The Elder Scrolls II Daggerfall is a vast improvement over its predecessor, Daggerfall takes everything that worked in Arena and improves it. The towns of Daggerfall now feel like actual locations, with distinct landmarks and layouts that actually make a lick of sense, the map for these towns is also much more useful, with NPCs helping out to find locations in a less random manner. The main quest line is now a completely non-linear adventure with the plot being more about discovery than going through points A to B, this makes the game much more replayable than Arena by default. The world itself is now actually explorable, as the towns are all connected in one giant world, however, similarly to Arena, the (now not so) endless void between towns is entirely pointless and can be completely ignored by using fast travel.
The gameplay itself is also vastly improved upon, your movement options have expanded to allow better stealth mechanics, climbing, and more thought-out platforming/jumping. Alongside this the dungeons are completely overhauled, gone are the flat, layer-by-layer dungeons of Arena, now we have randomly generated sprawling dungeons with tunnels and paths intersecting layers, going up and down and all around at all times, huge open halls to explore and endless corridors of secrets to uncover. The only downside to this is some minor sidequests can lead to these gigantic dungeons, but in moderation, these dungeons are a blast.
The soundtrack for this game takes a lot of tracks from Arena, and remixes/expands upon them along with adding quite a few of its own original tracks, all of which set a great tone to the game, along with just sounding great.
For my playthrough I decided to be a Mage this time around, the default classes in Daggerfall leave a lot to be desired and do not particularly suit any playstyle so its best to simply create a custom class. The spells in Daggerfall are once again, great, with some more op spells removed, such as passwall. Rather than simply buying spells, you have the option to make your own, which is awesome, but also makes buying spells totally obsolete, as you can simply create all your spells to your liking. There is also now a better enchanting system, with passive enchants, use on enchants, etc. building off Arenas enchantments which were simply spells attached to items, this system is near game-breaking but is fun for late game. There is also an alchemy system, with ingredients you collect throughout the game, but I personally didn't even touch this mechanic as I had spells to cover me rather than potion effects.
The main issue I have seen discussed about Daggerfall, is the aforementioned giant dungeons, but also the unstableness/bugs of the original release, for that reason I opted to use the Unity remake of Daggerfall for my playthrough, and due to the apparent glitchy nature of the original, I would advise this version be the definitive version, as it is a feature complete remake, simply with more optimisation and options.
Daggerfall is a fantastic sequel and a great game, the seeds that were planted for the Elder Scrolls series in Arena are beginning to grow in Daggerfall and it was a pleasure to revisit this piece in Elder Scrolls history.
The gameplay itself is also vastly improved upon, your movement options have expanded to allow better stealth mechanics, climbing, and more thought-out platforming/jumping. Alongside this the dungeons are completely overhauled, gone are the flat, layer-by-layer dungeons of Arena, now we have randomly generated sprawling dungeons with tunnels and paths intersecting layers, going up and down and all around at all times, huge open halls to explore and endless corridors of secrets to uncover. The only downside to this is some minor sidequests can lead to these gigantic dungeons, but in moderation, these dungeons are a blast.
The soundtrack for this game takes a lot of tracks from Arena, and remixes/expands upon them along with adding quite a few of its own original tracks, all of which set a great tone to the game, along with just sounding great.
For my playthrough I decided to be a Mage this time around, the default classes in Daggerfall leave a lot to be desired and do not particularly suit any playstyle so its best to simply create a custom class. The spells in Daggerfall are once again, great, with some more op spells removed, such as passwall. Rather than simply buying spells, you have the option to make your own, which is awesome, but also makes buying spells totally obsolete, as you can simply create all your spells to your liking. There is also now a better enchanting system, with passive enchants, use on enchants, etc. building off Arenas enchantments which were simply spells attached to items, this system is near game-breaking but is fun for late game. There is also an alchemy system, with ingredients you collect throughout the game, but I personally didn't even touch this mechanic as I had spells to cover me rather than potion effects.
The main issue I have seen discussed about Daggerfall, is the aforementioned giant dungeons, but also the unstableness/bugs of the original release, for that reason I opted to use the Unity remake of Daggerfall for my playthrough, and due to the apparent glitchy nature of the original, I would advise this version be the definitive version, as it is a feature complete remake, simply with more optimisation and options.
Daggerfall is a fantastic sequel and a great game, the seeds that were planted for the Elder Scrolls series in Arena are beginning to grow in Daggerfall and it was a pleasure to revisit this piece in Elder Scrolls history.