Bethesda QA tester beats Skyrim in just over 2 hours

@Fernin-Ker and how did you beat TES:6 when this is only TES:5 hmmmmmmm????

That's a cool way to test the content. Judging by the compared speeds, that means it would take me about 60 hours to complete Skyrim. I'm good with that, especially since I'll be taking me time to try and squeeze everything I can out of the experience.

no wonder. the game was trimmed down to one DVD because of the DVD format, screw Blu Ray, right? Thank you microsoft for stalling the progress of humanity in this regard.

@Fernin-ker you fail And why are there cheats for this game? or at least that's what it sounds like when they said the only stipulation is No Cheats Allowed

@mtait01 Couldn't agree more. Games like Elder Scrolls aren't even meant to be completed in such a fashion. Not even sure why this is news. I think its very much implied that a professional tester that played a game hours and weeks on end can beat the main story very quickly.

I'm unimpressed. I beat Elder Scrolls 6 in 1/2 hour.

I was a little worried about this until I read Oblivion's speed run only took an hour.

dang thats fast. but skyrim must be huge considering he beat oblivion in almost half that time!

if you buy Skyrim for a speed run, you are buying it for the wrong reason!

I play games that I REALLY like over and over, and somehow they never get old, I guess that's what makes a person a real gamer :)

Maybe if the QA guys spent less time honing their "speedrun" skills, and more time doing their jobs of testing the game, Bethesda games wouldn't be filled with bugs, glitches, and CTD's everytime they come out. And then maybe, just maybe, the modding community could actually spend time modding, rather than fixing, the games.

@gamer620 Regardless, I don't value '20 hours' of completion at $60, and I'm sure it'll have side quests etc. Seeing as games such as Rage, Deus ex (all recent and next gen games) are beatable within 10 hours without any guides at all (which I've done), I'll simply wait until the price drops to merit the playability. Or rent. You can buy it day one if you want, be my guest.

Obviously some people don't realise that this is only for Story missions - and that if side quests were involved it would take over 50 hours. Not to mention being QA testers, they would have probably beat the game many times over by now, so would know exactly where to go, what to do, and the best way to do it.

@Archontic, this is the Internet. All stories generate controversy among the majority who just skim through the content of the story. This is an overall interesting article. The people whining about this story would be whining about something not matter what the author wrote. xD

I don't know if I'd even be able to finish Skyrim, There will be one part where I will get stuck and end up saying "F" it. I will complete about 87% of the Elder Scrolls Skyrim, before I give up the ghost. So no just over 2 hours for me. RPG are not my best genre. But as long as the game is fun, interstesting I'll get my $59.99 money's worth, Then look up the walkthrough.

What real Elder Scrolls player cares about the main story? All I really want is the exploring, and the awesome mods (on PC, of course)

@sagameister3 You do realize that these guys play this game 8+ hours a day sometimes 7 days a week right? OF course they are going to be able to breeze through the main campaign. I doubt you would even be able to complete the game under 20 hours without cheating or using a strategy guide on your first play through.

There is a video on Youtube of someone beating Oblivion in 5 minutes. All he did was travel to the location where Martin Septim sacrifices himself and he literally jumped over the wall and triggered the event. So this guy doing it in 2 hours is nothing special.... Don't let articles like this mislead you guys. Like Archontic said articles like this should never see the light of day and for a good reason.

Seeing as I'm one who plows through most rpgs it looks like I'll have to pass on Skyrim until it sells for $30 two weeks later...

[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster]

I played TES Oblivion for 150hrs and have not even seen half of the content the game has.

Articles like this should never see the light of day, because they only stir controversy in the majority that skims through them and misunderstands them. I can already tell that most people are freaking out thinking Skyrim will only be two hours long.

Read the article people, this speed run is took almost twice as long as Oblivion and Fallout 3. These guys are Quality Assurance. They've spent the last 3(?) years doing nothing but play this game over and over and over.

Speed runs are different because all games have exploitable paths which cut hours of questing. The original Fallout could be finished in 10 minutes and same with Oblivion. There's a video of someone beating Demon Souls in less than an hour. Speed runs don't mean anything when it comes to everyones own personal input into a game. You'll all sink over 100 hours into this game, don't worry ;)

The guy no doubt did the following: 1.) Picked his class, race, sex, etc. as fast as possible (with the exception of perhaps emphasizing a speed class or dialog-heavy "persuasion" class). 2.) Did not read any dialog and skipped past everything, including cutscenes. 3.) Only pursued the main storyline (obviously). 4.) Ran past monsters (if monsters scale to your level, then what's the point of fighting them if they just get stronger?). 5.) Found a glitch somewhere. These guys made the game, so they know all the in's and out's. Remember CHEATING is not allowed, but exploiting a glitch is more than fair. This could be some form of bunny hopping, spamming a speed ability, clipping through a glitched wall, etc.

the campaign was always short in these games and im sure thats what they are speeding through. what makes these games super long is the side quests and item finding and such, it only took them a little over a hour to be oblivion but you can clock in well over 100 hours into the game doing quests, pretty much exactly what mtait01 said

Well.....this has be reconsidering a little bit...how much longer can the game be even with all the extra sidequests... Even though this is a speed run thats still really short for an RPG.

@Spacerac you can beat the prequel to Skyrim, TES3: Morrowind, in 15 minutes

@Spacerac Do not worry about the completion time... this is an RPG yes, but what makes these games so long is all the additional stuff. In Bethesda's other recent games (i.e. Fallout 3, New Vegas and Oblivion) the main quest line takes no time at all (which is what this news story is based on). 95% of the content in these games is aside from the main quest. For example, in Fallout 3 there were around 7 quests to finish the main story, but a further 30-ish (don't quote me on that) other quests to complete. Same with Oblivion, the main story was short, but then join all the guilds and do all of their quests and it will take forever. And those are just quests, there is so much to do in these games, you can literally walk around for days just exploring the massive world.

@otanikun - really? oblivion and F3 were too short for you?

the game guide is around 600 pages trust me im sure there will be plenty to do. also as they said this was an hour LONGER then speedruns for fallout 3, oblivion which had a lot of content so... i woudnt be too worried.

[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster]

Dark Souls?

Wow... An hour longer than Oblivion? That bodes well IMO... very well.

uh whaaaa?! I don't personally enjoy RPGs* but I know how long these things tend to be, how the fridge do you beat this in 2 ?! Speedruns though, they're entirely too hardcore for me. Best I'll do is back in the day when I had to beat Metroid Zero Mission under 2 hours. *I know that they're well made games I just don't tend to personally enjoy them. I would like to know a nice RPG to start with that plays closer to the action/adventure games I enjoy.

i don't really understand how they can beat the game so fast, because you can only fast-travel after you visit a location. So only the travelling should take more thant that...

I still haven't finished Oblivion, so many mods and other content to add into the game, finishing the main story to me is totally secondary. Hopefully, Skyrim will also get some awesome mods too.

Elder Scrolls games were never about the main story for me, though. I've yet to be disappointed with the story, but the meat and potatoes of the game as it were come after the main quest when you get to explore the world at your own pace and find the small hidden things. You know, do what they always say you can: Live another life in another world. And then you add mod support into it and this game will have no problems keeping me engrossed.

Personally, I'd be more interested to see their times on 100% speedruns.

this game isn't made for speed runs

I already see myself getting disreacted. I wonder how far in the main quest until I leave the world waiting to have some fun of my own.

That just scares me, but from different point of view. What this mean is: the level of enviroment grow with your level which i hate. So it is not like you go to some location and something will kill you at one hit. You meet just the samelevel of monsters... like Oblivion. Damn it... ireally hate this ssystem of gameplay and i prayed for Skyrim to be different.

@Barighm Actually, this speedrun is about an hour longer than the speedruns for Fallout 3 and Oblivion. So, it's most likely longer than the previous games, but of course, the rest of the stuff in-game will make it over 300+ hours.

I'm curious as to what took them so long. Perhaps quests will be more intricate than Oblivion, "go here, kill everything, come back" quests.... I'll definitely be getting this at release though...

That must mean Skyrim's main quest is about 33% shorter than previous games. I guess that's not really a bad thing so long as the extra length was moved to other facets of the game.

@ChaosUndivided I'll second that. It would be fun just to see the speed runs. Does anyone know if they're on Youtube or anywhere else (the ones for Fallout and Oblivion)?

What did they do, run past every fight that's not required?

wow so these same guys finished Oblivion in an hour?? I was 40 hrs in and didn't even really touch the main quest.

Can we watch these speed runs. Cause I remember It takes nearly half an hour just to get out of the sewers at the start in Oblivion plus closing all the Oblivion gates at a low level is hard and waiting for the super gate??? hmmm...

[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster]