on consoles, you absolutely have a manadotory obligation to stand up for what you believe.

dont quit [censored].

Riskybiz is singlehandedly picking apart every weak argument & is doing a great job of seperating fact from fanboyism(imo), It is a very enjoyable read & i'm glad there are people like him who can express their feelings in such a constructive & gentlemanly manner.

He would make a good lawyer, I should have hired him years ago when the ex wife ran off with the delivery driver & my wallet.

Regarding the so called limitations of an open world game, With a bit of effort & investment you can have a compelling story with memorable characters stationed in an open world game, I fail to understand why people do not want to see both in Skyrim if it was possible to do so without compromising the quality of the open world rather than fall back on the non confirmable limitations argument.

I fail to see how I'm asking for any kind of hand holding. You talked about worlds that tell stories. Everywhere I look in Skyrim I see the potential to tell stories, but the generally fail to do so. There are a few locations that work. Take Fort Sungard, for example. Just looking at it, I know exactly why it's there. Just like I know exactly why Broken Tower Redoubt is there. These are old fortresses built to guard the routes into the Reach. The same can't be said for most of the towers and ruins throughout the Reach. They're just random. They're lost opportunities to make the world richer and deeper.

As for my anology, I fail to see where the subjectiveness is. "Hot" means they are good looking. "Bimbo" specifically implies they are unintelligent and shallow. It's pretty straight forward. If you want to carry on the anology with what you said, then it should be obvious how someone that is not a looker, but is interesting and intelligent would relate to the game. It would be something like Zork or some other text or ascii based game. They're often very deep and interesting, but they're nothing worth looking at.

::sigh:: It's hard to argue with this level of fan-boyism, but I'll try. Sure, you don't have to quest. That's been the trademark argument since release: "Just don't do it." Is it stupid overpowered to craft your gear to legendary status? Yes! Is this imbalance an oversight of Bethesda? No! Because you could "just not do it."

Ironic that you mentioned the "cool and flashy lights" because, to me, that's what Skyrim really is. Flashy. It's got awesome graphics, breathtaking views, beautiful dungeons... but when you start scratching away the surface you realize how shallow this game really is.

You mention being a hunter. Cool. So go out into the wilds, kill some deer, then go back to town to sell the meat. Go to Belathor's shop, the same merchant you've been selling to for YEARS, since you started hunting decades ago. You know what you're greeted with when you walk in the door?

"HI! I WORK FOR BELATHOR IN BELATHOR'S SHOP!" Every.Single.Time.

Basically your argument is that since you can pick flowers and sell them to NPC merchants, dialogue, writing, quest lines, story, and combat are all irrelevant. Becuase you can "play how you want to play." Guess what? I CAN'T play this game how I want to play. I want to play a lawful evil Necromancer. Well, I only have ONE way of completing this quest which helps Skyrim's people and is a "good" quest. I want to play a chaotic good Cleric. Well, I can only reply to this NPC THIS ONE way, and it's evil.

You are so smart*







*sarcasm

One thing I've learned from 40 years of gaming, starting way back in the 60's with PnP, is that it's the game labelling and genre labelling system was developed by a bunch of dudes who simply wanted 'their' product to seem to be something different from someone else's, and added to by uni graduates who wanted to sound important in some study, or worse, on Wikipedia. Honestly, most of it is a bunch of self-important ****ing.

It's not the game that is constricting, in OP's post, it is the player who doesnt get out there and explore or experience things. If we want to 'blame' someone or something, blame it on the lazy devs and companies who churn out linear fps...essentially those products are video gaming's trashy pulp fiction, gaming porm if you prefer. With so many players heavily experienced in those, when a game comes along that lasts more than 20 hours it overruns their patience, and basically brings out gaming ADHD. Many players can't cope with the scope.

Hard to deal with this level od Anti -fanboyism but I'll try. I 'd would like to understand what you actually like about this game as you keep saying you do but I drify OT so...


I'll have take your word on the murder thing( I guess you killed all the witnesses because otherwise you's have a death bounty) but in my game I get the comments on many quests and often appreciative of my efforts. The guards in paticular almost always thank me when I help out the city even in some obscure way. I agree it needs to be taken to at least the next level but ignoring what is there doesn't help the case.

Again I agree more quests need multiple ways of doing things but I've found lots of very surprizing work arounds that have dialogi=ue for them this time.

no sweat.
they wanted to debate.

from the beginning.

lmao.. seriously. i don't need to participate in this argument. he's making all the points i would.

You're discrediting his approach to the game, you're using his approach to the game (taking full advantage of the open world) and picking specific examples to discredit it in some way. You yourself said that the open world is what appeals to most gamers and even yourself.

So why do you feel the need to pick an NPC that has no purpose other then to just be there?

If it's a world, he should say more than that, and contribute to a better atmosphere. He doesn't have give quests or anything, let alone engage in long dialogue.

Okay, after we turn Modern Warfare into a deep story based Visual Novel.
You know, I keep repeating this, and it's pretty much a strawman argument, but this whole "shallow", "flashy no substance", "no consequences" whatever thing can be said to the entire series.
And yes, they are probably caused because the game tries to be spread as possible, being a stealth, magic and swordfighting game, a life simulator, an exploration based game, a story based game at the same time.
But frankly, this is like complaining how bicycles would go faster if you wouldn't need to use your feet...

EDIT:
"Quickly outlander, I haven't got much time."

That mindset would need to be applied to all the NPCs in the game, from my understanding there are over 1,000 NPCs. On a base level you'd need around 7-10 lines of dialogue at minimum to keep a decent rotations which would be around 7,000 lines of dialogue that must be spoken and written, which doesn't include quests, story, or dialogue chains. That would be just greetings. That seems somewhat absurd.

You know what kills the atmosphere for me? Having the same voice actor for two characters, but I get over it because it's a game.


Not to mention the hyperlinks that replay the same line, no matter the NPC.

I don't mind the multiple voice actors so much. Go figure.

Besides rotating lines, you can always have these NPCs not say anything at all too (unless you click on them). That might help too.

So go play the myriad watered-down 'focused' pseudo-open games out there, and leave TES at the end of the spectrum where it belongs. The market creates open-world games with a variety of characteristics in this regard, so why do you want TES to rush to the muddy middle? Especially when games with open world mechanics but with more linear experiences tend to be so overwhelmingly mediocre.

If you want linearity, play a linear game; don't request that a series already on its fifth iteration should change its nature entirely.

Kingdoms of Amalur is standing by, ready to show you exactly why linear RPGs are not necessarily deep or "more focused." Just linear. Contrast with The Witcher 2, which is also linear, but of a much higher quality, and you will realize that Skyrim's flaws stem from its development team- not its open world nature.

NPCs in the TES series have always been way too friendly to you, ready to divulge even the dirtiest secrets at a moments notice. I understand this complaint as the NPCs seem to be so extroverted that it becomes annoying.

Exactly. Reading this thread it seems for some people it's enough that Bethesda have this amazing open world to explore and it doesn't need anything else. It doesn't look too different to the real world from what I can see. I'm willing to bet they will be even more amazed if they leave their house for a few hours and head for a forest or a mountain they will think 'wow the graphics in this real life thing are amazing'.

To the OP Skyrim's genre has nothing at all to do with the way it is as many people have pointed out. The writing is atrocious and the voice acting is even worse. It's a great big world full of people that talk absolute nonsense in stupid voices. If it was more linear it would simply mean that you would have to endure them all as you went through the game instead of missing out on some of them.

Skyrim is a huge RPG desperately crying out for some semblance of character, story and purpose. Ain't gonna happen, but it has nothing to do with the fact it's an open world game and everything to do with the fact their writers are awful. Morrowind was an open world RPG and it had much, much better writing with better dialogue and endless branching storylines. Oblivion put an end to all that but had a huge variety of quests and locations. Skyrim, well... Skyrim has a great big open world to explore and nothing else but it's very handy if you don't want to leave your front room and go to a park or a forest.

Which games did you have in mind? There are some good ones. Assassin's Creed 2, Red Dead Redemption, San Andreas, Bully, New Vegas, Just Cause 2.. I can understand not liking all of them, but "overwhelming mediocre" for all of them would be exaggerating.

This isn't really true. Morrowind NPCs wouldn't even offer you directions to local services or chat about rumors if they didn't like you enough. Dropping the gradient disposition bar for one that's simply binary (no opinion towards you - best friend) was a pretty poor move, I think.

Just because an important person dies doesn't mean a nation is crumbled and affected to a large degree. The person that is being killed in that quest isn't really vital in any way for the civil war, but they could have made so it was commented on and had some impact. But not that it drastically changes the progression because in my eyes that is wrong. People will mourn the person, but there are people who will quickly replace him so the effect that is due to your actions will be short term only not huge and change the world around you. But NPC's should have recognized it, it should be talked about and portrayed much better then it is.


Then you could conclude the same about bandits, about wildlife etc. I don't know how many wolves and bears I have killed or how many bandits have died so far, but in reality if this had been for real both bear and wolves would be on the brink of extinction by now. Alduin is the main threat the other dragons aren't a real threat compared to him, and seeing this is a game and that the player might just not have gotten all dragon words when they finish main quest it would be a bad idea to remove dragons from the world when Alduin died. I prefer that there is dragons still around, because it would allow me to complete all dragon words should I wish for it, not that I have to find all of them and complete them before I kill Alduin. This all boils down to game design, and removing dragon attacks and dragons when stopping Alduin isn't a good thing to do. If there still was dragons around but they left all cities and people alone it would also feel weird that they suddenly turned into peace loving creatures once Alduin was stopped.


This did disappointed me a bit as I had hoped for more then what happened, it would be a perfect start for a new life as part of the forsworn and helping them in their rise to power.


This is pretty much a standard issue with TES, joining guilds and consequences for being member of a opposite guild has never been a main concern with the guilds in TES. In Morrowind I was the top rank of all guilds I could be in. In oblivion I was leader of all guilds also. This is a problem that maybe they will fix with next game, although I do not hold my hopes high for it. I would have loved to see something like that as it had actually meant something about what guild you joined, and how you planned to play your character. Added with a good reputation system you could allow for someone to rise in the ranks, but if an assassin was caught and spotted as not only an assassin and leader of the assassins but also the leader of fighter guild he would be overthrown by the fighter guild. That way if people played their character really careful avoiding detection etc they would be able to join all guilds, but if discovered the consequence would be even bigger.

The guilds have always been a thing that has annoyed me since Daggerfall, the way they work when you are guildmaster simply simply feels a bit pointless. I would love for some micro management of the guilds, maybe get a few choices to choose from and then over time the guild would change based on my choices. The thieves guild seems to have some kind of rebuild phase and it will be interesting to play through it to see how it really is.

I agree, winning and earning the NPC's respect and friendship should be harder, it should also be based on your reputation. If you were known as a fearless warrior fighting for the people they should react in one way, if you was a feared assassin they should react with fear rather then friendliness. Both ways would work to get information on, but it shouldn't be just to say hello and then be best friends for life.

Red Dead, San Andreas, New Vegas and Just Cause strike me as open-world games in a more purist sense, although I have only played the first two.

How are they any different, apart from controlling your movement more and perhaps having an ending? Skyrim is linear too, inside its various faction questlines.

And as for 'overwhelmingly mediocre,' they are outnumbered, if not mediocre themselves. Seems it's every day that Yahtzee reviews a game with aimlessly-implemented open world components.

Save the world from a dragon outbreak! Yeah doesnt sound linear at all to me....

The main reason I play TES-games is that they have open world. Main story and other quests are nice but they are not the reason enough to play. I play TES to have an adventure. I may go where I want and explore areas and clear dungeons in the way I want. Quests are small spices in this big adventure. World's size and beauty, items, creatures and characters are more than written quest-lines can ever be. Anyway all game-worlds of TES-games since Daggerfall has felt too small.