The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Catch-All

Gravey wrote:

They took out crossbows for Oblivion, I wouldn't count on guns! ;)

That's just because that killjoy Pope, Innocent II, banned them.

Blessings of Julianos upon ye.

If they happen to bring back spears I will be a happy camper.

It doesn't sound like they will. Todd Howard goes over his philosophy of sequel design in this interview.

EDIT: Oops, that is the same interview Montalban posted a page back. Well, it's a new page, so consider this a *cough* back to the previous page.

Jeremy Soule is doing the music. I hope bethesda do something a bit more subtle that immediate cuts to the danger music as soon as a monster agros on you. Also something a bit more flavourful than generic fantasy music would go a long way to giving Skyrim and set it apart from Oblivion, and other fantasy games. It just felt mechanical and reminded me I was playing a game in their earlier games.

Scratched wrote:

Jeremy Soule is doing the music. I hope bethesda do something a bit more subtle that immediate cuts to the danger music as soon as a monster agros on you. Also something a bit more flavourful than generic fantasy music would go a long way to giving Skyrim and set it apart from Oblivion, and other fantasy games. It just felt mechanical and reminded me I was playing a game in their earlier games.

The very martial, male choir from the announcement trailer gives me high hopes for the music.

The Jeremy Soule news is good news. I looooove the Guild Wars music.

He's done the music since Morrowind, if not even earlier.

Oh really?

I barely noticed the music in Oblivion. The main theme was nice, but other than that it was pretty indistinct.

Never knew the two series share the same composer, but it makes sense for me. The music from both give off pretty similar vibes.

FWIW, I also found Morrowind's music more memorable than Oblivion's.

I have the Morrowind soundtrack on my iPhone, and listening to it makes running errands seem epic*.

* Which, oddly, it didn't always do in the game -- why couldn't anyone in the Wizard's Guild go to the bookstore for themselves?

I'd like to ask the fellow musicians among you, is it me or was Oblivion's score/main theme not more than a sped-up rearrange of Morrowind's? The melody is quite similar, only slightly faster and with shorter silences. I undertand that this resemblance can be justified as both games being part of the same universe/saga/contiuum/franchise/etc, but that always irked me about it, and when some time had passed after playing it I was unable to summon's Oblivion's mentally, while not having a problem remembering Morrowind's. Male choir dark martial score sounds about right for a real change of score in Skyrim.

Oblivion's title theme is, in fact, a faster arrangement of the Morrowind theme.

4xis.black wrote:

Oblivion's title theme is, in fact, a faster arrangement of the Morrowind theme.

It's remains one of my favorite theme songs from any game, regardless of its history.

To prepare for Skyrim I'm going to play through Oblivion again. It isn't everyone's favorite, but it was my first RPG. I'd play Morrowind but my PC won't handle it and it isn't backwards compatible on the 360.

Scruss wrote:

I'd play Morrowind but... it isn't backwards compatible on the 360.

Yes it is, or at least the GOTY version is (which you can probably pick up used for next to nothing)

ruhk wrote:
Scruss wrote:

I'd play Morrowind but... it isn't backwards compatible on the 360.

Yes it is, or at least the GOTY version is (which you can probably pick up used for next to nothing)

Even if it wasn't, you could always go get the PC vers-

banned

The technology: http://www.gameinformer.com/games/th...

I'm still not sure if it's fully new or not. They say they've tackled the character animation in this one, so that's one sore spot.

Scratched wrote:

The technology: http://www.gameinformer.com/games/th...

I'm still not sure if it's fully new or not. They say they've tackled the character animation in this one, so that's one sore spot.

Yeah, there are phrases like "built a new system" or "re-wrote every major system" or "the newly dubbed Creation Engine" but it's not unequivocal that it's absolutely new. It could just be the tone of the article or more likely it might as well be "brand new" but technically they didn't just start with a blank piece of paper.

Perhaps the most impressive use of the Behavior technology is how Bethesda is using it to create the dragon animations. Bethesda has worked meticulously to make sure the beasts look powerful and menacing when banking, flapping their wings, gaining altitude before making another strafing run, and breathing fire on their hapless victims. None of the dragons' actions are scripted, and Behavior helps make the movements look non-mechanical, even when the dragons are speaking/shouting.

Glad to hear my musings on quick time events are wrong.

An article, about another article... Is this really what internet journalism has become for some sites?

On the plus side, those are some VERY pretty pictures, I just wonder how they will look when they finally end up on the 360? So glad I have this one earmarked for a day 1 purchase. May need to book some annual leave to coincide with it too!

m0nk3yboy wrote:

On the plus side, those are some VERY pretty pictures, I just wonder how they will look when they finally end up on the 360?

That's why I'm taking it all with a pinch of salt until it actually arrives. It's easy to make a pretty picture, but an Elder scrolls game is so many components working in tandem to make a world that absorbs the player.

I know I'm in the minority, but I am still secretly hoping that this is actually a launch title for the 360's as yet unannounced successor to be unveiled at E3 and launched in November. However, considering how 360 consoles have consistently outsold the competition in North America since the 360 S was released last summer it seems highly unlikely we'll see a successor until fall 2012.

Why release an expensive new machine when you are raking in the cash now?

m0nk3yboy wrote:

An article, about another article... Is this really what internet journalism has become for some sites?

Every post about Skyrim on the Internet is recycling the GI article. So the answer is, yes.

Sub topic.

I think we're more likely to see a half-generation step than a full new consoles, perhaps similar to how Nintendo has progressed the DS.

The PS3 is a more likely candidate in my eyes, as it's recent security breach would mean they do need to make a major break in compatibility to keep potential piracy down, so they've got motivation. The use of blu-ray means the media has more headroom to put data on, and we're already at the point of multi-DVD games on PC/360. If they could release a game with the data for PS3 and PS3plus, with the PS3plus sharing the base data, new security and upgraded data used in more capable hardware (more memory) it might work.

The 360 is harder to upgrade as it's based on DVDs. Unless you make a DVD format that, say has more layers and is readable in all the old consoles, you have to break compatibility and make a wholly new console. Besides that you're just applying better image quality to the same data, and I'm not sure image quality is a massive problem in most consumer's eyes.

The real question for the next generation always comes back to the money. Will people pay more or pay again for the upgraded one?

Scratched wrote:

The 360 is harder to upgrade as it's based on DVDs. Unless you make a DVD format that, say has more layers and is readable in all the old consoles, you have to break compatibility and make a wholly new console. Besides that you're just applying better image quality to the same data, and I'm not sure image quality is a massive problem in most consumer's eyes.

The real question for the next generation always comes back to the money. Will people pay more or pay again for the upgraded one?

By all indications it seems clear that the next console generation will be moving away from physical media and towards digital distribution, so any theoretical upgrade to the 360 will probably move in that direction. They definitely have the framework in place, it would just be a matter of getting publishers on board.

Jasonofindy wrote:

I know I'm in the minority, but I am still secretly hoping that this is actually a launch title for the 360's as yet unannounced successor to be unveiled at E3 and launched in November. However, considering how 360 consoles have consistently outsold the competition in North America since the 360 S was released last summer it seems highly unlikely we'll see a successor until fall 2012.

Why release an expensive new machine when you are raking in the cash now?

So you think it's sad that more people can afford the 360, expanding the userbase and creating more competition and a larger market for games? I'm really not looking for to the "next gen". I'd like to see us stall as long as possible on that.

I pray that they tweak the Radiant AI to be less ridiculous though. After reading about Skyrim I picked up Oblivion to finish it off and the scaling of enemies appears even more out of place.

I attempted to sneak into another house through the sewers in Cyrodil and was attacked by not one, but three Goblin Warlords and two goblin Shamans. Apparently security as gotten pretty lax around town. I don't mind a good fight, I just don't want to claw my way over every inch of ground.

DSGamer wrote:
Jasonofindy wrote:

I know I'm in the minority, but I am still secretly hoping that this is actually a launch title for the 360's as yet unannounced successor to be unveiled at E3 and launched in November. However, considering how 360 consoles have consistently outsold the competition in North America since the 360 S was released last summer it seems highly unlikely we'll see a successor until fall 2012.

Why release an expensive new machine when you are raking in the cash now?

So you think it's sad that more people can afford the 360, expanding the userbase and creating more competition and a larger market for games? I'm really not looking for to the "next gen". I'd like to see us stall as long as possible on that.

In the Todd Howard interview videos on GI, he mentions that he doesn't think a new hardware generation is needed right now, especially for improving RPGs. Hardware is mainly about pushing graphics, and he thinks things look great now, so let's focus on improving the games themselves.

He also has a fun poke at JRPGs. All those videos, including the sound/music ones (for anyone worried about more fey Oblivion tracks), are worth checking out.

I don't know, it depends what the hardware is used for. More processing power can be used for more than making it look pretty, you can do more complex simulations and more of them for things that matter. How about a few thousand NPCs in your world doing their own thing and being more than window dressing who's only purpose in life is to be there for the player, that sounds like something a RPG like Skyrim could make use of.

Also looking forward, we're probably going to have to get rid of the notion that the CPU and GPU are for different tasks, they're rapidly becoming very similar. Back in 2005 most PC CPUs were just getting over the 'megahertz matters' phase, and multicore was just beginning to catch on. Right now you're talking 4+ CPU cores in a reasonable gaming rig, and massively parallel processing done on a GPU, that can be built into the same package as the CPU.

Getting way off topic, but don't the new Sandy Bridge processors from Intel have some kind of gpu built into them? Although it's somewhat related; I've been looking into buying a new computer this year for Skyrim. The NeoGAF thread has me intrigued.

In light of that Game Informer article, it sounds like they are addressing many of the concerns I had with Oblivion. I never did end up finishing that game.

Anyways, thread tagged.