Not looking to bash the game here, I've just been curious about this for a while so I thought I'd get some more opinions on it. It seems to me like a lot of the NPC's in this game don't even have real schedules, and a lot of them don't seem to ever sleep or eat.

Oblivion was widely criticized for it's overhyped Radiant AI, but in the end the NPC's really did all eat, sleep, work (if they had jobs), and socialize every day. It seems like in Skyrim every NPC has some scheduling, like working at a smith or chopping wood, but I get the sense that they don't have the robust schedules of Oblivion's NPC's. Many NPC's in this game don't seem to have beds, and I swear some of the shopkeepers never even leave their shops.

Also another point that almost warrants a thread of it's own is the fact that NPC conversations are all but gone from Skyrim. I know everyone made fun of the "I saw a mudcrab" NPC exchanges in Oblivion, but I preferred that to the NPC's just not socializing at all.

Jeeze just go to white run and listen to the people say the same things over and over and over and over

Do you get to the cloud district very often?

I'm pretty sure it's worse, although i have heard much more sensible conversations between NPCs rather than,

"Hi There"
"I don't know"
"Be seeing you"

The hype was about what Beth WANTED the AI to be like while they were working on the game. Trouble was..... If an NPC got hungry, he had no qualms about stealing food..... and everyone would attack him, then the guards would get involved, and then you would have an empty town, until the respawn timer ran out, but then, you would only have guards..... They had to tone it done some from what was initially hyped.

There is some AI in Skyrim. I just isn't very I..........

Skyrim has AI? That's new to me.

They don't socialize nearly as much but when do it's a lot more interesting and natural, in whiterun sometimes some NPCs talk to each other in the market place about their lives or other things.

You're right. In OBV you could follow NPCs around all day to different locations. In Skyrim, they stand around doing NOTHING all day, then go home.

This is not improvement.

No, those are just scripted events meant to give the ILLUSION of such a thing. As in the first time you see those characters. It's not repeated any other times you see them, thus illusion.

That's an interesting theory, HeyYou. What is your source for this? Or is it indeed just a personal theory of yours?


Stannie

I'm glad I'm not the only one who noticed this. My thief stopped breaking into people's houses at night, because they never seem to sleep. When I enter a new cell, it seems like I have to give the NPCs time to get into position, or open their shop. Some of them run to get into place. Not always, just sometimes.

It is toned down in Oblivion, but present. Radiant AI came with food-stealing enabled. NPCs might steal food in Skyrim too, but I haven't witnessed it.