The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Catch-All

Montalban wrote:

1.5 hours in. PC all ultra high. Some ugly textures, still getting used to the animations. Load times are practically 0 on my new machine, and I'm not running it on an SSD, just a regular hard drive. Nvidia 560Ti 8GB RAM. No bugs at all so far. Alt-tabbing is kind of a pain but I have it figured out how to work around it. Voice acting is great. The menu will need some work, but it's not as bad as some of the first complaints had me worried it would be. Everything is very snappy. I'm on a brand-new computer, so your mileage may vary, but so far I'm very impressed.

Edit: And I've already picked so many gorgeous flowers.

First off, this is a minor gripe. I don't really care about the graphics in this game all that much at launch. No matter what mods and texture packs get released, it's never going to look as good as The Witcher 2 from what I've seen so far. I just wanted to mention that this game runs like crap on my machine (i7 920 and 2x5870). I'm assuming at this point that crossfire isn't working at the moment. Still, I would think I'd at least be able to run 1920x1080 on High at 60 fps using a single 5870. The frame rate has gone from 20-60 when I've been playing on high. The only reason I'm mentioning it is so that other people on AMD cards aren't discouraged.

Anyways. MINOR GRIPE. I haven't experienced any crashes yet which is normal for Bethesda games. So YAY!

I'm off to hunt rabbits now.

Montalban wrote:

1.5 hours in. PC all ultra high. Some ugly textures, still getting used to the animations. Load times are practically 0 on my new machine, and I'm not running it on an SSD, just a regular hard drive. Nvidia 560Ti 8GB RAM. No bugs at all so far. Alt-tabbing is kind of a pain but I have it figured out how to work around it. Voice acting is great. The menu will need some work, but it's not as bad as some of the first complaints had me worried it would be. Everything is very snappy. I'm on a brand-new computer, so your mileage may vary, but so far I'm very impressed.

Edit: And I've already picked so many gorgeous flowers.

Almost word for word my experience. Also just built a new machine, it selected ultra high, ran beautifully for about 2 hours. Just crashed to desktop. Ah well, I needed to go to sleep an hour ago anyway Loving it so far, the atmosphere is exactly what I was hoping for.

One CTD after chasing a fox into a bandit camp. Some thief I'll make.
I have like 30 people on my friends list at the moment playing this.
My mouse control seems a little jumpy, and a bit laggy on menu / map / inventory screens etc. Also my vertical axis is a lot less sensitive than the horizontal when looking around.
Great intro though. I imagine I'll be putting a ton of hours in.

Damn, that cart has killed me three times! I've decided it's going to be my war chariot, and I'll refuse to fight unless I'm standing in it. I was trying to stand in it and scorch an enemy malcontent with my magical flamethrower, when my war chariot bucked under me, embedded my leg in its boards, and killed me.

IMAGE(http://www.pucemoose.com/pics/cartofdeath.jpg)

Few hours in now, definitely enjoying it. UI isn't great, but not as bad as it was made out IMO. I'm just using WASD keys to navigate it for the most part, E to select things. Use the mouse in the perks menu though! Trying to move with the keyboard is horrible in that particular menu.

Graphics are pretty slick. I was impressed it selected Ultra settings for my laptop, although it's an i7 and Nvidia 560m. It was seeming a little laggy in the opening dungeon though, so I reduced the AA from 8x to 2x, and it is super smooth now.

Edit: Oops, I think I also turned down Shadows from Ultra to High. Not sure which helped with FPS more.

I think I should go to bed now... but.. I just don't want to

@PuceMoose, good to see you trying to break the system, haha. I haven't seen too many strange things yet, although I've already seen a few ragdolls collapse in strange positions.

I did happen to cross a river stream, wanted to see what the water looked like underneath, and happened to see a rabbit hopping around under water... must be one of those aquatic rabbits we've heard Skyrim is filled with.

No manual .pdf for steamers? Or am I stooopid and missed something obvious?

Citizen86 wrote:

@PuceMoose, good to see you trying to break the system, haha. I haven't seen too many strange things yet, although I've already seen a few ragdolls collapse in strange positions.
I did happen to cross a river stream, wanted to see what the water looked like underneath, and happened to see a rabbit hopping around under water... must be one of those aquatic rabbits we've heard Skyrim is filled with.

That's a large part of my fun, finding something strange going on and making it a fundamental trait of my character. The cart continued to bedevil me:

IMAGE(http://www.pucemoose.com/pics/cart3.jpg)

I tried to bounce it into an enemy to see if it could inflict the same general grievous injuries to another as it did to me, but my plan backfired and it bounced back into me, impaling my elven form on its nasty wooden planks and ending my dragonborn career posthaste.

The cart was so quickly willing to drain my life force and send me shuffling off of my mortal coil that a thought sprang into my mind; could it do the opposite, and perhaps breathe life back into the dead?
To test this, I carefully loaded the corpse of a Stormcloak soldier into the cart.

IMAGE(http://www.pucemoose.com/pics/cart4.jpg)

At first, nothing happened. Then, when I approached to see if any magic was taking place, I accidentally nudged the cart. Both man and cart trembled violently, and then! Sweet Providence!
IMAGE(http://www.pucemoose.com/pics/cart5.jpg)

Though the sweet kiss of life had not been granted to this poor slain fellow, the powers of levitation were now his to command, even in death. Saddened at the loss of my war chariot, I traveled on, content in the knowledge that it had made another's passing less sorrowful.

Yep, the Moose is having fun so far.

Oh, and a heads-up for anyone with performance issues; disable VSYNC; this really helped my performance. I'm running a modest rig (C2D 3.16 ghz, 4 GB RAM, 5850+latest drivers) and I've been running on Ultra (shadows & blur one step down) 4x AA/8x AF at about 70-90 FPS so far *granted this has been inside; haven't made it out of the tutorial dungeon yet).*

I'm running the game on high on an ATI 6850. Played 2-2.5 hours with no crashes. Just did the tutorial and one of the early Riverwood missions mentioned in most of the previews and so far it's great, though I keep wavering between 1st and 3rd person.

I had one random encounter where three bandits attempted to kill me and make off with all my worldly possessions. I was fighting them off with my huge, two-handed Nord War Axe of Awesomeness when an old lady I'd just met sent a ghost wolf after the bandits while proceeding to light them on fire. As the bandits smoldered, I went to thank the lady but she sent her pet wolf at me and tried to light me on fire. To make a long story short, the Nord war axe of Awesomeness trumps ghost wolf and I now have a pretty blue robe to sell in town.

MadGav wrote:

Have played for 5 mins, and seems like a 360 controller on the PC is the way to go at the moment. Anyone agree/disagree?

Agree 100%

The interface is clearly consolized.

Pros:
-Sense of place is amazing
-Much improved leveling with the perks for the various skill sets
-Character models are improved
-I haven't run across one of the three guys they used to voice Oblivion, Fallout 3 and New Vegas

Cons:
-Low res textures
-Low poly environment models
-Console interface

The pros outweigh the consolely cons and after an hour or so I can tell this game is going to be special.

That is awesome Puce Moose!

Had a great time tonight! Didn't really get anywhere in 3 hours, but I had a great time goofing around.

I can't wait to dumb-down this thread with my consolized comments.

Oh, it's magnificent. Without spoiling anything: Dragons.

Oh. Oh my.

Anyone managed to join either the Brotherhood or the Thieves guild yet? I'm working on that right now.

Gravey wrote:

I can't wait to dumb-down this thread with my consolized comments.

*scrunchy face* I'm pretty sure you're going to have the exact same experience as us PC people (actually probably better because you don't have to deal with drivers). This game still looks like a console game on ultra to me.

So just enjoy it, damn it.

This game is a ton of fun so far. I've been running around with a shield and one-handed weapon, and the combat is pretty solid - not incredible, but I was still having plenty of fun trading blows with a giant spider and some zombie vikings.

Also, I've been eating everything. Bugs, fish, flowers, giant rat parts... anything new gets stuffed into my Nord's hungering maw. I tried hunting a rabbit with a bow but it was too erratic so I just chased it down and hit it with an axe instead.

The crafting system seems pretty decent as well. I made armor! And weapons! And cabbage stew!

Snooty advisor: How do we know he's Dragonborn? *I* haven't heard him shou-
(I hit the shout button, interrupting his speech)
Everyone: Kill the attacker!
(I die)

Lesson - face away from NPCs when proving your heritage.

This game is too awesome! I can't believe its 1:45 AM it feels like I've been playing for 30 minutes. Good thing I have tomorrow off.

My only complaint is the magic and items options in the menu should be reversed. Magic is the left choice, but then appears on the right side of the screen. It just doesn't feel right. Also: I still can't figure out how to make the weapon or spell I favorited stay in the hand I want it to.

I had one crash during the intro part. Not too bad for 4 hours of playing!

Tagging for future perusal.

I'm playing Oblivion on the PC for the very first time thanks to you enablers and make lack of money after preordering Saints Row 3 and Halo Anniversary.

How easy is it to access the music files for Skyrim? Would anyone mind taking a look for me?

Well, that's about five hours worth of playing, and I'm very impressed.

There's definitely a fair amount of console blight, primarily in terms of craptacular textures on clothing (worst-looking fur garments I've seen in a long time) and some aspects of the UI. I have no doubt that both of these are relatively easily fixable though via mods.

Overall, the environments are very pretty, the ambient sound is excellent, and the voice-acting is good. I've been wandering through the main storyline so far, and just killed my first dragon. This is an incredible game in many ways, and I'm enthusiastic about seeing how it continues to evolve over the next few months. The complaints above are minor gripes in what promises to be probably my GOTY even with just a few hours of play so far.

Playing as a spell-slinger. The quick menu (Q) is vital, but I like being able to quickly assign spells to left or right hands. Will probably see if I can tweak the FoV and the walking speed, as I often like to walk for ambiance but this walk speed is just a bit too slow. Something along the lines of the NPCs walking speed would be better.

Dragons are extremely impressive.

Buy this game if you haven't already.

Must sleep now.

Tagging...

My willpower isn't going to hold much longer...

muttonchop wrote:

This game is a ton of fun so far. I've been running around with a shield and one-handed weapon, and the combat is pretty solid - not incredible, but I was still having plenty of fun trading blows with a giant spider and some zombie vikings.

Also, I've been eating everything. Bugs, fish, flowers, giant rat parts... anything new gets stuffed into my Nord's hungering maw. I tried hunting a rabbit with a bow but it was too erratic so I just chased it down and hit it with an axe instead.

The crafting system seems pretty decent as well. I made armor! And weapons! And cabbage stew!

If you eat it and it doesn't kill you, it makes you stronger!

CTD in the opening sequence...

Try this Robear - fixed CTD problems for me.

Control Panel -> Hardware and Sound -> Sound
Pick your sound device that is set as default, click Properties.
Go to the Advanced tab and make sure the 'Default Format' it is set to 44.1khz 16bit.

Trust me.. I live in the FUTURE!

Wow this year is going by too fast. Still enamored with BF3. Tagging for enabling.

Grubber788 wrote:

How easy is it to access the music files for Skyrim? Would anyone mind taking a look for me?

Not hard

I have learned something important today. Two hours of sleep probably isn't enough for me. I might have been better just skipping bed entirely.

Anywho, I'm really liking it so far. I've been playing on high and it's been running very smooth on my ATI 4800 series card.

I'll reiterate that the UI is very consolized. While it isn't broken per say it is really annoying at times. Having to hit tab exclusively to exit all menus, the scroll wheel not really doing anything, and the lack of hot keys are all annoying.

The Australian Price on Steam = $89.95US

My price on Greenman gaming after trading in Men of war red tide (got it for free a few days ago) $47.79US

Half price Skyrim! Purchase justified!

Also, Mrs. Prozac is awesome and has been ordering me to buy Skyrim all day.

"Out for delivery" they say. It's a good thing I have so much work to do today, but I'm looking forward to joining in the discussion

[quote=Norfair]

Grubber788 wrote:

the scroll wheel not really doing anything

Bizzarely, it turns book pages. So they kinda thought of something to do with it, just... not much!

Why do I have a test today?