Exactly.
It's called dumbing down because if you accomadate for EVERYONE, you end up with nothing less. "Should we put philosophical overtones in the Civil war to make comments about the pointlessness of war?" Nah, not everyone has a good grasp of philosophy, so we need to accomidate to them, so no philosophy. "Should we make dungeons more complex, with challenging puzzles to be solved?" Nah, not everyone likes puzzles, so we need to accomidate to them. Therefore, no puzzles. "Should we make combat more complex, with timing being key and combos that need to be pulled off?" Nah, not everyone is good at such things, so combat shall remain basic.

Well [censored], now what is there that's special about the game? Nothing! It has a giant game world and that's about it.

Oblivion beat Gothic 3 to it.

I have to strongly agree on Sheogorath's point... I don't mind accessibility, per se; I do mind playing an RPG stripped of any RP element besides what's "in my imagination" in a series where I've had little trouble getting lost in the game itself over the past 10+ years.

Skyrim most definitely caters to a different audience -- a larger, more influential audience, sure, but I learned to play classic and table-top RPG's when I was, oh, ten years old? They ARE "dumbing down" (I do not like this phrase, as it does imply the avid consumer is dumb, which I don't agree with, much like the OP) the series, but at what cost?

It's like risk v. reward flew out the window with this one.

dumb down

vb

(tr) to make or become less intellectually demanding or sophisticated.

This game challenges me in a way that is no less intelectually demanding than other TES games. Therefore it is not dumbed down. Fact.

It's not dumber, it just has less tedious micro management. Honestly, what was the point of repairing your gear? I never played a game where it made any sense. In MW and OB you carry around thousands of hammers, in Diablo you carry around tousands of portal scrolls.
What's disposition for? If I get a stupid sword out of a dungeon full of draugr for some [censored] he better instantly treat me like a saint. If I knock a guy out, he better hate me. If you have to give an NPC ten BJs until he likes you like in MW or shove gold up his backside like in OB it's just stupid.
I see the problem with spell making, but it was basically a very bad spell upgrade system. Yes, Beth should have improved it, but at least we finally got a halfway decent crafting system.

I honestly don't see the point of the people always complaining about dumbing down in Skyrim. Morrowind's dungeons were extremely dumbed down compared to the ones in Daggerfall, but that is totally ok with the "hardcoe" RPG crowd? It was more accessible and people enjoyed it, so what? More money for Beth means more chance for addons or even new games.

At least now we have discovered some OB fans, I bet when TES6 is out, the forums will be covered with "Skyrim was so much better and only CoD fans play the new game" threads.

My sentiments exactly. For me the only difference between a hardcoe RPG'er and myself it seems is that i enjoy the games i play.

Skyrim and Oblivion (and the other Elder Scrolls titles) are all different games. If they were all the same with new quests, then I highly doubt Bethesda would be around today. If you like Oblivion's features more, play Oblivion. If you prefer Morrowind's features, play Morrowind. If you like the new style of RPG that Skyrim provides, play Skyrim. Don't complain because one is different to the other.

Since many complain threads are about "I got bored after 100 hours" I still think more people enjoy the game more than they want to admit.

If the game seems "dumbed down" to you and a minority of people who called themselves "roleplayers" this doesn't mean automatically that is a fault for Bethesda and the majority of players.


Philosophical overtones in an action/adventure game settled in the crude and crass nord ? if you want explanations -even if superficial for you perhaps -you find them in the "books" and the journals.


Skyrim isn't Fnv,bear that in mind.

If you want depth,moral choices/consequences you can always play Fnv,or one of the previous Tes games if you have "nostalgia" of other features - as solitudian have said before.

Skyrim is a different game,voluntarily "dumbed down" -if you like this epithet- by the developers to accomplish many more people than every previous Tes game.


The game it's not only a "giant game world" - It must be objectified.

For the puzzles and combat i partially agree with you,but i think that these are deliberate choices of Bethesda concerning a "more appealing" and linear gameplay for the masses -and maybe in an action/adventure even more appropriate.

A fair middle way in my opinion would be an optional hardcoe mode where is the player to choice a difficulty even for the puzzles and the combat system.

This would be the only way to please the roleplayers like you and me as well probably,but very difficult to realize i think.

In the meantime we can only hope for more depth/moral choices and consequences in the upcoming Skyrim Dlcs.

Micro management is one of the many elements of RPG specially the traditional hardcoe rpg's. I like repairing my armor/weapons. You like to carry a weapon the last forever. That's a fps mentality.

Here's what bugs me about this "dumbing down".

Everybody on the forums clamored when Oblivion came out for them to bring back the number of skills they had in Morrowind. They responded by making even less skills in Skyrim, saying the extra skills were unnecessary.

Unnecessary to who, is what I'd like to know.

However, I actually like not having to worry about attributes, although Carry Weight, Magicka and Fatigue could have been named Strength, Intelligence and Endurance (or Athletics, making it into a skill) with no problem whatsoever.

I have to sadly agree, I love Skyrim and enjoyed it a lot but in comparasion to the two previous games, it lacks in a lot of areas. The Compass part is probably one of the worst transgrestions, it's suppose to be optional yet due to no directions from the NPC's due to the Radiant system, it's not optional at all.

Huh? Many of the greatest RPGs of all time had no such thing as boring, repetitive micromanagement (aka chores). What 'traditional hardcoe RPGs' are you referring to?

Things like that are part of a tradition in RPGs of "reality simulation". Look at the old AD&D rule books. There were rules for just about everything in there, from Aging effects to STDs. Casual players wont like these things, but people who enjoy a more "hardcoe" RPG usually will. I guess I could use the word "oldschool" in place of "hardcoe", but whatever; when you talk of RPGs, they are pretty much interchangable terms.

People who mostly play CoD and Halo and other shooters where you just load up one session at a time are just interested in casual play. To them, the game is as "realistic" as you want, with one-shot kills and awesome graphics and blood splatter, realistic weapon models, etc. However, from an "oldschool" RPGer standpoint, there is very little reality there - nothing realistic about "respawning" every time you are killed, getting shot many times and having a medic revive or quickly heal you. You usually don't have to deal with weapon jams. I can tell you from experience, you can't go around shooting an automatic or semi-automatic weapon for an extended period of time without having to clean carbon out of the weapon and do basic weapon maintenance. For short online session, however, this is fine.

For a continuous world-style RPG, part of the fun is what happens after and before the battles - rest, healing, weapon maintenance, training etc. All these things enhance the sense (for some people) of being connected to your character and the game world they are in. In Daggerfall or Arena, you could give your weapons to a smith to have them repaired, but the repair time was actually a number of days. You also had the option of paying more gold to have it repaired faster and maybe get it back in the same day. For a cheap steel/iron sword, you're probably not gonna bother, but for your favorite magic sword, you would pay. What did you do in the mean time? Explore the town, visit other shops and temples, maybe just use an alternate weapon/armor until you get your other stuff back.

So yes, this process of "streamlining" or "dumbing down" has alot to do with the attention span of the average player. Maybe us "dinosaurs" are a minority, but my kids, nephews, and nieces etc. are being raised with the same values, so we aren't going anywhere anytime soon.

And don't forget that repair your weapons could be a good way to spend partially the (almost useless) insane amount of gold that you have at higher levels in Skyrim either

I don't think it's particularly crazy because it is actually the case. The game is ported to three different systems, two of which can't do anything about the menu interface, so surely it makes sense to optimise it towards those two systems rather than the PC for two main reasons:

1) PC users have far far far more ready access to mods that can improve the interface for their own personal taste, or can develop one themselves. Xbox/PS3 users have no such luxury and are therefore stuck with what comes out the box.

2) Xbox and PS3 users numerically make up the supreme majority of Skyrim players, so in terms of simply appealing to the largest proportion of their userbase, Beth went down the route of making it console accessible.

Well, for starters, Daggerfall. You have to keep track of many stats. You had to keep track of many quests that had a time limit. Even when you handed over a weapon to a smith for repairs you had to wait for x amount of time. Holidays/festival had nice incentives in which you get discounts for stuff and whatnot. So, knowing what date it was meant something. The bank of Daggerfall brought another element of management. There are other things to keep track, though the "micro-management" of RPG's aren't as deep and well developed as strategy games.

As for micro management being boring, well, not to me. I like running things instead of having things magically being done without me knowing about it. Btw, micro-management has taken a new meaning nowadays it seems. Back then, what I've mentioned were just normal managerial work, now, is looking more like micro-management .

Talk about a really bad anology. If I wanted to enjoy the ride, the manual is hands down the better choice. Especially on the open road. The greater level of control and increased interactivity with my car makes the ride a LOT more enjoyable. The manual? I'd choose it if I was commuting and expected to find myself in stop and go traffic. The manual just becomes tiresome and tedious under those conditions.

And yet there are plenty of people who would say they don't enjoy driving stick, even if they want to enjoy the ride.

Repeat after me: I should not call people who disagree with me "wrong" in any objective sense.

In defense of my anology, I don't think you would disagree with me that driving a car with manual transmission requires more "micro management" compared to an automatic. Some people, such as yourself, LIKE the extra work. It enhances your driving experience. Others, would be content to forgo the stick shift in favor of the easier "put it in drive and go"

That was a bit of sarcasm on my part.

I am certainly sympathetic to the constraints developers are placed under to make a game look great on all platforms, however when playing many titles, not just Skyrim, it can be painfully obvious to me playing on the PC that many games were designed with a controller in mind and not a keyboard and mouse.

I don't like things that are simplified and accessible.
I like complex mechanics that I have to learn before I fully understand them.
Especially in RPG's.

In action games however I don't care as much, I play TF2, Dead Island, Borderlands and Left 4 Dead for [censored] and giggles, not for homework assignments.
"Dumbing down" should stay out of RPG's IMO, streamlining things doesn't evolve the franchise, only destroys it.

In short; I's an improvement over Oblivion, but compared to Morrowind, a baby could play this.

I owned both oblivion and Morrowind on console, they were also accesible; actually just as accesible as Skyrim. Just not as good.

Morrowind didn't have a radar, just stating the obvious.