This thread is for ideas and suggestions for future Elder Scrolls games, and to keep all the discussion in one series of threads.

We have a long way to go before we get another ES game. In the meantime, similar topics will be closed and referred to this one.

Note there is a separate thread specifically for http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1601186-tes-vi-location-and-setting-speculation-31/ suggestions for future games. Please keep discussion of Skyrim in the correct forums.

http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1602822-official-beyond-skyrim-tes-vi-81/#entry25155718

I'm just going to leave this here... The game is probably already in development but...

ELDER SCROLLS 6 HAS TO BE BUILT ON A NEW ENGINE.

The roots of Creation Engine go back as far as 1991. Nineteen-ninety-one. That pre-dates recorded history.

Look at Deus Ex: Mankind Divided. Look at it.

Do what's right Bethesda. I believe in you.

YMMV on that. Personally, I find the CE easy to work with, so I'm not particularly in any rush to see it replaced by...anything, really. Unless the engine can replicate everything the CE can do, along with an ease of access to use, without sacrificing anything in exchange for pretty colors, I'll pass.

I think a new engine would benefit ES obviously, it's just how a question of many features are there of things that would be great to add to the next game that aren't doable in the current engine. I would love to see a new engine, that would allow for better A.I, larger worlds, improved physics etc, I just feel that this would delay the game by a long time and I don't know whether Bethesda will want to create a whole new engine before development on TES 6 begins.

If there's going to be a new engine, it's going to be Creation 2, guaranteed. A new engine isn't going to magically make their games less buggy, and most other engines aren't even capable of building a Bethesda-style open-world. It's not like other modern engines aren't iterations on much older engines, so I don't really understand why Bethesda gets so much crap for doing the same thing.

I disagree. I adore the Netimmerse / Gamebryo / Creation engine and I hope they continue to use it and improve it for many years to come. It is perfectly suited to the kind of non-linear, open-world, roleplaying games Bethesda makes. It allows Bethesda to integrate DLCs and expansions into existing content with ease. And when it comes to modding it is the most flexible engine I have ever worked with.

The AI does need an upgrade but they don't need an entirely new engine for that. Just look at the difference in AI between Morrowind and Skyrim.

There are no real engine limitations on world size; Morrowind had a shaking bug at points far enough from 0,0, but I believe that has been resolved by now. The real problem is time.

The physics are not an in-built part of the game engine. Instead, they're licensing Hakov physics. They could easily switch to a different physics engine and retain the current game engine.

If they looked at witcher 3 is there anything they must copy/incorporate

Is there anything they cant posdibly do due to limitations of engine or 3rd/1st person combo such as climbing ladders


Sort of lore related but are standing stones located in other parts of tamriel

Would be nice if they updated the physics middleware so that it didn't freak out above 60fps, though. I feel like general physics weirdness are just something we'll have to accept, even if it does get better... Bethesda games have so many things physics-enabled, you're going to see something weird eventually. Fallout 4's hair and cloth physics are a nice performance balance considering they're enabled for all of the NPCs in the game, too, instead of having glorious flowing locks and a dramatic cape on our player character alone.

I'm not sure there's much they should really glean from the Witcher. Completely different type of RPG, with completely different approaches to story, combat, and character progression. Witcher is a story-driven RPG focused on branching questlines and dialog, Elder Scrolls is an open-world RPG focused on character-development and exploration. And their combat really isn't very comparable - it's easy to say games like Dark Souls and the Witcher 3 have better combat than Skyrim, but honestly their combat systems couldn't even work in first-person. And to be honest, for all it's refinement and new features, the chewy center of how you fight in Elder Scrolls hasn't changed since Arena - you get into the bad guy's face and swing your melee around, or you aim a spell or arrow. Daggerfall added mouse look (don't take it for granted), Morrowind set directional attacks based on movement (probably because it works better in third-person compared to Daggerfall's combat), Oblivion removed the dice roll, added blocking and power-attacks, and Skyrim added dual-wielding and a bit more variety in how the different weapons actually "felt".

I guess my point is, Elder Scrolls isn't going to reinvent the wheel for first/third-person melee combat. And I'll betcha it won't have a complicated control scheme of directional attacks, parries, and feints - moving on from Skyrim, my guess is that they'll find better ways to differentiate every different weapon type, combat style, and enemy type. The hardest part will be spreading all of that out between crafting, skill trees, and the different weapons themselves.

Unlikely. Unlike most companies which license their engines, Bethesda has total control of their own engine since the switch to Creation. This basically stips them of Engine limitations altogether, and allows them to add, subtract or change whatever they want, with varying degrees of ease. The issues with Ladders seem to have more to do with the skills of workforce, and nothing to do with the limitations of the engine or the controls of First or Third Person.

Only take away from Witcher is...uh...y'know...uh...Well, not really much of anything. I guess instead of regular and power attacks, you could go with light and heavy attacks, the latter requiring Stamina to use. Needs a new controller scheme to make it work, since currently you can't follow up power attacks in succession with the current inputs.

Whether it will or not is somewhat secondary to whether one thinks it should. I don't expect it do be much different than Skyrim's, but that doesn't change the fact that adopting greater directional control offers far more options than you can achieve otherwise. It may not be likely, but it is the best choice. I don't expect Disposition to return either, that doesn't mean that there aren't huge advantages in terms of making the world seem more alive and the characters less robotic when you have a Disposition system.

That said... i really don't think there's anything useful from The Witcher. Not mechanically, not story wise, not character wise... TES is a very different beast, and needs to be approached differently from every angle.

I think at this point they could add ladders just fine if they really wanted to, it's just they don't really need to. Back when they talked about not doing ladders, it was because they had trouble with the AI pathfinding and just decided it wasn't worth the time. I mean, if VI has ladders, cool, but that's never been the deciding factor for success in a game. (nobody say Donkey Kong)

I mean, okay, if we wanna talk about Witcher 3's influence on VI, I'll bet the next game will have more involved storytelling. Not necessarily like the Witcher storytelling, but like that kind of RPG where there is an emphasis on expressive dialog and the beloved "choices and consequences". I wouldn't be surprised, at least, and their gameplay mechanics are doing well enough that they don't need a dramatic overhaul like what the last couple of games have done.

Don't mind me, I always liked to look at it from the angle of what I imagine Beth may actually do, and less from what I *think* they should do. I don't have a problem with the basic "press button to swing weapon" system, and I think there are plenty of ways to build on that and create more variety in combat. Although if they can get Daggerfall style directional attacks to work in third-person and feel good with weight behind them, I'd be satisfied. For disposition, the important part is for NPCs that actually spend enough time around us to care either way - in the older games it was mostly just used so you could svck up to people to get information or money out of them, instead of forming actual relationships with characters. Fallout's affinity is a great system for characters that see a lot of us (companions), and Skyrim's tiered system at least made sensible relationship changes for when you do quests for NPCs - it just didn't really matter unless the NPC was a potential follower or spouse.

I understand. I tend to take a different approach, simply because I have such low expectations from developers. I rarely expect new, simply slightly more shine. This is, I think, fueled by the consumer, who is generally adverse to change even when they demand it, but it's an overal trend which I find leaves little room for interesting discussion. It's been a very long time since we've seen any real innovation in games... We usually just see one idea borrowed from another genre, and even that tends to be rare.


The Witcher 3 is a very good example of this. It doesn't do anything new. It doesn't even borrow anything from other genres. It just does old ideas better than others.


The problem with talking about what you expect, given the rather stagnant 'New Coat of Paint' model of the gaming industry, is its about as exciting as talking about what the next government will do.


So... I don't. I personally prefer to look at the industry as a whole, not just the current Genre, and think about what could make not necessarily the 'Best' (as that is inherently subjective) but rather the most versatile game that can appeal to as healthy an audience as possible. Which is why I tend to subscribe go what my friends call the 'Swimming Pool' philosophy... You've got a shallow entrance where you can spend all your time, bit you've got a good deal of depth further in if you choose to explore it.


But, Oblivion was my shock when it comes to expectations. And it's a mistake I don't wish to repeat. Now, I expect each game, in any genre or franchise, to be the same as the last with a new coat of paint. And often, I think even that's optimistic. It doesn't stop me from considering what COULD be, though, which I think makes for better conversation.

Sorry, moved this post to TES VI setting.

I see BETH in a weird place were they either have to admit their engine is dated and/or has some sever shortcomings or admit they're just not very good at using it to it's full potential. Again I don't know [censored] about this stuff but from the perspective of a dedicated fan their games have seemed to really stagnate. Personally I hope they either do a huge update to their existing engine or preferably create a whole new that can improve upon the short comings of CE and do what CE can do even better and work as a good foundation for their future developments and their expanding company.

ladders. yes. ladders blew my mind.

is this really such an impossible or an absurdly difficult task for bethesda? is implementing climbable ladders such a herculean task, that trying to accomplish such a tremendous feat would become very detrimental to the development of other more important features that to even consider adding ladders is like saying screw everything else, because.. ladders?

haha. sarcasm aside, if bethesda could figure out how to implement ladders in the next TES, that would be cool. i just don't get why adding ladders for the CE sounds like such a huge engine limitation problem, so i kinda agree with ckelley61495 that bethesda should really consider updating the functionalities of their engine.

anyways, i did find a mod involving ladders but i haven't tested it out yet. http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/41282/? will check it out later when i get back.

edit :

actually just by looking at the pics, they look more like stairs rather than ladders. i'm not even sure if it has it's own climbing animation, but i'll find out later.

It's not an engine problem, because we know Gamebryo games which do it. The problem lies with the actual designers and programmers at Bethesda. Exactly what said problem is, remains unclear, but it's not the engine. In truth, that's where all the problems lie. Bethesda's team is great, but it's small, and that seems to spread them rather thin. Not only that, but they seem to rely on a substantial amount of milti-tasking because of their small size. Remember, Bethesda, for Fallout 4, was less than half the size of CD Projekt Red for The Witcher 3. Their studio is barely bigger than some of the larger Indi studios at this point.

There are issues that need to be addressed with their engine. That is undeniable. But building a new one will take time, which pushes back their releases, and adopting a pre-made one means bowing to the designs of someone else. Both sides require sacrifices.

The lack of ladders is probably because they would need to get the AI to recognize and use them. Certainly doable, but I didn't even notice the lack of ladders in Skyrim until somebody pointed it out. It's also so trivial that I would rather the programmers spend time on other things.

I really want some of the animations/ai of feral ghouls implemented in next tes

-without the pip boy you cant tell the live ones from dead- i want draugr or whatever to have this feature as it was too easy to spot the live ones in skyrim

-the way they spill out of walls etc- has to be done

For tes creatures. Imagine tons of little spiders crawling out of holes in caves

-blow a leg off and they keep coming.

-numbers. I want more than 3 creatures attacking at once. I want 5-6 skeletons raging towards me

-how they rush you then bounce off and regroup/ perfect for wolves etc

-their loot- sometimes they have a wooden block and sometimes they have better stuff. There is at least the illusion of random loot

- i want a creepy abandoned town/possibly 1/2 flooded where u dont know when they will attack

Modder have managed to do it in TES games, too. Mods like Maskar's Oblivion Overhaul and Unnecessary Violence III have added a climbing feature, for both enemies and player character. No one has made animations yet, but the coding works. It's actually kind of frightening to see a Goblin climbing up the side of a steep rock to get at you.

Fallout 4 character development is essentially similar to Witcher - you just level up and open new perks, find better gear, etc.

And yes, I don't like it in Witcher and I didn't even play Fallout 4.

On the other hand, there is a lot of things that TES VI can borrow from Witcher.

1. Quests and story writing. I don't get your point about two different types of games. Witcher 3 is a huge open world. Sure, it's not very similar to Beth's open world, but still. And it easily includes well-written quests and main story and open world simultaneously.

2. Crafting. My god, crafting in Witcher is the best which I have seen. Tons of reagents, materials, different ways to craft a special item... Every RPG in fantasy setting should borrow it from Witcher.

3. Leveled areas. TES is all about freedom, blablabla, but if this freedom includes going to deepest dungeon and see only rats there on level 1 (and a diseased rat as a dungeon boss)... well, you get Oblivion's auto-level.

4. Social problems, politics, racial prejudices, religion... I hope that Witcher's success will show Bethesda that you don't really need to make a sterile game which tries its best not to offend any other person in the world. Witcher has a gay character in the starting location, who is expelled from community for being gay and whose story is essentially an enormous part of White Orchard's troubles. And it's not about bashing homosixual persons - it's about how they were seen in the pseudo-medieval society. It seems very strange and immersion-breaking to me, that every nord in Skyrim with whom I fought enemies, says that feels something special to me when I put on the Amulet of Mara. Racial conflict is more or less believeable, as well as religion problem with Talos. But Bethesda surely can't be brave enough to center the whole plot around bringing down false gods like they did in Morrowind...

5. Mini-games, at last. It's ridiculous that there are none still.

Generally, I want to see a more controversial and mature game which isn't trying to be loved by anybody. You take higher risks, you get higher rewards.

Spoiler: none of things mentioned in my post will actually be present in TES VI. Why? Because Beth will sell 20 millions of copies without even trying to be less sterile. And I will play it too in the end.

More spoiler: well, mini-games can surely be included. They do not offend vocal minorities, after all. Although a player can lose a mini-game and become upset with Beth

These are actually present as of Skyrim. Dungeons have a level range so that some will be more or less challenging depending on level. For instance, a ruin with a level range of 5-15 will scale enemies to a minimum of level five and a maximum of level fifteen. This means that a level one character entering the dungeon will be facing level five content, a level ten character will be facing level ten content, and a level twenty character will be facing level fifteen content. It's much better than both Morrowind's fixed levels and Oblivion's infinite scaling. Could there have been more and better high level content? Absolutely. That's been one of the biggest problems with the series since Morrowind.

Agreed. As far as I remeber, the deeper is dungeon section, and the higher in the mountains is the outdoor section - the higher is a level range in Skyrim.

Except that this is ignoring the fact that Tamriel is not anologous with any particular medieval society on most levels, especially regarding sixual orientation and gender differences. The most you have with that is the Orcs, and even then they're not particularly crass about it. Tamriel really isn't earth or has any distinct parallels with it. It should conform with what we know about the setting, what exists there, and not include anything that seems completely out of place to compliment a historical sense of immersion that doesn't exist there.

Technically actual gods, albeit gods that stole their godhood, two of whom were brought back down to being mortal well before we actually begin the game. So there's that.