Superhaggis Posted April 7, 2012 Share Posted April 7, 2012 Was it just me or did every city somewhat pale in comparission to the Imperial City. Yes I know skyrim is a backwater, but in the many years since the oblivion crisis population numbers would have certainly increased. Given that the inspiration for the decline of the Empire is taken from the decline of the Roman Empire, I was thinking of desining a new city that was atually intresting enough to walk around, at least compared to the tiny village of Solitude. Constantinople was the Capital of the Byzantine Empire the last reminant of the Roman Empire during the Dark and Middle ages. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/70/Byzantine_Constantinople_eng.png City of Constantinople Anyone intrested? http://img3.imageshack.us/img3/6720/52835792.jpg http://larsbrownworth.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Varangian_Guard.jpg http://armstreet.com/images/catalogue/big_img_2008121870744.jpg Ideas for Guard Armour Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AjaxSt Posted April 7, 2012 Share Posted April 7, 2012 I do agree with your idea of Skyrim being like the decline of the Roman Empire, however, Constantinople was on the opposite side of the Roman world from where Skyrim would be based. If anything, Skyrim would be based on Roman Brittan, Gaul, and Germania, none of which had very large towns. And none of those towns were nearly as large as Constantinople. Also, keep in mind that in the Elder Scrolls universe, the Oblivion Crisis would be sort of like the world's Black Death. It wiped out one city in Cyrodiil, probably others in other provinces, nearly wiped out at least one more, and caused extreme chaos in multiple provinces. Population counts after the Oblivion Crisis would have drastically plummeted, ending thousands of family lines (Also keep in mind that Elder Scrolls games are drastically scaled down from where they would be in reality). From a disaster, it would take more than a few generations to completely recover, and it's only been 8 or so, if each generation came at about every 25 years. And, only 30 years earlier, a massive war tore the entire continent apart, which would again drastically reduce the population. So on top of just getting into the groove of recovering from one disaster, you pile another on top of it, plus the Red Mountain exploding which would cause any number of unforeseen consequences, and it all leads to a world where there are far fewer people than there really should be. So really big towns, like Constantinople, would not have the people needed to fill it's streets. It would be like Acre after Richard the Lionheart got through with it. I think that Constantinople would fit in the Elder Scrolls, just maybe not in Skyrim. If anything, it might actually be a good city for the Thalmor province of Sommerset Isle. It, too, split from the Empire, and if I recall correctly, the East and West Roman Empires (with the East Empire turning into the Byzantine Empire, which Constantinople is the capital) did fight at least one war against each other. Certainly the Roman Empire fought enough civil wars against itself that it could be probable. It would fit, then, that the provinces that split from the Empire takes after cities that split from the Roman Empire. I'm not saying it's a bad idea, and I do like the idea of using historical cities as a basis for redesigns of the basegame cities. It adds a flavor or realism to the game that is already fairly realistic as it is (Compared to the High Fantasy of Oblivion). You logic is sound, and I agree that a game that is clearly inspired by the fall of the Roman Empire should definitely take inspiration from cities and cultures from around the time OF the fall of the Roman Empire, I just think that you're looking on the wrong side of the world for inspiration, at least when compared to the rest of the basegame world. It is your idea, and I'll probably download it to check it out, at least. It's really cool, and I would like to see more mods like this released, not just for Skyrim, but for Oblivion and Morrowind as well. I would like to ask where you got that map of Constantinople, because I'm making a Medieval overhaul mod for Oblivion, and if I had maps like that of other cities, it would be a great help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ghosu Posted April 7, 2012 Share Posted April 7, 2012 It's from Wikipedia. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AjaxSt Posted April 7, 2012 Share Posted April 7, 2012 Ah. I'll have to find some maps then, myself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thoragoros Posted April 7, 2012 Share Posted April 7, 2012 (edited) On the topic of cities, I have to say I am really tired of the small-scale 'wilderness' settings that TES has had at least since Morrowind. You look at other open world games like Assassin's Creed, latest FFs, etc.,, and not only is Skyrim a comparetively small game world, it is also rather barren of life. - There is a civil war going on, yet there are no soldiers fighting anywhere in the game world. - There are no fortresses that aren't completely in ruins. Where are Ulfric's castles? Where are the Empire's fortresses? - Solitude, the Province Captiol of Skyrim has a total of 1 tavern, and perhaps two dozen npcs wandering around -- at most. Compare this to streets teaming with life in any Assassin's Creed game. Or the city-scapes of Deus Ex-HR. - Whiterun, flaunted as a commercially vibrant city, has less than six shopkeeps, one tavern, and about a of total six customers. Where are all the people? - Walking the roads of Skyrim, there are no travellers except for the occasional scripted event encounter, but no travellers, no rival adventurers. No carriages. No real caravans except for a couple of groups of wandering khajiit. Again, where is everyone? - There are shipwrecks on the coast. But where are there any sailing ships coming or going from the harbors of Solitude, Dawnstar, Winterhold, or Windhelm? Did all the ship's just wreck on the coast and no there are no more? All in all, Skyrim is a fun game, yes, but Bethesda needs to 'get out of the woods' so to speak, and start getting with the times a little more. In Oblivion, at least the city's 'felt' big on your first play through, but everything in Skyrim just feels downsized, especially comapred to more modern open world games. Edited April 7, 2012 by Thoragoros Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AjaxSt Posted April 7, 2012 Share Posted April 7, 2012 Actually, I had the opposite experience. Skyrim's cities felt more complete to me than Oblivion's. However, I do agree that while the design of the world, the scale of human population is far below what you would normally expect. Even a medieval village had an average of 150-250 people living in them. In both Oblivion and Skyrim, a village is a couple buildings, maybe an inn, and a farm. Usually around 3-10 people. Even if the worlds are supposed to be at 1/10th scale to what it would really be like, that's still far too few people. It would need to be at least 1/50th scale to be realistic. Then again, it could be argued that Assassin's Creed is designed around HUGE numbers of NPCs, while the engines that Bethesda uses just can't handle that many people. Oblivion would crash if more than 150 people were in the same area, or if not crash, severely bog down. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Superhaggis Posted April 8, 2012 Author Share Posted April 8, 2012 At the start of the Fall of th Roman empire the Imperial government lost control of lots of the countryside but retained control of larger cities (at least for a while), such as Londinium, Trier and Lyon. My view of the Thalmor is that they would be the Parthian Empire, which was Rome's greatest enemy for most of the Empire's existance but wasn't the enemy that eventually destroyed the Western Roman Empire. Byzantine- Sassanid War I'm Still going to give it a shot, i'll need to get up to speed with the Skyrim Creation Kit, rather than the old TES Editor Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AjaxSt Posted April 8, 2012 Share Posted April 8, 2012 Seeing the Thalmor as the Parthians is something I hadn't thought of...and is actually a good idea. XD I'm looking forward to seeing what happens with this. I'd offer to help, but I'm hip-deep in my Oblivion mod and personal, RL issues right now, and won't have time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Superhaggis Posted April 9, 2012 Author Share Posted April 9, 2012 (edited) Fair enough, it'll probebly be a loooooong time in development given I have examinations for the next 2 months bt after that I'll have a crack at it. Edited April 9, 2012 by Superhaggis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Superhaggis Posted August 1, 2012 Author Share Posted August 1, 2012 (edited) Okay time to brush the cobwebs off this idea and try and get back to it, ATM the creation kit won't open to I've been forced to sit and think about what i'm going to do before jumping into it, Edit; I might either try and get a Mod to move this thread to mod talk or just start a new topic. Okay started a New topic in Mod Talk http://forums.nexusmods.com/index.php?/topic/744687-konstantinoupolis-megas-constantinople-the-great/ Edited August 2, 2012 by Superhaggis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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