The Elder Scrolls in my favourite ever gaming franchise, and the 4th iteration, Oblivion, might be my most played single player game ever, it was the first ever RPG of this style I'd ever played and it utterly absorbed me. It might not look much now, even a touch cartoonish, but at the time I thought it was an immense work that I found charming, fascinating and immersive beyond any gaming experience I'd ever had. I don't think that game had any quest or playstyle that I didn't complete during the thousands of hours I spent playing it.
Skyrim followed, which for all the criticism it got as a watered-down RPG experience was still an immense game, that probably drew criticism due to Bethesda's milking of it rather than the game itself. It certainly didn't capture my imagination in the way Oblivion did, but I still put massive hours into the game and still play it now, ten years on from release. My love for these two titles did lead to me getting Morrowind, which has fantastic lore and a good story, but in all honesty it felt like a slog for me with the combat so clunky that it destroyed immersion. I know it was incredible for it's time, it just hasn't aged well in my opinion.
So now, with Skyrim approaching a decade old, there are a few trickles of news and a couple of teasers as to where the game might be set. We've had Vvardenfell of Morrowind, Skyrim, Cyrodiil and past iterations have taken in High Rock and Hammerfell in one shape or form. Obviously ESO has spanned the breadth of Tamriel but I've never played it and am not interested in an MMO.
Elsweyr and Black Marsh, as cool as they would be, would probably now feel too alien on their own to set the game in and still market to a mass audience. Equally, the lore of places like Valenwood (carnivorous Elves living on huge migratory tree-cities) may be a bit too weird a sell these days, even given Morrowind being equally out there. Skyrim had the cool Viking aesthetic whilst also riding the wave of Game of Thrones hysteria at the time, so was extremely easy to market to a Western Audience. I think from the teasers, a High Rock/ Hammerfell combo would be a good idea. You can have your easily marketable more typical 'western knights and magic' content from High Rock, which will be Bretons in French-themed medieval chateaus and castles etc as well as Hammerfell including deserts, seas, sand-swathed fortresses etc and a completely different aesthetic to High Rock.
Story wise, it's difficult to pinpoint what they'll do and what era it will be set in. The first four games were all set within 50 years of one another as far as I'm aware, and acted in more of a sequel-type fashion. They then jumped over 200 years to Skyrim and completely changed the make-up of the lore and where the story of Tamriel was at that point. I'd like to stay in a similar timeframe to Skyrim and would like to see a story geared towards the resolution of the tensions between The Empire and the Aldmeri Dominion. Hammerfell fits into this as the only area that ceded from the Empire but still fought off the Dominion to maintain independence, as of Skyrim times.
Personally I never really enjoyed the dragons, so have no strong wish to see them return. I also think the Elder Scrolls needs to stay in that rough time setting because swords, magic, bows etc suits it far better than advancing too far. It needs to stay absolutely distinct from Fallout for example.
I want it to stay a true RPG experience and not water it down any further, Skyrim took the formula a bit too far away from what it had been in the previous games and removed too much of the challenge and complexity. Morrowind and Oblivion has a few gameplay elements I'd like to see reinstated, even if it does add to the game feeling a touch less accessible to casual players (won't happen). I also want them to remove the hand-holding element that came with Skyrim, direct pointers showing you to every single thing even if you realistically had no way of knowing that information.
What do you anticipate? What do you want to see? Will you get it day one?
