Shouting at Kids, Dragonslaying and crafting 100 Daggers. Skyrim, the game of the year.
First Impressions: A big ol' happy face while I hacked and slashed my way through the world. It was fun, the world was pretty and it was almost breathing. And when I say it was almost breathing, it means that the world was so alive and vibrant enough for me to think I lived in it. Sort of weird when I admit that I was mixing up fiction and reality. The first thing and I mean the VERY FIRST thing I noted was the character models taken from Fallout. They just were, I've played and modded Fallout 3 and New Vegas and I've seen them enough to know that these are Fallout models. BUT they do look better. I'll give them that. Second thing I quickly noted was that Khajits look like BAMFS.
The opening presentation of the game was quite exhilarating and just plain shocking. It was a little more sudden and action packed compared to the other openings of the games. Seeing Mr.Alduin Shoopdawoop the executioner was just jaw dropping and made me go,"BAWHHHHHHHHHHHHHH". But after that, I knew, the game truly began from then on, and I had to reserve 200 hours of my life into that game. And I did.
Story: You're a prisoner (Nothing new) of a crime that is basically unknown (Still nothing new) and on your way to being beheaded (which was cool to see). But then a dragon scares people away, you get away with the choice of either an Imperial officer, or a Stormcloak rebel. Choosing who you start with doesn't impact the story but it directs you on your way on the path of being dragonborn and what not. Not exactly a summary is it? Well sorry, I didn't feel like writing it right then and there. Deal with it. Ok fine, I'll do one. The story is you're a Dragonborn, last of your verbal assaulting kind. You have to *Takes deep breath* saaaaavvveeee the world from dragons, namely Alduin who is the bringer of the end times. There's your summary.
Visual: If you can imagine a picture of the most amazing thing ever, then it becoming alive and melbourne shuffling around you with a smile saying, "I used to be an adventurer once, until I took an arrow to the knee". That's it. It's pretty awesome. The textures are better than Oblivion and the characters models are better than Oblivion, which is the main thing. The water effects are G-L-O-R-I-O-U-S (super caps that are spaced with hyphens are for only badasses of the internet) and made me happy to watch rivers and waterfalls. The water even had a current which was cool too.
Towns and forts all have that Nordic (Viking, Icelandic) look and it looks authentic too. Dungeons and caves have been handmade by the developers because they learned auto-generating the caves in Oblivion was a bad move. So they decided to craft those themselves like they did in Morrowind, which was smart. Each cave, den, dungeon and fort may sound the same but they have a couple notable, and subtle differences. May it be the trap placement, the banners inside or the stonework, developers decided to treat these areas as if they were their babies.
Armor have been rehauled to be really spectacular. Each armour set feels complete and even if it was weak Leather armour, it looks good. The monsters/creatures of the game have some reappearances. The old favourite Draughr's appear again from their Bloodmoon expansion debut and many other creatures like Spriggans,Skeletons and other beasts look good. I was sad that rats are gone, but I'll make do with the Skeevers.
Audio:I hear splishes and splashes, I hear birds chirping, wolves howling, dragons roaring and me running. Elder Scrolls is notorious for its sound. I was relieved to that Jeremy Soule composed from Morrowind has music in Skyrim. The battle music is quite thrilling and gets the blood pumping when you battle dragons. Music iz gewd. Moving away from that, sounds in the world is perfect as well. You heard the difference of your running while wearing Heavy Armour than wearing Light Armour. Animals make the appropriate sounds, the people have a little more diversity in voices however the guards all sound the same but they are females too. Skyrim isn't sexist that way. Hmmm what else... oh, I wish that each race had their own voice. Makes me sad that my Khajit doesn't sound azn like other khajits do. He sounds like a Nord, which is cool too but not my thaaaang.
Gameplay: Oh boy, this could be a big one. Errr, how about I point form this for you.
-It's
-A
-Elder
-Scrolls
-Game.
-It's
-Awesome.
I think I got it all... Yup. On a more serious note, the game has made some good innovations. Like the ability to shield/block bash people. It varies the fight a little bit but what really changes it is the death blows. Decapitating your opponent, Impaling him, or just backstabbing them in slow-mo is pretty cool (Fallout 3 slow mo Vats). You can dual wield weapons as you can place any weapon, shield, or magic in an certain hand. Magic has the ability to overcast effects of your spells by placing your hands together.
Concerning the combat, the leveling system has changed hugely. Bethesda scrapped the class system and decided," Let them do everything". Alright, I can dig that, but not when you drop the skills to 18 and not leave it at the 28 or so that Morrowind use to have. I'll leave this in a later section however. The levelling system has adopted a perk system which is reminiscent of Fallout (Starting to become a pattern yeh?) but you choose a perk that's apart of a tree within the skill you choose. For example, I can get the perk that allows me to overcast Destruction spells, within the Destruction tree. You dig? Good. The level cap has been reported to be 81. A big number. My character is only 51 but I've been playing more PC games and fiddling with my Lets Play Skyrim on PC on Master.
Away from character development, the game allows you to get married but it doesn't condone gay marriage. But since I have khajit they promote furries :) The game also kept the ability to buy houses for lots of money . Questing is the same but they introduced thousands of miscellaneous quests that would take months to complete as they appear randomly and you don't feel like doing them all because they all appear trivial and boring. Main/Side quests are more interesting usually yield better rewards. Quests can end up getting you more quests and make you popular with everyone because they will talk about your exploits. Especially if you're a werewolf and eat a town. Fighters guild, Mage guild don't technically exist but in a sense they do. Companions replace the Fighters guild and the Mages guild has been replaced with the College of Winterhold for Witchcraft and Wizardry (lulz). It's all fun.The game throws all kinds of jobs, errands, epic quests and tedious quest chains at you, but you will do them because they are fun.
CONS OF SKYRIM:Well, it had to come to this sooner or later, but here we go.
1. You've played this before. No seriously, this game is familiar to you if you have played Morrowind and/or Oblivion. It feels like the same game but it's different. Hard to explain but easy to understand. They didn't pull a Modern Warfare 3 but they dipped close.
2.Skill count. In Morrowind, there was 27 skills to level up and power through, that was dropped to 21 for Oblivion and then that was dropped to 18 with Skyrim. Why? I miss Morrowinds 27 skills because that guaranteed the most customizable character imaginable. I mean, they had a Spear skill. Yah, A SPEAR SKILL. That don't exist anymore. They dropped short blades,long blades,Medium armor, Enchant, and I think unarmoured when Oblivion came out. THEN they dropped Athletics, Acrobatics (giant piss off), Mysticism, Blunt weapon and whatever else for Skyrim.
I shed a quiet tear when I saw the skill list for Skyrim and learned of the class system being junked. Having a class system was the best choice because it truly makes your character favor their skills. They got levels faster off them and had a better affinity for them. In Skyrim, it doesn't matter, the only thing that dictates your characters ability is what they wear, and their stats (HP,MP,Stamina). That's it. The first 30 levels defines your character for awhile but really, lines get blurred when you learned all the perks within the skills you like. You will branch out to everything else.
I miss saying," I have a character in Morrowind that's pro with Long blades, Medium armor, can enchant really well, can jump like Superman, and can run super fast, and rocks at lockpicking.. He sucks at magic though.", that changed to," I have a character in Oblivion that uses marksman, wears light armor, can run really fast, lockpicks really well, and can jump pretty high. He sucks at magic though." Now it's ," I have a character in Skyrim, who uses 2handed,heavy armor who has the ability to enchant,make armour,cast magic fairly well, talk/persuade anyone easily,lockpick anything,pickpocket anything, utilizes one handed quite well, good at archery and sucks at light armor. He runs at a moderate pace and jumps like a human being" Wtf happened?
3. Thieves guild lowering their standards. Thieves guild likes stealthy people. I'm the Grandmaster and I wore Heavy Armour and killed anyone that saw me. The Thieves guild was all about not being seen and not killing anyone. If you did either one you payed a fine or lost a bonus or even kicked out. There were consequences that made a difference.
4. Personal opinion, lack of Katanas. I miss them. I understand that this is a Nordic province, I just miss them. Only having the Daedric artifact and the normal 1h is sad. I want to enchant a 2h katana.
5. The Time. Skyrim is 200 years after Oblivion. But the world didn't feel that it progressed at all. No innovations in the world. You would think that the inhabitants of this world researched enough about the Dwemer to use their technology. I'm not saying Skyrim should be a Mass Effect or Deus Ex aged game, but a little more than riding horses. Nawh mean?
6. The game wants you to be over powered. Didn't notice? Notice the ##% betters on your armour enchants? It's ridiculous. Get your enchanting high enough and enchant your stuff so you can hit things for an extra 145% damage. Or have it where your Magic Regen is god or spells cost 80% less when you're spec'd to have them already cast for half. You don't even have to dodge now, just poke or cast and you win. And people can have this on easy. I'm playing on expert on my OP character so I can have the chance to die or drink my potions.
7. Overall, this game sells out with one audience in mind. It hurts to say, but it's true. Morrowind will always be the best Elder Scrolls because it was Bethesda first game that got into selling to consoles. They didn't fully design the game for console players. But as Oblivion came out, those on the PC side of the fence noticed it wasn't quite the same quality of game. Then Skyrim comes out and people are mad. The game is mad easy for the console players to pick up and play.
8. This game has the same track as Morrowind in the background. It's a lie. I swear they copy and pasted it into the game. Maybe that's why I play this game all the time, I think it's Morrowind. Also they have Oblivion tracks in here as well. Why music director so lazy?
The End Word: This game is absolutely fun. I love it, I play it, it's on my shelf till the end of time. But my expectations for this game was bigger than what it could reach. This game was my hope for a Morrowind and Oblivion love child. We didn't get it, but we got something that is still worth mentioning and buying. This game is still worth every penny, but I wish it had more influences from Morrowind and Oblivion than just pasting the music tracks in them.