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The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim - November 11th, 2011 - [Update: New Engine]

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C

Commanche Raisin Toast

Member
Speevy said:
You're not understanding. Towns were connected to the wilderness in Morrowind.

They were cut off in Oblivion.
Click to expand...

that's exactly what i said. therefor i was understanding. :lol

what i was asking is why people are waiting until now to moan about per-town loading if it started with Oblivion. then again, now that i think of it, i didn't know too many morrowind nerds when Oblivion came out. and those that were locked themselves in their rooms for months after release...

Speevy said:
Bring back Silt Striders, get rid of "point to the map and go".
Click to expand...

agree with bringing in something other than horses but boo on doing away with fast travel altogether. they give you a time penalty for doing it, so why get rid of it? it would essentially be forcing players to play the game the way other players like it if you got rid of it altogether. how about some choice? make mounts available early on.

TheUsual said:
I think the important question is whether SpeedTree will be used?!
Click to expand...

not sure if want. unless speedtree is made a lot of improvements, i'd quite like to see other solutions. (waits for people to point out how many games use it and then me be all surprised and accidentally shooting marvin in the face)
 
G

GavinGT

Banned
Commanche Raisin Toast said:
what i was asking is why people are waiting until now to moan about per-town loading if it started with Oblivion. then again, now that i think of it, i didn't know too many morrowind nerds when Oblivion came out. and those that were locked themselves in their rooms for months after release...
Click to expand...

We've been complaining about all this stuff ever since we first encountered it. The problem is, half the people who bought Oblivion have played Morrowind, and the other half started with Oblivion. It will be difficult to cater to both groups.

Commanche Raisin Toast said:
agree with bringing in something other than horses but boo on doing away with fast travel altogether. they give you a time penalty for doing it, so why get rid of it? it would essentially be forcing players to play the game the way other players like it if you got rid of it altogether. how about some choice? make mounts available early on.
Click to expand...

Case in point.
 
S

Snuggles

erotic butter maelstrom
Also, something similar to New Vegas's hardcore mode would be cool. Put all those useless food items and those bodies of water to use, I would enjoy that.

I bet there will be Mead up the ass.
 
W

Wallach

Member
I don't mind fast travel being in the game. I do wish they would still bring back stuff like the silt striders so that if we're choosing to play without fast travel there are still some in-game options for travelling that make sense for the world.
 
EviLore

EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
Fast travel, as it is implemented in Oblivion and Fallout 3/NV, needs to be done away with. There are serious repercussions to the design of the game world when it's present. Trivial fetch quests send you 100 miles because the designers know you only need to traverse the game world once and afterwards it's all instant.

Allow you to fast travel between hub locations, sure. Between hundreds of random points in the wilderness, no thanks.
 
M

Max

I am not Max
Fuck yea new engine! When the thread had the Gamebryo title, I was convinced and told my friends. They probably hate my guts.
 
G

GavinGT

Banned
Wallach said:
I don't mind fast travel being in the game. I do wish they would still bring back stuff like the silt striders so that if we're choosing to play without fast travel there are still some in-game options for travelling that make sense for the world.
Click to expand...

They could make it an option in the menu to turn off fast-travel, and even make an achievement for not using fast-travel-anywhere. But I'd really rather they did away with it entirely, so I wouldn't be tempted to ruin the experience by abusing it.

I'm also reminded how awesome Mark and Recall were when they actually served a purpose.....
 
W

Wallach

Member
EviLore said:
Fast travel, as it is implemented in Oblivion and Fallout 3/NV, needs to be done away with. There are serious repercussions to the design of the game world when it's present. Trivial fetch quests send you 100 miles because the designers know you only need to traverse the game world once and afterwards it's all instant.

Allow you to fast travel between hub locations, sure. Between hundreds of random points in the wilderness, no thanks.
Click to expand...

Well... they could just as well design quests that don't have that much land between them (if it doesn't make sense to place the objectives that far, that is) whether fast travel is possible or not.
 
O

Old Gimlet Eyes

Member
I really hope lycanthropy makes a return in this game. Nothing more awesome than being a werewolf under the blood moon.

I can also agree with getting rid of fast travel. Bring back silt strides, blinding boots of speed, levitation, jump spells, boat rides, mages guild portals and mark/recall spells. Those are all plenty of ways to move around the world, no need for fast travel.
 
C

Commanche Raisin Toast

Member
GavinGT said:
We've been complaining about all this stuff ever since we first encountered it. The problem is, half the people who bought Oblivion have played Morrowind, and the other half started with Oblivion. It will be difficult to cater to both groups.

Case in point.
Click to expand...

you're right, understandable frustration. i can see where i've been in that position when a fave series of mine is altered in small (but HUGE to me) ways.

i started with Oblivion but i am COMPLETELY open to adopting some of the championed qualities of Morrowind because of how highly everyone speaks of it. as i said though, i like choice. hopefully they can find a way of giving both crowds some satisfaction. we'll get to see if Deux Ex 3 accomplishes that a lot sooner than ES, so maybe they'll give us some hope. :D

i'm guessing a may or june GI cover issue.
 
EviLore

EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
Wallach said:
Well... they could just as well design quests that don't have that much land between them (if it doesn't make sense to place the objectives that far, that is) whether fast travel is possible or not.
Click to expand...

They could design their game world and game mechanics to be like New Vegas, too, completely doing away with level scaling and still maintaining a strong difficulty curve and a true open world. But this is Bethesda we're talking about here, not Obsidian.
 
J

JoeBoy101

Member
Santiako said:
This thread is making me reinstall Morrowind and the expansions, any indispensable mod list around?
Click to expand...

This is for you.

And on that note, I am a little hesitant about the new engine, because its amazing how much the game can be made over with mods. Hopefully its open enough.

Also, a little concerned about the time frame. Nothing's getting rushed is it? I know its been a while since Oblivion, but I just being ansy.

Evilore said:
They could design their game world and game mechanics to be like New Vegas, too, completely doing away with level scaling and still maintaining a strong difficulty curve and a true open world. But this is Bethesda we're talking about here, not Obsidian.
Click to expand...

So you're saying it will be buggy, but not game crippling buggy? :D

I'll settle for a non-fast travel hardcore mode, though would like to see the game like that fully. Makes food and drink useful, yay!
 
T

Truant

Member
I loved Oblivion. Even vanilla Oblivion. Shitty graphics, shitty writing, shitty leveling/item system. Looking back, I didn't care. The mood and atmosphere was just so great at the time.
 
G

GavinGT

Banned
EviLore said:
They could design their game world and game mechanics to be like New Vegas, too, completely doing away with level scaling and still maintaining a strong difficulty curve and a true open world. But this is Bethesda we're talking about here, not Obsidian.
Click to expand...

Let's not forget who did it first. Morrowind was all those things.
 
L

Lucius86

Banned
EviLore said:
Fast travel, as it is implemented in Oblivion and Fallout 3/NV, needs to be done away with. There are serious repercussions to the design of the game world when it's present. Trivial fetch quests send you 100 miles because the designers know you only need to traverse the game world once and afterwards it's all instant.

Allow you to fast travel between hub locations, sure. Between hundreds of random points in the wilderness, no thanks.
Click to expand...

Agreed, but for different reasons - fast travel really did lessen the impact of exploring the wild after you been over a patch for the first time, and made the game world appear to be smaller than it really was. I know you CAN ignore fast travel, but it's hard to resist the temptation to use it when it is so readily available.
 
S

Speevy

Banned
The reason I don't like fast travel is that it's impossible not to use it.

It's not something you can merely say "Well, this sucks, so I'm gonna walk." but you want to anyway.

In an open world game, the best part of the experience is thinking you know where you're headed, then getting side-tracked into an adventure of your own making.

There were a number of previously mentioned problems which kept Oblivion from delivering even without the fast travel, but I still don't want to bounce around the world.

The designers of Oblivion misunderstood the appeal of teleportation and silt striders. It wasn't so that the players could make the game easy or accessible.

Reaching the silt striders meant you were up for a change of scenery, whether that was a quest location or not. Maybe you just wanted to go to Balmora and kill a random guy?

The appeal of recall was safety in the ultimate goal of creating a more powerful/richer character.


Someone said to all of this "WALKING IS HARD, NO ONE WANTS TO WALK, HAVE THEM POINT AT THE MAP"
 
W

Wallach

Member
EviLore said:
They could design their game world and game mechanics to be like New Vegas, too, completely doing away with level scaling and still maintaining a strong difficulty curve and a true open world. But this is Bethesda we're talking about here, not Obsidian.
Click to expand...

Well, right, but Bethesda was also the studio that made Morrowind, which definitely did a better job at it, right?

What I'm getting at is that I don't see that flaw being a problem with fast travel and really just being a specific problem of quest design. If the quest design remains and the fast travel is removed, now the problem is even worse than it was before. So, the thing they need to address specifically in that respect is the quests themselves.

The argument that I'd make against fast travel is that it sort of wholesale removed one of the roles that magic played in the ES lore. Teleportation and recall were important abilities to the people of the world, like being able to utilize the teleportation services as a function of the Mages' Guild. I'd rather see that element of it restored; it made the world more believable and helped differentiate the way each player approached the game.
 
C

Commanche Raisin Toast

Member
EviLore said:
Fast travel, as it is implemented in Oblivion and Fallout 3/NV, needs to be done away with. There are serious repercussions to the design of the game world when it's present. Trivial fetch quests send you 100 miles because the designers know you only need to traverse the game world once and afterwards it's all instant.

Allow you to fast travel between hub locations, sure. Between hundreds of random points in the wilderness, no thanks.
Click to expand...

first argument i've read about this subject that has actually had an explanation to follow.

i think city-to-city is a good compromise, but only if upon returning to the area you are trying to loot-whore the enemies haven't respawned or your loot isn't lost. i'd also like them to count small towns and villages into those points to.

to expand and rant:
i still disagree with removing it COMPLETELY (as some have requested) despite agreeing with you on what it does to the game. you have to give up something to gain something else in this case, and what is already a 40+ hour game with all quests could easily amount to MANY more hours without fast travel. those that want to get through everything quickly without breathing it all in should be able to use fast travel, and those that want to enjoy things and experience things as intended can walk. they could even put an option at the beginning with a warning saying developers highly recommend turning it off. i tried to avoid fast travel completely on my first play of Oblivion, but after a while it became so time consuming to get through the fetch quests that i caved in and started using it 90% of the time. "missing out on battles and encountered between point A and point B" isn't a big enough penalty to players in Oblivion/Fallout3 for most people to bother. they could work on that aspect too, but then again i'm the last person to be talking to about tweaking experience gain stats and all that complicated math.
 
S

Speevy

Banned
The bottom line of all this is that if the world is interesting and dynamic enough (i.e. the things I mentioned restored plus many more), you shouldn't want to skip walking.
 
J

Jokergrin

Member
Oblivion had horrible level scaling.

But whatever they did in Fallout 3 seemed to work pretty well. So they should go with that.
 
B

BlueTsunami

there is joy in sucking dick
Also being forced to walk makes certain areas feel desolate and out of the way which adds to the richness of the game world (like the Ghost Gate in Morrowind). Fast Travel truly does cheapen the experience a bit. I doubt they're going to implement silt striders though.
 
EviLore

EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
GavinGT said:
Let's not forget who did it first. Morrowind was all those things.
Click to expand...

Morrowind has scaling, actually. It's just not nearly as overt or retarded as Oblivion's.

It may seem simple to just add in a hardcore mode that turns off fast travel or what have you, but it's not simple to do it properly. In the case of New Vegas, the Obsidian guys designed the game around the hardcore mode feature set, then stripped everything out for normal mode. Making available a "disallow fast travel" mode requires you to design your quests in such a way that it's not an exercise in extreme tedium to play through the game with that mode, and that calls for completely different quest design with proper hub locations and intelligent dispersal of content, not spreading all of your content out equally at every intersection of the grid.

One of these methods is a whole lot easier than the other. Level scaling is a whole lot easier than not having level scaling. But maybe Bethesda is interested in doing it right this time.
 
I

infinityBCRT

Member
EviLore said:
Fast travel, as it is implemented in Oblivion and Fallout 3/NV, needs to be done away with. There are serious repercussions to the design of the game world when it's present. Trivial fetch quests send you 100 miles because the designers know you only need to traverse the game world once and afterwards it's all instant.

Allow you to fast travel between hub locations, sure. Between hundreds of random points in the wilderness, no thanks.
Click to expand...
... or they could make it like fallout where you find tons of random cool shit in the overworld so you're encouraged to explore and make the main quest such that theres little to no overlap so fast travel doesn't really come into play
 
S

Stumpokapow

listen to the mad man
Vampirism / Lycanthropy might return, but if it does I positively guarantee you there'll be a relatively simple way to revert it and you'll have to actively aim to get infected with it. Lasting consequence is an increasingly relegated element of game design and something as serious as Morrowind's Vampirism / Lycanthropy wouldn't jive well with some of the wimps playing games these days.
 
B

_Bro

Banned
GavinGT said:
Let's not forget who did it first. Morrowind was all those things.
Click to expand...
Someone has some very poor memory of Morrowind. The majority of the game was obscure fetch quests.

1. Get me a puzzle box.
2. Get me a skull.
3. Get me books.
- Get me out of here x2.
- Get that person out of here.
4. Get me a book.
5. Get me a bow.
6. Kill guys.
7. Get me boots.
8. Get to me.
9. Get me your approval
- Get me a weepings, a cup, and a shield.
- Get me a girl.
- Get me pumped.
- Get to all of us.
a. Find us x5.
b. Kill me.
- Get to all of us.
a. Get naked.
b. Find us x4.
c. Kill me.
- Get to all of us.
a. Find us x5.
b. Kill me.
10. Get the Five Step Plan.
11. The plan.
- Find us.
a. Kill us x6.
- Find Keening.
- Find Sunder.
12. Kill Dagoth Ur x2.

The game's quests were never really that great. They took you to awesome places but it never went farther than "Get me something." The worst part was that the area East of the mountain was pretty much quest-less, and it had one of the more interesting dungeons involving notes and a Fire Atronach.

edit: responding more to the idea of quests taking you places in an interesting way, which, i guess isn't really the point of the quoted post but.. MORROWIND QUEST LIST.
 
G

GhaleonEB

Member
RE: fast travel. I'd also like to see it go entirely, or barring that a hub system with a few major points (cities) to travel to. But that's about it. But they would need to leverage that to the quest design, as Evilore said.

Sad thing is, Oblivion had a system to make fast travel needless with the horseback riding, but it was so badly implemented as to be worthless.
 
I

itxaka

Defeatist
I still don't understand what was the problem with level scaling of enemies?

I mean, that made exploration possible, instead of being like wow where you enter a zone and the enemies are 10 levels higher so you have to run away from it and come back when you are on the proper level.

Anyone care to explain please? I only played oblivion so no idea how it was before, but if it was like wow then it was "wrong" for me as I prefer exploration. (Yes, I know I need to play morrowind, it's on my backlog)

Also, I hope is more like the expansion than the main game. The main game was awesome but the expansion was pretty fucking awesome and crazy :lol
 
D

Dennis

Banned
Betsheda is a great company. They have made a number of great games and they have been quite good in listening to complaints about gameplay. I also give them a lot of credit for allowing Obsidian to make a hardcore RPG like New Vegas.

Yeah, Betsheda wants to do big selling blockbuster games but they listened when gamers complined that Oblivion had taken a wrong turn with the level scaling. As for the loading of cities - consoles gave them no real choice. You can mod in a seamless no-loading world with mods on PC.
 
S

Snuggles

erotic butter maelstrom
Stumpokapow said:
Vampirism / Lycanthropy might return, but if it does I positively guarantee you there'll be a relatively simple way to revert it and you'll have to actively aim to get infected with it. Lasting consequence is an increasingly relegated element of game design and something as serious as Morrowind's Vampirism / Lycanthropy wouldn't jive well with some of the wimps playing games these days.
Click to expand...

This is why we need a hardcore mode! No fast travel, no easy cure for diseases, stuff like that. The pansies can have their simple mode, us men can have the real mode.
 
D

disappeared

Banned
EviLore said:
Fast travel, as it is implemented in Oblivion and Fallout 3/NV, needs to be done away with. There are serious repercussions to the design of the game world when it's present. Trivial fetch quests send you 100 miles because the designers know you only need to traverse the game world once and afterwards it's all instant.

Allow you to fast travel between hub locations, sure. Between hundreds of random points in the wilderness, no thanks.
Click to expand...

Yep. What I usually did in Oblivion was the half-and-half. If I had to trek the entirety of Cyrodil for a quest, I'd pick a halfway point, fast travel, and do the other half on foot. It felt at least a little better that way.
 
Jonsoncao

Jonsoncao

Banned
Snuggler said:
kL0Ld.png


shakyguy.gif
Click to expand...
quote for the newpage :lol
 
C

cnizzle06

Banned
Remember the first previews for Oblivion where they showcased true NPC intelligence and free-will? Good times. Too bad they had to nerf the AI to hell.
 
B

_Bro

Banned
itxaka said:
I still don't understand what was the problem with level scaling of enemies?

I mean, that made exploration possible, instead of being like wow where you enter a zone and the enemies are 10 levels higher so you have to run away from it and come back when you are on the proper level.

Anyone care to explain please? I only played oblivion so no idea how it was before, but if it was like wow then it was "wrong" for me as I prefer exploration. (Yes, I know I need to play morrowind, it's on my backlog)

Also, I hope is more like the expansion than the main game. The main game was awesome but the expansion was pretty fucking awesome and crazy :lol
Click to expand...
Well, it made the stealth skill actually unique instead of a cheap combat bonus. Sneaking around a dungeon you shouldn't be in to get a ring or loot that will be very beneficial to your under-leveled character was spectacular.
 
K

Kitschkraft

Member
Darkshier said:
I really hope lycanthropy makes a return in this game. Nothing more awesome than being a werewolf under the blood moon.

I can also agree with getting rid of fast travel. Bring back silt strides, blinding boots of speed, levitation, jump spells, boat rides, mages guild portals and mark/recall spells. Those are all plenty of ways to move around the world, no need for fast travel.
Click to expand...

I am sooooo in agreement with all of this.

For me, it's not so much about the effect on the gameplay as it is the general tone and atmosphere of the game world. Morrowind felt magical in the way that Zelda does, Oblivion felt more like LotR or something.

Of course, this will also need to manifest itself in the writing, artstyle, etc as well.
 
S

Seep

Member
Snuggler said:
Also, something similar to New Vegas's hardcore mode would be cool. Put all those useless food items and those bodies of water to use, I would enjoy that.

I bet there will be Mead up the ass.
Click to expand...

Yep they need this.

Also new engine is awesome!
 
S

Snuggles

erotic butter maelstrom
itxaka said:
I still don't understand what was the problem with level scaling of enemies?
Click to expand...

Because it made exploration so much more interesting, so much more tense. It made reaching a high level much more satisfying.

I mentioned this a page or two back, but coming across Daedric temples early in Morrowind was so intense. You could take the risk and run in, grab a few super valuables and try to escape with your life but the whole time you're being chased by high level enemies that can wipe you out in one hit. It added a layer of excitement and danger to the game, it made it feel like a daunting adventure.

Plus, once you finally hit that level level after shedding buckets of blood and tears, you were nearly a god. You could smite fools in one swing, one spell, even those dastardly monsters that you once ran from earlier in the game. It felt good.

Oblivion had neither of these things. You face scrub enemies at an early level, and thugs with ebony and Daedric armor later in the game. No risk, no reward.
 
C

Ceebs

Member
itxaka said:
I still don't understand what was the problem with level scaling of enemies?

I mean, that made exploration possible, instead of being like wow where you enter a zone and the enemies are 10 levels higher so you have to run away from it and come back when you are on the proper level.

Anyone care to explain please? I only played oblivion so no idea how it was before, but if it was like wow then it was "wrong" for me as I prefer exploration. (Yes, I know I need to play morrowind, it's on my backlog)

Also, I hope is more like the expansion than the main game. The main game was awesome but the expansion was pretty fucking awesome and crazy :lol
Click to expand...
The lack of scaling would actually increase the experience you have when exploring. It presents the possibility that there could be serious danger in the unknown area you are exploring instead of same level enemies you will have no trouble of dispatching.

Think of it this way, you find an old temple in the forest. You go in to hoping to find some artifacts or weapons that were stored there but encounter creatures many times your level. You can retreat and return later or come up with a way to leverage your character's build to possibly get by them.

With no scaling you could have predetermined loot in that temple of a certain level with the designers knowing you would have to best the high level creatures inside. With scaling you might stumble on this place early and have to fight some low level goblins and receive a rusty sword for your trouble.

Scaling to the degree Oblivion used it made the actual locations in the world not matter, only at what level you visited them.
 
D

Dennis

Banned
With level-scaling all tension is drained from exploring the world and leveling your character means next to nothing.

I like being happy when I have gained a level. That is a big part of RPGs for me - the meaningful stat development.
 
EviLore

EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
itxaka said:
I still don't understand what was the problem with level scaling of enemies?

I mean, that made exploration possible, instead of being like wow where you enter a zone and the enemies are 10 levels higher so you have to run away from it and come back when you are on the proper level.

Anyone care to explain please? I only played oblivion so no idea how it was before, but if it was like wow then it was "wrong" for me as I prefer exploration. (Yes, I know I need to play morrowind, it's on my backlog)

Also, I hope is more like the expansion than the main game. The main game was awesome but the expansion was pretty fucking awesome and crazy :lol
Click to expand...

Let's look at how Risen does it. Risen is an open world RPG set on an island. There is one main city and a couple secondary quest hub towns. When you start out, the basic wildlife is a serious danger to your well-being, and you may need to run away from or avoid wild animals as you get your bearings in the world. As you find some better gear and get better training in your combat abilities, you'll be able to start venturing out and exploring areas around the hub locations. The further into the wilderness you go, though, the more dangers await, and you WILL encounter things can can annihilate you. Because you're not all-powerful and "balanced" so that every encounter in the game is of a moderate difficulty at any given time.

So you run away, or die and reload, and come back later when you're stronger and more capable and have worked hard to progress your character and obtain rare and powerful items. Then you explore the really out of the way stuff, the lava-filled caverns and secret passages at the source of rivers and entire encampments of enemy creatures. You do this because you're *strong* now, because your character has made real progression over the course of the game.

In Oblivion (without mods), no matter where you go, you will fight something appropriate to your level and get loot appropriate to your level and complete quests with rewards appropriate to your level.
 
B

balladofwindfishes

Member
Even some of the most trivia Oblivion quests would be embarrassingly tedious without fast travel.

Take buying a house in Anvil. Let's say you start in the Imperial city. You have to travel for 10 minutes to get to Anvil. Talk to the guy, buy the house, sleep in house, slay ghosts. But now you have to trek back to Imperial city to find the guy, and trek all the way back to Anvil with him following you, and go from there.

A quest that takes around 10 minutes with fast travel turns into an hour or more without it.

TESV will have to be designed without quests like that, if it wants to not seem tedious on a "hardcore" mode.
 
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