We all know Bethesda specializes in creating huge, open world games in which you can do almost anything*. Are there any other games that are even close to Skyrim in this aspect?

I know Skyrim indirectly competes with games like Dragon Age and Dark Souls, but these are obviously very different games from Skyrim.

If I want to play a shooter, there are 1000 options, but if I want to play an open-world, first person, real time RPG, then I have to wait 5 years to get a new TES?

TES games seem to sell pretty well, so I wonder why other companies do not take a shot at competing with Bethesda.

* Note: You can do almost anything except kill essential NPCs.

No because such games like TES take huge amounts of resources to create, hence the long production times between titles of the series.

The only companies I can see taking as much time that Bethesda does is either Blizzard or Valve and we both know that they don't participate in Bethesda's genre of games.

Bioware is the only real competition when it comes to epic scale, single player RPG's, but Bioware style games are different enough so that each company offered different gameplay experiences.

No, and Ive said this before, numerous times. The only games that compete with ES, are other ES games, since they are the only games that even try to do what they do. And, arguably, succeed at just that. Nobody even comes close. Other RPGs aren't even RPGs compared to the ES.

Closest I see is Obsidian Entertainment.
They've made Dungeons Siege III and have had Neverwinter Nights for a while.

And they made Fallout: New Vegas. Primarily because of this, I could see them putting something to challenge TES on the market. But, also because of this, it seems likely they would work in conjunction with Bethesda if that happened.

Unfortunately no they do not. Which is exactly why the series has suffered throughout the years.

wouldnt the fact that they have to compete with other people make them turn to casual gamers?

Zelda? I only say that cause its losing goty votes to it.

Not really, which I think is a shame. Means they have more or less a monopoly (and we have to wait years for awesome games, ).

well there is two worlds and two worlds 2, but imo they are two terrible open world rpgs that shamelessly ripped off oblivion in many respects. Also, something I am interested in rpg wise that could possibly rival elder scrolls is Kingdoms of Amalur, the developers of which are headed by Ken Rolston, the dude who had a massive influence on morrowind and other previous es titles. It is shaping up to be epic if they get it right.

The thing that sets bethesda apart are the massive detailed open-worlds, which basically no other developers ever dares attempt.

I played Two Worlds II when it first came out a year or so ago. Got bored with it fairly quick, but I'd classify it in the same genre.

Well Piranha Bytes tried once, but Gothic III was a complete Bug-festival, far worse than anything Beth ever released on the opening day. Thanks to the community it is nearly bugfree since last year (4 years after release), but still far too easy if you use magic. But in return it looks far more awesome than Oblivion.

They since reverted back to the old-style of their games and therefore are no competition anymore.

The Gothic series was its early competition. But that series went to [censored] after Gothic 3 on release was unplayable (you think SKyrim was bad at release?) and Gothic 4 was utter crap.

Well, there's Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning coming out next year. Looks like a lot of fun.

Two Worlds/ Gothic/ Fallout/ Dead Island?

There is no Gothic 4! I refuse to refer to Arcania as Gothic, since it is complete and utter crap.

You should play Risen btw, if you liked Gothic I and II.

Compared to other genres, the number of new RPG releases is rather low, so there is no direct competition between companies like Bioware, Obsidian, or Bethesda. RPG fans get all the games, anyway.

No, not at this kind of genre...

I don't know any other game that has such a big lore and it is RPG with a LOTR style

Nope, world building is Bethesda's specialty.

Just like Bioware is with character dialog and storyline...

Just like Blizzard is with strategy based rpg games...

Dragon Age 2

If you think TES is an open ended sandbox in which you can do anything, try Dwarf Fortress. Learning how to play it is almost as complex as learning a new language, but, oh. It's worth it.

well, there is 2 worlds by zuxxez... but...

I believe that Bioware's intention with the Dragon Age franchise was to directly compete with Bethesda. However, the difference between TES and Beth's FO3 and DA is so huge in Beth's favor that Bioware's effort suffers greatly simply due to the attempt to offer a comparison.

To be fair, Beth is facing some really difficult choices, particularly due to the engine and time passage. Beth has become successful due to sticking with the GameByro engine as a basis for their games for over 10 years, plus keeping the same core team intact since TES III: Morrowind. This allows them to continually refine the engine within a reasonable time frame for the next game. In addition, it allows the community to learn the elements of the engine. Beth has become successful through the efforts of their community.

Companies do not usually make a new engine from scratch anymore because it simply takes too long and costs too much. In addition, it takes a long time for programmers and artists to learn all the capabilities and quirks of any software tool. If Beth tries to develop a completely new engine of their own, they would need enormous investment from Zenimax and a huge span of time (i.e., many years). They would also need to continually learn the quirks of the new tool, and so would the community. These things are possible, but there would be a lot of missteps and people would need to be patient, including consumers and investors. We can see that this doesn't seem to be likely based on comments posted here.

also no one will make a elderscrolls like game because since they are so huge and alot of stuff is going on it leads to alot of glitches which as you can see people b*tch about them alot

but I think alot of people just dont seem to relizes its size=alot of problems.

Those three companies should come together...

To forge the greatest RPG the world has ever known.