Elder Scrolls Online

[Princess Luna]

One day after tipping the massively multiplayer online (MMO) version of its Elder Scrolls franchise, Bethesda Softworks today posted a teaser video for the upcoming online gaming experience.
The one-minute video (below) is light on details, with quick flashes of the new Elder Scrolls adventure.
"The imperial throne sits empty," an ominous voiceover informs viewers. "The dragon fires cold, unlit and from every corner, darkness grows. Now ancient enemies band together, unlikely alliances are forged, old ambitions rekindled. And as enemies rise faster than allies, salvation cannot come from one hero alone. But from many."
In the video description, Bethesda said the "epic MMO" will be the first Elder Scrolls to let players explore the series' universe with each other.
Yesterday, Bethesda said The Elder Scrolls Online is in development at ZeniMax Online Studios under the direction of director Matt Firor. It will be available on PCs and Macs sometime next year.
"We have been working hard to create an online world in which players will be able to experience the epic Elder Scrolls universe with their friends, something fans have long said they wanted," Firor said in a statement yesterday. "It will be extremely rewarding finally to unveil what we have been developing the last several years. The entire team is committed to creating the best MMO ever made – and one that is worthy of The Elder Scrolls franchise."
The June issue of Game Informer will include exclusive information about the upcoming MMO. In a preview, the magazine said "players will discover an entirely new chapter of Elder Scrolls history in this ambitious world, set a millennium before the events of Skyrim as the daedric prince Molag Bal tries to pull all of Tamriel into his demonic realm."
For more details, follow The Elder Scrolls Online via Twitter and Facebook.
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2404001,00.asp

I hope this fails, I hope Bethesda goes under, I hope Todd Howard ends up living in a cardboard box, and for the record No, Fans have NOT requested an online elder scrolls for years, assholes whose only exprience with TSE is Skyrim and maybe a little bit of Oblivion, and who think the fact you have to collect 9 pieces of armor in Morrowind is "lame" requested it :cursing:

[Leonid Brozhnev]

Don't care for MMORPG's... I mean, there's been a lot trying over the past few years of companies vying to take the crown from WoW... all of them failed. Personally, I think Bethesda is a little late to the fantasy MMO party... if they wanted to do something like this, they should have made a Fallout MMO... I mean, they got the rights to it from Interplay and it's probably been asked for by old Fallout fans more than this shite.
Even if a Fallout mmo was announced though, I won't be buying it anyway, as I said, I don't care for MMORPG's and my games list is pretty full next year with what... GTAV, Hitman Absolution, Sim City 5, Company of Heroes 2... I haven't bought a single game this year, but I'm already planning on getting 4 next year without a second thought... if another Fallout game was announced, I think I'd have a stroke.

[Manifesto]

Meh, it might work but only as a side project, I'm not missing out on the next ES game because of that blunder (if they dumb it down more like Skyrim then fuck it). Also, don't even pretend that Morrowind had one too many armour pieces. We both know that finding both Daedric pauldrons was a pain in the ASS to find.

[Drosophila]

As if Skyrim wasn't a big enough failure.

Why would they even do this knowing about the tragedy of the TORtanic?

[honest john's firing squad]

still don't really get what everyone has against skyrim

[The Jay]

Though Skyrim was different it was hardly a bad game. I found that it made up for much of what it lost. It was better than Oblivion in my opinion, though it fell short of Morrowind. I am opposed to any sort of TES MMO.

[Princess Luna]

still don't really get what everyone has against skyrim
My problem was it was too simplified, Speech and Mechantilism were compressed together and the ability to haggle was removed. Athletics and Acrobatics were simply gone, weapons were reduced to one-handed and two-handed. Armor was reduced to chest, boots, hands, and helmet, removing greaves. Video games should get more complex as the series progresses, but starting with Oblivion TES has followed the opposite trend of getting more and more shallow. In morrowind there were over a dozen factions outside the main storyline, in Oblivion it was reduced to 4, mages guilds, fighter's guild, thief's guild, and dark brotherhood.

[ForgedConscience]

Actually my biggest gripe with Skyrim wasn't simplification, it was that the entire atmosphere felt unlike a TES game. I can't put my finger on why though. That said I am having fun with it now that CK is out and mods are being rolled out rapidly.

As for the MMO... I'm apathetic. Neutral. I gave up on MMOs after years of WoW.

[Yuppie Grinder]

I'm not interested in playing a MMO at all, I'd rather they got to work on another fallout or regular elder scrolls.

[#FF0000]

still don't really get what everyone has against skyrim

look at my opinion hey hey look (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=2293369&postcount=2)

it was better than oblivion at least. still not that great imo.

either way i kinda don't understand why so many developers are turning to mmos or free-to-play online games. also this sounds like it's just gonna be shovelware.

[Bostana]

Haters gonna Hate

[Zav]

Why would they even do this knowing about the tragedy of the TORtanic?
I wish they made a KotOR 3 instead of that travesty. They made the worst cliffhanger in history with TSL. Every fan of the series would buy it.

[Manifesto]

My problem was it was too simplified, Speech and Mechantilism were compressed together and the ability to haggle was removed. Athletics and Acrobatics were simply gone, weapons were reduced to one-handed and two-handed. Armor was reduced to chest, boots, hands, and helmet, removing greaves. Video games should get more complex as the series progresses, but starting with Oblivion TES has followed the opposite trend of getting more and more shallow. In morrowind there were over a dozen factions outside the main storyline, in Oblivion it was reduced to 4, mages guilds, fighter's guild, thief's guild, and dark brotherhood.
Granted they did better with random weapon variety than Oblivion did but still no Morrowind. Also the leveling system was broken, it was not hard to become a god without much work. Still, we must not make Morrowind our prototype for every RPG or we'll always be disappointed.

[Leonid Brozhnev]

I didn't mind Skyrim, I enjoyed it more than Oblivion and it ran like melted butter on my system. I didn't hate the game, but I feel like it lacked the variety of previous TES games, the combat was repetitive, the missions were fairly shallow, weapons didn't deteriorate and I was disappointed with the leveling system also. I would have appreciated a 'Hardcore' mode (with needs like having to eat, drink and sleep), there's probably a mod out there that adds this but I don't have time to play Skyrim these days.

[Deicide]

Prepare yourself for an unfathomable amount of whining.

[Rusty Shackleford]

fuck off id like to play an mmo version of TES. who knows, it might actually be as enjoyable as the single player ones. if not then oh well, there will be rpgs in the future.

[Manifesto]

I didn't mind Skyrim, I enjoyed it more than Oblivion and it ran like melted butter on my system. I didn't hate the game, but I feel like it lacked the variety of previous TES games, the combat was repetitive, the missions were fairly shallow, weapons didn't deteriorate and I was disappointed with the leveling system also. I would have appreciated a 'Hardcore' mode (with needs like having to eat, drink and sleep), there's probably a mod out there that adds this but I don't have time to play Skyrim these days.
Compared to the other two the combat was a huge improvement. They got really lazy with the story. It's just you magically soar through the ranks to the leader after somebody betrays you.

[Drosophila]

I wish they made a KotOR 3 instead of that travesty. They made the worst cliffhanger in history with TSL. Every fan of the series would buy it.

Instead we get Kinect Star Wars dance game, The Force Unleashed 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, .... and TOR.

You can't take a good RPG and turn it into an MMO. That has never succeeded.

[Rusty Shackleford]

Instead we get Kinect Star Wars dance game, The Force Unleashed 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, .... and TOR.

You can't take a good RPG and turn it into an MMO. That has never succeeded.



yet a great RTS can be made into a great MMO.

[honest john's firing squad]

In morrowind there were over a dozen factions outside the main storyline, in Oblivion it was reduced to 4, mages guilds, fighter's guild, thief's guild, and dark brotherhood. I've never played Morrowind or Oblivion (though Skyrim has definitely kindled some interest in TES series in me, so I've been meaning to play them), but this is one of my few gripes about Skyrim: that there are so few factions, and the questlines for some of these factions are waaayyy too short (dark brotherhood and the companions come to mind). The large environment and the myriad of other side quests partially make up for this though.

[honest john's firing squad]

yet a great RTS can be made into a great MMO. I think it has something to do with RPGs being a more personal experience which seems to be diminished to an extent in MMORPGs, whilst in RTSs the same primary focus on strategy seems to persist in MMORTSs.

[#FF0000]

i don't mind "simplifying" things in a game as long as it doesn't negatively impact the richness of the experience.

Buuuuuuuut I feel like that's what happened in Skyrim, so.

[Princess Luna]

yet a great RTS can be made into a great MMO.
I think you can make a good RPG into a good MMO, but what has always set The Elder Scrolls apart from other RPG titles is the level of immersion, and this is something that is impossible to replicate in a MMO. It is already confirmed the game is going to be in third person not first, and I have a strong suspicion they are going to do away with skill based leveling and go with traditional XP. Because the skill based leveling is way to easy to exploit in a multi-player game, if want to level sneak skill just have your friend create an enemy character and have him face the wall, then find something to hold the sneak button and come back 3 hours later and there are many other skills that can be leveled in a similar vein. Also dedicated RP servers almost never work and are simply troll magnets.

[Per Levy]

well i dislike mmos so this wont be for me in any way, but hey its not that bad, i mean they could've canceld skyrim to make an elder scrolls mmo. i mean you have no idea how heartbroken i was about the fact that the next kotor would be an mmo. fucking hell that was bad. also im waiting for a new jedi knight game while im at it.

about skyrim, i enjoy it and its a good game, my problem with it is just that it baffles me that they take more and more out(content wise) and thats just sad. do you know that they have so many finishing moves for close combat? why do that if that is not even a skill you can improve. and a lot of other things are also quite baffling, creating spells is gone because to powerful and gamebreaking while with a maxed out enchanting skill you can pretty much become a magic god(in the way when you do it right you dont use any mana for your spells).

also i want spears back, my miss the days when my argonin char would run around with a spear and had big feet and a extra swiming animation unlike the other races.

[pluckedflowers]

Frankly, at this historical moment I think it's time we start demanding more radical video games. If I can't orchestrate a peasant uprising, I don't want anything to do with that shit.

[rylasasin]

My problem was it was too simplified, Speech and Mechantilism were compressed together and the ability to haggle was removed. Athletics and Acrobatics were simply gone, weapons were reduced to one-handed and two-handed. Armor was reduced to chest, boots, hands, and helmet, removing greaves. Video games should get more complex as the series progresses, but starting with Oblivion TES has followed the opposite trend of getting more and more shallow. In morrowind there were over a dozen factions outside the main storyline, in Oblivion it was reduced to 4, mages guilds, fighter's guild, thief's guild, and dark brotherhood.

That's happening to just about every game nowadays sadly. Everything is getting simplified in favor of GUD GWAFIKS (or at least that used to be the case. Nowadays it's not even that. It's how good of a trailer one can make) in order to get easily impressed people to fork over their bucks for as little effort as possible.

With the elder scrolls series part of the problem is, and I really hate to say this because I love it so much, is the mod community. Yeah, the Mod Community. They've pretty much outpaced the developers in pretty much every single way you can imagine, from bug fixing to quest development to facton overhauls to gameplay enhancements etc.

So of course the devs basically say "phhhht why should we care about fleshing out quests, adding new weapons, more combat features, new lands, or even playtesting this shit? The Mod Community will take care of that for us anyway! Just add in a few swords axes hammers etc, put in some cheap guild quests, some barely functional marriage system, and they'll take care of the rest.
And for the console kids who don't get mods? ehhh screw'em they're mostly 10 year olds who'll just drop it for the next game that comes out anyway. As long as we get our 50 bucks. And besides, if they want it that badly we'll just release some of those cool features in 10-20 dollar DLCs and make it xbox-exclusive for a month to make those console kiddies feel special for a while."

Capitalist game production at it's finest, people.

[Yugo45]

I just hope they don't fuck up the lore...

[The Jay]

Like I said here's my list out of the three I've played: Morrowind > Skyrim > Oblivion.

[Rafiq]

All I really wanted was a two player cooperative feature for the Elder Scrolls Skyrim, which wouldn't have ruined the game at all, imo.

An MMO? That's fucking ludicrous! Fuck you Zenimax, piece of shit.

[Rafiq]

The problem with Skyrim (Perhaps Oblivion) in a certain regards was that you weren't given enough freedom in that, if you wanted to conquer a city, or assassinate X king, you couldn't, because they were all essential players. Fuck you Bethesda. You said that you were taking out Essential players!

Also, Skyrim by itself is a piece of shit which gets boring in a month. It's only really good on the PC where you can install mods, etc. I actually liked Oblivion better in that Oblivion was colorful, and you felt like you were in a very ancient and mysterious enviroment that was begging for you to explore it. Skyrim felt like you were in some shit hole in one of the Scandandavian countries one thousand years ago. Just not enough Fantasy, really, and I think this had a lot to do with the fact that they had to implement Dragons. Seriously, fuck Dragons, they ruined the game, in that they took up too much space. The boss fight was really dumb, Alduin was extremely easy to kill. They could have implemented so much in the game in place of Dragons (the space), but they couldn't, because shit heads who weren't familiar with the rest of TES were begging for "DRAGONS!!!!1111". Even the decent people who asked for Dragons (me) most definitely did not ask for the whole fucking game to be based off of them, we just wanted, you know, maybe one or two that we could fight eventually.

[eric922]

Ehh, I got my hopes up for SWTOR and was let down. I'm going to reserve judgment on this one until I see more. What very little they've shown looks like another WoW clone and I'm sick of those.

[The Jay]

The problem with Skyrim (Perhaps Oblivion) in a certain regards was that you weren't given enough freedom in that, if you wanted to conquer a city, or assassinate X king, you couldn't, because they were all essential players. Fuck you Bethesda. You said that you were taking out Essential players!

Also, Skyrim by itself is a piece of shit which gets boring in a month. It's only really good on the PC where you can install mods, etc. I actually liked Oblivion better in that Oblivion was colorful, and you felt like you were in a very ancient and mysterious enviroment that was begging for you to explore it. Skyrim felt like you were in some shit hole in one of the Scandandavian countries one thousand years ago. Just not enough Fantasy, really, and I think this had a lot to do with the fact that they had to implement Dragons. Seriously, fuck Dragons, they ruined the game, in that they took up too much space. The boss fight was really dumb, Alduin was extremely easy to kill. They could have implemented so much in the game in place of Dragons (the space), but they couldn't, because shit heads who weren't familiar with the rest of TES were begging for "DRAGONS!!!!1111". Even the decent people who asked for Dragons (me) most definitely did not ask for the whole fucking game to be based off of them, we just wanted, you know, maybe one or two that we could fight eventually.

It may not have been as colorful but it was grittier. I actually liked it more for that. As for Alduin being easy, so was fighting Dagon and his army. Dagoth Ur was tougher than the daedric lord.

[bcbm]

Also, Skyrim by itself is a piece of shit which gets boring in a month.

i just keep experimenting with different characters and doing different stuff and its still p fun, though i took a break for awhile. the new expansion has got me back into it.


I actually liked Oblivion better in that Oblivion was colorful

skyrim has nice colorful forest bits but it also captured part of what i liked in morrowind, the rugged wasteland kind of areas.


nd you felt like you were in a very ancient and mysterious enviroment that was begging for you to explore it.

dwemer... nuf said.


Just not enough Fantasy, really, and I think this had a lot to do with the fact that they had to implement Dragons. Seriously, fuck Dragons, they ruined the game, in that they took up too much space. The boss fight was really dumb, Alduin was extremely easy to kill. They could have implemented so much in the game in place of Dragons (the space), but they couldn't, because shit heads who weren't familiar with the rest of TES were begging for "DRAGONS!!!!1111". Even the decent people who asked for Dragons (me) most definitely did not ask for the whole fucking game to be based off of them, we just wanted, you know, maybe one or two that we could fight eventually.

yeah dragons are whatever, in a couple of my games i havent even bothered to go that far in the mq so i dont have to deal with the fuckers

[Princess Luna]

Honestly after further consideration, I would be willing to give a Elder Scrolls MMO a chance if it did two of three things

1: Allow the option of playing in 1st person, all the games back to Arena have been have allowed first person perspective. This is honestly the only feature that have survived all 5 games, the idea of skill leveling as opposed to EXP leveling found in most RPG's started with Daggerfall. Yet it has been confirmed that ESO will be third person only, why??? I would love to see any kind first person MMORPG, and the ESO would have been a perfect chance. But no, instead we are going to get a Third Person MMORPG just like every other one out there. If people want to play the game in third person that is fine, but at least allow for the option of first person.

2: Keep Skill-Leveling this is in my opinion the most defining game-play aspect of the series. If they remove it, it simply isn't an Elder Scrolls game (Arena was the first, so it's forgiven). I haven't been following the news relating to ESO, because my inner fan boy won't let me, so I don't know if they have announced what kind of leveling system the game will use but I really wouldn't be surprised if they went with an Exp based leveling system.

3: Bring back attributes Removing them was by far them worst mistake Skyrim made, attributes have been a staple of RPG's for decades for the reason that they are what define characters both PC and NPC, and if someone wants to create a new system to replace the old I have no problem, but Skyrim didn't, it just removed attributes and replaced them with.......nothing. So in the end there was a world where everybody is equally strong, everybody is equally intelligent, everybody is equally agile, the only things that separates characters are that some people are good with an ax and some people are good with a sword. To illustrate how broken the system in Skyrim is, My level 4 mage was able to beat a warrior wearing plate armor in a fist fight on expert. difficulty.

if ESO did only two of those three things I would be willing to at least give it a chance, but it is confirmed they are not doing 1, i highly doubt judging from the response people seem to have given Skyrim they will do 3, so that only leaves 2 which isn't enough to get me to play the game and even then it isn't guaranteed it will be in the game.

[Igor]

My problem was it was too simplified, Speech and Mechantilism were compressed together and the ability to haggle was removed. Athletics and Acrobatics were simply gone, weapons were reduced to one-handed and two-handed. Armor was reduced to chest, boots, hands, and helmet, removing greaves. Video games should get more complex as the series progresses, but starting with Oblivion TES has followed the opposite trend of getting more and more shallow. In morrowind there were over a dozen factions outside the main storyline, in Oblivion it was reduced to 4, mages guilds, fighter's guild, thief's guild, and dark brotherhood.

Dunno, I don't get why people think these things are bad, because I for one thought Mercantilism was an absolutely useless skill and it was a real pain in the ass to specialize in different kind of weapons. Who the fuck would specialize in spears anyways? Simplifying this kind of shit was precisely what Morrowind needed, it seriously had too much skills. That wasn't making the game more challenging at all, it was making the game more annoying. Yeah games should get more complex, but in ways that make the gameplay actually enjoyable, trying to level up your Mercantilism or not being able to use the new really cool weapon you got because the game has like six different weapon classes is just cluttering it all up. Having lots of different factions, interesting storylines and a fascinating world made Morrowind awesome and Oblivion boring, not bloody spear or blunt weapon skills.

[bcbm]

the factions in oblivion were a lot more developed though, even more so than skyrim i thought. in morrowind a lot of them seemed pretty weak and it was all just 'go here do this' with only a few interesting quests thrown in

[Igor]

the factions in oblivion were a lot more developed though, even more so than skyrim i thought. in morrowind a lot of them seemed pretty weak and it was all just 'go here do this' with only a few interesting quests thrown in

yeah they kind of stopped trying after the guilds and great houses. see imperial cult for example, which was an absolutely pitiful faction that had no place in the game and was about as interesting as your citadel. the thing that irks me about morrowind perhaps the most is the potential of some of the settings and how it all turned out to be just rushed and not really complete

[bcbm]

morrowind with some tweaks and more developed stories would pretty much rule. i mean shit i have owned the game for eight years and have never even touched the main quest cuz its so much fun doing other shit.

[Rafiq]

I'm not going to fucking pay monthly for a goddamn game. Actually, fuck mmos. I really could only ever find myself trolling on it.

[bcbm]

i liked star wars galaxies but that was about it. and then the bastards ruined that

[Rafiq]

Though, you know that Zenimax is developing this shit, not Bethesda.

[Princess Luna]

yeah they kind of stopped trying after the guilds and great houses. see imperial cult for example, which was an absolutely pitiful faction that had no place in the game and was about as interesting as your citadel. the thing that irks me about morrowind perhaps the most is the potential of some of the settings and how it all turned out to be just rushed and not really complete
In my opinion The Temple was the funnest faction in Morrowind. The Thieves Guild in Oblivion and Skyrim where a lot better then in Morrowind, but this was countered by the fact being a thief was less fun because there was nothing to really do outside the Thieves guild . There was no equivalent to the great house vaults, which sucks because the system was so much better, it would have been awesome if in Oblivion each castle had a treasury. However The Dark Brotherhood in Oblivion, and playing a assassin type character in general, was vastly superior to in Morrowind in every way.

[Hermes]

Eh, I'd kind of like a mode where you could play with a friend. About as far as I would go, though.

As for the comparison of the games, I think Morrowind wins hand over fist. The only real reason that I preferred Oblivion/Skyrim stealth was the actual stealth system that had to do with visibility, noise, etc (even though it was really dodgy). I also really didn't like Oblivion's Thief's Guild, if only because the plot was obvious, the missions were fairly easy, and it seemed far too intent on making itself grandiose. With Skyrim, it was far too short, and the emphasis was never really on thievery. Also those generic stock quests kind of upset me.

My opinion, of course.

[Grenzer]

Shit, I've been an elder scrolls fan since Daggerfall(1996). I even played The Elder Scrolls Adventures: Redguard. Who the fuck has even heard of that game these days? I enjoy playing Skyrim and all, but the last decent game Bethesda put out was Morrowind in my opinion.

And fuck, this MMO bullshit? It looks like complete trash.

The Temple was a fun faction in morrowind.. even more so because of the fact that no one ever really played it because you had to go through the Pilgrimage crap. The Imperial Cult was fun though; especially since you get quests where they just tell you to get artifacts. My favorite faction was the Morag Tong because it's fucking hard to find and obscure. Most of the people I know that played Morrowind don't even know what the hell I'm talking about when I bring up the Morag Tong. Morrowind was my favorite of the TES series.. I had like 15 GB worth of mods installed. I had so many new guilds that there was one, and I shit you not, called the "Nine Toes Guild" or something like that. Too bad Tamriel Rebuilt never really took off..

[PC LOAD LETTER]

Fuck this, I'm just going to play Morrowind again