TES V: Skyrim

[Cthulhu]

Nope, but I did set the mouse sensitivity to highest in order to make it reasonable.

Also, protip, get a trackball instead (one of them Logitech thingies, wireless is optional but good) - I have no problem playing anything but the most hardcore of FPSes with that one, and they're quite comfortable.

Also, I just killed my first dragon, .

They really should work on their storytelling though. I mean,

Spoiler

You defeat the dragon and swirly fancy effects show up which, if you haven't spoiled yourself, could be confusing to their point. Then some guard calls out to the distance 'omg ur dragonborn!' and suddenly everyone's like 'OMG YOUR OUR HEROE HELP US! CTHULHU FHTAGN!' and shit. I mean, Bethesda, re-read Crowning Moment of Awesome or whatever - you're doing it wrong.

Same thing when you first meet the Jarl of Whatshisface:

Spoiler

You walk up to him and do a one-liner. Suddenly you're his best friend and after beating a dragon suddenly the second-moast awesome person in the city (or something). I mean, what?

.

And similarly in a sidequest: You meet a blacksmith woman in the first city you come to. You say hi, she says hi, then

Spoiler

hands you her life's work 'cause you're going that way anyways, despite it's her fucking dad you have to give it to her. Disfunctional family meets lazy biatch much?

And them kids piss me off. Why are you announcing you're helping your mom sell shit when I walk by? I don't give a shit, kthx. If there was a mod I could install, it would be the be-able-to-kill-children-and-get-cheered-on-for-doing-it mod.

 

[Tifabelle]

I like how after I killed the first dragon, every city I traveled to, everyone already knew who I was. I was like, wow word travels fast around here.

 

[Interslicery]

Nope, but I did set the mouse sensitivity to highest in order to make it reasonable.

Also, protip, get a trackball instead (one of them Logitech thingies, wireless is optional but good) - I have no problem playing anything but the most hardcore of FPSes with that one, and they're quite comfortable.

This is the only game I have the problem with. I've even gone into the games files to manually change the sensitivity. I can change the games sensitivity, but as soon as I bring up the menu it goes back to slow as shit.

 

[Russell]

I had a brief experience with Oblivion.

Accidentally became a vampire, and the PAL (European) PS3 GOTY edition was bugged and there was no cure. Becoming a vampire meaning you instantly burst into flames and die when you are in daylight, which was funny until I realised the game was basically unplayable after that.

Didn’t have a backup save to go to and I didn’t want to waste 30 hours or more getting to where I was with a new character. So I gave up and traded it in.

Besides I was tired of the entire map looking exactly the same, fighting the same wolfs over and over and not having the slightest clue what I was doing. Gates to the demon world were opening all over because…. something. And the King died and gave me the quest to do…. something.

I really do like to get into the mythology & history of a games world, (Fallout, Mass Effect, Dragon Age etc) but I just couldn’t get into Oblivion. See Zero Punctuation’s Video; he’s explains the lack of immersion as a fatal flaw, and I’d have to agree:

I found it to be a vast but empty world, full of bored emotionless NPCS & the exact same frickin wolfs, now that I think about it all my memories of the game are the locations looking the same no matter where you when and fighting wolfs constantly.

Has Skyrim fixed this? Meaning if I pick a direction and just go exploring am I going to find anything interesting? And is the world easier to understand? Is there a clear plot? Oblivion's plot was to do with closing the portals to the underworld or whatever, but I never understand why they were appearing in the first place.

I just couldn’t get into Oblivion, is Skyrim more of the same but with better graphics and better combat? Because If so I’ll give it a miss….. Or is it a hugely different game?

Wow, lots of questions there.

 

[Cthulhu]

Weird.

I've had random crashes to desktop for shit today. Googled some, one suggestion was to turn off Steam and run it straight from the .exe. Hasn't crashed since, but I'm still keeping my fingers crossed. Silly Steam.

Also, am I the only one that wonders why there's no opening video with epic vocalized TES theme in the actual game?

 

[Tifabelle]

Also, am I the only one that wonders why there's no opening video with epic vocalized TES theme in the actual game?

no you're not.

Has Skyrim fixed this? Meaning if I pick a direction and just go exploring am I going to find anything interesting?

idk, really. It seems to me that the exploration is similar to how it was in oblivion. I mean, you travel from point A to point B, find some stuff in between. The one major traveling thing that I did, I randomly got attacked by a dragon, which was pretty freakin' awesome. I also found some location by accident, got attacked by skeletons, and lost my horse. (does anyone know where I can find it?)

And is the world easier to understand? Is there a clear plot? Oblivion's plot was to do with closing the portals to the underworld or whatever, but I never understand why they were appearing in the first place.

I didn't have a problem following Oblivion's plot, and I'm not having trouble following this one. Although there is not much explanation as to the "why" of things. But then again, I've only completed a couple of the main missions.

 

[Russell]

Put another way: Does Skyrim feel like a new Elder Scrolls game, or does it feel like an Oblivion sequel?

I know technical it is a sequel, but you know what I mean, different location, different plot etc etc…
…but is it a new game in the same world or Oblivion 2?

Compare Skyrim to Oblivion, do they seem like the exact same game with only graphics separating them? Or are they vastly different games?

Sorry to keep nagging y’all but I’m trying to decide if I should get Skyrim at some point.

 

[Geostigma]

Im about level 15, just finished clearing out alftan (sp?) ruins and traversing across the Black Reach to reach the mzark(sp?) tower and get

Spoiler

the elder scroll needed to time travel to the past and learn the dragonrend shout to make Alduin fall from the sky.

Tip : The difficulty level sky rockets when you enter Black Reach, i had to run away from most monsters there even though they were incredibly easy to kill a few rooms prior.

I must say the last time ive picked up a game and couldnt put it down was when i got Uncharted 2. This game is that good.
Im playing a Kitty cat man and run him somewhat like a cleric, restoration spells in my left hand and made in the right hand. It gets the job done, i was tanking Dragons solo fairly early on doing this lol.

@Russell i think they did a good job of addressing some of Oblivions big flaws. I couldnt stand playing Oblivion at all, i gave it a good try (about 25 hours) before quitting, i loved morrowind but just could not get into Oblivion at all. It was so blah.

In Skyrim you always have an idea of why you are doing something and your not running around the world map aimlessly trying to reach point B for some nearly non existent plot.
The game does a good job of keeping you immersed while keeping things ambiguous to keep some questions fresh in your mind so that you can get answers at the end of the quest or side quest For instance

Spoiler

something thats be nagging me, im pretty sure Ulfrich is Dragon Born as well. They had his mouth wrapped in the opening, and some NPC's in solitude say that he killed the king with his voice. Then theres the fact that Alduin showed up in time to save him as well. Hopefully theres an answer to this later xD

The side quests are great as well from what ive encountered so far. There not just random fetch quests. Some lead you into some neat dungeon crawl sequences and some even tie right into the main plot as well.

Also keep in mind the Magic system is less customizable then in Oblivion but aside from that Skyrim is definitely worth a try.


P.S. For those of you who have the Clear Skies shout, cast it a few times at night for some awesomess

 

[Alessa Gillespie]

Put another way: Does Skyrim feel like a new Elder Scrolls game, or does it feel like an Oblivion sequel?

I know technical it is a sequel, but you know what I mean, different location, different plot etc etc…
…but is it a new game in the same world or Oblivion 2?

Compare Skyrim to Oblivion, do they seem like the exact same game with only graphics separating them? Or are they vastly different games?

Sorry to keep nagging y’all but I’m trying to decide if I should get Skyrim at some point.

i felt more like this was a morrowind sequel than an oblivion sequel, minus the screen for characterstats (which is equally oblivion and morrowind rly) obviously, they're gonna be similar, but it feels bigger and more exploration based than oblivion ever felt to me

 

[Interslicery]

I just turned into a werewolf and tore through Whiterun and launched myself at the Jarl. t'was fun

 

[Rumpelstiltskin]

Spoiler

something thats be nagging me, im pretty sure Ulfrich is Dragon Born as well. They had his mouth wrapped in the opening, and some NPC's in solitude say that he killed the king with his voice. Then theres the fact that Alduin showed up in time to save him as well. Hopefully theres an answer to this later xD

Doesn't necessarily mean he is

Spoiler

dragonborn, it just means he knows the words of power. the biggest difference between the dragonborn and the greybeards is that the dragonborn can literally train in a matter of days what it may take the greybeards years to learn. Once you fight the first dragon the jarl mentions that he too climbed the steps and visited the greybeards so maybe it's not that uncommon that people know how to perform the thu'um

 

[Xelazander]

Just got Steam and downloading Skyrim as I type this. Add me: Xelazander

 

[Cthulhu]

@Russell: I'd say it's an Oblivion sequel. Same engine, same game - with some tweaked and (imho) better gameplay - etc. It's better, has better and more fleshed-out quests with some story and it's more polished - they did the Fallout games in between - but it still has some of the flaws like in Oblivion - repetitive world (tundra and mountains and tundra and mountains and - oh look! tundra!, uncanny NPC's - better voice acting, but still stiff as a board - uncomfortable storytelling - Oh hey look you're

Spoiler

some guy that was prophesized

and oh look there

Spoiler

a dragon which we haven't seen since the last age where did it come from I have no clue but it's there and the whole game revolves around them so you better get used to them!11

- and things like that.

PC version is also a bit odd in the menus - clicks that don't work or do something you didn't intend to like select the wrong option or exit the menu.

Anyways. It's a fun game - immersive, I'd even say, if you can look beyond the silly NPC's and the repetitive pack of wolves trying to kill you - but it's not the game of the year or something like that. I still think Bethesda's learning. For their next game - be it TES, Fallout, or some other franchise - they should work on their storytelling, i.e:

* Facial / body animations. Learn from L.A. Noire and Battlefield 3.
* Custom animations for key scenes (as opposed to NPC A running down a list of 'walk to location X, say Y, play animation Z, then key NPC B to do his Xs, Y's an Z's - as a matter of fact, that's exactly how ZZT works, and that's an early 1990's game whose graphics were plain ASCII characters.
* Believable stories. I don't believe the boss of a city considers me his best friend and most able soldier after telling him about something, nor that being some prophesized fellow somehow makes me worthy to do everything important for the whole world.
* Linearity, or at least throttling of stuff. I don't like having a dozen 'random' events occurring around me, each of which add another quest to the stack of quests I'm building up - by the time I get to them, I will have forgotten what that was about and it'll just become a 'walk to that fancy arrow and see what happens' kinda quest. Know what quest I'm on, and leave me the fuck alone when I'm doing it unless it's important. Save some quests for when I revisit the city after half the game or something.
* Videos! What happened to the fancy CGI they had in the trailer? It showed

Spoiler

dragons awaking and probably the reason why, but I forgot

, why not include it in the game? Sense, that makes none.

/rant

Going to play now, .

 

[Xelazander]

It didn't work :/
Installed from Steam, watched first cinematic and then it closes itself every time you try and change race at the character creation bit.

Trying reinstall.

 

[Tifabelle]

huh. I don't have any problems on my ps3...

 

[Geostigma]

Only problem ive run across is a random glitch where the texture of the world map gets fucked up.
It flashes from skyblue, to white to its correct texture at seizure inducing speeds and reloading the save doesnt work either. The only way to stop it is to actually shut off the console or remove the disc and restart.

Very annoying to deal with when you get really into the game then have to refresh.
I did the last half of black reach dungeon dealing with it because i didnt feel like resetting the ps3 lol.

 

[ForceStealer]

I FINALLY got to start this last night, after getting it on Friday. Just got to that first village and did the dragon claw quest really. Always takes me awhile to make all the decisions involved in making a character, lol. The fact that the other races looks pretty awesome now and not so cartoony made the decision even harder. There are also a LOT of options every time you level up as to what you want to get perks for.

Magic is a lot more useful and cool this time around, I think, and the little finishing moves are pretty sweet.

The only thing I don't like so far - and I'm gonna sound like a stereotypical PC gamer here - are the menus that were clearly designed for a damn controller. Even Oblivion's menu was a lot better than this, and Fallout's better still.

 

[Xelazander]

Mine works now after reinstall, level 8 :o

 

[Hisako]

* Facial / body animations. Learn from L.A. Noire and Battlefield 3.
* Custom animations for key scenes (as opposed to NPC A running down a list of 'walk to location X, say Y, play animation Z, then key NPC B to do his Xs, Y's an Z's - as a matter of fact, that's exactly how ZZT works, and that's an early 1990's game whose graphics were plain ASCII characters.
* Believable stories. I don't believe the boss of a city considers me his best friend and most able soldier after telling him about something, nor that being some prophesized fellow somehow makes me worthy to do everything important for the whole world.
* Linearity, or at least throttling of stuff. I don't like having a dozen 'random' events occurring around me, each of which add another quest to the stack of quests I'm building up - by the time I get to them, I will have forgotten what that was about and it'll just become a 'walk to that fancy arrow and see what happens' kinda quest. Know what quest I'm on, and leave me the fuck alone when I'm doing it unless it's important. Save some quests for when I revisit the city after half the game or something.

... that sounds like the exact same problems Bethesda has had since Oblivion Although I've never minded their writing, even though it does get bogged down in fifty feet of sidequests.
Their poor animations are probably to do with the fact that A) They're still recycling Gamebryo, and B) They're too lazy to add some custom things in since working with the engine is like playing with Excel.

huh. I don't have any problems on my ps3...

I will spank you
in the face
with a cowpat

 

[Tifabelle]

Do you guys play in first-person or third-person view? I find myself going back and forth. The first-person view when traveling or just walking through a city sort makes my eyes roll, so I generally use first-person when I'm in a battle and third-person otherwise.

Also, I had a horse but got attacked on the road. So I had to get off my horse to fight. While I was fighting, my horse disappeared. I don't think it died since I didn't see its body anywhere, but where the hell did it go? ;.; I want my horsey back.

 

[Cthulhu]

First person manily, but I wouldn't mind if they made it cool in third person. They'd have to improve on animations though, and make the controls more action-oriënted. The only 3rd person games I've been able to stomach are action games like DMC and GoW, which are very responsive and things. That's also my main gripe with The Witcher 2 actually - it - at least to me - tries to profile itself as a third person action RPG, but it leans heavier on the RPG bit and less on the player's skill and smoothness of gameplay, which kinda slows the whole game down.

anyways. Glitches, you say? I twiddled with some ini settings the other day - stuff like up the render distance of grass and trees and the mother of all, the amount of cells that gets loaded so that there's more long-range detail which wreaks havoc on your FPS but eh - and after that I had things like mammoths spawning in mid-air and falling to their deaths, or a giant and its companion being stuck inside and on top of a guard tower.

Which is cool, but kinda glitchy . I hope Bethesda's going to build a new engine after this one btw.

@B'loody: Your horse should return automagically to a stable or your home or something. In Oblivion you'd get your horse near you when you fast traveled to a city - the horse would be put outside of the city then. Not sure if that's in Skyrim too - I haven't got a horse or fast traveled yet .

Related to thread:

http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-personality-flaws-skyrim-forces-you-to-deal-with/

King: Wanderer! Thank the gods you've come! The prophecy told us that a mighty warrior would arise, worthy of wielding Fjalnir, the God-axe, and slaying the evil Demon Prince Synraith. We believe you to be that warrior. What say you, traveler? Will you accept this task?

Me: Yea, verily I shall accept thine task and vanq- wait, Synraith? Fiery dude in a floating city? Cape made out of screeching souls? Ahhh, shit. I already killed that guy.

King: You ... already slew the Demon Prince, the Knife in the Dark, the Void at the Heart of All Men, whose identity you did not learn until just now?

Me: Yup. I saw that castle floating up in the sky, and I wanted to know if I could jump up the rocks to get in the back way. It took a lot of reloads, but I finally managed to hop on up in there.

King: You "hopped on up" into the Abyssal Palace?

Me: Yeeeep, yep yep yep. Just squat-jumped on in there and looted the place. Then I killed that Sydney guy-

King: Synraith, Demon Prince of the Abyss.

Me: -yeah him. I ganked that guy. Mostly just to see if I could. Plus he looked like kind of a dick.

King: Indeed, the Foulest of the Foul was "kind of a dick." But you vanquished him without the aid of sacred Fjalnir, the God-axe?

Me: Totally. It wasn't even a thing. I just hid on top of a bookshelf where he couldn't reach me and shot him with arrows. Then I waited until he forgot I was shooting him, and did it all again to get the sneak damage bonus. Took a while, but he died all the same.

King: Forsooth! Thine heroic deeds are ... well, that sounds kind of fucked up, actually. Never thought I'd feel bad for He Who Devours. So you have no need of our sacred totem weapon?

Me: What, the gold dealy, with the shiny bits? Nah, I already stole that out of the display case four hours ago, before I knew who you were. I gave it to Sven, but he Quantum Leaped out of the game with that shit.

King: Huh. So. I guess ... the bards will ... sing of your tale now?

Me: Oh yeah? Sweet, let's hear it.

Bard: The hero came with eyes aflame / his tasks already done / the land was rescued all the same / but 'tis kind of a shitty song.

Me: Word.

 

[Zee]

Do you guys play in first-person or third-person view? I find myself going back and forth. The first-person view when traveling or just walking through a city sort makes my eyes roll, so I generally use first-person when I'm in a battle and third-person otherwise.

Also, I had a horse but got attacked on the road. So I had to get off my horse to fight. While I was fighting, my horse disappeared. I don't think it died since I didn't see its body anywhere, but where the hell did it go? ;.; I want my horsey back.

On my mage I'm usually in third person, but my thief is usually in first person since that perspective is a lot kinder to archers.

As for the horse: try fast traveling! If you're at a city, you're horse will be at the nearest stable. At a dungeon/fort, the horse should be somewhere near you or the entrance. The horses usually run away from a fight not too far from you but it is hard to keep track of which direction they run.

My horse always ran like a bitch when shit got rough...until a hag firebolted him to death....R.I.P Drogon ;O;

 

[Max Payne]

 

[Tifabelle]

whaaaaaattt. holy shit.

 

[Cthulhu]

hax. HAX! HAAAXXXX!!! Aimbot, too.