This

Because We're all just figurative dust in the digital wind!

Right, right... killing the freaking emperor or defeating the dragon god of time and saving the world, thus fulfilling a prophecy, aren't important enough to warrant at least a few lines of dialogue and some minute differences on the gameworld even while there is only one way to actually do either or other similarly major actions the PC can take in the gameworld. Even Daggerfall, Morrowind, and Oblivion all at least had reputation systems that accounted for actions and may even get some people to actually say a few lines or treat you a bit differently.

I think that the lack of rep and Karma was a big mistake. It adds a ton to Fallout.

I find it comical that people honestly believe the linear one outcome per quest are actually unknowns that can't be accounted for in a game made by the very peeps who thought them up, nevermind that Guards comment on the Grey beards making a peace summit before you finish the quest, but that they don't even say anything about it or the players other achievements over the course of the game.


I don't need a pat on the back, but I'd like that when I do something OBVIOUSLY WORLD CHANGING the world changes significantly.

At least in FO3 and NV people react somehow. In Skyrim you can't even tell if you've played one hour or a hundred. Nothing matters.

Pretty much these!!!

All of the really devoted fans have either never played New Vegas or just like putting their fingers in their ears and going "lalalalalala ICAN'THEARYOU! lalalalalalala SKYRIMISTHEBESTGAMEEVER!"

OP, I agree. It is kind of annoying that almost nothing you do matters. I especially like how being a hero in the Civil War questline causes almost no changes in how others treat you.

Meh, it's not a big deal to me. I'm sure in TES VI they will have more details like this added, since enough people are probably going to complain about this, and it's a legitimate gripe. So we should see Bethesda pay more attention to this stuff in the next game. Skyrim as-is though is still amazing, even if not everyone in the world treats you differently based on every decision you make.

And more satisfying.

Yea but ironically the guards have been tracking your every single move, including your skill gains, but still think you fetch the mead at the companions -.-
Im starting to think this was all a cruel joke by bethesda to make us go rampage and kill every single person, i've never been so annoyed when walking through towns. Not to mention CHILDREN.
And Nazeem.

No nightly news in skyrim

The only thing that changes is their clothes/armor. Their ignorant attitudes remain the same. Bethesda could have easily left out the stupid guard comments and inserted Hail Dragonborn. NPCs for that matter too. One line comments that you hear through 150+ hours of game play is ridiculous. Get rid of all those stupid comments and just put Hail Dragonborn unless the NPC gives you a quest or you "talk" to them. Easily done by Bethesda but they chose a different path probably to make us want to gut the stupid guards and npcs.

For those who think news doesn't travel fast, hail citizen is also good. Hail high elf, whatever. Oblivion did this well. Skyrim, no.

The "open world" excuse is... well... an excuse.

If you aren't going to do it right, don't do it.

It's a game.

Cheers

Thanks for the insightful post.

If the ever devlope a form of a storage device capable of holding all of their thoughts, then you more than likely would not see this.

Just blame a majority of it on tech. limits.

That's your answer, to the question, "Why does nothing the PC does make any impact on Skyrim?" ??

What an idiotic answer.

Oh come on that's a crock of bull.

I heard more varied comments from NPC's in Oblivion.

I mean seriously they couldn't remove the "so you're Brynjolf's new protege" comment from the bartender at the Ragged Flaggon once I'm halfway through the Questline? Couldn't remove the "fetch mead for the guild" comment after half the questline is complete.


I can deal with a [censored] gaurd commenting on my 1 handed skill and saying he to prefers a sword and board while we both have battleaxes hanging from our back's. But at the very least please take notice of how the world has SIGNIFICANTLY changed around you!

It has nothing to do with tech limits. It's strictly a design decision. gamesas chose to have every NPC line done in voice over and then they chose not to do a few extra lines that would add flourish to the world. They chose. They were definitely not forced, not by time, not by tech constraints, not by the difficulty of implementation... They chose.

It was a cold and cynical evaluation of whether what they had would be enough to svcker in casuals or if they needed more. Nothing else. And because everything is done in voice art, it's going to be almost impossible for modders to do sod all about it without it sticking out like a sore thumb. And gamesas CHOSE TO MAKE THINGS THIS WAY.

There's no excusing it or dodging it, there's only accepting the cold, hard truth. gamesas made every choice regarding this game, nothing was forced by some external publisher, and they chose to not record more flourish lines, for the simple reason that all the simpleton reviewers and all the casuals wouldn't notice anyway, so really there wouldn't be a good return on investment in buying more lines from the voice artists.

You know what's really funny? it's all a matter of rank in a lookup table. In all the previous games since Morrowind, the NPC greeting (and all the other dialogue) is determined by which entry with matched prerequisites comes first in a table with entries. I'm guessing it's the same in Skyrim, which means it's hugely simple to add a few lines about the main events in the game. It is thus exclusively a matter of intent.

If modders could do voice art that even remotely resembled what is already in the game then the problem could easily be fixed for the PC segment, but modders usually can't do voice art worth a damn and so all the platforms are doomed to a stupidly static world, solely because gamesas couldn't be bothered with a bit of polish.

Best thing mods can do at this point is shuffle the existing dialogue around so guards only call you sneak-thief if you're wearing thief guild or nightingale armor and NPCs stop talking about you being a new member of the companions once you're not new anymore. It will be an improvement but won't fix the depth issue.

Wrong.

I'm a PS3 player, it's a slideshow.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but last time I played Skyrim, there was only ONE possible outcome for every one of the few major questlines (ie main quest, civil war, guilds). Only exceptions are the dark brotherhood and civil war that have 2 possible outcomes.
Well, considering that most of everything else is insignificant on a world scale, the number of sets of phrases/slight world-gameplay changes could easily be typed down in ONE digit... maybe a bit over ten in number if the devs desided to be generous and add a couple more things like Forsworn and Orcs or something... and considering that NONE of the questline endings intervene with each other, I'd say it's PRETTY DAMN EASY to achieve with todays technology. I'm no game designer expert, but really: all the phrases could be written in one afternoon and recorded in the very next if need be... adding a couple extra dialogue options and a few lines in the code to cater for all the new dialogue... probably wouldn't take that much. I've seen modders do more complex stuff alone and in their free time... and all that would add... a few MBs in the game files...

But NOOOO, they'd rather do the same but for stupid things like that small deadric item that is hidden deep beneath a pile of trash in your bag and no person could possibly see it, or for how much you've leveled up your speech and sneak... Good job Beth, it's always nice to see developers who know how to prioritise!!!

Well, I think Beth has the "caring" part a bit upside down because if I kill a chicken all of Skyrim is after me.

I think it's pretty obvious why. This is really the first Elder Scrolls game to even dabble in such subjects like the player having roles that would "impact" the world, and the first time Bethesda designed a system to try and account for that. Older elder scrolls games relied entirely 100% on imagination for such roles, and the only "major" thing the players would do that the world might react to was the mainquest.

As such, the game's implementation of such things is rather shallow and not well implimented, just like how the first "new big" feature they implement in all their sequels turn out. A lot of the faults in Oblivion were due to the newness of the type of design they were doing - which was pretty much fixed with Skyrim. However Skyrim's faults all boil down to them implementing things for the first time, that may or may not be entirely developed due to them testing-the-waters per say, and not knowing any better.

It may seem pretty obvious to us, but that's why I am convinced Bethesda lives in a bubble and as such never are aware of the implications in their new designs/features until after they release them

Because scripting is very tedious work.