volnaiskra

The game itself is probably more forgiving than you realise. You can afford to treat it quite organically, and just do what you like, in the manner you like, and choose the perks that you like, and you'll still be able to do most of the quests, dungeons, etc. It's a very long game, so you'll probably evolve from one playstyle to another several times before you get to the end anyway. So, my advice is: don't worry too much about it, especially since your'e familiar with Fallout 3. If magic is confusing to you, just be more of a warrior and/or sneaking character. Try focusing on archery, as that's quite fun, and doesn't dump in you the deep end of battles you can't win as much as a melee approach. And combine that with potions that you can make at alchemy tables (it's no more complicated than crafting in FNV). You'll get some 'spells' regardless in the form of dragon shouts anyway. They're fun and easy to use.

Elder Scrolls I : Arena - PC exclusiveElder Scrolls II : Daggerfall - PC exclusive Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind - PC game, ported somewhat poorly to XBox Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion - PC game, ported decently to consoles Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim - XBox game ported poorly to PC (WTF?), Creation Kit still not released. Essentially, Elder scrolls fans who played the infinitely superior Morrowind and Oblivion PC experiences are feeling betrayed now, because Skyrim was made for 360, gets special treatment for 360, and was ported very poorly to the PC. Elder Scrolls games have ALWAYS been PC games up to this point. You make a good, albeit sad, point. But most of the issues disappear once you download some HD textures and plug in an xbox controller for windows (gamepads aren't just for consoles, people - PCs are great because they can do almost anything, and that includes supporting gamepads). Many parts of the game play way better with an analogue stick than they ever could on a binary input keyboard (eg. sneaking, lockpicking)

Plain old-fashioned bigotry and snobbery, basically. Same reason a lot of White people used to hate Black people and vice versa, or why a lot of rich people think they're better than poor people, or poor people think they're better than rich people. A lot of people just love to feel superior to others and will use any excuse to do so. I'm a PC gamer through and through and have never owned a console, but the amount of hatred towards console gamers you regularly come across in PC circles gets real tired real quick. Yes, Bethesda games get bogged down with some serious technical and design compromises in order to make the games more console-friendly. I guess some people misdirect their frustration and instead of venting against consoles and the companies that make them, they start hating the individuals who happen to play them.

I'm pretty sure sabre cats attack the moment they see you, as do chauruses. And probably some other creatures that are perhaps not strictly speaking animals, but fulfil pretty much the same role, such as spriggans. But there's another problem for those that do not immediately attack: Unless I'm mistaken, there seems to be a very simple binary behaviour to them: they're peaceful until you set off an invisible 'trigger' by getting within x metres of them, after which they instantly switch from "completely pacifist" to "will chase you to the ends of the earth and fight you to the death". Some more complexity and/or variety there would be nice. For example: -an animal that gives you a 'warning' attack: swipes you in the face once, and if you get the message and back off, it will leave you alone. -an animal that tries to scare you with a somewhat empty threat: runs three steps towards you aggressively, but refrains from actually attacking you, unless you keep loitering for a very long time -if it's losing a fight will run away (and not just when its health is at 5% and it's almost dead, but earlier, when it realises that its health is at 60% but yours is still 95%, and that a change of plan is desirable) -a normally peaceful animal such as a caribou that eventually attacks you if you're not respecting its personal space/territory. Also, while I'm at it, there's another problem that I'd love to see modded out: there are far too many solitary animals around. Ok, so there are obviously engine limitations preventing us being able to have 60-strong herds of mammoths or caribou (and after seeing how much trouble Bethesda's engine has with keeping one mammoth on the ground, I shudder at the thought of 60 mammoths all colliding and falling from the sky at once), but seeing at least some small family units (5-10 individuals, including children) travel together would be cool.......That was already done pretty well in FNV vanilla, so I don't see why it couldn't be done in skyrim,

I've been enabling SSAO in Skyrim using the Nvidia Inspector settings that have been posted here and elsewhere. I used the "0x00000011 Oblivion" settings (rather than the "0x00000003 Fallout 3" settings, as was often recommended) because they looked better to me. But now nvidia have released official support for SSAO through the nvidia control panel. Does anyone know what the differences are between the inspector implementation and the official nvidia implementation, in terms of visuals, compatibility and/or performance? Does the nvidia one use a new profile custom-built specifically for Skyrim (rather than oblivion/fallout 3)?

You can also choose the Oblivion mode. It looks much better in my opinion. Less heavy-handed and more realistic. Possibly less glitchy too, as it looks fine to me in fog etc. I haven't noticed any glitches, except for underwater. Tell me about it. A motion blur mod is my single-most anticipated mod for Skyrim. It would add so much more atmosphere to it, and would help counteract the irregular fps in parts, too. Godrays would be pretty sweet too.

Wolves are intelligent. They don't just suicidally charge at everything they see. They only attack if threatened or hungry, and even then, they scope things out, they hide in the shadows, and stalk their target while they plot their attack. There is a FNV mod called "realistic wildlife" that does a great job of making animals more unpredictable (and hence more realistic): they usually only attack if provoked or if you get too close, they won't attack if they know they have no chance, they'll sometimes threaten you but calm down if you back away....all with variations based on species, and some randomisation thrown in. A mod like that would be great for skyrim. Many animals already seem to have a less psychotic nature (eg. mammoths, bears, and foxes), though some, like wolves, just seem to attack for no reason every time, and it gets boring. Speaking of wolves, how awesome would it be if from time to time, a small pack of wolves decided to stalk you, for hours or even days (and eventually attacking you and/or giving up). And everywhere you went, there was the same pack of wolves following you in the near distance. Talk about unnerving! How awesome would that be?!

Well, the best thing is to experiment, really. Start with low/medium settings, load the game up, see how it works, and then keep increasing the settings until you hit a nice balance between smoothness and quailty. Do some looking around google and nexus for advice. And in a week or two, check tweakguides.com or geforce.com for Karoush's comprehensive guide - that will give you all you need to know.

This solution worked for me: When you're in the binding menu, DON'T use the mouse to select an action. Instead, use "E". In other words, use WASD to scroll to the action you want to bind, then press E to select the action, and then when it asks you to choose your binding, press your desired mouse button. I don't know exactly why this is the way it is, but this method fixes the problem for me. (well, I do know, of course. The answer is that it was made by Bethesda, and it just wouldn't be Bethesda if stuff worked the way it should.) An alternate solution is to use a gamepad - I was forced into making the switch because of a mouse glitch, and since then I'm discovering more and more things that just work better on a gamepad compared to mouse&keyboard: not just the UI, but sneaking, lockingpicking, dual wielding, melee combat, etc. etc. Even though aiming is harder with a gamepad, the overall experience is much more smooth and satisfying. Unless a modder makes a gargantuan overhaul of the whole game's mechanics, using keyboard and mouse will always be a second-rate experience in Skyrim, I'm afraid.

I'd say that it all depends on how much great graphics and smooth framerates matter to you, and how much you love the Elder Scrolls. If the answer to the former is "yes, they make a big difference to me", and the answer to the former is "I LOVE them - Skyrim is a once-in-five-years experience for me", then I'd say it's worth it. Skyrim looks good on lower settings, and looks good on consoles, but you can already get significantly nicer visuals on PC, with things like self-shadowing trees and forced SSAO. Eventually there'll be high-res textures available on the nexus, and that'll make all the difference - but all that kind of warrants a high-end PC. If you're going to sink hundreds of hours into it and you want to savour each one of those hours, then it's probably worth the upgrade to make the experience as beautiful and immersive as possible for you. One final thing to add: I've just made the switch to playing this with a gamepad, because the kb&mouse UI just sucks. So, that's perhaps another argument in favour of getting it on PS3.

General rule of thumb is that the graphics card is the most important by far. If you want a serious improvement, invest in a better one. Preferably nvidia, as they tend to have better support for certain features. Also, they tend to perform better. Maybe a gtx 560, or a second hand gtx280. EDIT: actually, your current one is quite decent. No need to upgrade unless you want top of the line The cpu seems fine to me, though perhaps it is a little old, and skyrim is supposedlvery cpu-heavy. Upgrading that might mean a new mobo though, which means you're halfway to getting a whole new computer. The RAM is likely to make the least difference, but will be by far the cheapest (providing you have enough free slots on your mobo for it). So start there. I'm also concerned about those broken fans. If the comp is overheating, that could be causing your freezes. You should get them checked out. For now, you can try running your pc while it's open, with a desk fan pointing in, and see if that helps. Also, if you getmore ram, consider upgrading to windows 7.thatll probably help with performance too.

You just hold one mouse button to pull the arrow back, then press the other mouse button to zoom

From memory, you can also right click and drag to partially rotate it. Also, there's a mod that fixes those hard coded key bindings. It's called "hard coded key tweaks', i think

Elesyweyr, with out a doubt!!!!! Oblivion gave us lush woodlands and meadows; Skyrim's given us mountains and babbling brooks. By the time the next game rolls around (which will hopefully be 3x prettier than Skyrim, having being built for next-gen consoles and not bogged down by old tech), it'll be the perfect time to increase the diversity further and go to some tropical rainforests and sandy deserts, no?! :)

No offence, but you come across as kind of loopy. You write off a game and make a melodrama about how you'll never play it again, all because you had problems with installing a simple piece of software that millions of users around the world can get working without a hitch. With all that tinkering and registery digging that you do, it seems pretty likely that it's a case of PEBKAC. It makes no sense for Steam to install malware (or "adware", whatever that's supposed to mean in this case). Malware is more the domain of single guys trying to sell fake viagra out of a Russian apartment, not highly-respected multi-billion dollar companies. The reason Steam makes billions of dollars is precisely BECAUSE they offer a fluid, hassle-free, and trustworthy platform that millions of people are prepared to use (some because they love it, some because they grudgingly tolerate it). Part of the functionality of that platform is that it regularly communicates with their servers for game patches, cloudsync, friend updates, etc. (which perhaps is triggering your adware detector). But for Steam to put things in there with malicious intentions would go directly against their own interests.

anyone? :( edit: So far, it SEEMS to work ok with an xbox controller. Never thought I'd be playing Skyrim with a gamepad, but f*** it - it's obviously designed for one, so why fight it? And as a nice bonus, I've realised that the analogue stick is better for sneaking too.

That sounds so romantic! Makes me wish my wife was into gaming :( I feel like this calls for some clarity...their characters didn't have clothes on...not the OP and his girlfriend. ;] And that calls for some more clarity: I was making a joke ;)

I've been using a bow for hours, and it's been fine, but lately I'm getting a bug that occurs more and more often. I try to fire an arrow, the bow-pulling animation plays out, but no arrow shoots out. Only when I switch weapons does the arrow come out. If I try to shoot 4 arrows in a row, and then switch to another weapon (a dagger, mace, spell, whatever), then all 4 arrows come out simultanously. I suspect that it's a hotkey-related bug, although I can't really figure out what triggers it and what prevents it. As I'm an archer character, it's making my game unplayable. I first thought it was the hard coded key tweaks mod that was causing it, but I've since uninstalled the mod, but with no change. I've tried to re-bind the attack key a few times, but it doesn't seem to help. I've got L-mouse controlling the left hand and R-mouse controlling the right hand, btw Any ideas?

Great. Thanks. If Winterhold and Breezehome are fine, then I think it's safe to hope that all player homes (I'm assuming there might be more) are ok too. Phew. :)

@OP: Yes! It is stupid. In my opinion, this problem is even stupider in the context of the barter menu. Because whenever you try to leave the barter menu, it prompts you with a popup confirmation dialog. In other words, the game thinks "stop talking to the merchant for a few seconds? Ooooh, I don't know if we should let the player do that!! Better double check that this is really a decision the player is comfortable with...........on the other hand, the player just sold his one-of-a-kind sword of awesomeness, and it'll cost 10 times more to buy back - should we double-check whether the player really meant to sell it, or whether s/he just instinctively pressed "e"? Or should we let the player buy that sword back for the same price in case it was a mistake? Naaaah." My other gripe is that the marker for whether something is equipped is in the same place as the one to tell you whether something is favourited or not. As a result, you can see whether something is equipped, or whether it's favourited, but not both. Simply because the UI designer decided that was too difficult and couldn't be arsed coming up with a better solution. That, and a multi-billion dollar company like Bethesda couldn't be stuffed hiring a proper UI designer for their flagship game. AAAAAGH!

I'm sure there's a way to mod it in. And you're right, it is a little odd not having it. Though I've stopped using the launcher anyway. With all the ini tweaks and mod testing I've been doing, I got kind of sick of the extra step, so I now have the game exe stuck to my quickmenu.

That sounds so romantic! Makes me wish my wife was into gaming :(

When I played Oblivion, I wasted several days of gameplay by storing a lot of my treasured possessions in a chest inside the Thief Cave (an official DLC player home), only to discover that they completely disappeared from the game a few days later. Turns out that only some of the containers in that cave were 'permanent', while others cleared their contents automatically after xx hours. Some of the stuff I'd lost was just too important to me, so I had to load a much older savegame just to get it back. As infuriatingly cretinous as the decision to give the player a home with 'trick' containers in it was, I wouldn't put it past Bethesda to do it again in Skyrim (though I think the issue wasn't repeated in the Fallout games, so hopefully they learnt from their mistakes). Can anyone confirm whether the containers in houses you buy are safe to store stuff in? And what about the floor - if you drop something on the floor or lean it against the wall, will it still be there a few days later? (I've only played about 15 hours so don't actually own any houses yet, by the way)

I'm a hoarder in real life, and I'm the same in RPGs. So raising it would just add to my problem :D I prefer the extra layer of tactics of having to travel light, and sometimes it feels liberating to just let stuff go, rather than carrying EVERYTHING you might possibly need on a rainy day.

I don't think s/he's got a problem with the style, but rather with the implementation. When your sword doesn't appear to make any real contact with an enemy when you hit him, that's not a stylistic choice, but a technical flaw. The combat is definitely better this time around, but they still haven't nailed it. And they certainly could learn from how other games/engines tackle it. For example, I've read that Dead Island does 1st-person melee combat much more convincingly (though haven't played that myself) Come to think of it, there's a LOT that Bethesda could learn from other games, not to mention from their own modding community. Yet they seem to repeat so many of the same mistakes with each game. They're like the lazy genius kid at school who you want to throttle for being so slack but you can't because even when he's barely trying he still produces one of the best essays in the class.