I feel like I say this every time but damn if there was a game I was certain I wasn’t gonna like upon revisiting it, Skyrim would’ve been my number one choice. It’s a big budget western game made by the developers of all of my least favorite Fallout games, it simplifies the remaining Elder Scrolls RPG systems even more than Oblivion did, and, I mean, it’s just so lame to be like “I LOVE SKYRIM” in 2023. BUT JUST LOOK AT WHAT HAPPENED!!!
Basically, as much as Skyrim’s design builds heavily off of Oblivion’s, it’s setting and mood are much more reminiscent of Morrowind. Not that it feels the same, Morrowind is all alien and ash-covered, where Skyrim is all vikingy and snow-covered. It’s a more classic setting for sure, but there’s a lot of unique flavor on top that Oblivion simply didn’t have, with its throwback-to-daggerfall tone. There’s a culture to explore, a land to learn, and a complex system of faction relationships to untangle, whether they be classic TES guilds or almost Fallout-ey political factions. What’s really great about these factions is that the division between them, the civil war that sets the scene for the game, is incredibly morally ambiguous, in that classic way that no matter who wins, so, so many people lose. Morrowind had wonderful factions as well, but the factions in Skyrim feel more active, more direct, like you should choose a side even if you don’t really want to. The flora and fauna are less varied and less… strange than Morrowind’s, but put Oblivion’s collection far to shame. All this to say Skyrim feels fleshed out and thick in the places Morrowind did, in all the places Oblivion felt thin and repetitive.
The design systems Skyrim continues from Oblivion aren’t my cup of tea generally, but they’re also not the kinda things you can walk back. In particular, the non-diagetic fast travel cat is out of the bag, and the amount of people who want it removed and/or the game designed to be fully playable without it is.. not that large, and it was certainly tiny back in 2011. However, in the recent versions of the game, there’s a survival mode you can enable. Basically, it makes you need to eat, sleep, and stay warm, and removes your ability to fast travel. Since I wanted a more detail-oriented experience than my fast-travel-laden sprint through Oblivion, I decided to try it out, and honestly I’m glad I did. While it’s suuuuuuuper tacked on and clear the game is not built around it at all, for most of the game it was great to have to plan my routes, stock up on food, and make sure to rent a room every time I went into a city. I used the carriage to travel from city to city all the time, and would hide out in caves along paths if I was getting too cold. I would definitely recommend trying it out, but also being ok with turning it off at certain points of the game (at one point I almost froze to death during a particularly long story-required dialogue on top of a mountain). It’s dumb and tacked on for sure, but putting it on during the early and mid game really accentuates the rpg elements of the game, and makes you treat the world as a place instead of a backdrop.
Really my only large issues with the game are that 1. they really needed to hire more voice actors, so many (sometimes major!) characters have one of two voices and it really hurts the immersion, and 2. for a special edition rerelease of one of the most successful games ever made, wow there’s so many bugs and weird bad-feeling failure modes. Like, and this is carried over from oblivion, if you’re walking up a slope and it becomes too steep to walk up, you just stop. You can’t jump, but you can move laterally?? And if you stop moving you VERY SLOWLY slide down the slope. Feels terrible. Also like, the shouts and the magic are tough to use in a pinch, as their animations have strange timings and the shouts in particular just like, don’t happen sometimes. I’m ok with this kinda stuff in general, and most people know skyrim is buggy as hell, but it’s also wild that it’s so buggy at this budget and level of success.
But yeah, broadly, Skyrim is a return to form while still keeping the grandeur of Oblivion, in a way I’ve never really seen a studio pull off before. It feels bigger and more streamlined, but also well detailed and deep if you look at it, and most importantly it lets you know “HEY, LOOK AT THE DEEP COOL PARTS, DON’T JUST GLOSS OVER THEM”. It’s considered and well made and goddamn I feel so lame for gushing on Skyrim lmao
Basically, as much as Skyrim’s design builds heavily off of Oblivion’s, it’s setting and mood are much more reminiscent of Morrowind. Not that it feels the same, Morrowind is all alien and ash-covered, where Skyrim is all vikingy and snow-covered. It’s a more classic setting for sure, but there’s a lot of unique flavor on top that Oblivion simply didn’t have, with its throwback-to-daggerfall tone. There’s a culture to explore, a land to learn, and a complex system of faction relationships to untangle, whether they be classic TES guilds or almost Fallout-ey political factions. What’s really great about these factions is that the division between them, the civil war that sets the scene for the game, is incredibly morally ambiguous, in that classic way that no matter who wins, so, so many people lose. Morrowind had wonderful factions as well, but the factions in Skyrim feel more active, more direct, like you should choose a side even if you don’t really want to. The flora and fauna are less varied and less… strange than Morrowind’s, but put Oblivion’s collection far to shame. All this to say Skyrim feels fleshed out and thick in the places Morrowind did, in all the places Oblivion felt thin and repetitive.
The design systems Skyrim continues from Oblivion aren’t my cup of tea generally, but they’re also not the kinda things you can walk back. In particular, the non-diagetic fast travel cat is out of the bag, and the amount of people who want it removed and/or the game designed to be fully playable without it is.. not that large, and it was certainly tiny back in 2011. However, in the recent versions of the game, there’s a survival mode you can enable. Basically, it makes you need to eat, sleep, and stay warm, and removes your ability to fast travel. Since I wanted a more detail-oriented experience than my fast-travel-laden sprint through Oblivion, I decided to try it out, and honestly I’m glad I did. While it’s suuuuuuuper tacked on and clear the game is not built around it at all, for most of the game it was great to have to plan my routes, stock up on food, and make sure to rent a room every time I went into a city. I used the carriage to travel from city to city all the time, and would hide out in caves along paths if I was getting too cold. I would definitely recommend trying it out, but also being ok with turning it off at certain points of the game (at one point I almost froze to death during a particularly long story-required dialogue on top of a mountain). It’s dumb and tacked on for sure, but putting it on during the early and mid game really accentuates the rpg elements of the game, and makes you treat the world as a place instead of a backdrop.
Really my only large issues with the game are that 1. they really needed to hire more voice actors, so many (sometimes major!) characters have one of two voices and it really hurts the immersion, and 2. for a special edition rerelease of one of the most successful games ever made, wow there’s so many bugs and weird bad-feeling failure modes. Like, and this is carried over from oblivion, if you’re walking up a slope and it becomes too steep to walk up, you just stop. You can’t jump, but you can move laterally?? And if you stop moving you VERY SLOWLY slide down the slope. Feels terrible. Also like, the shouts and the magic are tough to use in a pinch, as their animations have strange timings and the shouts in particular just like, don’t happen sometimes. I’m ok with this kinda stuff in general, and most people know skyrim is buggy as hell, but it’s also wild that it’s so buggy at this budget and level of success.
But yeah, broadly, Skyrim is a return to form while still keeping the grandeur of Oblivion, in a way I’ve never really seen a studio pull off before. It feels bigger and more streamlined, but also well detailed and deep if you look at it, and most importantly it lets you know “HEY, LOOK AT THE DEEP COOL PARTS, DON’T JUST GLOSS OVER THEM”. It’s considered and well made and goddamn I feel so lame for gushing on Skyrim lmao