The
Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim developed by Bethesda Game Studios is the fifth
installment of the popular Elder Scrolls series. It’s an open-world action
role-playing game (RPG) that I can honestly say, in my opinion, it is a whole
new level of gaming.
I know there are already plenty of
reviews and walkthroughs created for Skyrim,
but I feel that I need to add to the already massive online community
surrounding the game. I thought I should do my own review of the game. Why
review it? Because it is an RPG that deserves to be talked about. Not many
females are known to review games, so why not explain Skyrim through what I have seen and experienced while playing?
The Elder Scrolls has always had a
dedicated group of fans, since it kicked off the series back in 1994 with The Elder Scrolls: Arena developed for
the DOS PC system. After Skyrim’s
release and worldwide wave of success, the fan base has only grown larger, and
after what Bethesda bought to the table with Skyrim, its popularity is well-deserved.
As the game kicked off, I was a little
worried. I’d just spent a fair bit of money on the game and the opening
sequence didn’t really do it for me. The game opened with a first-person view
through the eyes of my character, a prisoner, waiting to be executed. While
that was an interesting enough opening storyline for me, having no idea what
was going to come between my character and their head meeting an axe, it just
didn’t get me excited. I got annoyed with the first-person view that jerked
around, especially during the ride on the back of the carriage and the lack of
flow with the narration. It was a bunch of characters saying stuff to me, no
real connection was there. There were odd pauses in the scene, moments where
practically nothing was happening. For me, this took away the “real” feeling
that Bethesda Game Studio’s tried to set up through cinematic
storytelling.
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| Opening scene in carriage. |
After a few minutes of me wondering if
I had wasted my money, I was greeted with something that changed my mind and
got me excited. Completely out of the blue, a dragon attacks, destroying just
about everything in the village. The quick peeks you get to take at the dragon
while you’re running away from it are awesome. The beast looks fantastic and
animation and sequencing is brilliant as it smashes its way through buildings
as it starts to chase you (which sets up the story very well as you find
getting further into the game). Begin the escape sequence. It’s fairly fast-paced
and hearing the dragon as it burns and ruins everything around it makes it an
exhilarating lead into the world that Bethesda has been setting up, completely
open and ready for exploration.
After playing Oblivion, you already know that there is a lot to do in Bethesda’s world,
but when I stepped out of the ruined village into the world of Skyrim, anything I loved in Oblivion was forgotten. It had nothing
on Skyrim’s world. Everything about
it is breath-taking; the landscape and realism of the trees growing in the
woods and off the sides of mountains amazed me (I had to take a moment to
absorb it all and have a little fit of excitement alone on the couch). From
that moment, you really get to start your adventure. The world is yours to do
with it what you will, you can cross the frozen-tundra, discover mines and
tunnels that take you through the center of mountains and jump on your trusty
steed, gallop across rushing rivers and ride your way up the side of
snow-covered mountains.
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| One of the watchtowers with surrounding landscape, shot taken in game. |
The towns and small villages spread out
across the map are each unique in their own way. They have their own history,
political beliefs and stories behind them and I found it really cool to
discover more about them as you helped citizens and completed quests in the
areas. I found, with some of the towns, that you can build an emotional
connection with them. The histories behind the towns and their people can make
you feel a lot of things emotionally. I know, for me, Whiterun became one of my
favorite cities and I enjoyed spending time there and completing quests for its
people. I really liked how Bethesda managed to make me have an emotional link
with certain characters or a location, I think it makes Skyrim that much more enjoyable and easy to spend hours playing the
game without getting bored.
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| City of Whiterun |
Along with improved gameplay and combat
systems, Skyrim has also bought some
really cool armour and weaponry into The
Elder Scrolls series. There’s new and improved armour in both lightweight
and heavyweight styles and weapons ranging from your regular daggers to
enchanted bows, swords and battleaxes. Overall I think they look great as well
as have some pretty cool added bonuses when used and it continues to add to the
list of things that makes Skyrim such
a loved and enjoyed game.
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| In game combat showing dual-weilding using a spell and one-handed weapon. |
Marriage is another new addition Skyrim brings to the series. Your
character can marry specific characters throughout the game and live together
with them. This can be great as they cook you meals to help recover health and
stamina and are always prepared to join you and help out on an adventure.
Having your spouse call you ‘love’ and other sweet things constantly can get a
bit annoying though, so that is the downside to establishing that relationship.
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| In-game shot of marriage ceremony. |
Along with the ability to marry, you
can still become a vampire as you could in Oblivion.
However, in Skyrim, you can now
become a Lycanthrope (werewolf) with a bloodlust that can cause some pretty
impressive moves in your combat against enemies.
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| Screenshot of a female vampire in Skyrim. |
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| Screenshot of Lycanthrope in Skyrim. |
Some
things that could have been improved:
- Some people complained about buggyness in their games and having to reload saves, this happened to me a few times too, but it didn’t annoy me nearly as much as in Oblivion, I had some leeway since I was just so into the game and it wasn’t bugging nearly as much as Oblivion.
- There should have been the ability to engage in combat with enemies without having to get down from your mount. It took extra time before you could defend yourself which meant that both your character and your mount were open to enemy fire for several moments. Plus in the advert for the game, we saw the Dragonborn (our character) being able to pull some pretty cool fighting moves on horseback, which we weren’t actually able to do in the game. I found that a little disappointing.
- Mounts for followers. Yes, there had been a mod created for this that is available for download, but I wish that Bethesda had included this in the game themselves. I think it looks a little ridiculous having your characters follower running along after you while you gallop away on a horse. They can’t keep up so when you stop, there is a short space of time where you have to wait for them to catch up. This can be quite frustrating if you get ambushed unexpectedly and they aren’t there to back you up.
Aside from the few things that I think
could have been improved on, Skyrim
really is a great addition to The Elder
Scrolls series as well as the RPG genre. So far, out of the
medieval/fantasy style RPG games I have played, Skyrim is the best. It really is the first great game that is
hopefully going to begin a long line of gaming evolution.
My Rating for The Elder Scrolls V:
Skyrim is 8.5/10
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