It is simple really. The most "avid Skyrim complainers" are long time TES fans who are willing to really put the game through its paces because they want the series to be improved.

I don't really like Dragon Age: Origins that much because it is not an open world "do what you want game". After playing Oblivion for more than 500 hours, I played that DA:O for like five hours, but it was not for me, so I took out DA:O and put Oblivion back in for another 500 plus hours. Did I join a DA:O forum to complain about it? No. Not worth my time to complain about a game that is just not my cup of tea.

Skyrim, however, is a TES game, so here I am complaining about it. Now granted, I still enjoy Skyrim quite a bit, maybe even more than Oblivion or Morrowind, so that is part of why I have put several hundred hours into Skyrim -- I enjoy it, but there is still a ton of stuff about Skyrim I would like to see changed and improved.

I'd bet that most of the "avid Skyrim complainers" are like me and enjoy the game despite its flaws but want to see the series improved. And even those "avid Skyrim complainers" who don't enjoy playing Skyrim that much probably have played other TES games that they do enjoy and are at least willing to give Skyrim a good try before condemning it.

Remember, there are lots of folks here who have put way more than 1,000 hours in Oblivion or Morrowind (or both) so for folks like that, 100 hours in Skyrim is a drop in the bucket.

In my case i don't have any choice. Games that came out for last 3 years svck monkeyyouallknowwhat(thank consoles). I'm sick of playing old games and finally Skyrim came out in november. At one hand it's open-world RPG based on Tolkien universe with dragons and stuff which is cool. But on another hand it's full of bugs, glitches, poor graphics, [censored] interface and so on because it's 100% consololo port. Moreover it's streamlined for dumb kids who like to beat game in 5 hours (like CoD, syndicate and another "masterpieces"). So i'm playing Skyrim because it's the best option. Now i have 220+ hours but i still can't beat the game. Infinite loading, crashes and so on. After uninstalling Skyrim i understand that i don't have any choice and install it again, now it's my 6th time. TRUE STORY

meh far to much focus is being but on "Those who where around before Oblivion/Skyrim "game after morrowind here" and what these Morrowind Fan hawks are forgetting/not paying attention to are PEOPLE who've never done TES before play Skyrim and See the Similar issues, Shallow Guilds, No Choices, No consequence of Actions, not all that combat Mechanics upon a myriad of other things.

But of course if you have a complaint its instantly assumed that your someone with Morrowind Tattooed across their retina.

It's rather sad that this is what the gaming industry has come to...

Not all complaints are out of hate. I have tons of problems with Skyrim, but love it. I have tons of complaints about many games I like, but enjoy those games anyways. Some of these complaints are coming from people who want to see the game get better. There's some people who just complain for the sake of it, but that's kind of something you are going to see anywhere on the internet. I'm not a longtime fan of the TES series, but love the series and once I was able to, checked out the games that came before Oblivion. Love Daggerfall, Arena has some strange problem on my computer, love Morrowind, love Oblivion, and love Skyrim.

You like the game and have no complaints, great. Does that mean there's no need for everyone else to want to see the game get better? No.

great post!. i agree i love every single TES from arena to skyrim, hell i put skyrim as my #2 favorite TES to me skyrim is many steps ahead of oblivion but many steps below morrowind. many things i love about skyrim is the thrill of danger in the world again, i never felt in danger of dying in oblivion it was too easy. i love skyrims world in terms of exploring and finding new places.

the problems are the bugs, guilds,black smithing have been discussed over and over again. making armor and weapons is something i wanted, but IMO it feels like it was a piss poor attempt. you can make dragon armor but no dragon weapons? you can make (supposedly hard to obtain daedra amor) but not a wooden arrow? to me smithing should have been a cool addition but should have been way harder to level and way harder to get the components to make weapons and armor, something that takes real time and effort . IMO you should never be able to craft daedric armor, that shouldnt be random loot either, it should be like in morrowind where it is hard to find and something that is searched long and hard for.

My real itch with Skyrim is the almost complete lack of playability for anything that isn't a heavy armor + 2handed or 1hand/shield character, without being forced to rely on smithing and enchanting. A little less "ooh, shiny" features in these patches and a little more balance would be nice.

with scaled leveling and a manual difficulty slider you weren't able to make oblivion hard?

as well, since, dying was never a concern did you try DiD?

Personally, I've complained about Skyrim quite a bit, only because I know the devs can do better! I played Morrowind, and it was one of if not the best game I've ever played - so much of what they showed they could do has been cut out in Skyrim. But I still love Skyrim, it's a brilliant game and I really enjoy playing it. Criticism from TES fans is really a form of compliment: it's only because we respect Bethesda so much that we are so upset when they don't live up to expectations - expectations they have set.

For example, the devs talking about how they didn't want to use levitate or mark/recall spells in Skyrim, because it made level design much harder; at any difficult point, the player could just levitate or mark/recall their way out of the problem. But here's the thing: they managed it perfectly well in Morrowind. Morrowind had a fantastic storyline, fantastic dungeons, some of the best level design in any TES game. So we know they can do better, and we wish they'd tried a little harder in Skyrim.

That doesn't mean it's not a wonderful game, with mind-blowingly good level design. It is. It's just, if they'd stuck to the heights they set themselves in Morrowind, instead of dumbing-down, it would have been even better.

Interesting point OP. I played about 8 hours of Dragon Age 2 before I put it down and never played it again (I think I just made it into the main city). Although I have complaints about Skyrim, I still have hundreds of hours on it, and I think that really means something. Maybe it's because I am attached to the series (Bethesda is my favourite video game developer, TES is my favourite video game series) and want more out of it, or maybe it's because I can't help but point out the little flaws and I let myself allow that to plague my enjoyment of the game.

Seriously, dude. That was a rash judgement. You have no idea how old I am. I've been playing games since Pong and been hooked since Atari 2600. Morrowind set the benchmark for TES games as it was a wildly impressive upgrade in graphics and level design. But, of course, you knew that already. As it became the benchmark, both Oblivion and Skyrim naturally will be graded by it.

Exactly. And that's why people "complain" so much.

I'm enjoying "Skyrim" but it does illustrate what a much better game "Oblivion" was from an RPG point of view if you were playing your own character.

It seems ironic that the same people who moaned about the Compass holding their hand in "Oblivion" are the same people who needed the writers to create a story so black and white they don't have to strain their imaginations trying to come up with character motivation.

But hey, "Morrowind" exists and is amazing so I didn't need "Oblivion" to be "Morrowind II" and since "Oblivion" already exists and is amazing then there's no real need for "Skyrim" to be "Oblivion II".

There are a couple of things I'd change:

- More depth to magic.

- More open story.

That's it really but I understand these are really just my personal tastes.

And where my personal tastes have not been expressely catered for in the latest offering of "The Elder Scrolls" series rather than sink to my knees, clench my fists and rage in dissapointment I enjoy all the great stuff that they have added to the series instead.

Az

You would think in that long amount of gaming you would realize what I, and many others, have told you.

I was a long, long time Street Fighter player and competitor. I could talk a long, long time about how Sagat has consistently been "overpowered" in nearly every game. Doesn't mean I hate the game, means I want them to rebalance the "broken" character.

People dont get frustrated by thing's they think are utterley pap,they just walk away from them.

Skyrim can be both astounding and shocking at the same time and that's what frustrates people.The fact that Beth can create such a stunning gameworld and populate it with a lot of petty annoyances is what gets on a lot of peoples nerves.These annoyances increase the longer you play so it stands to reason that a lot of the critics on here have clocked up a lot of hours on it.

NPCs are the most infuriating thing, I swear. Hearing Jorlief in Windhelm claim the Stormcloaks are finding victory across the land after taking Windhelm for the Imperials is just...

I get the differences between us are much greater than I thought. For example, I don't look like the comic book guy on the Simpsons so I don't necessarily spend hours of my time debating whether Captain Picard was better than Captain Kirk. I have a family, a job, and a life. I can get worked up and go through things that bug me about a game with a fine tooth comb as well. You don't have a corner on that market and it's actually kind of funny to hear you boast about how cool you are because you can complain about Street Fighter (one of the games I've always hated, by the way... but that's just my opinion). But reality always tends to bite me in the behind. When I play a game for over 100+ without putting it down, it means I like the game... and any grievances I have must be minor. I certainly would never make the mistake of being an armchair game developer (as a software developer/systems anolyst myself) and start ragging on developers or designers after making a game that I paid $60 for and have played over 100 hours.

Except I'm not an armchair game developer.

I've already worked in the industry and am going back to get my degree to take a different course in said game industry.

I've spent hundreds of hours, as a QA tester alone, playing through games I liked but hated an aspect of, in those hundreds of hours, again as a tester alone, I learned what works, what doesn't, etc, etc.

It's nice to see that you no longer have a logical leg to stand on when you reduce your argument to include a suggestion that I was "boasting about how cool I was" when that was hardly the case.

That. And just because someone complains about things they see as faults, or things lacking from the game, doesn't mean they hate the game. If often means they like or even love the game, but still feel they must point out what they think could be improved upon. If I didn't like the game and wish it were even better, I wouldn't play it, and I wouldn't be here. Just because someone doesn't always wax rhapsodic about a game, doesn't give you a right to lump them into an imaginary 'haters' category.

ty God u saved me from writing a similar thread

I totally agree...

sure MW had more quests and NPCs but something people keep forgetting is that MW was 95% TEXT no voice over for most NPCs so u can't beat text economy and allowances

actually fanatics do that, they will keep thinking they are winning until their heads fly

My first TES game was Arena. The closest I have gotten to a shooter was....Skyrim. Which frustrates me. I want more roleplaying choices and less powergaming. I want Bethesda to stop ripping out things that were basicly good--attributes, spellcrafting, etc--and then reinvent the wheel. The things they replace them with are less than the things they replace. Some things, that were great roleplaying they didn't even replace--like reputation, climbing, acrobatics. The npc's are on their way to becoming nothing more than targets. Perhaps that is why so many of them repeat really irritating things over and over again--so that it will be satisfying when you kill them. I stick with Skyrim because it is an open world, sandbox game, nobody does that better than Bethesda--but I'm really hoping they reverse the direction they are going in--I don't like shooters.

I know you are talking to someone else here, but there's such a thing as people who make mods, have dabbled in attempting to make games with existing programs, people who observe the things in games to help further their knowledge of coding, and so much more. In fact, I may not have a job at all in game development, since I'm a junior in high school who kinda isn't in college. I do dabble in the things that game making requires, though. Especially writing and art. I also enjoy picking apart the things about a game. One of my favorite games, Psychonauts, has possibly one of the worst last levels ever. The Silent Hill games have some bad controls despite being great games.

I plan to do programming as a career and this just made me feel indirectly insulted. Also, the people buying and playing the game are also people who are helping make note of bugs and problems.

Maybe some of us put 100+ hours into it because we were HOPING that SOMETHING would turn out to be good, and didn't want to make a judgement after 5 hours of play.

Someone else mentioned this, but if you haven't played for a long time you don't get deep enough to know that there are real problems in the game, or that there isn't anything to actually interest you there.

For example, after completing the dark brotherhood questline, I felt underwhelmed with it and decided to make some new characters to complete the companions' questline. Well, 20 hours later (yes, I know I could have finished it in 2 hours but I prefer to take my time and enjoy details of games.) I was even more disappointed. Same thing after the main quest. Same thing after the other guilds, etc. etc.

If I just completed a single quest and it was underwhelming, why would I trash the rest of the game just because of that? It's like if I went to watch a movie, didn't enjoy the first 5 minutes, and then decided to leave. But... the rest of it could have actually been something I would enjoy a lot and I would have wasted my money.

I'd rather keep playing with the hopes that eventually there will be something about it that will make it feel like it was worth playing. Well, there was almost nothing like that after exploring most of the world and completing most questlines. The only thing remotely interesting is making mods to fix the game.

I know what you mean.I actually finished the mages guild questline when i thought i was just getting started on it.

I got a comment from the dark elf lady in the guild along the lines of "You the archmage,i can hardly believe it!" - You're not the only one love.