Why not? There are plenty of ways Bethesda could have improved the opening scene but for some reason diddnt implement any of them, while maybe not as good as COD4 they could have done a lot better than they did.


^ not a total TES really devoted fan


Yeah when I first played Skyrim I was really underwhelmed by the intro, of course I eventually was able to get into the game but the intro did leave a rather sour taste in my mouth.

You go join the stormcloaks then.

Unless the game is marketed as a Tough as Nails, We'll Kick Your Ass game, having no difficulty curve or a reverse curve is terrible Design.

I know. This is why I'm not making threads about wanting this feature back. I know I am in a minority with me wanting to experience games like holidays. When you visit a foreign land than you also read up about the culture and the history. I know that most people play Elder Scrolls from more action-orientated purposes so I could never win such an argument.



It doesn't have to be that extreme. Morrowind wasn't exceptional hard, it was just unknown to the player. You didn't know about diseases that you could get for example. You also didn't know how to cure them. And without a means to quickly fasttravel to a city this could definatly be a problem. But it didnt make the game hardcoe.

Also how is it a bad design to feel more knowledgeble and powerfull as you progress? Isn't that the whole point of a RPG? And yes, I do still count Skyrim as a RPG although with the removal of most non-combat skills it is a RPG aimed a action, so an action-RPG if you will.

I liked the comparison between Call of Duty 4 and Skyrim in the video the OP brought

He's doing it all intentionally - A person new to the series WOULDN'T recognize or understand any of the words.

And he wasn't saying that Call of Duty's a better game than Skyrim - he's saying that the opening of Skyrim doesn't fit the theme of the game as well as the opening of Call of Duty... he also says that Skyrim's great everywhere but the opening.
Or, they play like me, and say "Books are a crutch at worse, irrelevent entertainment usually, and an augmentation to what's seen in-game at best." Morrowind definitely used Books as a Crutch. In Skyrim and Oblivion, you don't need to read the books to figure out what's going on, just as you don't need to read books to figure out what's going on in the world around you. They just augment and reinforce the conversations and elements in the game.

They should have had a "confirm character" option as you exit Helgen - I'm surprised they didn't give you the choice to amend your character at all. On PC you can use the console, but if you reroll after the tutorial dungeon I think it can be a bit counterproductive - like you've added a couple of points to one or two handed hacking your way through then decide you want a pure mage. I find the tutorial is basically taking you to level 2 and those points can feel important in the early game. At least they do to me.

I thought the beginning was very good and set the mood perfectly. As for epic battles, they seemed fine to me although obviously in the real world there would be more soldiers. However, this isnt the real world and its not a strategy game. As for giant populations, i rather use my imagination because having cities populated by thousands or even hundreds would be a nightmare quest-wise and also i love that ES is more 'personalized' than the other rpgs out there that have random disposable townsperson hanging out with no function at all. Yes, some npcs have barely anything to say in Skyrim, but most still have a life to them and some sort of function

I liked the opening scene. It manages to convey well the general tone of the game.

But I stopped to read when the OP said the game fails to be epic. #epicfail

Your so right, all I can think about after 200 hours of exploration is the first 5 minutes.

i think the cinematic style they chose for the opening of the game was very well done. it was short and to the point, gave you all the story info you needed including a quick dragon tease, got the character creation out of the way and let you quickly see how great of a world they created and are about to get to explore.

good stuff.

It was OK, but I enjoyed the simplicity of Morrowind's opening better.

I've only seen it on Youtube, with the Macho-Man dragon mod... Does that make it more awesome or less?

* I can imagine what it would look like with the dragon model instead; and I agree, it's cool.
(I'll wait until I see it in the game though, rather than look for it online.)

What a irritating review of Skyrim's opening. The altered Alvin and the Chipmunks voice he uses is bad enough (he's aping Zero Punctuation's style and failing miserably), but to almost completely concentrate on the cart scene is ridiculous. Basically, after a couple minutes you create your character and then all hell breaks loose (graphic beheading and Alduin's attack). Then a quick tutorial on controlling your character. Its all very fast and gets you out into the world much more quickly than Oblivion or Fallout 3 did (which is what the reviewer was apparently wanting).

He might also want to try to spell things correctly (i.e. when he was posting all the geographic and ES related things mentioned in the first few minutes that might "confuse" a player).

He did that intentionally, to show just what a Rookie to the series would think of it all.

Actually, I agree with them. If you are going to stick your opening on rails, then do it well. The classic example of how to do this is Half-Life 2 - its so well done you really don't notice the rails. MW4 seems to do it pretty well, too, as do Saints Row 2 and 3

That is why I prefer Morrowind's intro to Oblivion's and Skyrim's despite the massive text dump at the beginning (which is skippable) - you are off the rails as soon as you talk to Sullus Gravius, who you can reach in about a minute or so. It would be better if that was when you got the character creation screen, but it beats 15 minutes of dungeon crawling.

You should watch some of the other Extra Credits videos http://www.penny-arcade.com/patv/show/extra-credits They have some really interesting things to say about game design.

EDIT: spelling, watch their other videos, fix formatting

I kinda love/hate Morrowind, it has a lot of pluses to it but the challenge in that game is really bad. Most of it comes from a terrible dice roll system that often let victory to be decided by fate, not skill. When I first played, starting out was like hitting a brick wall if you wanted to explore dungeons. I think it would have been a lot better if it taught you things instead of assuming you knew them. The presset classes were mostly garbage, meaning you had to make a custom class to have a decent character.

There's nothing wrong with an RPG making you feel powerful, but it needs not to become pointless. Skyrim does fail a bit here since if you make a character with the right skills, even the enemies that should be stronger lack challenge. I didn't have the problem because I tend to play a jack of all trades character so they tend to be a bit weaker than a character that's focussed or powergamed. I'm just saying there needs to be a balanced, fighting a troll who's blows bounce off my super crystal armor and kill with a poke of a glowing sword is fun once and a while but I'd much rather fight a foe where it comes down to skill.

I think there's a place for games that put palyers through the school of hard knocks but I think that's for games like Dark Souls or inja Gaiden, Games that tell you: "Beware for we will kick your ass and you will be on your own for figuring out how to kick our ass instead." Skyrim isn't one of these and it doesn't need to be, we got 2 great kick your butt RPGs this year(Witcher 2 and Dark Souls.)

Why is it necessary to compare a game that is set on another planet (Skyrim) to a game that is loosely based on B.S. involving a war scenario?

Skyrim is strictly a fantasy game, not loosely based on anything. It includes ideas from other games, but you can't be serious here.

The Penny Arcade video is a joke, and I laugh AT it , not WITH it.

Skyrim's beginning sets the tone......you are captured. Why were you captured specifically? You really aren't told why. And your past is
all up to you.......which should tell you what makes this game great..... Call of Dooty is a game on rails......there is no open world, and it's just a story,
with no radiant quest design, and all about combat. At least Skyrim mixes it up and tries to create realism in its world (not just with graphics alone).

COD is a good game, but its replayability falls short of Skyrim. And both games cannot be compared with each other in any way at all.

One thing untrue: Skyrim borrowed its ideas not from COD....... The prisoner idea has been around since Morrowind, and actually in other rpg games
before that.

COD fanboyism at its finest.

And, how can you have a "legitimate discussion" (as in the op's starting post), when the title of the thread itself is: Skyrim's opening svcks!


Get real........ You are screaming in the title, and asking to discuss it........haha.

Ok.

It's not COD fanboyism. They are saying the scenario, you being introduced to the game world as a prisoner is done better by the introduction to COD4.

They are not talking about any of the other merits of either game. They are saying that the introduction of Skyrim is disappointing and comparing it to another intro with a similar premise that does it well, in their opinion. It is just a comparison of the introductions, not the games as a whole. At no point do they say COD4 as a whole is better than Skyrim as a whole.

EDIT spelling

Agree with you.

Especially, when you're on the ground, and your head is only a few inches away from the head of the guy who was just decapitated less than a minute before you. And you glance up and see a dragon spitting fire, and the "stuff" hits the fan, and it's panic city.

Yep, quite well done, I thought.

Then it would seem that you and I have different opinions on what exactly epic is, perhaps I just have higher standards than most or perhaps you have set the bar so low that even a monkey in a tutu could pass as being "epic". But please if you feel that Skyrim was SO epic then perhaps you would like to elaborate on what exactly it is that makes Skyrim so epic?

And no I will not be accepting "the amount of content" as an answer, I dont care if Skyrim boasts over 300 hours of gameplay I only care about the quality. Skyrim is like the buffet table at Chucky Cheese, sure you get more for your money but none of it is of a high quality.


If you had actually read the thread instead of just the title you would know that the problem goes far deeper than just the opening scene as most of Skyrims set pieces and the set pieces of the Elder Scrolls Series as a whole suffer from the same problems.


Really? Pot calling the Kettle black much? Nobody is trying to say that Skyrim stole the idea of having a prisoner brought to his execution off COD4 however it is only natural that one would bring up the execution scene from COD4 when highlighting the flaws of the opening scene in Skyrim as the 2 scenes are pretty much mechanically identical.

But it is funny that you would call the video "COD fanboyism at its finest" dispite the fact that they bring up some fairly valid points, and going by your knee jerk reaction and lame attempt at defending the game while missing the point completely I would say that it is you who is the really devoted fan.


First rule of advertising kiddo, catch the viewers attention, that was the only purpose that the heading served and it served that purpose well. This is a legitimate discussion on the flaws of the storytelling and set pieces within the Elder Scrolls games, if you do not wish to discuss this because you cant handle the fact that some people dont share your view that Skyrim is perfect and "THE BEST GAME EVAR" then that is your prerogative, however should that be the case and you have nothing constuctive to add then I will have to ask you to move along kid.


I gotta say that I really hated how all the prisoners formed an orderly line and casually placed their head on the chopping block as if to say "please Mr Headsman, chop off my head I dont mind", I really expected to see the prisoners at least put up some fight before they axe came down on their neck.

I've seen enough of these threads to just start replying based on the subject line. So here it goes:

No it doesn't.

Ah, my mistake. I thought he was just being a moron...which is an easy assumption to make after watching his "review".

I loved the opening to the game.