Skyrim

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Released on November 11, 2011 (11/11/11)

Publisher: Bethesda

Blue's Take:


So it's been a while since Green and I have talked about the same thing on a post and that is what is going to happen here. Obviously the thing in question is Bethesda's Skyrim. A game that I personally, love. In fact, later on I will talk about the Dawngaurd DLC as well, but that is not in this post.

So yeah, here we go, Skyrim. What most people who haven't played it or those cynical types will say it is Oblivion 2. I really have a problem with that. Yes, some of the mechanics are the same but it is a completely different game altogether. I'll get this right out of the way. 1. The graphics have had a complete overhaul. I have played both the 360 and the PC version (medium video settings) and they are both better than Oblivion. 2. The storyline is so much more epic it makes Oblivion look like Bethesda's bastard child from a crack-smoking-alcoholic mother. Too far? Well it's the truth. 3. The leveling is markedly improved. Gone are the days of being able to jump up and down for your levels (that damn acrobatics skill is completely gone by the way) and every swing of your sword, hit you take, spell you cast, and item you sell counts toward leveling. 4. The combat is also markedly improved. The two hand system is something that is so much better than the previous it makes look as I mentioned before. A bastard child from a crack-smoking-alcoholic mother. Yes, the same joke but again, it's true. 
One can make the argument that the game does get somewhat repetitive but for me that wasn't much a problem for me. The thing that got to me was that there are so many ways to go about playing the game that made it badass for me. I mean really, you can choose to go through the story or you could just simply not do that. I mean that's really the beauty of this game. There is so much to do that simply trying just to do one thing (story, thieves guild, etc) for a long succession of time doesn't really work. It is really liberating when you finish a quest and then say.... well what next? I literally had around 20 misc. objectives to do at one point    

It was kind of overwhelming to think I had so much to do. Another way to play the game is to build characters specifically for certain guilds and just do that one guild with them. And combat can vary from character to character just as greatly. I have not found one other game that brings as many options as this one does. The graphics are amazing, the leveling is great, the storyline is nothing short of amazing, and the combat is just as good as the rest of it. 


However, just like a lot of games, Skyrim does have it's flaws. They aren't many, but sometimes they become annoying. Glitching through the side of the mountain has happened to me more than once and that was greatly annoying after walking through the wilderness for 20 minutes and not saving because I didn't think there was a need to. (Yeah that was kinda my fault but it happened a lot.) And the fact that even though the graphics were great, they kinda just showed the same thing over and over. But still a great game overall in my opinion. 


9 pissed off Draugers out of 10

Green's Take:

Alright then, Skyrim. This is an interesting review for me to write cause I'm wonder exactly now in depth I should be about my criticism. Not that I even have a lot of criticism. I think largely it's a really good game. I have however one fairly large issue with it. However, before we get to that, I'll talk about the good parts.

Skrim does a lot of things right. I really liked Oblivion and I feel like Skyrim looks at Oblivion tells it what a disgrace and a fuck up it is and proceeds to beat it like a red-headed step child. The level system is altered so that all of your skills actually matter and I feel like the enemies don't get tougher exponentially faster than I do. I feel like the bonuses attained for leveling a skill are actually useful, well all of them basically other than the locking picking tree. The set design is gorgeous. The huge overworld actually varies from place to place. The caves and dungeons are also imaculately done, my personal favorite being the dwarven, or I suppose dwemer, ruins. I love the architecture both of the gilded ruins and the mechanical inhabitants and the freakish twisted creatures dwelling beneath them with their weapons fashion from the hides of dead beasts. The visuals of the games are amazing. It's just pretty to look at and I played it on the 360. I have no doubt it would look even better on a good computer.

So then by now you're probably asking "Well then what's you're problem with it? You're talking a lot of praise here Green." The game deserves a lot of praise. The aesthetics are great. The mechanics are great. The progression system is great. The ridiculously massive open world is beyond great, but also leads to my problem with the game. It's really really samey. I feel like to truly fill a world this size, there really needs to be about two or three times the amount of enemy variance and types of items that there are. Case in point, in the huge world there's only really four dungeons. Don't get me wrong here, the whole world is full of them, but there's only about four different ones. There are natural caves, Typically inhabited by bandits or a few of the not too many types of wildlife, occasionally also there will be vampires or necromancers. But they all look like a cave. There's rocks and some plant life and occasionally light shines in from somewhere, but within a small degree of variance they all look like fairly generic caves. Type two is nordic ruins. These can generally be trusted to be filled to bursting with drauger. And other than the claw doors and the occasional puzzle in these they are again basically interchangeable one for another. Third type, the one I said was my favorite above is the dwemer ruins. These dungeons are filled mostly with the left over mechanical defenders who apparently kill any living thing other than falmer on sight. It looks great, bit underground stone cities with mechanization prominent in every corner. But they all look exactly that way. The last type of dungeon is the innards of a castle. They're typically populated by bandits and again here, they all look more or less the same. These could have all been the inside of one super huge castle that many yeas ago spanned the entire continent. The only one of them I can think of that looks in different is the half flooded one. And it looks exactly like all the others only half full of water.

And I think I'll be done with that line of thought now.

Skyrim is still a great game certainly, it's just not a game that lasts very long to me. I feel like about 70% of the game is spent in a dungeon and it's always one of those same four dungeons. It's really really fun for as long as you can tolerate seeing those same four areas over and over and over. And for me that's about the amount of time it takes to get to level 20. Every so often I'll remember I own skyrim and make a new character on it and play the hell out of it..... for about a week. Then I stop playing it for another month or so. It's an amazing game and I definitely don't regret buying it it just doesn't have very lasting appeal for me.

7.5 shouts better than fus ro dah out of 10

Also Bethesda, bears should not be stronger than dragons. 

Seriously, they shouldn't.