Dhruin
SasqWatch
For anyone who missed the translation of the GameInformer Skyrim "dragon text" in our thread about the cover, here we go courtesy of Destructoid:
More information.
Skyrim - GameInformer Tease Translated
- Thread starter Dhruin
- Start date
Article Scans
I assume we can't post links to article scans right?
Well here's what I read in my neighbor's copy of the Game Informer article:
-The player is the dragon born and will gain access to a wide range of powers associated with that semi divine heritage. This includes being able to speak the word of power and use them to perform 20 or so dragon-born powers. You will become and have to become as powerful as the dragon born of tamriel's past - as you will be doing a decent ammount of one on one combat with dragons. They have also brought in a few giant or ettin like creatures as well- basically the foes you will fight in your normal wandering (and not just scripted/boss type encounters) will eventually be things far more impressive than in previous elder scrolls games.
-They got rid of face zoom for NPC conversations
-NPC behavior during conversations are more realistic. If you interupt a wood cutter chopping wood (which is now an actual animated activity along with cooking and forging and the like) he may occaisionally resume chopping while you ponder over the dialogue options. Characters no longer snap to you and stand a attention while you get up in their grill with questions. The guy a the bar will continue taking drinks from his mug and blacksmith will strike his anvil once or twice in between dialog (not breaking the conversation but also not standing like a statue waiting for you to say something.)
-As forging and woodcutting and other crafting activities are real animated activities for the NPCs so they are for the player as well. You can perform a myriad of crafts which are animated (including the old ones like alchemy - you brew your potions and you can see alchemists doing this in their shops as well). The ability to forge weapons rather than just enchant existing ones does mean that strange and rare ore you found in III will now have a real use in the game besides just being very heavy alchemy components or vender loot.
-NPC Faces look so much better that I'd swear bethesda got someone else to do them
-The menu system was completely reworked from the ground up and the interface from oblivion and the fallout games was not the basis for it.
-It actually is a completely different engine from what we've seen before.
-Monster and NPC animations appear to be built upon a different frame work - more fliuid and organic
-NPC bodies actually look like human beings. It's not the prettiest game out there in terms of realistic looking character models but they are of similar quality to mass effect but not quite as detailed (remember there's FAR more NPCs in an elder scrolls game.)
-Landscapes are, of course, beautiful. Rather than the over-exposed photograph feeling you got from Oblivion though these look far more organic and crisp. Water is not just a flat thing they've drawn across the land either, streams and small waterfalls look pretty convincing.
-Radiant AI has been overhauled and has been paired with a new system called Radiant Story. No this isn't procederally generated plot but rather a way to make the world more responsive to your actions. The example given is a player tossing a two handed sword of some sort on the road in town because they didn't feel like hauling it in their inventory to bother selling at a shop. Depending on where this is and other conditions you could have a small boy run up to ask if you dropped it or perhaps a leader of some burly drunkards picks it up and decides he doesn't like the look of you. The reason they used a claymore as their example and not a mushroom chunk is because they explain the system won't act as litter police.
-The most interesting way they say they use Radiant Story is in presenting a subset of the myriad of minor quests scripts. An old lady approaching a hero and asking them to rescure her daughter from bandits will direct you towards a dungeon of appropriate difficulty and type that you have not already visted. This serves as a way to encourage exploration. You also aren't going to be told to go rescue a girl from a cave you were just at and swore was empty. Nor is this kidnap victim sitting with extremely patient kidnappers throughout the entire game - they're an event rather than a static preplaced group of actors that sit around waiting to be foiled the entire game. This is somewhat remeniscent of Daggerfall except that the dungeons and quests are premade and not procedurally generated. SOME quests and events are flexible and use Radiant story to introduce them in ways that make sense. That's the goal at least - they do seem to be trying to make their world feel more alive and dynamic compared to Oblivion.
-
I can post more later if I can get the magazine away from my neighbor for more than five minutes. He hated oblivion but he and I are both feeling optimistic about this one.
I assume we can't post links to article scans right?
Well here's what I read in my neighbor's copy of the Game Informer article:
-The player is the dragon born and will gain access to a wide range of powers associated with that semi divine heritage. This includes being able to speak the word of power and use them to perform 20 or so dragon-born powers. You will become and have to become as powerful as the dragon born of tamriel's past - as you will be doing a decent ammount of one on one combat with dragons. They have also brought in a few giant or ettin like creatures as well- basically the foes you will fight in your normal wandering (and not just scripted/boss type encounters) will eventually be things far more impressive than in previous elder scrolls games.
-They got rid of face zoom for NPC conversations
-NPC behavior during conversations are more realistic. If you interupt a wood cutter chopping wood (which is now an actual animated activity along with cooking and forging and the like) he may occaisionally resume chopping while you ponder over the dialogue options. Characters no longer snap to you and stand a attention while you get up in their grill with questions. The guy a the bar will continue taking drinks from his mug and blacksmith will strike his anvil once or twice in between dialog (not breaking the conversation but also not standing like a statue waiting for you to say something.)
-As forging and woodcutting and other crafting activities are real animated activities for the NPCs so they are for the player as well. You can perform a myriad of crafts which are animated (including the old ones like alchemy - you brew your potions and you can see alchemists doing this in their shops as well). The ability to forge weapons rather than just enchant existing ones does mean that strange and rare ore you found in III will now have a real use in the game besides just being very heavy alchemy components or vender loot.
-NPC Faces look so much better that I'd swear bethesda got someone else to do them
-The menu system was completely reworked from the ground up and the interface from oblivion and the fallout games was not the basis for it.
-It actually is a completely different engine from what we've seen before.
-Monster and NPC animations appear to be built upon a different frame work - more fliuid and organic
-NPC bodies actually look like human beings. It's not the prettiest game out there in terms of realistic looking character models but they are of similar quality to mass effect but not quite as detailed (remember there's FAR more NPCs in an elder scrolls game.)
-Landscapes are, of course, beautiful. Rather than the over-exposed photograph feeling you got from Oblivion though these look far more organic and crisp. Water is not just a flat thing they've drawn across the land either, streams and small waterfalls look pretty convincing.
-Radiant AI has been overhauled and has been paired with a new system called Radiant Story. No this isn't procederally generated plot but rather a way to make the world more responsive to your actions. The example given is a player tossing a two handed sword of some sort on the road in town because they didn't feel like hauling it in their inventory to bother selling at a shop. Depending on where this is and other conditions you could have a small boy run up to ask if you dropped it or perhaps a leader of some burly drunkards picks it up and decides he doesn't like the look of you. The reason they used a claymore as their example and not a mushroom chunk is because they explain the system won't act as litter police.
-The most interesting way they say they use Radiant Story is in presenting a subset of the myriad of minor quests scripts. An old lady approaching a hero and asking them to rescure her daughter from bandits will direct you towards a dungeon of appropriate difficulty and type that you have not already visted. This serves as a way to encourage exploration. You also aren't going to be told to go rescue a girl from a cave you were just at and swore was empty. Nor is this kidnap victim sitting with extremely patient kidnappers throughout the entire game - they're an event rather than a static preplaced group of actors that sit around waiting to be foiled the entire game. This is somewhat remeniscent of Daggerfall except that the dungeons and quests are premade and not procedurally generated. SOME quests and events are flexible and use Radiant story to introduce them in ways that make sense. That's the goal at least - they do seem to be trying to make their world feel more alive and dynamic compared to Oblivion.
-
I can post more later if I can get the magazine away from my neighbor for more than five minutes. He hated oblivion but he and I are both feeling optimistic about this one.
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Wasn´t this game supposed to be open-ended?
MrSanta78
Watchdog
Thanks for the infos jhwisner
. According to this Skyrim might be a pretty good game. Let's hope everything will work in the game as stated in the article.
So far I was not much interested in this game, but now, after reading your post, I am begining to think Skyrim could be a nice present for this year Christmas. I will definitely keep an eye on the next chapter of Elder Scrolls. Once again thanks for the details about it.
. According to this Skyrim might be a pretty good game. Let's hope everything will work in the game as stated in the article.So far I was not much interested in this game, but now, after reading your post, I am begining to think Skyrim could be a nice present for this year Christmas. I will definitely keep an eye on the next chapter of Elder Scrolls. Once again thanks for the details about it.
Dhruin
SasqWatch
Thanks for the summary. I'd rather play an "everyman" than Dragon-born but it sounds OK otherwise.
^Yeah in the past I think they managed to take advantage of you being a historyless prisononer to please those wanting to play an everyman. But while you were almost always some schmuck yanked out of the imperial prison - you were pre-ordained by prophecy and fate to be a very important schmuck. This is going to be the first time though that you are playing a semi devine being.
I'm also a little worried about how the describe the dragon-born powers. They called them dragon shouts - but then they described them as variations on different combinations of the 3 words of power spoken with power of god. Dragon shouts sound silly, the description and explanation sounded interesting. I'm hoping the abilities sound more like the fluff they created for them than bestial battle roars as the name makes me think.
Sorry - I was typing quickly and made a poor word choice. No- as in it won't send you half way across to world to kill 3 bandits and rescue a teenager begging the question how the two dragons to the left missed them when they came in. The idea of "level" was my mis-reading. Bethesda actually said nearby and unvisited. Sorry to confuse on that one.
Hey some of the early articles on Oblivion had me really excited too though. At least it does sound they they are attempting to address many of the complaints about oblivion (and things that even persisted through the fallout games) as well as implement new mechanics into their open world. If they just fixed what was wrong with Oblivion and gave us a new story that would be fun and all - but I'd wonder where they spent the time.
I'm hopeful - the game looks much better and it sounds like they're trying to adress the wooden feel their worlds tend to have - even in my favorite game of the series, Morrowind (which was a great setting but the generic and bumbling NPCs and spaces lacked the sense of being alive that even Ultima VII managed before some of the console kiddies had learned how to read).
Those are minor optional side quests. The example they gave was a "my daughter was just taken- please chase after the bandits" I think what they're going for is a small quest that presents a sense of urgency. These events are what Radiant Story is supposed to add in; the feeling that life is happening rather than static.
They didn't say they removed things like finding slavers and finding important things while exploring. They're adding things like - a woman running up and begging for help because something horrible just happend; a mage NPC approaching and offering a magically adept PC a magic related quest you would have otherwise had to ask about and possibly convince them to entrust to you; another possibility for dropping a relatively powerful weapon in the street being one of two people in the middle of an argument deciding they just found a better if perhaps messier means of discourse.
It sounds a lot like a system for being able to drop in events or trigger NPC behavior based on evaluation of the player and their actions. They stated the system could evaluate your actions and play style when triggering and placing these events. I have to admit though I'm intrigued at what sort of hilarious problems they've had fine tuning it. I know in their early testing of the Radiant AI they had an issue where a farmer killed a deer because it had food on it (heck some Fallout NV NPCs still presented odd behavior because of this Radiant AI feature - namely trying to kill and eat ED-E) and that guards would sometimes then kill the farmer because they wrongly saw killing the dear as hostility. Then the other guards would attack the farmer killer and then each other. Basically one deer and a hungry farmer had been the trigger for wiping out the guards in one of their early test builds (must have been a single city or something.)
I'm waiting to see if I can get a whole town to kill each other by dropping an extremely powerful weapon next to the right/wrong person. Although that might be something you could call a feature.
I'm also a little worried about how the describe the dragon-born powers. They called them dragon shouts - but then they described them as variations on different combinations of the 3 words of power spoken with power of god. Dragon shouts sound silly, the description and explanation sounded interesting. I'm hoping the abilities sound more like the fluff they created for them than bestial battle roars as the name makes me think.
LEVEL SCALING
Sorry - I was typing quickly and made a poor word choice. No- as in it won't send you half way across to world to kill 3 bandits and rescue a teenager begging the question how the two dragons to the left missed them when they came in. The idea of "level" was my mis-reading. Bethesda actually said nearby and unvisited. Sorry to confuse on that one.
Thanks for the infos jhwisner
So far I was not much interested in this game, but now, after reading your post, I am begining to think Skyrim could be a nice present for this year Christmas. I will definitely keep an eye on the next chapter of Elder Scrolls. Once again thanks for the details about it.
Hey some of the early articles on Oblivion had me really excited too though. At least it does sound they they are attempting to address many of the complaints about oblivion (and things that even persisted through the fallout games) as well as implement new mechanics into their open world. If they just fixed what was wrong with Oblivion and gave us a new story that would be fun and all - but I'd wonder where they spent the time.
I'm hopeful - the game looks much better and it sounds like they're trying to adress the wooden feel their worlds tend to have - even in my favorite game of the series, Morrowind (which was a great setting but the generic and bumbling NPCs and spaces lacked the sense of being alive that even Ultima VII managed before some of the console kiddies had learned how to read).
Those are minor optional side quests. The example they gave was a "my daughter was just taken- please chase after the bandits" I think what they're going for is a small quest that presents a sense of urgency. These events are what Radiant Story is supposed to add in; the feeling that life is happening rather than static.
They didn't say they removed things like finding slavers and finding important things while exploring. They're adding things like - a woman running up and begging for help because something horrible just happend; a mage NPC approaching and offering a magically adept PC a magic related quest you would have otherwise had to ask about and possibly convince them to entrust to you; another possibility for dropping a relatively powerful weapon in the street being one of two people in the middle of an argument deciding they just found a better if perhaps messier means of discourse.
It sounds a lot like a system for being able to drop in events or trigger NPC behavior based on evaluation of the player and their actions. They stated the system could evaluate your actions and play style when triggering and placing these events. I have to admit though I'm intrigued at what sort of hilarious problems they've had fine tuning it. I know in their early testing of the Radiant AI they had an issue where a farmer killed a deer because it had food on it (heck some Fallout NV NPCs still presented odd behavior because of this Radiant AI feature - namely trying to kill and eat ED-E) and that guards would sometimes then kill the farmer because they wrongly saw killing the dear as hostility. Then the other guards would attack the farmer killer and then each other. Basically one deer and a hungry farmer had been the trigger for wiping out the guards in one of their early test builds (must have been a single city or something.)
I'm waiting to see if I can get a whole town to kill each other by dropping an extremely powerful weapon next to the right/wrong person. Although that might be something you could call a feature.
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I did something similar with the help of the OOO mod and it was one of the most enjoyable moments of my 100+ hours of game time with TES4. I got attacked by an Ancient Vampire, and since I didn't stand a chance, I ran. Like miles, back to the nearest town. I entered the gates, but the vampire followed me to town! Luckily, the Town Guard (and a few minutes later, members of the Fighters Guild) rushed to my help. Eventually, I watched the vampire kill about a dozen of NPCs before he was put down. Then I looted all of the corpses and came across some pretty über stuff.
Sorry for being off-topic. My point is that if I could pull off something similar in Skyrim, I certainly wouldn't mind it.
Well your Dragonborn will be able to cook, smith and cut wood. Looks like everyman activities to me.
I'm still surprised they added crafting activities…
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Sounds great to me! can't wait. I would love it if the prophecy was about the dragonborn being the guardian of some poor schmuck, nice twist to the typical "you're the chosen one"
Mana Garmr
Watchdog
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I was really hoping dragons wouldn't be very common in the game Even with the teaser I was hoping for something revolving around preventing/fixing schemes the dragons put in place and dealing with the reason they showed up rather than fighting a bunch of them.
Is that the picture showing the list of some skills along with the box where they talk about perks? Seems to be a lot of screen real-estate being used to show very little information in that, hope there's a more efficient option.
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I don't normally buy "gaming magazines" anymore, but I might have to make a special trip to the store for this particular issue.
Actually, that's the game plot, according to Todd in the magazine interview. We will need to find "Why are the dragons back?" and "How do we stop them?". There was also a mention of finding other Dragonborns to help you…
It's just that there is smaller dragons around that act as random encounters. Also, you can learn Thu'um (dragon shouts). There is 20 of them, but the mag specify that you can learn them from different places, not just by killing a dragon and getting his "soul".
Like somebody said on the official forum, dragons are the new Oblivion gates.
Unfortunately, Todd want to copy Coverflow and other Apple UI…
There is 11 months left, if we make enough noise in the official forum, they might change it. I already voiced my disapproval. Works great on a Iphone, totally crappy on a computer monitor with 1000% the resolution and when you need to actually see everything at the same time to make level up decisions.
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Yeah I hope the dragons are done well if they're going to be as common as oblivion gates were. I suspect though since they're not cookie cutter dungeons they won't be as tedious once you're high level. After about the third oblivion gate I had done I was powerful enough that they posed little challenge but that didn't really change the fact that I had to walk through them at speed of boring.
I am a little skeptical about their inspiration for the new UI. I'm sure it will work great on consoles but I do hope they take the time to make it scale better for PC users. I also hope they don't limit the number of hotkeys to the number of directions on a D-pad. Granted I only have two more number keys than that - but come on let me use all 10 of them at least.
At least they're trying something different than their previous menu systems though so there is some chance it will be better than Oblivion's even if it is not close to ideal. I'll reserve judgement until they release some gameplay footage that shows the interface in action but yeah I'm not expecting a great interface, just something that is less of a chore than onlivion's was. Hopefully the "greatly improved" inventory system includes robust sorting options too. I can deal with a console centric inventory system if it at least has a robust way of sorting things (sort by cost, recent, damage, protection, condition would be nice)
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