I think at this point it’s a lot of nostalgia. But the game does have a lot in it, so once the jank becomes endearing rather than off-putting, it is easy to lose yourself in my experience. There are still heaps of quests and parts of the game I haven’t finished. And if I want to replay something, I can approach it very differently each time.
I think it’s an okay game. I think it was the best available game with mass appeal (see overlap of marketing with early Game of Thrones) during formative years for a lot of people, which extended and amplified the volume of discourse.
To be clear, I think the game is still fine, but like the worst kind of fine. Like mediocre fine. Like I find the vast majority of quests absolutely mind numbingly boring, even if they technically add to the experience and function perfectly well
People point at the fact that you can walk in practically any direction and stunble on a quest or landmark, but I really have to ask how many times they’ve actually done that?Let alone how many have gone on to complete the quest or dungeon once found
Almost all quests and dungeons, outside of the main story/side quests, felt practically identical. It gets to the point where you feel like you’re forcing yourself into cave number 196 just to get another level up so you can pick locks slightly easier, meanwhile all the enemies become slightly beefier, undoing all your progress
And don’t get me started on the levelling system. I hate how enemies don’t really get harder the further into the game you are, but rather they just have more health and damage. When you can barely go back to some bandits at the start of the game after 15 hours it really feels defeatist
Compare this to botw and elden ring. Yes, they have a similar problem where their shrines and catacombs started feeling samey towards the end (and on subsequent playthroughs), but each one still had a unique gimmick, making them stand out amongst their peers. I love replaying each one every now and then (gone through botw 6 times, elden ring 3, started skyrim 15+ times and completed 0)
The most fun I’ll always have with Skyrim is wistfully thinking what my next character should be, before playing for ~2 hours, and remembering all my problems with the game
I think at this point it’s a lot of nostalgia. But the game does have a lot in it, so once the jank becomes endearing rather than off-putting, it is easy to lose yourself in my experience. There are still heaps of quests and parts of the game I haven’t finished. And if I want to replay something, I can approach it very differently each time.
I think it’s an okay game. I think it was the best available game with mass appeal (see overlap of marketing with early Game of Thrones) during formative years for a lot of people, which extended and amplified the volume of discourse.
100%
To be clear, I think the game is still fine, but like the worst kind of fine. Like mediocre fine. Like I find the vast majority of quests absolutely mind numbingly boring, even if they technically add to the experience and function perfectly well
People point at the fact that you can walk in practically any direction and stunble on a quest or landmark, but I really have to ask how many times they’ve actually done that?Let alone how many have gone on to complete the quest or dungeon once found
Almost all quests and dungeons, outside of the main story/side quests, felt practically identical. It gets to the point where you feel like you’re forcing yourself into cave number 196 just to get another level up so you can pick locks slightly easier, meanwhile all the enemies become slightly beefier, undoing all your progress
And don’t get me started on the levelling system. I hate how enemies don’t really get harder the further into the game you are, but rather they just have more health and damage. When you can barely go back to some bandits at the start of the game after 15 hours it really feels defeatist
Compare this to botw and elden ring. Yes, they have a similar problem where their shrines and catacombs started feeling samey towards the end (and on subsequent playthroughs), but each one still had a unique gimmick, making them stand out amongst their peers. I love replaying each one every now and then (gone through botw 6 times, elden ring 3, started skyrim 15+ times and completed 0)
The most fun I’ll always have with Skyrim is wistfully thinking what my next character should be, before playing for ~2 hours, and remembering all my problems with the game