicisions, but I got to be honest with you, I play games to escape from that sort of stuff. Turn on the news if you're looking for that. To me beheading someone or following the Dark Brotherhood story line was enough for me. So I'll ask, did you mean Maturity or Depth? Because I would agree with you whole heartidly on the latter, just not so much the prior.

Why would young people fear non-simplistic dialogue? You are not making any sense. They had a limited budget, that's all. As far as six and blood go, im happy as it is. I don't see how more of those things would rise the overall quality, since nether are very important. Besides, Skyrim has its fair share of sixual content. Someone in Riften comes to mind. There is also a necromancer who keeps ghosts as six slaves.

I'd like more shades of gray, but then Bethesda couldn't have released the game on 11/11/11, and it would have been a disaster.

More mature dialogue is my no1 wish. The lack of depth and choices is not necessarily designed for children, I know a lot of mature people who are less mature than their children
Anyways, I agree that the atmosphere should be darker to support the difficult times of today's Skyrim, and that darker atmosphere should have been built little by little in all the aspects you addressed: story, dialogue, violence, graphic and audio unsettling experiences.

when i speak of mature content i'm talking about many aspects OTHER THAN gore and violence and six.

those can be rendered childish, in my book.

i'm talking depth, complexity, decision making, difficulty.

Read the books of Skyrim, plenty of literature on the intimacies of races, anatomy, and a certain Argonain Maid. Throughout my adventures I've come to the conclusiions that the only Necromancer in existence who is animating corpses for power, knowledge, furthering their understanding of the ethereal is you, if you choose to play one. The rest are simply hell bent on abusing undead flesh for companionship, intimate or otherwise, because they are lonely basemant trolls who got kicked out of thier Mom's house in Dawnstar and fantasized about bar wenches who never gave them the light of day.

These are real world applications here people, don't be a bully.

I get what you are saying, I would like it to be a bit more "mature". I mean if i am gonna escape my life into this wondrous thing call Skyrim, i want to escape into another real, mistifying, scary, and yet beautiful world. To the point where it is obviously fantasy, but makes me FEEL for what is going on through the towns of skyrim. Otherwise im just mindlessly sluaghtering people not even giving a care for them, or skipping dialogue, cause the way it is, the dialogue has no effect on me, means nothing to me.


So yes i would enjoy a bit more mature game.

My first mature game was Gothic, a game that was rated +12 and is much more mature than Skyrim in any way conceivable: story, handholding, language and dialogue, learning curve, atmosphere, graphic illustration of poverty, pain and dirt... by taking your useless 'funny' spout to a personal level instead of replying to the subject you clearly are not more mature than you think I am.

tes games have never been particuarly deep, at the core its an action movie, an adventure story. Not every story has to bear some great revalation or moral conundrum, its an action adventure story where the hero slays the monster, just enjoy it for what it is.

you've added some great words that mimic my description of mature: handholding, learning curve, atmosphere and the graphics of life.

very nice.

I agree with OP, the game is lacking the mature writing. The graphics design is great, the technology is great, but the "meat" on those bones is rather thin and shallow. Childish dialogue, no meaningful dialogue replies for our character, a lot of one liners when one would expect a full description or explanation. Yes, the dialogue is childish. I also agree about the role of graphics and sounds in the overall make believe of detention. There should be more pain and agony espec in prisons. I love the way Dark Souls punishes the player for experimenting and exploring, the real life also punishes before it rewards. Skyrim has too much reward and zero punishment, therefore is more suitable for players who seek instant gratification and endless hand-holding.

Elder scrolls have never been that mature really:P
maybe morrowind?

Take a look at some places. You might find things like a necromancer with ghost six slaves in one, bloody rooms with tortured and decapitated corpses in another, maybe a family slaughtered by underground creatures, and more.
Also, as was said before, books have more "mature content" than the game itself does.
The overall "maturity" in the game is subtle, but effective. And it's effective because of the subtlety, at least for me. Instead of giving an impression of a game that tries too hard to be "hardcoe", it has its little easter eggs that can be very amusing, shocking or terrifying.

what was so mature? the dunmer are [censored] bags but you have to save them anyways? the devil really just wants to spread divine cancer to convert everyone to his side? the temple gods are false, Its still just an action adventure story, no choices.

although its main quest is probably my favorite of all of them, it practically oozed flavor, where ob and skyrim just had one or two characters who got into the lore

Welli dont know,It felt like it was more of a serious Game in some way,and morrowind had my favourite main quest too,but i do like OB sn skyrims too,what i am saying is elder scrolls game have never been that mature really
Wonder if TES will ever have that mature content Witcher,dragon age and mass effect has

Even games like The Witcher 2, which is currently being advertised as "[The] Most Mature and Complex Game on Consoles," isn't really all that terribly "mature," emotionally-speaking. The entire game deals with any mature and serious subject matter with all the grace of an Image comic from the '90s.

And much like comics from the '90s, I think that the fantasy genre went through a "we-need-to-be-grittier-and-edgier" phase, with similar results. Lots of pandering and gratuitousness, but also the occasional diamond in the rough, like George R.R. Martin's stuff.

I think I'd take these games a lot more seriously if they marketed them as what they are: bawdy sword-and-sorcery. You know, the way S&S is supposed to be. Just drop the "mature" bullcrap. When you say it like that, it just brings to mind the "advlt Savings & Loan" from Idiocracy.

ah i think we share the same view, miss read your first post,

Drug addiction and references of six and [censored] are in the game. There's death all over the place. Of course it deserves the "mature rating". Truth be told, if the game were any more "mature", it would risk alienating some it's target crowd, and maybe Microsoft publishing of it for XBox.

This

And this

No, not really
Added:
- difficult choices and consequences that can not be tested right away by save/load method. The effects will show up much later in the story line, so you will BE FORCED to live with the outcome. This adds a lot to replayability
- more dialogue branches and skill checks. Much more!
- characters with deep personalities and backstories. Let me know my companions in every detail. Detailed like BioWare. Make me feel something about them, be it love, hate, fear or admiration. Make CHARACTERS MATTER by giving them a soul and a personality. As they are now, they are various replaceable pieces of dead meat with different names and costumes
- different approaches to difficult situations, more diplomacy and espionage ways of avoiding fights
- harder puzzles! Come on, what's the point of a puzzle once you realize the answer is ALWAYS in the same [censored]in room?
- less arrows and pointers and more thinking on my own and searching for locations

Removed:
- children
- essential npc's
- full voice acting, let some suplimentary text based dialogue go deeper into the stories and character descriptions