The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall

Regarded by some die-hard fans as the best game in the series, Daggerfall is certainly a substantial leap in quality over its predecessor.  The game now runs on a true 3D engine (Bethesda's own XnGine), the world is now a truly connected and cohesive one with over 15,000 towns and 750,000 NPCs, and the game even takes pains to simulate a virtual environment with various guilds the player can join to bolster their reputation, an economy where one can buy and sell various goods and even borrow money from banks, and fast travel has a more realistic element, with the player having different options like travelling by caravan, ship or just walking to save money (while taking much longer).  One can buy ships and horses to make navigation faster, and encountering certain enemies can have the player transform into a vampire, werewolf or wereboar (the former two of which would appear in later games as well).  There are even seven different possible endings to see, which gives the game some substantial replay value.  Make no mistake, though, that this is still a game which is largely procedurally generated - nearly every quest, dungeon, town and character one encounters is created by a random seed rather than a developer, and as a result of that and the dice-roll dependent gameplay, the game's difficulty tends to be very uneven.  You'll never be wanting for things to do in Daggerfall, but the fact that most of it is still generic, and its world not particularly interesting to see and interact with, will likely leave you pining for later entries in the series after a handful of hours.

Developer: Bethesda Softworks, Flashpoint Productions

Publisher: Bethesda Softworks

Released: 1996

Platforms: PC

The Elder Scrolls: Arena

Originally built as a medieval gladiator combat game (hence the name), The Elder Scrolls soon developed into something much more sprawling and ambitious, promising a massive open-world RPG with gameplay and design inspired by Ultima Underworld and literally tens of thousands of square miles of terrain, replete with equally massive numbers of towns, NPCs and monsters.  As worlds of this scale weren't exactly feasible in the era, though (even with the advent of CD technology), something had to give - in this case, nearly all of the game is randomly generated, with terrain, towns, NPCs and dialog, and just about every quest the player encounters falling into cookie-cutter territory.  The world map is also not as big as marketing would suggest; if you simply go out expecting to walk to another town, you'll never get anywhere as you'll be stuck on an endless procedurally-generated map, so fast travel is the only real way to traverse the world.  Much like Ultima Underworld and many other CRPGs before it, the game is quite unforgiving in many respects - even escaping the first dungeon is a trial that took me several attempts owing to its aggressive enemies who never grant you a moment's respite.  That, plus the fact that every action one takes in the game is based upon a dice roll (even combat, resulting in battles just looking like you awkwardly flailing at a target and missing most of your strikes), makes the game more of a chore to complete than a grandiose adventure.  A cult classic and origin of a legendary franchise it may be, but Arena is not a very auspicious game by any measuring stick today.

Developer: Bethesda Softworks

Publisher: Bethesda Softworks

Released: 1994

Platforms: PC

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

The fifth main entry in the Elder Scrolls franchise was a massive success for Bethesda, becoming a big hit among fans and critics as well as one of the best-selling video game titles of all time.  But is there enough here to appeal to long-time series fans as well, or does it change too much to an action-oriented format and alienate them?

Skyrim is a game that needs no introduction to modern gamers, as it was nothing short of an institution at the time of its release.  As with the earlier Elder Scrolls games, it introduced the player to an enormous, intricately-detailed fantasy world and gave them the freedom to do nearly anything they wished within it - exploring dungeons, fighting bosses, taking on a huge variety of side quests, or even doing more mundane things like gathering ingredients for alchemic potions, mining ore to craft swords and axes, or just taking on the role of a freelance thief or pickpocket.

The exploration aspect of the game feels considerably more well-refined in Skyrim's case, with a dense landscape to dotted with numerous towers, fortresses and caverns to explore.  Many of these have a bit more of a distinct "video game level", feel, with a series of puzzles, traps and enemy obstacles to overcome and usually capped off with a "boss encounter" featuring a powerful foe with some scripted events in the fight (such as a hagraven who summons more foes before teleporting away, only to confront the player later in the gauntlet).  Efforts are made to give a tangible reward at the end of each of these as well, whether it's a nice piece of loot that ties into a larger quest, another word for a Dragon shout (more on those in a bit) or just a nice magical weapon the player can keep or sell at their discretion.  Most even have a quick escape route after the boss is defeated, cutting down on time spent backtracking and keeping the overall gameplay flow smooth.

Combat in Skyrim has seen much improvement as well.  As in Oblivion and Fallout, enemies show a much greater degree of intelligence, requiring the player to time their attacks and blocks in order to counter their opponent's moves and to quickly identify the biggest threat in a group of enemies.  New options are afforded in the various "dragon shouts" the player acquires throughout the game, which have a variety of effects - sending enemies flying with a powerful blast of force, breathing fire, slowing time momentarily, or even speeding up one's own attacks in order to deal damage more quickly, to name just a few.  Spells are similarly overhauled, with the player now having the ability to use spells that consistently launch elemental damage or heal themselves as long as they hold the button, rather than having to continuously cast a spell over and over again.  Using a stealthier approach is beneficial at times as well, as the player can often pick off several opponents from a distance with a bow before they are alerted to the player's position and attack in force.

Dual-wielding weapons is also possible now, letting the player wield two one-handed weapons at a time and gaining the enchantments of both, as well as being able to attack more quickly.  However, this comes at a cost - characters cannot block attacks while dual-wielding, so while they deal out more damage, they will take more as well.  Learning to evade enemy attacks becomes more important when employing this style, and of course having a few spare potions around isn't a bad idea either.  Spells can be used in similar fashion, with the player equipping a different one in each hand and casting them separately, or even both at once, at their leisure.

But with this success came much criticism from long-time fans, who were quick to point out that several elements from earlier Elder Scrolls games were simplified or removed entirely.  Most noticeably, there are three melee weapon types now (swords, maces and axes) and no individual skills for them - instead, they are now coalesced into simple "One-handed weapon" and "Two-handed weapon" skills and are largely interchangeable.  Weapons also no longer break or degrade with use, which effectively takes away the Blacksmithing skill and its associated benefits.  There are no longer Unarmored or Unarmed skills in the game, making fist-fighting rather pointless and all but forcing mage-type characters to either avoid direct combat entirely or bring enchanted gear and spells to offset the disadvantage it puts them at.

Another common criticism is that some of the freedom afforded the player in earlier games is lost in the spell system.  Players no longer have the ability to make custom spells, instead having to find or buy spell books that give them pre-made effects.  Enchanting is somewhat more limited as well, as the player must now find a pre-existing magical weapon and "decompile" it at an enchanting altar, which destroys the weapon in the process but gives the player that spell effect to add to their own enchantments.  Many of these are randomly placed throughout the world, which can ensure that some effects (such as Banish) are entirely a matter of luck to find.

Perhaps the most stark change, however, is that the player's core stats are now completely removed from the game.  No longer does the player have things like Strength, Intelligence, Personality, Speed or Luck; instead, these are either fixed (such as move speed and jump height) or determined by the perks one receives through the refined skill system.  For example, once one reaches a certain level of proficiency in the One-Handed Weapons skill, they can buy a Perk that allows them to deal more damage with all one handed weapons, in effect giving them more "strength" and damage when using those types of weapons.  These don't always boil down to just numbers, either - training the Archery skill tree can give the player the ability to zoom in and slow down time in order to take more precise shots, while powering up the Stealth skill can remove the penalty for moving quickly while in sneaking mode.  Similarly, one can cast two of the same spell at the same time to get a bonus to its effect, whether extra damage, defensive buff or healing effect on themselves.  The Lockpicking tree has some benefits as well, even if the player has gotten quite good at the minigame associated with it - boosting it enough and buying new perks will grant bonus gold or rarer items in chests.  In short, the game abolishes a significant RPG element by doing away with core stats, but also makes efforts to preserve its roleplaying element by rewarding the player for sticking to a certain style of play, all while sacrificing none of the dynamic action of the game.  It's different, but works surprisingly well.

I feel that also sums up my feelings about the game as a whole.  While it makes some controversial changes to long-established genre and series tropes that were unpopular among many series fans and its main plot is pretty lacking compared to its predecessors, its action is quite engrossing and its atmosphere is quite heavy, though the fun books, dialog trees and notes from the earlier games that filled in a lot of its lore and backstory in an interesting way seem considerably less prevalent this time.  However, in spite of those issues, as well as series' trademark bugs and balance issues, Skyrim remains a fun adventure to undertake - one you can easily get immersed in for hundreds of hours.

Developer: Bethesda Game Studios
Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
Platform: Playstation 3, Xbox 360, PC, Playstation 4, XBox One, Switch
Released: 2011, 2016, 2017
Recommended version: As with the other Elder Scrolls games, I'd recommend the PC version solely on the fact that it features modding support, which allows for virtually unlimited replayability by tweaking some of its gameplay elements and adding new content.  The Playstation 4 and Xbox One ports include all of the DLC and have modding support as well, however, making them worth consideration for those looking for a console version.  Finally, the Switch version provides a bit of exclusive content (in the form of Amiibo support and an exclusive Link costume) and includes all the DLC from the earlier releases, making it an excellent portable version of the game.

Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

The fourth entry in the Elder Scrolls franchise marks a transition into a more dynamic-feeling game world and a much heavier emphasis on action-oriented gameplay than the flat dice rolls of its predecessors.  But does this change-up work in the franchise's favor, or has it simply lost any charm it held with this new format?

Elder Scrolls, despite being a 3D game experience from its origins, was always at its core a tabletop RPG, with a large emphasis on random dice rolls, statistics and role-playing being integral to enjoyment of the core experience.  Quests could easily be made or broken by a single skill roll and combat was overall rather dry, mostly just consisting of swinging or firing arrows/spells at an enemy and hoping you deplete its HP before it does the same to you.  This was somewhat necessary due to the game's heavily randomized design (with most quests in the game being randomly generated monster extermination/item delivery quests), but in light of the series' jump to a new engine and a smaller, more detailed game world with Morrowind, didn't make a great deal of sense there.  Particularly when one's actions could make key NPCs unwilling to talk to their character and when seemingly innocuous but actually plot-important NPCs could die, rendering the player unable to continue in the main quest.

For lack of a better description, Oblivion is less of a tabletop game and much more of a video game.  While obviously the player's abilities are still reliant on their stats, the overall gameplay now has something of a more common-sense approach.  For example, weapon statistics no longer roll a hit or miss based on your stat - if you see a weapon physically connect with an enemy, it counts as such.  However, boosting your weapon's stat can cause you to do more damage, and when certain milestones are hit, unlock new moves that can pierce an enemy's defenses or otherwise give you an advantage in a fight (such as knocking them down or disarming them).  Armor skills work in similar fashion, with the player unlocking benefits once they hit certain milestones, such as slower degradation or being able to perform defensive dodge maneuvers to evade enemy attacks.  Lockpicking is now governed by a minigame rather than a simple dice roll, though raising one's skill with it can give bonuses like not resetting all of the tumblers when a click is mistimed.  NPC interaction now works on this principle too, with a minigame that allows the player to raise or lower disposition by clicking quarters of a rotating circle with the right timing (or handing out bribes to gain a free boost).  Finally, the days of having to wander aimlessly around the landscape to find one's next goal are largely gone.  Oblivion features a first for the series with the advent of a waypoint system, pointing you to your currently selected objective with a marker on your map and compass.  Fast travel is also more convenient, returning to the Daggerfall-styled system of letting the player pick their destination on a map and quickly travel there at almost any time.  However, this only works for locations they have already visited, so there is still quite a bit of emphasis on exploring the game's world.

Great strides have also been made in making Oblivion's environment feel much more alive and realistic than in previous Elder Scrolls games.  NPCs now freely wander the world, operating by their own schedules and acting in a fairly realistic fashion - visiting pubs, talking in the streets, working at their shops at the day and going home at night, guards changing shifts and leaving brief gaps in their security, and so forth.  This can occasionally be annoying when a quest requires you to track down a particular NPC and speak to them at a specific time or place, but adds much to the immersion factor of the game overall.  The player can also no longer kill plot-essential NPCs (they will simply be "knocked unconscious" instead), so they no longer have to worry about putting the game into an unwinnable state as they pursue goals not relevant to the main quest.

Also helping matters is the fact that every character in the game is now voiced (and quite well at that), though this comes at the tradeoff of having far fewer dialog options than in previous Elder Scrolls games; generally, one can only ask NPCs about a limited range of topics referring to their profession, or the generic coverall choice of "Rumors".  This does lend itself to a lot of repeated dialog as well, with the game quickly achieving some notoriety for its frequent and inane conversations between NPCs.

As with most open-ended RPGs of this time, the game's sidequests are where much of the development's effort took place.  Oblivion is no different, and great strides have been made to make the sidequests much more diverse and interesting than the usual slew of slay-the-monster or deliver-the-item quests that plague most games of this type.  The thieves guild goals are largely open-ended, simply requiring the player to steal and fence a set amount of goods from any NPC they can before another story-driven quest comes up; these tend to be more high-profile, requiring the player to break into noble mansions or even castles to acquire a particular item.  The assassins' guild gets equally creative, with some particularly depraved moments throughout its questline that I won't spoil here (though anyone who has played the game will probably have vivid memories of the infamous party mission).  Even some of the one-off quests are quite fun, such as tracking down the cursed sword Umbra (in the hands of an extremely powerful and dangerous NPC) or just using a map and a few vague clues to seek out hidden treasures can all be quite fun.  The DLC missions are surprisingly good, too - from new strongholds for the the player to liberate, rebuild and decorate to their liking to  quests like Mehrunes' Razor to two fully-featured expansion packs in Knights of the Nine and Shivering Isles that add hours of new content and, in the latter's case, a pretty twisted sense of humor to the proceedings.  Of course, not all of it is golden; the notorious Horse Armor DLC is commonly cited among gamers as a prime example of overpriced and ultimately useless game addons, and is frequently blamed for a trend of them that persists to this day.

The main quest, on the other hand, doesn't feel quite as well-polished.  While it does tell a fun story, it does lend itself to several annoying moments.  Once the player gets a few steps into the main questline, "oblivion gates" begin spawning frequently throughout the countryside, which they can then enter and close by making their way through a series of towers and traps.  However, the lack of variety in these, as well as the frequently repeated enemies and layouts, quickly got me burned out on them; before long I just began ignoring them entirely.  They didn't give enough of a tangible reward to make them worth exploring after a while, and their layouts just ended up being more confusing to navigate than anything.  As many have also attested, the ending to the main questline feels rather rushed and more than a bit like a copout; indeed, developer comments reveal this is actually the case, with a lot more planned for the idea they had that was dropped due to looming deadlines.

Other signs of the game's somewhat rushed development are evident as well - many of the ruins and dungeon interiors one encounters look very similar, with a lot of the exact same wall textures and 3D models present throughout.  More infamously, though, some lines of dialog aren't voiced at all, while others contain outtakes that were accidentally left in the game, which is a bit awkward (and unintentionally funny) when one runs across them.  Character faces and lip-syncing are also rather awkward-looking overall, though this was still before such things were common elements of gaming, so it is forgivable to a degree.  The leveling system in the game leaves something to be desired too; enemies' strength scales up with the player's, which can lead to the game becoming exceptionally difficult if they gain too many levels without taking care to keep their equipment and spells up-to-date to deal with new threats; ironically, one way many players deal with this is to specialize in numerous skills they rarely (if ever) plan to use so that they can more easily control when they, and by extension the enemy - will gain levels and power up.  There are various player mods on the PC version to offset this, though you're kind of out of luck for the console ports.

Oblivion definitely took the Elder Scrolls series in a different direction, for both good and ill; the action it provides is satisfying for a time, as is the bigger focus on immersion with its voiceover, active world and story-driven questlines that rarely fall into the boring "go here get this and return" format.  However, its falls short in other ways - the base storyline is pretty dull, the balance is all over the map (and much easier to exploit than even Morrowind's) and the greatly simplified NPC interactions and still-not-great combat make its gameplay feel pretty monotonous after a while.  One step forward for gameplay, but a significant step back in storytelling, balance and polish factor.

Developer: Bethesda Game Studios
Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
Platform: PC, Playstation 3, Xbox 360
Released:  2006, 2007
Recommended version:  As with the other Elder Scrolls titles, I generally prefer the PC versions for their modding capabilities, as well as the ability to get the maximum benefit from the more powerful  hardware the platform generally allows.  Oblivion doesn't have quite as many mods as Morrowind or Skyrim, but the ones it does have - such as a leveling system overhaul, revamped interface, slews of new monsters and a variety of new spells to play with - nevertheless add much to the experience.

The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind

The game that put the Elder Scrolls franchise on the map and turned Bethesda into a major player in the gaming industry, as well as helping to redefine the entire RPG genre into something much more grandiose in scale.  But does Morrowind still hold up today, or is this an interesting piece of history that should remain in the past?

It's a bit hard to believe given the current gaming landscape, but Bethesda's Elder Scrolls franchise was actually rather unpopular in its earliest days.  While critics praised Arena for attempting to create a sprawling virtual world in a game engine similar to the Ultima Underworld franchise, its procedurally-generated environment, high system requirements and overall bugginess made its gameplay difficult to enjoy, which led to a mixed reception overall.  Still, its ambitious and open-ended design let it build a cult following that led to slow but steady sales, and Bethesda was eventually convinced to release a sequel two years later.  Daggerfall upped the ante even further, moving the game to a true 3D engine and giving the player guilds to join, the ability to build their own spells and enchant their own items, the option to become a werewolf, wereboar or vampire, and even simulated a virtual economy and law system.  However, much of the game was still randomly generated and it managed to be even buggier and more system-intensive than the original title, leading its developers to eventually release some of their development tools publicly so that players could attempt to fix it themselves.  Nevertheless, Daggerfall won over many gamers for its sheer scale as well as its open-ended design that encouraged character roleplaying (including six different possible endings to attain), and it attained great critical success for these factors as well.

Morrowind, the third numbered game in the franchise, followed six years later and drastically changed up the series' format.  Rather than giving the player free reign of the whole continent of Tamriel, the action was now restricted to a much smaller geographic area in the island of Vvardenfell.  The game no longer featured procedurally-generated towns, dungeons, quests or terrain, trading them in for a fixed game world populated by NPCs with scripted dialog and quests.  While this change did attract some criticism from long-time fans, both newcomers and veterans soon saw the benefits of this new style, being treated to a world full of unique sights and sounds that added much to the appeal of roaming the landscape and exploring its every facet instead of just skipping over everything with fast travel.  This was only further compounded by Vvardenfell's design - a strange, hostile and yet oddly beautiful environment filled with towering mushrooms, flying invertebrates, giant insects used for a variety of purposes (most prominently traveling from city to city), countless ruins and tombs to explore, and a dense history and lore told through NPC interactions and dozens of books that can easily stretch on for a dozen or more pages.  All of this was accompanied by an excellent soundtrack composed by Jeremy Soule, which only adds to the feel of the player being on a grand adventure with its overall uplifting feel and sense of intrigue.

But while the game's explorable boundaries have been greatly scaled down in size, Elder Scrolls retains its core appeal in that it is essentially a free-roaming role playing experience.  The player is given plenty of options to customize their character, with ten races to choose from, ten birthsigns to choose (which each grant either bonus stats or extra abilities) and a number of premade classes in addition to letting them create custom classes by picking  skills from a list.  Daggerfall's tradition also continues in that the player can only gain levels by using skills that pertain to their chosen class (a fighter, for example, can't level up by casting Illusion spells); however, boosing minor skills can allow them to earn greater stat gains when it comes time to level up.  The player can buy or find premade spells, potions and enchanted weapons, or if their skill level is high enough, even create their own.  There are countless quests to explore in the game and numerous factions to join, some of which even skirt the bounds of the law like the Thieves' Guild and the Morag Tong (government-sanctioned assassins).  One can even become a vampire or (in the Bloodmoon expansion) a werewolf in order to put a new spin on the game, though both of these carry substantial drawbacks as well, making them more of a novelty or an avenue of challenge than anything else.

While efforts have definitely been made to make Morrowind a more immersive and realistic place, there are still some things lacking in the game that were present in earlier RPGs like Ultima.  Most NPCs don't abide by any real schedule according to their occupation or the time of day, mostly just standing in place or being restrained to a small area to roam about aimlessly.  Many NPCs serve no real interesting purpose, either just repeating canned lines in response to player queries or even having nothing at all to say when spoken to.  Creature AI is disappointingly simple for the most part, simply having them stay in a small area until the player wanders in close enough for them to notice, at which point they immediately run to them and attack.  Combat as a whole in the game is also rather underwhelming, often consisting of little more than holding and releasing the attack button (or firing off a spell) and rolling the dice with each swing/spell until your target dies.  While one does still have the ability to swing, thrust or bash with any weapon as in the earlier Elder Scrolls titles, there is an option that simply enables the player to always use their particular weapon's strongest attack, rendering it rather pointless.  Voiceover in the game, while of decent quality, is relatively limited, with only a few plot-relevant characters having distinct dialog and most NPCs being limited to a handful of canned lines corresponding to their race and gender.

Another element present in earlier Elder Scrolls games but oddly absent here is freeform fast-travel.  In Arena and Daggerfall, one could travel to any location on the map by either clicking it's icon, or, in Daggerfall's case, typing in part of its name on the map screen and pointing the player toward the nearest match.  Morrowind's fast travel is considerably more limited, having the player travel by boat, Silt Strider or teleporting between Mage's Guilds, all of which only take them to a small handful of fixed locations (which vary by your current location - one can only travel to relatively close-by towns).  While this does arguably get the player more immersed in the environment, it can lead to frustration as they may have to travel through areas filled with dangerous enemies and low draw distance for a fairly long period before they discover their destination.  This was also before the ever-controversial objective markers became the norm in open-world games, so finding an area tucked between two large mountains or a switch needed to enter a Dwemer ruin can quickly lead to frustration as well.  Moreso because moving at a decent clip requires one to deplete their Fatigue meter, and when it is low, all of their skill and attack rolls suffer as well.

Finally, and as most people who have played the game eventually figure out, its overall balance leaves much to be desired.  There are methods in the game by which one can quickly earn thousands upon thousands of gold pieces with only a few minutes of work, which they can then turn around and spend on training with one of the game's many NPCs who offer it, maxing out their skills and levels in mere minutes while doing so manually could take many, many hours.  One can also boost their stats to absurd levels through clever use of alchemy, brewing potions that last for days of game time and grant thousands of points in Strength, Luck or whatever stat they may wish to boost (in a game where the normal statistic maximum is 100).  One can even give themselves a 100% Chameleon effect through clever armor enchantments and effectively make themselves untouchable, as no NPC will even attempt to attack a target they cannot see.  While it can be amusing to see just how far the game can be pushed in this direction, it does considerably dampen the immersion factor that Elder Scrolls seems to pride itself on.

Regardless of its faults, however, Elder Scrolls was a monumental step forward for both the franchise and for CRPGs on the whole.  It's amazingly realized world, intriguing storyline and dense lore set a new standard for the genre, and for many console players whose genre exposure was primarily limited to the more linear, anime-esque fare of Japanese RPGs, it was a very drastic change of pace.  While it may not be the best-balanced experience or have the same gameplay hook as its sequels (or arguably even its prequels), its immersive design, ingenious narrative and sense of freedom ensure Morrowind is nevertheless a game of interest for any serious genre fan.

Developer: Bethesda Game Studios
Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
Platform: PC, XBox
Released: 2002
Recommended version: Both versions of the game are essentially the same (being developed concurrently and released a month apart), though the PC version gets the benefits of its platform by allowing players to create custom mods for all manner of tweaks and additional content through the use of the included Elder Scrolls Construction Set.  This allows for all sorts of balance tweaks as well as new features like more convenient fast travel, magic regeneration and entirely new questlines, weapons, enemies and so forth, so it is definitely the version to play these days.  A fan-created executable called "OpenMW" also makes it run flawlessly under modern operating systems and further expands what it will be capable of (with multiplayer co-op in an experimental state), so keep an eye on that too.