» Fri Aug 24, 2012 1:51 pm I made the comment about playing Skyrim for hundreds of hours, and some wondered how I could do that if the game was so bad.
FIrst...OCD...a need to finish what I start.
Second, as some pointed out, it's when you play a game long enough that you start realizing its shortcomings are stealing away the pleasure of playing that you recognize the flaws more readily. I didn't have issues with Skyrim in the first few hours...but after days of playing and it beginning to feel like a daily grind, that's when I felt the mechanics were flawed.
Now, that said....
How I think Bethesda should improve the next TES game.
Initial thoughts.....
1. Introduce classes again.
Maybe not so many (like in Morrowind and Oblivion). I'm thinking more along the lines of what was done in the Mass Effect series. Three pure classes (Fighter, Mage, Thief) and three hybrid classes (representing a combo of two of the three pure classes). Every class should have bonuses and penalties exclusive to that class.
Example 1: Fighter gets a 20% boost to current "real" endurance and health levels (so it's always 20% more than your actual score). Maybe a 10% boost to effectiveness in all combat skills. Down side would be a -20% on mana and mana regeneration. Maybe a -10% on spell effectiveness.
Example 2: Mage gets a 20% boost to mana and mana regeneration (and 10% boost in mage skills) but is limited to dagger and one-handed sword for weapons and maybe a -10% on effectiveness in melee combat.
Example 3: Thief gets an extra 100 in carry capacity and a 10% boost in learning all skills, but has a -10% on magic and combat skill effectiveness.
Hybrid classes (like a Battlemage...part fighter, part mage) would have boons and penalties that represent what a hybrid character should have.
Of course, like they did in Skyrim with giving a player the option to have to eat/sleep or ignore that gameplay option, you would always have the option to just play the "tradional" way where you can do it all, but no inherent boons or penalties based on role playing a class. This should all be possible by coding a two sets of values. One telling the game you are playing a class and the other telling the modified values (which would be zero for those playing the traditional way).
2. Limit options based on game choices.
Make the game (and this is just one idea), overall, shorter so that if a path will be forever blocked off by a choice, you can finish and replay to try other options. That, or at least label such options notoriously so that the player knows to leave those quest lines to the very last and they can make a save point if they would rather load and try a different path rather than start the game from the beginning.
At the very least, joining one group or guild should preclude your options elsewhere. You should be required to either downgrade your involvement with one guild to "associate" (compared to a "full" member) or outright resign the guild forever to get involved with a rival guild. This would mean if you want ot be head of the fighter's guild and it's incompatable with the thief's guild, you would have to step down as leader...possibly even leave it, to join the other. Your choice to resign would be permanent, but it puts some reality back into role playing. You can still do it all...just be sure to do it all for one faction before starting another. No more "I can be all things at the same time" nonsense.
4. Always have a blank version of specialty clothing and armor. Someone pointed out that you can't get assassin's gear without enchantments already on it. That's an ovesight that should be avoided. You should be able to have specialty clothing (assassin, thief, mage, etc.) available for custom enchanting or no enchanting at all.
5. Make relationship sims (marriage) more worth getting into or just leave them out.
6. I'd like to see custom spellmaking brought back, but I'm going to focus on the lack of a real "role play" feel that TES seems to suffer from.
