» Mon May 14, 2012 9:54 pm Player freedom, to me, means that in some form or another you have the ability to roleplay a background and motivation in your head, and then choose from skills and abilities freely in order to live out that role. Many lamented Skyrim's elimination of attributes for this reason (i.e. we can be good at using axes, but we cannot be WEAK - perhaps due to a roleplayed injury - because there is no strength attribute.) But even in Skyrim, thanks to perks and the lack of classes, we still had the freedom to make our own way, at any time. If we are restricted to classes in ESO, that freedom is gone. That the classes essentially boil down to the typical triad in MMOs diminishes freedom and the sense of character uniqueness even more.
Lore and the sense of an ancient, complex political and cultural history is and always has been at the heart of TES. The single player games have managed to spoon feed us that lore in bites both large and small via books, dialogue, and plots (however poor or well done you feel they've been.) We have always had the freedom to seek it out - almost as though we were in-game scholars, doing "research." Given that this game sounds like it's using fairly traditional, status quo MMO mechanics, and given the end-game's reliance on PvP over the Imperial City, it's easy to envision any political or cultual connotations quickly being reduced to hyper-competitive meta-gaming and clans. I imagine it may be difficult to concentrate on how there's a war of succession for the throne of an ancient civilization going on when your primary concern is whether your healer is buffing your party enough. When games like Terra have political systems like they do, it seems unnatural for a game that should be so steeped in culture and lore to not have one that goes at all beyond PvP.
The combat in TES games is unique. It may not be that innovative or, depending upon your tastes, even particularly well implmented. But the fact is that TES games are known specifically for their first person melee combat, having to equip or read spells in order to use them, and managing your stamina, HP, and magicka (MP.) It sounds like the stats are there, but without the first person, visceral combat that makes you feel like you're really there, it simply WILL NOT feel like an Elder Scrolls game to me. Maybe I'm alone in this.
Which brings us to exploration. This at least, presumably, will factor into an MMO. But in any MMO, especially one using traditional structure and design elements, there are going to be areas you can't go before a certain level. One of the great things about TES is that you can venture off in any direction and accidentally find yourself somewhere that perhaps you shouldn't be yet. But if you're careful and well-stocked, you have at least some chance of survival... with a commensurate loot and XP reward for surviving encounters you by all rights weren't prepared for. I have yet to play any typical fantasy MMO where this is possible, and from the look of things, ESO will not be an exception. So how will this sense of exploration and discovery translate into ESO? Will it at all?
I know there are balance concerns not inherent in a single player game that Zenimax must consider, but unless you're going to at least TRY, in some way shape or form, to hit all of the notes that make up the chord that is "The Elder Scrolls," then I am forced to ask: why even bother? The only answer I can come up with is, "because an MMO with even a decent player population with the name Elder Scrolls stamped on it is a potential cash cow." And with a series as special and beloved as TES - a series which has remained defiantly single player, massive, and hand-crafted in an age of increasingly MP-centric, on rails, smallish games churned out every year - that just isn't a good enough reason, Zenimax.
I hope to be proved wrong in the future and, as I said, will TRY to reserve judgment.
