Skyrim - 5 Five Ways to Make the Next Elder Scrolls Game Better @ Forbes

[MigRib]

I will go out and say this:

there's an easy way to make the next Elder Scrolls a better game: make it less of an RPG than it already is. (....) And wait for Elder Scrolls 10 or something for a decent game free of the RPG bounds that never really existed because Bethesda SUCKS at RPGs big time and always has.

I am very sorry to say this, but clearly you don't have a clue about an RPG is supposed to be. I have a hint for you, though it started it all, D&D is not actually an RPG, it is a tabletop strategy game with stats. The problem is most computer RPGs are inspired, directly or indirectly by D&D, which makes them easier to adapt from the pen & paper type to the computer-playable type. Fortunately, Bethesda (and some other companies as well, but usually Bethesda, or someone being distributed by Bethesda) has been bringing to the PC the pen & paper feel to computer RPG. There is a problem, though: not everybody really likes RPGs, and some gamers think they like them, because have a wrong idea about what they are supposed to be. Oblivion, Skyrim, Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas are the best RPGs on the market, and I could even say that they have been the only ones for the past 5/6 years. Mass Effect and Dragon Age were very close-by, but are too structured and are not open worldish enough to be true RPGs. This is my opinion, of course, but I've been playing RPGs in both forms for the last 25 years, so... I think I have a clue about what I'm talking about.

 

[Stingray]

I would say that generally when people on a forum like this talk about RPG's, they are really talking about CRPG's, and just saying RPG because it's shorter. Whatever pen and paper RPG's are all about isn't all that relevant. Most CRPG'ers have never played one and don't care.

 

[Dajjer]

Interesting title for an article but the content did not sway.

the only thing I sort of agreed with was the better story telling. But not how he put it. I thought that the NPC character set was way too limited for such a large game and it detracted from immersion. Also after a couple hundred gaming hours you get pretty fed up with the same limited set of voice actors.

The article reads like this guy played the game on a console and that he wants to make the next Elder Scrolls a better console game not a better game.

 

[MigRib]

Well they should care, because some CRPGs are doing just fine the immersion feeling that a pen & paper RPG has. And Skyrim is one of them. It has it's flaws, but it trully annoys me that meme that Bethesda's games suck, and have bugs crawling all about them and whatnot... Maybe they are that, but they are also the best RPGs. And only Bioware is still out there making big CRPGS (at least I hope they still are). The rest are small companies with short budgets, good ideas that not always turn into good games. Maybe the kickstarters will push the market in the right direction, but right now I trully hope that Bethesda does not give up on RPGs or starts taking the R out of the playing game.

 

[Stingray]

Haven't played Skyrim, but despite your argument I still think Oblivion is an awful RPG, doesn't matter whether you're talking pen & paper RPG or CRPG, it's bad either way. Care to explain how you can play a worthwhile "role" in a game where nothing you do really matters?

With Fallout New Vegas I can see what you're getting at, though.

 

[vurt]

1. Skyrim is clearly an action-RPG. IMO, it's more of an action-RPG than Diablo and its clones are.

That's just BS. You can actually roleplay in TES, in Diablo try roleplaying a person who doesnt commit crimes and only live off animals that he hunts, there are numerous ways to roleplay in a TES game, and if you add in mods it's almost limitless. Bethesda are by far the best roleplaying devs, a Bioware game is just a laughable in comparsion, ok maybe apart from BG but even that doesnt allow the deep roleplaying that a Bethesda RPG allows.

 

[Dajjer]

That's just BS. You can actually roleplay in TES, in Diablo try roleplaying a person who doesnt commit crimes and only live off animals that he hunts, there are numerous ways to roleplay in a TES game, and if you add in mods it's almost limitless. Bethesda are by far the best roleplaying devs, a Bioware game is just a laughable in comparsion, ok maybe apart from BG but even that doesnt allow the deep roleplaying that a Bethesda RPG allows.

Totally agree. I put in over 300 hours and barely touched the main quest nor the civil war quest. I just roll played the character I wanted to be. And in this game while I sort of favored the status quo, the game did not prevent me from playing this middle ground. Yep, there were certain game events that weren't gonna happen with this character because that was how I was playing him (her).

 

[tolknaz]

LARP-ing is not roleplaying though. I never understood people, who write stuff like that. That's got nothing to do with roleplaying, that's simply playing a sandbox game while disregarding the actual rules and mechanics of the game and making your own.

 

[vurt]

LARP-ing is not roleplaying though. I never understood people, who write stuff like that. That's got nothing to do with roleplaying, that's simply playing a sandbox game while disregarding the actual rules and mechanics of the game and making your own.

It has everything to do with roleplaying. When you play a P&P you decide the role of your character, it's not set in stone by the game how you are going to act and the role you have (like in the Witcher ""RPG"" or any recent Bioware ""RPG"").

It's has nothing to do with disregarding anything, you just fail to understand that this is what TES is all about, you're not breaking any game mechanic or game rule by roleplaying like i describe, it's designed to be roleplayed like that. When you play a P&P RPG you need to be imaginative and creative for it to be fun, it's the same in a TES game. "Role"players that want's everything served are much better off with a linear movie-like game and they will probably hate TES.

Edit: Also, LARP isnt roleplaying? I think you should look up what RP in LARP stands for.. Not sure i'd say this is LARP, it's just what roleplaying is, even in P&P RPG's..

 

[killias2]

That's just BS. You can actually roleplay in TES, in Diablo try roleplaying a person who doesnt commit crimes and only live off animals that he hunts, there are numerous ways to roleplay in a TES game, and if you add in mods it's almost limitless. Bethesda are by far the best roleplaying devs, a Bioware game is just a laughable in comparsion, ok maybe apart from BG but even that doesnt allow the deep roleplaying that a Bethesda RPG allows.

I'm not sure why you're saying I said "BS" when I agree with everything you said. In fact, this is -precisely- why I have the views that I have. Skyrim is an RPG with an action combat system. IMO, Diablo and Diablolikes lack strong RPG elements (with exceptions, like Divine Divinity) and -also- don't really have a combat system I would consider "action" oriented. Diablo 3 is neither an RPG nor action oriented. Skyrim is an RPG with action-oriented battles.

The big difference comes down to what you think "action" is in a video game. When I think "action," I think fighting games, FPSs, beat'em'ups, and old school action platformers. I don't think of a top-down game where you click enemies and occasionally use abilities. That seems more like Starcraft than Call of Duty. Skyrim or, even more tellingly, Fallout feels more like a FPS or fighting game or beat'em'up than that click-click-click battling of Diablolikes.

Edit: Let me boil this down further. If you click an enemy to "tell" your character to go do something, then you're not playing an action game. If you attack an enemy by directly controlling your character in a real-time context, you're playing an action game. Seriously, Diablo is not action nor an RPG. It's its own thing; some sort of half-breed Roguelike with MMORPG elements.

 

[tolknaz]

It's has nothing to do with disregarding anything, you just fail to understand that this is what TES is all about, you're not breaking any game mechanic or game rule by roleplaying like i describe, it's designed to be roleplayed like that.

That kind of roleplaying still sounds simply like make believe to me. I know lots of sandbox crpg fans like that kind of stuff, but i could never spend a minute doing something, that the game has no mechanics for.

When you play a P&P RPG you need to be imaginative and creative for it to be fun, it's the same in a TES game.

It seems we see things in reverse. To me any and all capacity for fun lies in what the game (or in the case of P&P the DM) puts me through using the mechanics imposed by the game's rules system.

Oh and as a sidenote, i hear all the time, that a P&P game is very sandboxy in nature. In my experience that is not neccessarily true. Yes, often you have a lot more viable choices to tackle any given path, than in a typical CRPG, but you forget one thing. The DM is still human and has likely prepared a limited amount of content for the session. Sooner or later some railroading WILL occur in any P&P game, weather the players understand it or not.

 

[vurt]

Roleplaying is a lot of make-belief, that's why its very important to have a good GM. He should both understand all the rules and be imaginative and creative. A P&P doesnt have mechanics for a lot of things, much of the fun is up to you and your own or the groups creativity. For example you could write "whatever" as a background for your character and act completely lifeless or just completetly moronic all the time and you could still play it if you follow the rules, but it wouldnt be very fun.

There's railroading in TES too, just like a P&P it's unavoidable. It's just that TES feels closer in so many ways to a P&P than Diablo or Witcher ever could. This will obviously depend on the players preference, if all he cares for is combat situations and statistics then most action RPG's will do just fine.

killias2: if you meant just the combat then yes.

 

[ChienAboyeur]

I am very sorry to say this, but clearly you don't have a clue about an RPG is supposed to be. I have a hint for you, though it started it all, D&D is not actually an RPG, it is a tabletop strategy game with stats. The problem is most computer RPGs are inspired, directly or indirectly by D&D, which makes them easier to adapt from the pen & paper type to the computer-playable type.

The D&D rules set, as so many other RPG rules set, can be used to support a RPG.

But indeed, the rules set of many RPGs can be used to support a skirmish game.

As D&D rules set easily leads this way, with players seldom bothering about roleplaying and focusing on powergaming their character, seeking for the optimal developpment tree evolution.

The only RPGs I know that can not be degraded in powergaming are RPGs with no stats, no developpment tree...

Bringing RPGs to computers is a more difficult task than for some other games due to various core features that do not exist for other games.

Studios went for the lower hanging fruits and it was easier to complete the skirmish parts a RPG can contain than the other RPG parts.

 

[ChienAboyeur]

Roleplaying is a lot of make-belief, that's why its very important to have a good GM. He should both understand all the rules and be imaginative and creative. A P&P doesnt have mechanics for a lot of things, much of the fun is up to you and your own or the groups creativity. For example you could write "whatever" as a background for your character and act completely lifeless or just completetly moronic all the time and you could still play it if you follow the rules, but it wouldnt be very fun.

When you buy a game, you buy game mechanics first. There are the core substance of a game. And game situations are resolved through mechanics.

Non computer RPGs bring flexibility as mechanics can be designed and incorporated on the fly. A flexibility a cRPG will probably never have.
But this should not lead to the false conclusion that essential RP mechanics must exist in a game for being a RP.


Skyrim does not contain necessary RPG mechanics. You can substitute some mental ones but they do not exist in the game (contrary to non computer RPGs that always provide some kind of mechanics [self made or provided by the rule book]) to resolve a game situation)

The situation is similar to a shooter in which you can aim, shoot but the collision detection algorithms not being implemented, you do not know if you hit. In your mind, you can bring a substitute for this lack but the game is incomplete.

 

[ChienAboyeur]

I pretty much agree to the rest, but fuck the class system. If i want to make a character, that likes to dabble in alchemy to poison that huge fucking halberd of his then why do i need an artificial limit, that says "No, you can't have both of those skills!". Let me deicide what skills my char has and let his stats influence how good he can be at these. Limit the amount of skills a char can have at a reasonable level, and limit characters level, but leave the classes out. They are a lazy mans tool anyway.

Roles in a universe are contextualized. They are not created at will. Roles are a set of constraints. Living up to a role goes through enduring and making the most of the constraints.

For a game to be a RPG, the roles must exist in the game universe. Many players have taken this following course: they design a character, attribute to it an arbitrary role and whatever the character does has to define what the role is.

There can be no RP in these conditions as roles do not exist in the game, only the mind of the players. This kind of game does not include RP.

 

[ChienAboyeur]

Skyrim is an RPG with action-oriented battles.

Skyrim can not be a RPG. There are no roles contextualized in the game.

The first necessary point for a game to be a RPG: existence of roles. No roles in Skyrim.

 

[MigRib]

Haven't played Skyrim, but despite your argument I still think Oblivion is an awful RPG, doesn't matter whether you're talking pen & paper RPG or CRPG, it's bad either way. Care to explain how you can play a worthwhile "role" in a game where nothing you do really matters?

With Fallout New Vegas I can see what you're getting at, though.

Not everything in an RPG has to revolve around choices that really matter. Sometimes they don't matter that much. But Oblivion is an old game compared to any of the others, so I agree it is worse than the recent Bethesda games.

 

[vurt]

When you buy a game, you buy game mechanics first. There are the core substance of a game. And game situations are resolved through mechanics.

You don't seem to understand that the freedom in TES (or FO1-3/FO:NV) is a part of the game mechanic. I even bought them mainly because of this. You don't need make-belief roleplaying, the game has working economics, working law/order, freedom of where to go etc etc. This allows for all kinds of situations and roleplaying because those mechanics are pretty "wide".

Non computer RPGs bring flexibility as mechanics can be designed and incorporated on the fly. A flexibility a cRPG will probably never have.
But this should not lead to the false conclusion that essential RP mechanics must exist in a game for being a RP.

Skyrim does not contain necessary RPG mechanics. You can substitute some mental ones but they do not exist in the game (contrary to non computer RPGs that always provide some kind of mechanics [self made or provided by the rule book]) to resolve a game situation)

The situation is similar to a shooter in which you can aim, shoot but the collision detection algorithms not being implemented, you do not know if you hit. In your mind, you can bring a substitute for this lack but the game is incomplete.

That's a pretty shitty comparison. TES is obviously limited of how you can roleplay, but please give examples of a cRPG that does it a lot better. Again, P&P RPG's doesnt always come with specific mechanics. TES has mechanics enough to allow for roleplaying, but we dont need to pretend it's going to be super complex, we're dealing with shitty computer A.I after all, like in all cRPG's..

 

[MigRib]

Skyrim can not be a RPG. There are no roles contextualized in the game.

The first necessary point for a game to be a RPG: existence of roles. No roles in Skyrim.

When you play a costumizable character, and you have dialogues with NPC's and freedom of choice, you are playing a role.... Every player character in Skyrim has to be the Dovahikin, but if you don't care about the main plotline you don't even have to know that - of course it depends on the time you spend playing Skyrim, but I have a second character with which I have played two, maybe three of the major quests (but not the main plotline) and I haven't killed any dragon, learned any shout or got involved in the dragon quest (or the civil war). This character is clearly distinct from my main character, which is a typical nord warrior, who was involved in all the major quests and the main plot. There are roles in Skyrim. There are no roles in Deus Ex: HR, where you MUST play Adam Jensen. It's a great game, I love it, but Deus Ex is not trully a role playing game because it does not have roles to play, just one.

 

[MigRib]

That's a pretty shitty comparison. TES is obviously limited of how you can roleplay, but please give examples of a cRPG that does it a lot better. Again, P&P RPG's doesnt always come with specific mechanics. TES has mechanics enough to allow for roleplaying, but we dont need to pretend it's going to be super complex, we're dealing with shitty computer A.I after all, like in all cRPG's..

That's really one of the problems with cRPGs, the faulty computer A.I. At least for now. But some of us understand that what games like TES or the Fallout series do is a very bright way of countering the A.I. to create something that can really be called a role playing game. I just wish there were more games out there just like those. I also wish that the people who really don't like RPGs (and for some strange reason there are RPG hatters in a site called RPGWatch) would stop complaining about games that they do not like. If someone wants to play action fantasy games there are hundreds of them. I can't understand the need to put down games of a rare nature like Skyrim, even when they are selling a lot. Anyway, I agree with you...