I find myself struggling to write this review. How do I begin to describe the majesty that is Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. It’s a daunting task to be sure, so daunting in fact that I have been dreading writing this review for the past two days. I just can not do this game justice, I carry neither the vocabulary nor the emotional depth to put this long lost feeling of wonder and awe into words that would do it justice. It’s the same feeling I had playing games like Legend of Zelda, or Final Fantasy 7 for the first time. The same feeling that I had begun to think had been driven out of me due to age, cynicism, and an industry that seems to care about the bottom line and little else.

Tonight while staring at the blank page I decided to keep it simple and simply say that Bethesda put the magic back in video games for me, and for that I will be forever grateful.

Skyrim feels more alive and dynamic than any virtual world I have ever experienced. It’s a place where simply traveling from point A to point B can present a multitude of possibilities and diverging paths. None of which feel like they have been set there to artificially increase your play time. Instead random encounters, be it friend or foe, feel like a natural side effect of being a part of this world. Skyrim does not feel the need to hold the players hand, or treat it’s audience like a spoiled youth needing to be catered to. It is unrelenting in it’s depth and difficulty, forcing the player to adapt and experiment with new play styles and mechanics that might have gone unnoticed in a lesser game.

This lack of coddling provides the player with an amazing sense of achievement when obstacles are overcome, and enemies have been defeated. It’s something that has been lost in video game development this generation, and it’s nice to see that at least one developer out there still gets it.

Graphics:

Skyrim is so vast in it’s scope and grandeur that small graphical issues such as the occasional low res texture, or nasty bit of clipping are immediately forgivable. I was fully expecting to run into large amounts of slow down, anticipating my 360 melting as it struggled to keep up with all the polys being pushed. Happily it didn’t go down that way, even while fighting some of the larger bosses.

I did encounter a few bigger issues that bear noting. Such as bosses clipping out of view entirely, only to pop right back in a moment later. My character, and sometimes my companions getting stuck in animations until a collision would snap us out of it. This did provide me with a couple of chuckles as I floated around Dragon’s Reach looking like a medieval Jedi levitating myself, while in actuality I was just stuck mid-jump.

The look of Skyrim and the citizens that inhabit it help give the game it’s visual appeal. Towns and people look authentic to Skyrim’s fantasy setting and provide a level of realism to an unreal world. Trolls, dragons, werewolves, and giants, all standard fare in a fantasy setting, feel fresh and newly experienced thanks to amazing design work by Bethesda’s art team. These are not the monsters from video games past, and it’s nice to see an innovative take on them. Environments change depending on the region of Skyrim you are in, and all look amazing. Traveling the mountain path to meet with the Greybeards and watching the environment change from balmy spring day to snow covered mountain top was pretty special, and added a level of tactility that echoed one of my other favorite games this generation, Red Dead Redemption.

Skyrim stumbles a bit with it’s combat animations and magic effects. While not an eyesore by any stretch of the imagination, it does seem that a little more time could have been spent polishing. Especially the death blow animations as on more than one occasion I was viewing them from weird angles which made it appear as I hadn’t even made contact with the enemy I was supposedly killing. It bears noting that I have been playing the game from it’s third person view almost exclusively. Yes, I should have allocated equal time for both features but third person just feels more natural for me. I’m sure playing from the first person perspective would have decreased the amount of issues I encountered. If you buy Skyrim tomorrow make sure to not patch the game. Play offline until you have found a giant and let him smash you with his hammer. Everyone should experience getting launched into orbit like their name was Sputnik before Bethesda fixes the issue.

Gone are the days of conversations with “dead eyed” NPC’s. Skyrim’s conversation system has a more dynamic look to it, allowing the player to pan the camera around for different vantage points. Again, this was in third person mode and the few times I did zoom into first person I was pleasantly surprised to find I wasn’t staring straight ahead into the face of an obviously soulless AI.

Gameplay:

Skyrim’s mechanics are not the smoothest, they aren’t the most intuitive, but somehow they still feel right and are very enjoyable. Weapons have weight and momentum when swung, but impact with your intended target provides little to no satisfaction. Crafting, what little crafting I did, seems to be a deep system with supplies readily available to be foraged or looted in the open world or for sale in shops.

Bethesda has also provided players with a means of improving their weapons and armor through the blacksmith system. By applying various minerals, and attaining the proper level, players can upgrade their favorite weapons to (fine) giving them a boost in damage and value. Weapons and armor can also have enchantments, poisons, and other stat effects placed on them increasing there overall effectiveness.

The level progression in Skyrim is pretty similar to what we have seen in the Fallout games. After leveling up, the player can allocate points into traits that will increase anything from armor proficiency, to speech which unlocks additional dialogue options. Each trait has it’s own tree, the deeper you go in any given trait the more skills or enhancements you unlock. Players will also have to choose which key attribute they want to level as well, those being health, magic, and stamina. Skyrim does not lock you into a specific role or class, you build your character and decide what you want them to be without the restrictions of a preset template. Want to be an all powerful mage, a bad ass swordsman, or a mixture of the two? No problem!

I found the lack of a hotkey system somewhat disappointing. Would it have been so hard to have let us map weapons and spells to specific keys? I’m guessing that this is something Bethesda wanted to implement but for some reason couldn’t make it work. Instead we got a kind of half baked quick select system that is activated by pushing up on the d-pad. This pauses the game and allows the player to pick an item, spell, weapon, etc… from a list of favorite items in their inventory. Sure it works, but pausing the game puts a break in the action and thus a break in the immersion. I would have preferred hotkeys.

Traveling around on foot is a blast, and you never know what you might find around the next curve in the path. Horses are available as a mode of transport, no they weren’t wearing any armor, and no I did not mount up and cut my trip time in half. Skyrim is such an interesting and full world that I didn’t want to miss anything interesting by accidentally galloping by it. Not once did I think to myself “God I wish I would just get there already!” as there was always something to entertain me along the way, be it a cave to explore or giants to slay.

Story:

The story of Skyrim, and the “Dragon Born” isn’t the most original or innovative. It’s pretty standard fare actually. The main character stumbles into a situation, finds out he has a special destiny and in this case birthright, then undertakes an epic quest to save the world. It’s not wholly unfamiliar, but the magic isn’t in the originality. It’s in the presentation.
Skyrim’s story is better than most because it puts players in situations we love to be in. We all want to slay the dragon, Skyrim lets us do just that but presents the encounter in a way we really haven’t seen before. I really do not want to say too much as it’s pretty amazing, and something that should be experienced first and talked about later.

The game is so non-linear it’s ridiculous. I kind of love that. You can travel anywhere, at any time, and do pretty much anything you want. Whether that means robbing a town blind while it’s citizens sleep, or clearing out a dungeon you stumbled across while exploring. Just keep in mind that your actions will have an affect on the main quest, and how you are perceived by the people you meet.

I’ve heard some people complain about Skyrim, saying that the game needs to be more focused, and that this lack of linearity causes the player to lose track of his main objective. I haven’t experienced this at all. I’ve enjoyed most of the random encounter and side quests I’ve experienced. Very few felt pointless or uninteresting and usually took me someplace I hadn’t been, or provided me with a way to upgrade my character through loot, the gaining of a new companion, or experience.

I will say that I think Bethesda could have done something really special with it’s companion system by taking a few notes from Dragon Age. All in all they really don’t serve much of a purpose other than combat support and extra storage. I absolutely would have liked to see companions incorporated into the main story a bit more, as it stands I don’t even remember their names and developed no real connection to them.

Replayability:

Skyrim is a two, possibly three playthrough game. Even more for the really hardcore fans of this game, which I’m sure there are going to be a ton of. There is so much in the world to see, and so many different ways to build your character which in turn changes the story, that it seems like someone would be cheating themselves if they only played Skyrim once. Throw in the inevitable DLC packs, which hopefully will be of a similar quality as Fallout 3′s dlc, and we could be playing Skyrim well into 2012 and possibly beyond. Let’s just try to avoid any horse armor drama this time around Bethesda…

Conclusion:

I was not a fan of Oblivion, it never captured me as it did so many others. I never understood why fans of Oblivion lofted Bethesda up on their shoulders like a conquering hero who had saved them from miserable gaming experiences, at least for a time. Worse than that, I would poke fun at these little bastards and their level of devotion to both game, and developer.

You guys were right, I was wrong.

With Skyrim, Bethesda has crafted one of the best gaming experiences of this generation, possibly of any generation. I can think of no higher compliment then to say that I do not want the game to end, as that would bring the immense amount of enjoyment Skyrim has brought me to an end as well. At least until I start another playthrough…