Critique of the game and why I don't like it (anymore).

[BucMan55]

Why should athletics/acrobatics be in the game?? Because not everyone can jump or run the same speed. Because it creates another customization path for a faster, more agile character. And it has been in Elder Scrolls since the beginning. Having it in Skyrim with the perks even makes it have MORE sense than previous titles because you can't do it all. You used to be able to have a strong super athlete that was a mage because you could still level up all your skills. In Skyrim, you only have so many perks to choose from.

 

 

Why shouldn't it be in the game?? Apparently because some found one or both annoying in the same previous titles.

 

 

So logically, Bethesda goes with the people who found it annoying while stripping away more ways to create a more unique character, even though many of those same people would use it to benefit a character if it were there.

 

Same for Hand to Hand.

[Lachdonin]

So logically, Bethesda goes with the people who found it annoying while stripping away more ways to create a more unique character, even though many of those same people would use it to benefit a character if it were there.

 

Same for Hand to Hand.

 

There is actually a much, MUCH greater ability to create a unique character in Skyrim than there was in Oblivion, despite diminished number of skills. Both games maintain the ability to level all your skills (and in Oblivion, stats) to 100 with some degree of work. However, while in Oblivion every character who is 100 in everything will be the same, in Skyrim thats not a certianty. With 80 (or is it 81?) perk points and over 200 possible choices, you get uniqueness.

 

I do lament the loss of some skills, Atheletics and Acrobatics being two of them (Simply for mobility reasons) but saying that they stripped away more ways to create a unique character is utterly false.

[bearskiy]

But... but.. but I like the game!

 

Sure, sandbox-games get tedious after too much play, but I know it will be fun again in a few months and probably with some really cool new mods by then. =)

[elleonblanco]

I agree 100% with the OP of this thread. Unfortunately as I said on another thread too little too late. You would think that they have known for some time that one of their own designers has a fantastic looking hack and slash releasing on Feb 7. You would think Beth would have had the CK, a huge patch fixing at least 90% of the issues, and a serious DLC in the wings for launch a couple of days before the 7th to take the wind out of Amalur's sails. But no, sadly enough Beth has decided to basically ignore their customers and break promises, miss release dates, etc. A very sad situation indeed as Skyrim was a title that was worth saving but now will slip into it's dated mediocrity well before it's time. I doubt that even the modding community can rescue it now.

[yruapita]

I agree with what you've got here and I would add so much more if I thought it would help, but unfortunately I know it won't and, would probably get me kicked off the forum/site.

However I would like to add:

 

I have been playing since pong was new and 5 cents a game on a sit down table style model (pre P.C.), and Zork was new on the P.C., so yeah I've seen just about all that's been put out there in the video game world, ( again just about all not all).

 

For this post I would like to add a bit about the philosophy / logic (or lack of it) in the responses I've read so far...

 

A common logic model that needs to be understood here is the philosophical continuum, simply put when you have two conditions that are being compared, let's say the worst graphics and the best graphics available on any system, then you have a dichotomy ( a choice between 2 distinct and opposing ideas or things or processes or...) here's an example:

 

(Worst Graphics) -10 |------------------------------0------------------------------| +10 (Best graphics)

 

( Zero equals middle of the road / average graphics).

 

When someone says "the graphics here aren't bad, I've seen much worse in many other places" this statement implies that since there are worse graphics than these, that the graphics here are good by comparison and that's just not true, the continuum shows why that may be false quite clearly.

 

 

For example: you say that Skyrim's graphics are a -5 (or anywhere to the left of zero) and the other graphics you've seen that are "much worse" say -10 ( or anywhere left of Skyrim's position) then by comparison Skyrim's graphics are much better than the other graphics you've seen. However that's a relative assessment, meaning as long as you ignore the fact that both are on the negative side of average and Skyrim's graphics are closer to the positive or Best side then yes they are better than the others but neither are good because they are both less than middle of the road or average and so both are bad, true one is worse than the other, but both are still bad.

 

In other words, when one thing is said to be better than another, that in no way means that either is good, only that one is not as bad as what it is being compared to.

 

Or maybe another way to put it is this:

Just because something doesn't suck as hard as it could, doesn't mean it doesn't suck, for example: You got busted for skipping school to play Skyrim, Your school V.P. wants to suspend you for 3 days and give you 2 weeks detention, but you convince him to go easy on you because it's your first time being in his office, so he says OK, I'll drop the suspension and just give you the detention provided it doesn't happen again. Not getting suspended is good, but that doesn't mean that 2 weeks of detention doesn't suck.

 

Many people want to use this way of comparing things by relativity to help them deal with a given situation, but it's just not good logic or a good way to go through life because it's always possible to look at a given situation and say it's not as bad as it could be so therefore it's not bad, wrong. When something is bad it's bad, period. Yes it may be able to get worse but that doesn't mean it's good.

 

As to the graphics in Skyrim, I too believe they aren't that good compared to the graphics that are in other games produced by the same companies and compared to what is available with this software or the hardware in my 3 year old system, and for that evidence I give you the mods that take the low res / low detail / low 3D graphics that the game shipped with and turn them into hi res/ hi detail / hi 3D using the same or similar software that the Bethesda et.al.. used to make the game(s) in the first place. Much better graphics are possible without changing the hardware or software available, and if they are really trying to reach more people with low end machines, that's what the variable modes that the software checks during install (and that you can adjust manually) are there for, no need to limit the maximum graphics for those who can't use them, they already have modes available for their systems.

 

Companies continue to put out inferior products because we still buy them knowing the products are inferior and because they still make money and they still get people to say nice things about their product that encourages other people to continue to buy more. Just look at the official site for Skyrim and read about all the awards they've received and the positive write-ups put out about this game, in reading their reviews you'd think it was the best game ever produced: game of the year, best R.P.G.,etc...

 

IMO it's an upgrade from Oblivion in many ways but not in others and considering that Oblivion was released in March 2006 and Skyrim was released in November 2011, the 5 years and 8 months wait for a game that isn't much better than it's predecessor just wasn't worth it.

 

By way of comparison think back to 2006 and the video cards that were available, for example one of the top of the line cards that showed up late in 2006 was nVidia's 8800 GTX, compare that to the nvidia GTX 480 of today, the differences in technology has the 9,100, 200, 300 and the lower 400 series cards between them and all of the speed, memory,processing, software and functionality improvements that go with it.

 

Now, considering the differences in just the video cards in the 5 plus years, do you believe that Skyrim is that much farther ahead of Oblivion? I know I don't, not even close. Also considering that Skyrim took over 5 years to get out, I don't think it's fair to defend their effort by saying they were rushed, technology continues to improve at an exponential rate, Bethesda needs to keep up and they haven't, and on top of all that , the Creation Kit is late for its promised release...'cest la vie..

 

Finally to the person who said they planned on fixing many of the problems once the CK comes out, understand that you shouldn't need to. Yours, mine and anyone else's time with the creation kit should be spent expanding and enhancing a solid product in new and wonderful ways, not fixing it, hence the name "creation kit" or "construction kit", what ever name you choose, neither is the "fix it because we didn't take the time to do it right the first time kit".... :ermm:

Edited February 2, 2012 by yruapita

[redneck1st]

Some of the things the OP listed as negatives I actually like and see as positives ... such as the no acrobatics/jumping skill gains. LOL.

 

 

I couldn't agree with you more. I just didn't understand the point of the acrobatics/jumpining skills gain in Oblivion of course at the tiem I thought it was just me.

 

OP; I take it that you are upset that there isn't any bright pretty colors like there are in a lot of games like that onegame that comes out this month Amulur something or other. To be honest with you I'm happy that their isn't. Wh o wants to go inot a burial crypt and it looks like the village people decorated it? I"m happly with the fact that its more true to life colors as opposed to them bright colors of allot of games. I want to go into an old crypt and it look like an old crypt for one and Bethesda does that very well.

 

The only real gripes I've got about the game are/have being/been taking care of by Bethesda. I just wish that you could obtain the house in Windhelm not long after the Blood on Ice quest not when you done or amost done with it as well as almost 1/2 the game including most if not all the Civil war quest line.

[Wraithofdoom]

Wow that is a long post OP !

 

Lets start:

 

1- Dont rant about graphics, they look good enough, the characters animate correctly. Graphics dont make or break a game, i can still enjoy Oblivion without graphical mods just adding gameplay mods like Unholy Darkness (checking it out at the moment, really fun) & others.

 

2- Archery Does not Auto Aim

 

3- Dont expect any other sort of combat from a TES game they are stat based and not very action or skill oriented, be gratefull we get finishing moves this time.

 

4- The NPCs are somewhat flat, true, but you cant pour 100 dialogue lines into each NPC so they can all tell you their story when you are talking about a game this big, i agree important characters like Delphine or Babette should be more developed.

 

5- The Guild storylines (maybe with the exception of the DB and Thieves guild) are an absolute joke this time around, 100 % agree on your thoughts about the Companions, around 5 main missions, all of them boring and repetitive (kill werewolf hunters) and the whole point is just to cure Kodlak.

 

6- I am very pleased with the Radiant missions, they keep me occupied, finding stuff to do in Skyrim is a lot easier than finding stuff to do in Oblivion.

 

 

Conclusion:

 

All you have said about graphics makes you sound like a 12 year old hungry for some flashy colors and lights. Your other points are much more valid and you can see i agreed in some cases, i also would like to add that this game is clearly much more "mainstream" oriented to try and find some of the COD (or other mainstream gamer type) public, the RPG factor suffers from this.

 

Overall though, you seem to stress yourself too much with things that will be fixed in a couple of months by modders. Wait, be patient and i am sure this will be the best game ever for you eventually, just wait till the modders get their hands on the CK and start putting out gameplay fixes and whole questlines out there. And Bethesda's DLC will be more substantial or so they say, personally im really excited to see if they'll do an Expansion like SI.

Edited February 8, 2012 by Wraithofdoom

[thedemoninside]

Sorry folks, but this game is shallow. Questing and clearing dungeons feels tedious and unrewarding. After you complete the quest lines once, everything else is just boring and feels like a job. The scripted quests are short and just hand you the guild master title without making you feel like you even earned it.

 

I'm also kind of pissed that first they took away pauldrens, then pants. I liked having that much more customization, but it just gets worse with each game.

 

I enjoyed the first playthrough, but the second was god awful boring, and the second one was where I tried to explore absolutely everything. Maybe a year of mods can make it fun again, but I doubt it. Most are going to forget about this game and move on by march.

[Ferodaktyl]

Sorry folks, but this game is shallow. Questing and clearing dungeons feels tedious and unrewarding. After you complete the quest lines once, everything else is just boring and feels like a job. The scripted quests are short and just hand you the guild master title without making you feel like you even earned it.

 

I'm also kind of pissed that first they took away pauldrens, then pants. I liked having that much more customization, but it just gets worse with each game.

 

I enjoyed the first playthrough, but the second was god awful boring, and the second one was where I tried to explore absolutely everything. Maybe a year of mods can make it fun again, but I doubt it. Most are going to forget about this game and move on by march.

 

sad but true. Shallow is the exact word that fits Skyrim. Nevermind the graphics, or the bugs ,or the game mechanics, but after the first playthrough never managed to finish a second one. Spent more time adding mods and haunting the forum than actually playing.

 

Too bad for the open world that is Skyrim. Without a good story, without good quests, i'd rather play Railroad tycoon.

I'll probably give it another try after some DLCs.

It's a good game. Too bad i expected a great one. :armscrossed:

[Kaleid]

I used to like Skyrim, then I took an arrow in the knee...

 

For me the familiarity with Oblivion is too great, it feels too much like the same game. The main problem is the gameplay...if the player has high enough levels then it's possible to pretty much run through the game without a lot of problems. Just go where the arrow points you, there's very little thought required.