» Sun Jul 29, 2012 9:45 am Posting it here.
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"It’s that time of year when all good gaming journalists are putting together their best games of 2011 lists. My exact numbered order is still sorting itself out, but I wanted to discuss a fact I already know to be true.
Skyrim isn’t my game of the year.
Why? I’m not being contrarian, I promise, as I’m not alone in this thought. Places like GamesRadar and the Associated Press have said Portal 2 is their top pick for 2011. I too, would place Portal 2 above Skyrim on my list, with my ultimate Game of the Year being Deus Ex: Human Revolution, a selection I might be alone in choosing.
But rather than extol the virtues of these two titles, I’ll weave their triumphs into this critique of why Skyrim isn’t my choice for GOTY, but rather a solid third place instead.
In short, bigger is not necessarily better.
It cannot be overstated how truly impressive Skyrim is from a technical perspective. The new engine Betheseda has created is stunningly gorgeous, and improves leaps and bounds over its past titles. The world of Skyrim is one of the most rich and beautiful in video game history, and the fact that you can trek from one side of the massive country to the other with nary a loading screen is astonishing.
I’ve poured over a hundred hours into the game so far, and still have no idea how many more quests may be lurking out there. Skyrim is incredibly deep in terms of sheer volume of content, and has a quest list that quite literally never ends, thanks to a radial quest system that keeps doling out new ones long after all main plotlines are finished.
There is a sense of wonder to be able to just purely adventure, something that most games will rarely let you do, wanting to keep you on a pretty tight leash to experience the story. Skyrim will have you tripping over new stories left and right, and through exploration be rewarded by finding secrets and powerful items you would have missed if you stuck to the script.
But what does it matter really, if in a thousand quests, there isn’t one truly excellent storyline among them? Though the game makes a point of fleshing out almost every single NPC you talk to, and giving them a problem that they need your help solving, the individual plotlines of the game are all somewhat…lacking.
The guild quests are all some sort of variant of “the guild is in trouble, do petty jobs until we allow you to help save us, then become our grand leader a few days later.” Each of these plotlines anoint you the “chosen one” and despite being the newcomer, you’ll find yourself in charge of the place mere hours later sometimes. In one instance I was allowed to be the Archmage of a magic college despite the fact I hadn’t used a spell in the entire questline.
[img]http://blogs-images.forbes.com/insertcoin/files/2011/12/skyrim2.jpg[/img]
The main plot is even worse, deeming you the chosen one destined to slay all the dragons that are rising from the dead. But a few dungeons, a few dozen dragon fights later, and all the world is safe, though it’s unclear what the threat actually was, as even after the grand dragon is slain, his cronies keep attacking at every turn. No one seems to recognize what you’ve done to save the world, and almost none of the millions of branching plotlines found in the game seem to have anything to do with the main plot at hand.
Games like Portal 2 and Deus Ex give us far fewer story options. Portal only has one, discovering the history of Aperture and escaping the compound, and it keeps you on the rails for the duration. Deus Ex gives you a bit more freedom to explore, but largely stays in the augmentation theme, which raises some very interesting implications about morality and technology.
But both stories are fantastically told, and the games don’t need a thousand sidequests to supplement them. The universes are as stylistically impressive as Skyrim’s, and despite not being an enormous physical world, the characters and setting and backstory makes the world just as profound, even if you can’t explore every inch of it.
We’re not watching a movie however, so an effective story shouldn’t be theonly consideration in what makes a great game. Rather, gameplay is the chief concern when crafting an effective title, and in a hundred hours, you really get to see how truly repetitive the combat system in Skyrim is, no matter which type of character you’re playing.
A warrior class is the most straightforward. Almost every single encounter will be a simple combination of sword swinging and blocking, with little else to consider as most enemies will be dead in a few lunges. Mages can summon creatures to fight for them as they chip away with elemental magic in the background, but the awkward spell-switching system makes fighting a chore, even though you’re doing the exact same order of summon-defense-attack spells in every encounter. As for stealth? It’s perhaps the most satisfying build, but the higher the level you are, the more it becomes ridiculous. You can almost never be seen and you take out unsuspecting enemies with a single blow. The point is that all three of these classes show little variance no matter the dungeon or enemy, and it can get boring relatively quickly.
Contrast this to a game like Portal, which requires you to be incredibly creative in every single room, despite having a gun that only does one thing, shoot blue and orange portals. The puzzles take one simple mechanic and create endless possibilities with it, as opposed to Skyrim which has endless amounts of spells and weapons, and still ends up feeling repetitive.
[img]http://blogs-images.forbes.com/insertcoin/files/2011/12/skyrim3.jpg[/img]
Deus Ex, when played from a stealth perspective, has a level of complexity that far exceeds that of Skyrim’s sneaking play style. There’s much more to consider than just staying in the dark and wearing padded shoes. Each area requires masterful planning and patience to progress through unseen, and the level design makes each new section a kind of puzzle to get through. Even playing as a guns blazing warrior instead, the varied enemy types require a great deal of strategy for you to survive as you have to place your perks accordingly and decide the appropriate weapon combination to use in each setting.
This where Skyrim’s size works against it. With literally hundreds of caves and ruins to explore, it’s impossible to craft such carefully constructed scenarios as the ones you’ll find in shorter games. The dungeons have greatly improved over past titles, with much effort put into making them at least LOOK diverse, but with the same four or five enemy, puzzle and trap types, in the end they’re still not all that different, and almost never require anything approaching “strategy.” The fact that you can put a hundred hours in exploring all these places does not necessarily mean your game is ten times better than one that’s a mere ten hours length. Brevity allows games to use every minute with care (the good ones anyway), but sprawling adventures will often find themselves overloaded with filler. Would Star Wars have been a better film if it was eleven hours long instead of two? Perhaps, but most likely not.
Is Skyrim a monumental achievement in gaming? Absolutely. The worldBethesda has created is perhaps the most technically impressive in video game history. It’s teeming with life and adventure, and it’s easy to see why you can spend countless hours getting lost in it.
But from a narrative and gameplay perspective, which I would argue are the two most important facets of a game, it’s surpassed by a few titles this year, Portal 2 and Deus Ex among them. A thousand square miles of map means nothing if there’s not a compelling story to be found anywhere. A mountain of different weapons means nothing is all they do is bash heads in over and over again.
Skyrim achieved many great things with its release this year, but it’s just not the total package that games like Portal 2 or Deus Ex have proved themselves to be. It’s one of the best games of the year to be sure, but the best? I can’t let myself give it that honor."
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Can only say I completely agree with this ( even if its old as hell , lol. ) , this article really nailed it.
in the end Skyrim is a good and fun game, yep, but it's not anything unforgivable that I'll remember forever, like Planescape Torment, Baldur's Gate 2, Red Dead Redemption, Mass Effect, or Warcraft 3.
I'd rate it 8 - 8.5 , nothing like those absurd 9.5 - 10 critics give. IMO, The Witcher 2 should've gotten the praise Skyrim got.
sadly he isn't the first (or last) to relay this thought, and it will fall on def ears.
I think the only way is to pm a mod and ask them to do it? But its not that serious. Keep the title. 
