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[Skyrim] Is Skyrim a bad game? No. What it did wrong though... (SPOILERS)

[Spoilers Below]
Thank you, loyal viewers who keep messaging me to keep making Skyrim videos. I'm actually in no danger of running out of source video for Skyrim yet so I'll keep producing the videos as long as I'm able (in what little free time I have). To those who don't know what the hell I'm talking about, check out THIS PLAYLIST or jump into episode 1 (NSFW Warning if the picture didn't give you an idea first):



Ok, so back on topic, I love skyrim... 

But I love all the Elder Scrolls games. Still, visiting the Steam Forums I found a simple topic named Things you hate about Skyrim. It was full of Skyrim fans, but they ALL had things they hated about the game. How do you do that? Have a game full of things you hate, yet you are still a fan of it? Well, they pulled it off, and I suspect it's because of the work of the "The Franchise". The aspects of the game that were grandfathered from previous games.

The number one hated thing about Skyrim from that thread was really the "dumbing down" of the series. That is to say the game is designed so that 8 year olds can play it efficiently, failing really isn't an option anymore. But I personally understand the need to expand your base and make your game as accessible as possible  I don't hate them for it, unless you are PLANNING to create a niche game like Darksouls, you SHOULD make your game as accessible as possible. So I'm going to disregard this, the number one hated aspect of Skyrim.

No, the aspects I'm going to most focus on are the ones that have infuriated me within my two playthroughs of Skyrim....

1: Guilds - Too Short

Okay, first we have the guilds. Previous Elder Scrolls games (Yes, I'm going to compare Skyrim to the other games) had several guild halls scattered across the playable gamespace, mostly in each town. The guilds allowed you to gain reputation with them slowly over time eventually becoming their masters; you had to actually to a number of things for people before the trusted you enough for advancment. BUT, in Skyrim you can become the master of the Companions (The Fighters Guild in every other Elder Scrolls game) in a mere 9 Quests, all connected through a single plot. People will bitch that it has side quests, but really only one or two of those side quests are EVER needed to be done, you can MASTER the guild in an hour and a half.

The College of Winterhold is even more asinine, after 8, EIGHT of the most menial tasks I've ever seen, you are inexplicably crowned Archmage. There are SO MANY more people who are more experienced than you, people who can teach you MASTER spells, open gates to oblivion and what not... they are so far beyond you but you are their Archmage because you found a zappy staff and used it to prevent the college from being destroyed. So congrats and good luck running the college into the ground... or over the cliff into the ocean like the rest of Winterhold.

The Dark Brotherhood is the ONLY guild I felt that did the job well, and that's because they were piratically fallen apart when you met them, the short questline is indictive of you resucing them, bringing them back to what they were meant to be... but they could have picked it up from there, there should have been more quests after you are officially crowned as Listener. You should have ACTUALLY rebuilt them from the Dawnstar Sanctuary, hired a speaker, found and groomed new agents, so on.... really done Sithus' Will.

So yes, ALL of the guilds in Skyrim are a joke. Daggerfall/Morrowind's Guilds were done the best, Oblivion's were good enough, and Skyrim's FAILED.

2: The Blades & Paarthurnax 

This was on a lot of people's rant lists and people went as far as to install mods to fix it. I'm talking about the DRAGON who is the true master of the Greybeards, the one who teaches them the Dragon Language aka The Voice.

At a certain point, you meet The Blades, who are the people who get you started in Morrowind and are your MAIN supporters in Oblivion. Well in Skyrim they are only a couple left, they reveal their purpose was to protect the Septim emperrors but without them around they revered to their ORIGINAL purpose which was to protect the Dragonborn, Talos. As the new Dragonborn their purpose has transferred to you.

Lets reclairify, their entire purpose for existing now is to PROTECT AND SERVE YOU, and their profession are dragonslayers.

Well, you've defeated the ultimate evil dragon, the dragons will stop coming back to life now.... the world is saved... but WAIT! The Blades, whose entire purpose for existing is to protect and serve you... found out that his general Paarthurnax is still alive! And what's this? YOU ARE IN LEAGUE WITH HIM!? Suddenly they will not lend you any aid until Paarthurnax is slain. For the honor of the Blades his crimes of the past can not be forgiven...

I can not fucking believe that the wise sage Esbern is that much of an inane moron all of a sudden, it's completely out of character from what they've established! He of all people should look passed that and work toward the greater good. I could kind of expect the half-assed logic from Delphine who seems to be guided by the past more than anything but not Esbern whom constantly looks toward the future.

Paarthurnax is now good and trains humans to use the voice for the betterment of all, the blades are also a force for good and slay the evil dragons for the betterment of all. They are both good, and this out-of-character writer-imposed hate for Paarthurnax with no chance at persuading the already logical and intelligent  Esbern is perhaps the worst of cop-outs.


3: Half-Ass'd Civil War

The game starts you off as a prisoner who is about to be executed along with Ulfric Stormcloak, leader of the rebellion. Due to the "Dragon Attack" at the beginning of the game Ulfric is allowed to escape and continue to build his army against the Empire. This creates a connection between Ulfric and the Dragons in the mind of the player, or at least a player who likes to examine the plot. Is there a connection between Ulfric and the dragons? No.

The Guards who are about to execute him read the charges along the lines of "Using 'The Voice' to murder the High King". As you learn about "the way of the voice", gain your dragonshout, and then Elisif say things about how when ulfric let out his voice her husband was undone. This creates a real feeling that Ulfric may hold the key to your dragonshouts, that he may be dragonborn too, that he may be a rival dragonborn whom you must defeat, or bettet yet reinforcing the implied connection he had with the dragons. Could Ulfric be the villain or working with the villain? NOPE, he's just an ordinary guy.

OKAY So we finished going over all the failed potential of Ulfric. Now then, what happens when you follow one quest line or another to it's conclusion and end the civil war? NOTHING.

Now, as I've only sided with the empire I've seen the following: The Jarls of the defeated side end up sitting FOREVER at the table in Windhelm in "EXILE" hahahahahaha. While the towns (and I say the word towns with fervor because the towns in skyrim are TINY AS FUCK, they arn't worthy of the term cities) are now controlled by new NPCs popping out of nowhere as "imperial puppets". But otherwise NOTHING CHANGES. It's horrible, people still act, sing, and otherwise converse as if the war were still on. Hell, the military "camps" that exist all over the wilderness are UNKILLABLE. The leader of each camp just gets back up after you kill them, and all the lesser guards you may kill just respawn later.

But in general the Civil War is worthless, aside from a couple epic fort battles, NOTHING is resolved by it and the world changes a little... but not nearly not enough.




4: The HORRIBLE AI

Many times throughout my game, Bandit Warlords, Dragur Demigods, and Dragons alike would freeze up. Yes, they would stop moving and sit there as I hacked/blasted/shot them into oblivion. Taking no action their AI simply BROKE.

Alas, that is but a MINOR ISSUE compared to the PATHING, yes... you can jump on a barrel or a rock and the enemies are entirely unable to catch up with you. They will stop what they are doing, go AROUND all obstacles to reach you. They are toughly unable to travel as you are, they can't jump, climb, or perform any actions other than move along a seemingly scripted path which renders them WORTHLESS in the face of ranged weaponry or spells.

Take a lesson from Left 4 Dead, let them climb on anything. Take a lesson from World of Warcraft, if they "break" make them reset to their original status.

PS: Have AI Followers think about where the player is and STOP GETTING IN MY FUCKING LINE OF FIRE. How many times must you get hit by my arrows/spells before you understand?



5: Buffs 

This is an exceedingly minor point but I wanted to make it anyway. Lets set aside the fact you can't create your own spells like in previous games for a second, the beneficial effects I gain from shrines or other places last a SHORT amount of time, I practically can't fast travel without them going away and not only that but every shrine you pray at MAKES ALL OTHER BLESSINGS GO AWAY. I think I understand why it's there for balance sake, but it still throughly pisses me off.

Look at how many spells you play on yourself throughout Morrowind or Oblivion, it's a change I just plain don't like, even if I do understand it from a designer's point of view.



6: Misc Problems 



  1. You need the "Everybody Get Inside - Dragon Attack" and "When Vampires Attack" mods installed for the base game and Dawnguard respectively. If you don't, attacks from these enemies will EMPTY your city of people over the course of your time in Skyrim. It will make you very sad. The fact these mods are needed is a POOR DESIGN CHOICE and I sincerly hope these get fixed in a later official patch. Sure, PC players like me have it good but on playfire Xbox/PS3 babies cry all day long about it... and it's not their fault, it's poor game design.
  2. Nightcaller Temple is full of bugs, CRASH BUGS, fix them.
  3. The list really goes on, minor problems with a very complicated game world that I can only assume wasn't put through enough beta testing.



Conclusion

Skyrim is not a bad game, I love Skyrim, I love all the Elder Scrolls games... I'm not too sure about this upcoming MMORPG by Zenimax Online Studios... but I love all the earlier Elder Scrolls games. As a player who makes HEAVY use of mods this isn't so bad for me but think of the poor console users... you market this game to them and then deliver a steaming pile of crap without any way of fixing it.

As for us PC users, please visit the following Websites for a better game: