Bethesda QA tester beats Skyrim in just over 2 hours

@renegade_magnum I think you missed the point of the article. It was a speedrun to test the Main Quest's length, and compare it to previous games. And this proved us that Skyrim is nearly twice as long as Fallout 3 & Oblivion, bringing us to the conclusion that if you play the main quest with the right amount of breaks, exploring, side-questing, and goofin' around abit, it should hold for about 20-30 hours of gameplay. Together with all the sidequests and Exploration, this amounts to about 100++ hours of gameplay. And I didn't even talk about the Mods yet. Overall, this was merely a test, not the way this is meant to be played.

wth ... i played oblivion for month to finish ... and he did only 2h+ for skyrim ... damn him :|

Guys im not trying to be a fanboy here, but im kinda concerned that Skyrim on Xbox gonna have 1disc only..... How they put such an massive RPG into 1 DVD Disc?? anyone know?

i will probably spend an hour and a half making my character like i did in oblivion

@anthonycg what part of "speed run" don't you get?

@ishan316 Where was it said that the story was going to be 200+ hours?

Why speed-run? When you can ride ;)

I'll probly spend more time than that creating my character.

I would slap anyone who tries to do a speedrun of Deus Ex

@darkcomedian I couldn't agree more.

@Zero2545 Yes, actually that is what I'm saying. And saying matter-of-factly that I'm wrong isn't making you right. In fact I do consider eating contests quite useless, and downright ridiculous. Guinness world records are touch and go. Some records are in fact impressive because they require an incredible amount of skill or stamina to master. Weight lifting requires strength. But saying that you are able to complete a game like Skyrim in a set amount of time is not impressive, it's ridiculous. This isn't a game that is meant to be rushed through to begin with. In other words, "I completed Skyrim in less than this time" is most appropriately answered by "So what?" Now, you tell me you can complete a track on a racing game in record time, then I'll be impressed. Just because you CAN do something it doesn't mean you should be impressed by it. You're right, it's about the contest. That's not the point I was making. My point was the contest itself was ridiculous, certainly not impressive, and most definitely not newsworthy. You could hold the Guinness World record for being able to spit the furthest, but it's nothing impressive or remotely even worth noting. THAT'S my point.

Could you imagine how stressful it must have been to play? I don't know about you guys, but I think that games like this are supposed to be enjoyed over long stretches of time exploring, doing side missions etc.

So in other words the game is almost twice as big as Oblivion?? This makes me very happy and maybe a little concerned. I pounded 347 hours into Oblivion & 150+ in Fallout3. Can't wait.

@renegade_magnum It's not about bragging. It's about the contest. You're basically saying guinness world records, eating contests, weight lifting and other stuff is all for bragging? You're wrong.

Bethesda, can we get a character creator or something?

This isn't news. It's like someone bragging that they can eat an entire lobster dinner in ten minutes flat, or like someone bragging he can sing a hit song so fast that they can finish it in less then ten seconds. I mean, sure, it's great that they can do that if they want to, but it certainly doesn't merit news worthiness. Skyrim, as I'm sure Oblivion was, is something to be savored, something to be enjoyed. It's the journey that makes the game so effin' awesome. In other words, the person who comes to me and tells me he can finish this game in less than two hours doesn't merit applause, but ridicule. There's no point in stuffing yourself full of lobster if you don't savor the taste. There's no point in singing a great song so fast if you don't appreciate the music. There's no point in finishing this kind of game if you don't savor it. This isn't Need for Speed where times matter.

How long would this game take to beat in an easy-going playthrough, on average?

Kinda predictable.

It took them nearly twice as long to beat this than for Oblivion and Fallout 3? Hmm.......goodbye chances of getting into grad school

I love everyone QQing about OMG so short... did they not read this is almost twice as long as speed runs to previous games!?!?!

So much for speculated 200+ hours...

He probably beat the game by killing the important NPCs and failing most of the missions or something.

i heard that guy/girl who reviewed batman arkham city will also review this, dammit it should be 10/10 but its gonna be given 9/10 for not having multiplayer or something. @janspies88 Posted Oct 15, 2011 9:38 am GMT Just over 2h... good for them. This game will take more than 2h for me and cost me my marriage and social life. when in doubt choose life over everything else.

well, as long as the side quests amount for hundred of hours, I will be happy.

@anthonycg No, it's a speedrun. That means it's the barest of the barest minimum to finish the main quest, exploiting every possible loophole that allows you skip quests in order to advance faster through the story.

Is this 2hrs with sidequests done??!?!?!

I can't wait to play this game cause it's going to epic and big.

It is true though that this new concept of difficulty scaling goes against the logic of RPGs: you're supposed to kill stuff, do quests, etc. so that you become stronger. But in games like this or Dead Island, the more you kill and level up, the stronger the enemy becomes.

@OdinssonThor I am at a loss for words... I bet when you start a game you turn it down to easy don't you?

Love the Series-can't wait for the release. I'll have it in my hands on 11-11-11! But I will want to experience all the glory and grandeur of the game and not try for a time record. Obviously the QA testers have had the final version of this title in their hands for some time.

@OdinssonThor Wait, so randomly generated is boring? I thought that playing the same thing over and over again was boring, variety is the spice of life and all that. "Games should be easy so that every dude with IQ 10 can feel like a hero...NOT" This goes against the point which your previous comment about levelled enemies was trying to make. By having enemies scale with the player you ensure that the game is always challenging the player, never letting them become some unbeatable god among men. Also, the levelling was not as bad as you try to make out. I never encountered a wolf or a rat or a mudcrab at level 30 which I couldn't kill in one hit. I encountered more large enemies such as Minotaurs instead. The levelling system in the game was designed with a maximum level of each creature so you wouldn't encounter super tough rats. If you open up the Construction Set and look at the levelled lists you'd see that. Also your comment about Hitler is ridiculous. Hitler was a product of his environment, an environment which was already extremely anti-semitic and bitter. If he were to have been born in a different place or time then there would be no guarantee that he would be have been exactly the same as a person.

What's he yell at th end? "Novacaine"?

Meh!

@sayondas4 yes, there is gonna be a 3rd person view. Main view is 1st person view though just like the other elder scrolls games or fallout 3/ new vegas

@OdinssonThor They did that in Oblivion and earned a lot of criticism for it. That's why they supposedly changed the model. Now you have regions where enemys are lvl. 1-5 for example. They level with you in that range and after that you become stronger than them. If you go into an Area with enemys lvl 30-40 and you are only lvl 20 you will probably get beaten up by lvl 30 enemys. I think this model sounds pretty promising.

@OdinssonThor seriously stop getting into a fanboy stress...if you dont like the game, then dont post about it. "haha low iq people tumbed me down" wow, that says it all, you must be the most knowledgeable person on here, lol.

@robgamer4ever No, like I said, I haven't played much beyond the games of 2005 ( when I played KotOR 2, with Torchlight and Dark Messiah of Might and Magic as the only "recent" exceptions). I think I will really enjoy Dragon Age: Origins when the time comes. For better or worse, I'm still playing a lot of old games (like Deus Ex and Diablo 2) and most of them are so good in themselves that I haven't checked out any mods for them, which will make me play them for an even longer time.

@Hurvl Have you played Dragon Age - Origins? One of the best RPG's I've ever played :)

I'm at the complete opposite side of the time scale when it comes to completing a game (especially RPG:s). I want to explore and mess with it (I wonder what happens if I do this?) as much as possible before I complete it. It's not about dragging the experience out, so that you get your money's worth, but rather taking the time to learn and do everything a game has to offer. I like to do every side quest, talk to everyone and look everywhere. Maybe that's why I still haven't played much beyond games released in 2005, I simply play the old games so much that I get far behind on the newer ones. Oh well, guess I have to cope with buying Goty editions of every game I want, with all DLC included for a fraction of the initial cost and not having to wait for mods that seem great.

@sayondas4 the answer to your questin is Yes.

is this game also available in third person view like fallout games?

No special rules? So how does one know where is the finish line?

@MasterKingMP exactly my point...the whole concept is stupid. It's against any logic and sense! You meet a wolf in the wild at lvl 1 and you kill it with 5 strokes. You will meet that same wolf at lvl 40 and you will need 5 strokes to kill him???? SEE HOW STUPID THAT IS! There should be different enemies that should struck fear into you. But once you surpass that level or whatever you should be supreme hero, not some constantly challenged baby...as i said before games are still being made for kids with stuff hanging from their noses. Games should be easy so that every dude with IQ 10 can feel like a hero...NOT

@OdinssonThor The computer levels up and gets stronger also....

Did that dreaded paintbrush glitch make it back into this game?

Fallout 2 could be finished in under 15 minutes. Fallout 1 under 10. Both are among the most immersive and expansive RPGs of all time

Shows how little main story is in these games, and just how much of everything else there is. Can speed run it in a couple hours, but be lost in the world for hundreds.

ahhh this is the only game I would pay 60 far.

Just over 2h... good for them. This game will take more than 2h for me and cost me my marriage and social life.... TIME WELL SPENT!!! LOL! Love you Baby, really!

@Spahettificator you don't have to play the game to know that randomly generated stuff is boring...this is the year 2011 not 1995 with diablo. You just look at the previous bethesda games and anyone can see that it's a randomly generated boring game. It' like saying hitler 2 will be a good guy when you know hitler was a lunatic. and remember he was mighty popular too amongst the common people...you support boring games still...sad and stupid!