The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (Xbox 360)
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The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (Xbox 360) Reviews
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Skyrim – It’s Finally Here!,
After a much anticipated wait by thousands upon thousands, 11.11.11 has finally arrived. Some people will have gotten the game on launch day, some unfortunate enough to receive it after. And for the lucky few a day or two before release.
There has been a lot of coverage of Skyrim leading up to its release that people have likely seen, about the animation, the sound, the world, the decapitations and dragon battles. But honestly none of that can truly do justice for how wonderful the game is, you need to play it for yourself to see it.
When running down a snowy mountain and first entering a pine forest, memories of oblivion can start to enter the mind, but they soon get washed away by fresh ones as the many new and improved aspects kick into play. Basically the game is a sure improvement over oblivion and here is why.
Firstly: (MINOR SPOILER) Werewolves are indeed back, and better than ever!
COMBAT:
When you charge towards someone and swing a steel great sword with full power at their head, it feels like you’re charging towards someone swinging a steel great sword with full power at their head! The way the camera subtly jolts and the dragonborn’s body continues moving in the direction of the force for a second. Though these attacks drain nearly all your stamina at first and take a brief moment to recover from.. well if you can land it the attack is as deadly as it looks, usually killing enemies with a single blow. It adds a new found sense of realism just like when it comes to firing arrows at enemies, you no longer have to fire more than 2-4, no more hedgehog arrow enemies. Don’t think this means the game is easy though, on the normal of the 5 difficulty settings, you can easily be slain if you make silly decisions and forget to block or heal accordingly. Try swinging a sword non stop at one enemy whilst their friends fire arrows and spells at you; see how long you survive.
The dual wielding adds a brilliant new dimension to the combat, you can select what goes in your left or right hand by pressing the L or R triggers in the weapons menu, meaning you can use a spell in both hands for greater effect, two of the same weapons, or mix them up. Sure; the woodcutter axe is for chopping wood at the lumber mill, and the pick axe is for mining ore (both doable jobs) but you can dual wield the two in each hand and do combos with them by holding down both triggers. This means 2 little daggers can quickly become a lot of fun. You can even dual wield staffs! If you can sneak up on someone without them detecting you, you can slit their throat for an instant kill! this is actually more satisfying then the old 3x critical strike of past games as you feel more rewarded for your sneaking, you can still do critical strikes but the slit throat one is also available. And this allows for continued non-detection.
The kill animations are quite satisfying too and tend to happen at random which means they don’t become repetitive (my fear was every enemy on low health equaled a kill animation) but sometimes it’s a normal kill, sometimes you can run up to a full HP enemy and stick your great sword through them as their body rises in the air. The neat thing here is enemies can do final kill animations to you and each other adding even more gritty realism to the elder scrolls universe.
Magic attacks in this game are awesome and not to be over looked if you are the hack and slash type of player, when you have 3 deranged people trying to kill you, there’s nothing better than assigning your flame spell to both hands and unleashing fiery hell on them. There is a nice variety of spells in the game, from the elementals to conjuring, alteration and traps etc. That’s before even touching the dragon shouts.
The dragon shouts are alot of fun to use, they feel powerful while the controller vibrates and are a nice new addition to elder scrolls. They can really give the edge in a battle that is difficult. And they are just as scary when you fight a enemy that can use them such as a Draugh scourge.
GAMEPLAY FEATURES:
Five years later after Oblivion, there are indeed new features, and old ones that have been refined to give a more user friendly and credible feel. I’ll list them.
– Dual Wield (As you know, wield both magic and weapons in either hands)
– Cooking (using recipes to make food that get better healing properties)
– Grindstone (Used with gathered materials to better equipment quality)
– Workbench (Used with gathered materials to create new armor pieces)
– Forge (Used with gathered materials to create new weapons)
– Tanning (Put a knife to a animal hide to gather leather and strips)
– Mining (Use a pick axe in your inventory to gather ore from rocks)
– Smelting (Use gathered ore to create ingots used in equipment creation)
– Alchemy Lab (Use ingredients acquired to create and try new potions)…
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|Best Game Ever?,
Well, it’s got some laughable bugs in it (NPCs don’t react if you put buckets or pots on their heads), the AI isn’t groundbreaking, the character dialogue can be a bit hammy and limited, and the enemy animation can sometimes be unconvincing. Now, with any other game these issues would be reasons to avoid purchase, but with Skyrim? They’re just facts. Facts of a new life you’ve since assumed that, at most, will make you shrug forgetfully as you gaze open-mouthed before yet another astonishingly beautiful vista; yet another inspirational discovery; yet another exciting mission; yet another adrenalined-fueled victory.
Already for me, this game is legendary – to date, it’s been out three days but It feels like i’ve played it for weeks. I’ve experienced so much – and I’m only level 24 out of . . . what? I don’t know. I won’t despoil it for you here, but suffice to say that some side quests have more depth to them than a fair few main story arc missions in its predecessor, Oblivion. I haven’t been as excited by the sense of discovery in any game I’ve played before (including HL2/Portal/etc). I spent quite a few hours after starting the game reading in-game books to get an idea of the backstory of the world (It’s been a few years since I played the last one). The books are actually good reads, and I found one that had told of a mysterious and intriguing legend associated with a wizard, which made me want to read more about it in a possible subsequent volume. Imagine my surprise and excitement upon closing the book, to see the ‘Mission Started’ writing across the screen, and a map location being added! This then, is a new kind of fantasy RPG – in the land of Skyrim you don’t just ruminate on secrets and legends left in the game world, you are expected to hunt them down and discover their truths for yourself, and play the role of intrepid explorer; someone who cannot be said to exist anymore in reality. It is a very rare thing to be able to capture that, and it speaks volumes for the game’s immersion that this is possible, for me at least.
How you explore the world then, is up to you. Since this game is actually five-games-and-a-world-in-one (be-a-fighter, be-a-Mage, be-a-Ranger, be-a-Thief, be-an-Assassin game), and Eidos Montreal’s Thief 4 is not out yet, I chose to be a Wood Elf Thief (Wood Elves are granted racial bonuses that work for thievery). I previously mentioned that the AI isn’t groundbreaking, but in reality, it’s slightly better than Deus Ex Human Revolution, which isn’t bad, but nothing original. For a Thief substitute, it does very well, as you are less visible in shadows and line-of-sight, while you get sneaking bonuses applied for the amount of detectable sound your armour makes while moving, plus you can spend perk points within that skill (given each time you level-up, overall) on becoming even more undetectable. Separate skill trees are available for pickpocketing and lockpicking, completing the game genre/class setup. Each skill levels up with repeated use (successful or otherwise – ie, get caught and the skill increases, break a lockpick and the skill increases) and I believe that eventually, after about level 30/35, I will no longer need to use weapons – my character will have all but assumed the role of Master Thief, Garret-Style. All this without even having joined a Thieves Guild, which I haven’t even heard of yet. Obviously, you don’t have to do this. You can be anything you want. There are 18 skill trees each with 10-15 points to spend your perks for each level-up, where each skill has a level cap of around 100 – so there’s no way you can get every one in a single playthrough.
And what a playthrough! I’ve mixed potions and poisons (the paralysis poison is something best used on arrows, shot at guards walking towards the edge of high battlements – hugely entertaining), cooked tomato soup (not out of a tin!), had a contract taken out on me (damned vigilant shopkeepers!), been voluntarily cursed by a prisoner (!?), chopped thousands of septims’ worth of wood, been chased off the edge of a cliff by a cave bear (gasping in awe at the view on the way down), cowered inside a stable (while a frost dragon perched on the roof), killed a giant spider (it had been given a name by some silly guards), trapped souls, killed vampires, eaten human flesh (trust me, you’ll try it too!) and explored a submerged shipwreck. And I’ve only been playing for a few days and made it through three missions of the main quest and about one-third of the map. It is an unrivalled epic, which will be remembered, like its predecessor, for years after you have set it down. It assumes the mantle of my favourite genre (stealth) and lets me modify it in an organic way to suit my style. It does all these things whilst looking absolutely beautiful. I mean Assassin’s Creed-killing beautiful. I honestly did not expect the 360 to be capable of such a feat, thinking that all trailer screens were…
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|A masterpiece. Back to Morrowind,
Warning: minor spoilers (not plot-related).
I had been waiting a long time to play Skyrim and I must say that all the hype was indeed justified; for once! It is complicated reviewing an RPG of this incredible depth. So first I committed myself to play for 80 hours before I sat down to write a review. It has been difficult to put the game aside and find the time to write this review, it is that good.
To give you some background, I played Oblivion and Fallout 3 to exhaustion and dabbled with Morrowind. In Skyrim I’m almost at level 39 with over 160 locations discovered and some 20 quests finished. I haven’t being doing many quests really; I have focused mainly on exploring. There are over 350 main locations and a plethora of other unmarked locations just to give you an idea. I’ve been playing at Master level since the very beginning and I highly recommend playing at this difficulty setting. Only below level 6 did I have to tweak down the difficulty level at times to face a tough opponent (i.e. Master Vampire).
As a quick run down:
Is it better than Oblivion? Yes, hands down. It is more “mature” and has a Morrowind-esque feeling to it which Oblivion lacked. A return to its classical TES roots.
Better than Fallout 3? Hard to say. Maybe marginally.
Is it better than Dark Souls? Yes
Better than The Witcher 2? Yes.
Is it better than DA2? Ha ha ha. Do you really have to ask this?
Has it been dumbed down? Yes and no. Rather than using this ugly expression, let us just say they’ve “streamlined” gameplay to enhance it rather than detract from it. DA2, for example, dumbed-down gameplay without achieving what Bethesda has -successfully- done. The decisions that have been taken are for the better to make gameplay smoother so as to speak. To remove, for example, athletics (so you are not encumbered jumping constantly around like a nutter to increase your skill- level), to remove having the Oblivion hammer system which forced you to hotkey your hammer after every single fight feel like appropriate changes that move the game forward.
I’m not sure however the removal of armour pieces was a good idea. In Oblivion you had 6 body armour pieces and this has been trimmed down to only 4 (helmet, armour, boots and gauntlets).
Pros
1. Graphics are very much improved. To the point that it feels realistic at times. In third-person view it has great visuals. Skyrim has in many instances a Dragon Age Origins-esque feeling to its graphics which I love. One of the most realistic-looking graphics for an RPG I’ve ever played. Totally immersive. I miss however the beautiful dawns and dusks from Oblivion which in Skyrim seem to have been neglected for some odd reason. In Oblivion I used to climb a high mountain just to see a beautiful dusk sunset. Particularly impressive are the way in which Dragons are rendered. They move and act almost life-like. Forget Oblivion’s Akatosh avatar in the final fight. More on that below.
2. Dragons! By far surpasses what we saw in Dragon Age Origins. When you look at them flying with the sun from behind, you actually get to see the detailed wing membranes. The way they move, roar and attack is most impressive. The music when you are in the midst of battling them is very rousing, epic like. Each and every battle is unexpected and can happen anywhere at any time. The first class of dragons are easy to kill even at Master level. Things get complicated when type B make their appearance (Blood dragons). And when you think you’ve finally mastered the fine art of dragon-killing along come type C (Elder dragons): run for your life. I forge my own armour and weapons. I have a master smithing skill level (100) (plus I drink a blacksmith potion to further enhance my weapon-making by 40%) AND I smith using enchanted gauntlets which eminent smithing spell (smithing increased plus 20%). Bottomline my gear is all very much improved at legendary status and even so Elder dragons kill me with a single blow blow, or with one fire breath. I even have enchanted gear like shields which give 60% protection to fire and boots that give you 30% protection but even so these dragons kill me with one blow. Unlike Oblivion, elemental protection level is capped at 85%. So it doesn’t matter if your gear gives you 100pc protection against fire, the limit is set at 85%. After memorable battles a dragon may drop some top-class gear i.e. Ebony armour or a special axe that sends Daedra of up to level 12 back to Oblivion.
3. Kudos to Bethesda art team. Everything looks so Scandinavian, so Viking like. Immersion is great, a big thank you. The game grows on you as you play.
4. The perks system is a killer. Why didn’t they do this before? The 18 skill-set is divided among the three major constellations (Warrior, Mage and Thief). A lot of thought has been put in the correct positioning of…
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