Speaking of chores: What should be thrilling fights in Skyrim are often weighed down by the same clunky melee system Oblivion suffered from. In fact, even the word "system" is pretty generous considering we're just talking about hammering on the right trigger. While Skyrim has expanded the series in almost every conceivable direction, its mindless melee still feels rooted in the past. Having a lightning bolt in your left hand helps, make no mistake, but it's no substitute for real variety in the swordplay.
I love the Elder Scrolls games. I've played them all. Finished every one up through Morrowind. Oblivion was fun at first, but I just got tremendously irritated at the dull combat. Combined with the silly writing ("Hurry, it's the end of the world! Shut those gates! But feel free to stop and do 50 hours of side missions on the way."), it just never grabbed hold of me.
I'm going to get this game and hopefully the areas they have improved will make this issue fade into the background, but I'd hoped that we'd see some dynamism added to combat.
XBL Gamertag: RobVarak
"Ok I'm an elitist, but I have a healthy respect for people who don't measure up." --Aaron Sorkin
I agree Rob but I am thinking the rest of the game will make up for it. After playing the new Batman, War in the North and even Dark Souls which all have satisfying melee combat it is going to feel odd about hammering on a button but that's the worlds of 1st / 3rd person action rpg's these days. I'm old school I prefer phased or turn based combat in my rpg's but I know I am a dying breed.
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"The melee combat is less perfected, but has nevertheless been evolved. Those who specialise in it may not be left feeling quite as satisfied as those who prefer to dabble in the darker arts, but it's still a sweeter deal than the rote, block-and-retaliate combat of Oblivion. Enemies will circle and prod at your defences more effectively, displaying a little more intelligence when exploiting your weaknesses. A similar degree of refinement has been made to Bethesda's famously floaty third-person animations. "
I think when you compare it to shooting lightning bolts from your hands, it probably has less impact. But I've always been a melee guy, so I expect to see a mild evolution of Oblivion's combat. I know the block is almost like a parry now--you can't just hold the block button, and have to time your blocks with the swings. And you can shield bash by blocking and striking at the same time to stagger opponents, so I know there are changes that affect how the melee combat plays out. But if you ended up hating Oblivion's combat, you may want to wait for a Steam sale or something. The Elder Scrolls combat hasn't changed much since I first played Arena, so expecting it to change with Skyrim will probably leave a bad taste in your mouth.
RobVarak wrote:Oblivion was fun at first, but I just got tremendously irritated at the dull combat. Combined with the silly writing ("Hurry, it's the end of the world! Shut those gates! But feel free to stop and do 50 hours of side missions on the way."), it just never grabbed hold of me.
Yes, my sentiments exactly! Add to this the ridiculous scaling system that eliminated a lot of the sense of character improvement that is typical of these games (and added ridiculous elements like bandits wearing super armor as you developed, because of this scaling), and I could never get into Oblivion as much as I wanted to. The story aspect was the worst, though; I could never understand why they would make a main quest line fraught with such urgency if you could (and really should, to embrace the bulk of what was offered) ignore it to just meander around for as long as you liked.
I loved Morrowind too, so I was especially disappointed in what I got out of Oblivion.
I'm really temped by Skyrim, but I'll probably hold off for a bit to hear more about it, particularly how the scaling works this time. (More thugs in full glass armor?)
Danimal wrote:The monster scaling is gone, replaced with Fallout 3's system. Which means you'll find tougher monsters but the old ones will become easy.
I'm watching this live stream and it looks good, very excited for tomorrow.
Good news. I was much more worried about the scaling than a sub par combat system. I do know what you mean about going from the precise combat of a Dark Souls to this but I will get used to it. Im not saying Dark Souls is shallow as Ive played a million hours of it but Im thinking Skyrm is going to be a much deeper game with much more to see and do. A trade off of sorts.
I watched some of the stream and it does look like I will really enjoy the game.
I've been anticipating this game for a bit, even though I've never been into the Elder Scrolls games-never played but a small bit of Oblivion. I'm reading some very good reviews. But...the reviews are actually pushing me away. This seems like an enormous time suck, and I just don't really know if I want to invest in something like this that will require so much of me. It's a game. A diversion. And small diversions are one thing. This honestly...scares me a little. 65 hours to complete the main quest? Infinite side quests? I've never dived into anything like this before, and I'm thinking I won't start now. I'm being drawn in by the visuals, more than anything. The 'stuff' you can do seems daunting. The minutae.
I'm at least gonna wait out the release day, and see what shakes out. But there's this whole other life I have, y'know? A real one. And it can suck sometimes, but I don't really want to give it up to play Skyrim...lol
Yep. If you don't want to sink time into a game, pass this one up. Oblivion is the only game I could have unlocked every achievement for--I have 59 out of 60, with the one I'm missing being an either/or that I didn't save at before hand, so I'd have had to have replayed a large chunk of the game to get it. When I finished playing the "core" game, I had 120 hours logged on my save file. When I finished the expansion content, it was over 200 hours.
With all reports being that this game is vastly larger, hundreds and hundreds of hours will be gone if you want to complete it. That being said, the main quest was completed in 2 hours and 16 minutes on a beta tester "speed run", so it's really something you could just follow along and "beat" like a normal game, ignoring everything else, but that's never been the pull with Elder Scrolls games. It's all the extra crap that makes them special, but I can see how that can be intimidating.
Well, yeah, that...and my rpg experience has largely been hack and slash stuff. The attributes, the whole star cluster thing, the lingo...not sure I understand any of it. And it does intimidate me. I think I might be lost as last year's easter egg. Yeah...think I'll just finish Batman's stuff, play BF3 and MW3 online, and possibly get AC:R. Hell, I had to watch a youtube video to see how Brotherhood ended, because I just couldn't finish that one...
Teal, the thing about this kind of game is that it's not really meant to be 'finished' by the player. These kinds of open world RPGs are more like big open worlds which you are free to explore how you wish. Only the truest hard core would even bother to try more than one or two character classes, for example, and there's no question that this game will allow a humongous range of differen experiences for different player classes / types / races. The designers would certainly never expect more than maybe 1% of gamers to play every race in the game.
And of course there is surely a 'main quest' or story quest line to play through if you want, and also there are tons of side quests or quest lines that tell mini stories of there own, not to mention what I'd assume are going to be guild type quest lines (such as the mages guild or thieves guild quest lines in Oblivion). So there's a lot of structured story elements within this huge open world to give one some impetus to do certain things.
But sometimes in this type of game it's fun as hell just to wander around and come upon a cave and explore and see what you find.
You can't say that because this type of game could contain hundreds of hours of content that you wouldn't get anything out of it of you don't put hundreds of hours into it. It's certainly not like, say, the Batman games or Dead Space where you really are compelled to complete the story to feel like you've 'played the game.'
This thing is going to be a great experience even if you only play it a few hours here and there. Plus it's definitely the type of game to come back to even years after its release.
That said, I still wouldn't recommend it for you personally. I just don't see you getting involved in a world of sword and sorcery. Certainly a big draw to these games for many including myself is the lore that you come upon and slowly reveal and discover through your journey, and i dont know that you would get into that stuff very much.
Well, I really like movies like the Lord of the Rings, Braveheart, that kind of thing. And I love the whole era this kind of game represents...minus the magic, I suppose. So I was thinking I might get into it-but I just don't know. I never finished AC:Brotherhood because I got sorta bored about halfway through it; I LOVE the AC story arc, with it's Dan Brown-esque conspiracy stuff, but the older I get, the less attention span I get. I'm thinking that I'll pick up Saint's Row the Third just because it's wide open, and huge, and all that...but it's over the top and ridiculous. With the war games, and Batman, I think I've had enough war/death/ serious for awhile, anyway...
Might I suggest War in the North. It's an action rpg which is really good and might be more what you're looking for. Having said that there isn't an Elder Scrolls game i have finished since the 2nd one but I still enjoy the freedom of the games a lot.
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I'll second this, I'm having a blast with War In The North.
Danimal wrote:Teal -
Might I suggest War in the North. It's an action rpg which is really good and might be more what you're looking for. Having said that there isn't an Elder Scrolls game i have finished since the 2nd one but I still enjoy the freedom of the games a lot.
Gurantsu wrote:I'll second this, I'm having a blast with War In The North.
Danimal wrote:Teal -
Might I suggest War in the North. It's an action rpg which is really good and might be more what you're looking for. Having said that there isn't an Elder Scrolls game i have finished since the 2nd one but I still enjoy the freedom of the games a lot.
And a 3rd vote for War in the North. I've finished war in the north twice and working on a 3rd run through. The only thing I think is bizarre is it seems to get easier as your difficulty level rises. It may be because the first run through you don't have abilities or the heavy gear, but we're absolutely annihilating things on each higher level that were more difficult before.
I was reading reviews saying anywhere from 6 to 7 and I'm baffled. The combat is so similar to Batman with the "hit X for attacks, hit Y when something appears over their head", only this time it's a critical strike instead of a counter. It really has a Batman-esque feel to it IMO, and is thoroughly enjoyable. So if you don't want the full blown explore the world experience, LOTR might scratch the itch to sever goblin head from body.
This is my most anticipated game maybe ever but I am holding off until Christmas. I envy you guys but Christmas will be damn good this year. Enjoy tomorrow fellas.
I am a patient boy.
I wait, I wait, I wait, I wait.
My time is water down a drain.
ScoopBrady wrote:This is my most anticipated game maybe ever but I am holding off until Christmas. I envy you guys but Christmas will be damn good this year. Enjoy tomorrow fellas.
My Gamestop was jammed for the launch. 5x the amount of people that I've ever seen there for a game.
Best part was some 10 yr old kid was there with his dad (there's no school tomorrow, obviously). This kid was positively vibrating from excitement and his dad was sweet and indulgent. The kid had worked extra chores for cash and the right to get it at midnight. They passed out letters based on when you checked in. I was "G" and the kid was "Z". He wasn't too disappointed, but he did say "26th?" when he got the letter. So I busted a Mean Joe Green on him and slid my ticket across the counter to where he was standing and traded him. Made my whole night.
Oh, and I've been part of some nerdy groups in my day, but this group made crowd at the midnight showing of "Fellowship of the Ring" look like p***y magnets. I swear if you'd dropped a girl into that room, 2/3 of them would have just evaporated.
XBL Gamertag: RobVarak
"Ok I'm an elitist, but I have a healthy respect for people who don't measure up." --Aaron Sorkin
Well, yeah, that...and my rpg experience has largely been hack and slash stuff. The attributes, the whole star cluster thing, the lingo...not sure I understand any of it. And it does intimidate me. I think I might be lost as last year's easter egg. Yeah...think I'll just finish Batman's stuff, play BF3 and MW3 online, and possibly get AC:R. Hell, I had to watch a youtube video to see how Brotherhood ended, because I just couldn't finish that one...
So I was thinking I might get into it-but I just don't know. I never finished AC:Brotherhood because I got sorta bored about halfway through it; I LOVE the AC story arc, with it's Dan Brown-esque conspiracy stuff, but the older I get, the less attention span I get. I'm thinking that I'll pick up Saint's Row the Third just because it's wide open, and huge, and all that...but it's over the top and ridiculous. With the war games, and Batman, I think I've had enough war/death/ serious for awhile, anyway...
