oh em gee

Quote :

I didnt like how the old system paused the world, so like if something was going on behind the npc your talking to, it would just freeze until you stopped talking, even light sources and like fire from torches would freeze which really hurt the immersion

thats true, i'd forgotten about that

Quote :

The new dialog system makes it so you can just walk away from npc's that are talking without having to click the correct sequence of dialog choices to exit dialog mode that the old games had

but with this the character is going to keep talking to themselves until you get a set distance away. i can almost guarentee it won't be lifelike so this'll probably be as bad for immersion as the first one, although perhaps a bit more convenient

Quote :

Im going to play the PC version so i dont care about the targeting system changes, unless they force it on PC users, which i doubt they would do

you're ridiculous. go find a wall to argue with, im still not going to bite.

Serenity09 wrote:

but with this the character is going to keep talking to themselves until you get a set distance away. i can almost guarentee it won't be lifelike so this'll probably be as bad for immersion as the first one, although perhaps a bit more convenient

True, but id rather take that immersion breaker then the other one
I mean in oblivion if your holding something when someone talks to you it freezes all glitched pressing into their face while they talk like your trying to smother them with w/e you were holding, or if you had just cast a spell the spell visual effect freezes, its annoying
Also you can make a spell like charm 100 for 1 second as soon as you get all the recommendations for the mages guild, and use it on an npc and talk to them immediately after and the charm 100 effect lasts the entire time you talk to them since the stats freeze to
So you can slide the haggle bar all the way to get the lowest prices for buying and the highest prices for selling, or get any information from them without having to do that disposition minigame
Which makes speechcraft and mercantile pointless
You can even use it on guards right before they come up to arrest you and they will just let you go
You couldve just went on a mass murder spree in town and the guard will like you so much that he lets you off with a warning

But Im hoping they can get it right with the new system, like when you walk away they yell at you or something
Maybe lower their disposition towards you a little

Serenity09 wrote:

you're ridiculous. go find a wall to argue with, im still not going to bite.

The walls are on my side with this one

Quote :

Also you can make a spell like charm 100 for 1 second as soon as you get all the recommendations for the mages guild, and use it on an npc and talk to them immediately after and the charm 100 effect lasts the entire time you talk to them since the stats freeze to

remember in morrowind where you could lower a skill to 1 and then talk to any trainer and raise it for 1g?
ahhh good times

Quote :

So you can slide the haggle bar all the way to get the lowest prices for buying and the highest prices for selling, or get any information from them without having to do that disposition minigame
Which makes speechcraft and mercantile pointless

mercantile and speechcraft have been useless in every game ever.
except for as dummy skills so you can control when you level, but that isn't really a point in their favor.

Quote :

But Im hoping they can get it right with the new system, like when you walk away they yell at you or something
Maybe lower their disposition towards you a little

i agree, thatd be awesome

Quote :

The walls are on my side with this one

bribes.

Pat1487 wrote:

Serenity09 wrote:

you're ridiculous. go find a wall to argue with, im still not going to bite.

The walls are on my side with this one

This guy is really stupid ^

AmAzIn[G]232 wrote:

Pat1487 wrote:

Serenity09 wrote:

you're ridiculous. go find a wall to argue with, im still not going to bite.

The walls are on my side with this one

This guy is really stupid ^

Yes, seren is stupid
Hes not going to argue pc vs console, but will argue pc vs mac to the death
I should switch to the mac side

Macs are better then PCs because....
Hmmm
Macs can ....
PCs cant ....
Macs cost les- ....
Uhhhh
Macs start faster, sometimes
Macs are dumbed down to the point where anyone is able to use it easily?

Yeah this isnt working
Lets try this: http://apcmag.com/15_reasons_macs_are_still_better_than_windows.htm

Less blinking lights are why mac is better
Pc users have those pesky lights that quickly and easily give you visual feedback on certain aspects of your laptop
That should be 1 of your top 5 reasons to get a mac




Seriously though, if you play elder scrolls on a console your worse then hitler
You might as well just round up all the mac users and commit genocide
Oh wait, i dont think mac has enough users to count as genocide

Spoiler:

pat wrote:

Lets try this: http://apcmag.com/15_reasons_macs_are_still_better_than_windows.htm

you know what
you've convinced me

macs are better then pc's

reason 1:
reliable sleep mode
this killer feature cannot be underestimated. considering the cause and effect relationship of owning a mac to being 90+ years old, you yourself are gonna have to take a nap at the drop of a hat. thus you may want to consider giving this feature its own sticky note since you'll probably forget it in 5 minutes anyway you old fuck.

reason 2:
extremely fast boot times
lets face it
you can count the days you've got left to live on 1 hand, and by god you ain't gonna spend an extra 10 seconds waiting on goddamn itunes to start up.

reason 3:
apple uses good quality parts
cuz you know, picking out good quality parts on your own is really hard
it requires eyes
and a brain
OH MY GOD DO THE PREREQUISITES EVER END?

Spoiler:

reason 4:
bright lights
everyone knows the flashy thing with the trashcan is useless, but we also know that times are hard and duck tape/stickers are expensive - so just buy a mac now and save money!

reason 5:
os x is just better then windows
not only can i run both OS's legitimately on a mac, having my own stash of kiddie porn is not only considered fair play but is thoroughly recommended.
hell the newer versions of macs feature a port for male stimulation!
now masturbating all over yourself in hipster coffee shops has never been easier, you pretentious fuck.

Spoiler:

Serenity09 wrote:

reason 3:
apple uses good quality parts
cuz you know, picking out good quality parts on your own is really hard
it requires eyes
and a brain
OH MY GOD DO THE PREREQUISITES EVER END?

seeing as how i'm the only one that hasn't had a major hardware malfunction in the past few years, your eyes and brain must really suck.

define "only one" cause i havent had any sort of hardware major hardware malfunction... like ever

my friends mac just crashed like a week ago and we all laughed good long time.


also i think its stupid that they say "macs are better cause they can run both OS"

- mac users want/need windows so apple makes it so you can use windows

- windows users know macs suck and dont want/need it so microsoft doesnt waste their time making it compatible

So back to Skyrim, which was what this topic was originally about

I played it today and its pretty good
I havent really gotten far enough to judge it though, but so far i like it better then oblivion

The skill tree like progression for perks when you level up is a really nice system
Its like how in Diablo 2 you get 3 skill trees and the skill you can pick is based on your character level
Except here its 18 skill trees and they are based on your proficiency at that skill, so lets say you use a one handed sword as your primary means of attack your one handed weapon skill will increase and when it reaches 20 you can pick perks from the one handed tree that require your one handed weapon skill to be 20, even if your character is only level 2

Going inside a building is instanced, and some of the bigger towns are to, but not all of them
Theres even a lot of random buildings that you can find while youre walking in the middle of no where
So the world feels large

You can pickpocket people, which by itself isnt all that cool, but you can pickpocket someone like a courier thats delivering a message, steal the message he was to deliver and use what the message said to your advantage or to get information that helps you talk to people that you wouldnt normally be able to get
You might even be able to deliver the message yourself if you want

The shops sell stuff that you cant steal, which was disappointing to me
There was this badass robe that cost like 2k and i went around the entire shop looking for where that robe was to steal it since i couldnt afford it
The shops in general have less for you to steal, alot of the products they sell arent physically in the shop for you to see, but then theres stuff thats not for sale in the shop that is physically in the shop

The menu system on the PC version is pretty bad, you cant click anything that isnt highlighted and you have to highlight things by using W A S and D (or the arrow keys)
Tab acts as the back button and E acts as the confirm button
At first i thought something was wrong with the game because i couldnt click Options
Once you get used to how it works it isnt that bad, i can overlook it
The map works as you would expect it to though, you can click and use the mouse there all you want, which i find odd, they made it work for the map, but not for anything else
There was something wrong with my game, its fixed now, the menu works like a standard menu, you can click anything you want on the screen at any time

Theres no easy way to switch between weapon sets
You can have favorite weapons/items and bring up a menu to quickly select them but theres no way to use the quick select menu to equip 2 spells at the same time if you already have a weapon equipped
The way i play, i want to use a bow for long range, dual destruction spells for medium range, and 1 handed weapon/shield for when i run out of mana, then back to spells if they are still alive once i regen some mana
The problem is that theres no way to quickly go from sword/shield to dual spells, even using the quick favorite menu
What ends up happening is that the shield gets replaced by the spell and the weapon wont switch out at all
You can use the favorites menu to unequip your weapon from the right hand and then equip a spell, you can also use hotkeys 1-8 for weapons/spells/items, just that theres nothing that tells you how you can so you have to figure it out on your own, and its not that intuitive
Its not as quick as i would want it either since dual casting is still a bit of a prob when you want to go from dual casting 2 of the same spell to 2 of a different spell

Some of the side quests have alot of different outcomes, i did one where i think there was 4 ways for it to end, and i think i got the worst one (my reward was 25 gold and a bard that will follow me)
I like how some of the side quests happen by accident, like you just wander into a situation and have to deal with it
I havent done enough side quests to know if thats how most of them work, or if those are just rare, but if thats how alot work it would be great

Crafting is really well done
Well, crafting armor/weapons is done well
Crafting potions is just confusing
I mixed together 7 or 8 different combinations of stuff trying to make any kind of potion and all i got was Potion with Unknown effect, which wouldve been fine, but every time i tried to make the unknown potion it said that it failed
I need to mess with it more to find out what im doing wrong
I havent tried enchanting yet
I figured out crafting potions, you eat the raw potion ingredients to find out what effects they have, which i like, using yourself as a human guinea-pig
Then you can make potions of those effects once you eat enough of different types and figure out what effects they have
Enchanting works by disenchanting magic items you find to learn the effects of that magic item, once you learn the effect you can enchant any item with that effect, unlike potion crafting though you know what magic items will give you what effects by just reading what effects that magic item has, you also need sould gems, which im not entirely sure how to fill

There are puzzles in the game
Mostly combination locks that use symbols as the code
Ive only encountered 2 of them so far, so i shouldnt say mostly
The first one you encounter is easy, the 2nd i didnt even figure out, i just kept trying combinations until it opened
I looked everywhere for the symbols that were on the lock on the 2nd one and couldnt find them in any order, i tried interpreting the stuff on the walls nearby, and trying to find meaning in the design of the structure of the surrounding area in relation to the symbols on the door, but i just couldnt come up with it, i bet it was something easy, like written in a book nearby that i just didnt see or something
Even though i failed miserably and had to resort to spending 10 mins putting in codes 1 at a time, it was fun
It turned out that the solution was on the item you retrieve, just that my game was sorta broke at the time and i was unable to zoom in on it


Ill play some more when i have time and update this post or make another with more stuff
If youve played it, tell me what you think of it so far

Serenity09 wrote:

but with this the character is going to keep talking to themselves until you get a set distance away. i can almost guarentee it won't be lifelike so this'll probably be as bad for immersion as the first one, although perhaps a bit more convenient

This actually happens, you called it

The NPCs sometimes talk with each other as if you are standing there, even if you are just arriving to the area, they will be in the middle of a conversation that you shouldve been there for
This usually only happens during group talks though, when its you and 2 or more people interacting, if its just you and another they normally wont talk to themselves
But it causes another problem where theres awkward silences between lines when waiting for an NPC to get into the right position before he talks to you

Also since the world doesnt pause like in Oblivion other problems arise when talking to people
Like if you stole a horse and get off it to talk to someone you meet on the road, while your talking the horse will wander off down the path, depending on how long you talk it might be impossible to find it
Another example was i went to an inn in one of the main towns, in this town there just happened to be 4 quest related NPCs that gathered there for unrelated reasons (1 was supposed to be there)
I was there on a specific quest, while i was doing the actions of that quest in the inn the other quest NPCs were talking to me about their respective quests, 1 of them actually activated the next step of the quest while i was on the quest i went there to do, so it was really hectic
That woulve been awesome if they were aware of each other all talking to me at once, but as it was it felt ridiculous

A funny example of this, that i can go into more detail about without spoilers, was when i found a group of 3 (friendly) hunters randomly in the wilderness, they wanted me to drink with them, while we were talking (while i was deciding if i should trust them and drink what they wanted me to drink) a bear came out of no where and started to maul the guy on the left
The guy being attacked reacted like you would expect but the other 2 just stood there, so i carried the conversation on as if there was no bear
When it was the left guys turn to speak the other 2 looked in his direction while he was being mauled and just stared waiting for him to say something
When the guy died the conversation ended and the other 2 attacked the bear like normal

Has no one played Skyrim?

Im surprised no one posted anything

Nope

ive been playing it so much i havent been on the forums (and other things have kept me busy)

so far i like it, its been awhile since i played oblivion but some of the things just feel better

killing dragons makes you feel so badass its quite epic

in oblivion the thieves guild was cooler

and you can apparently get married

for side quests there was this epic one that im in the middle of in which it started by me joining a drinking contest and then i blacked out and woke up on the other side of skyrim with no memory of the events of that night (totally reminded me of the hangover the whole time)


oh and im a werewolf now.

Killing dragons gets ridiculous though
I have a huge stockpile of dragon bones/scales, theres 2 permanent dragon corpses in the middle of the mage's collage courtyard (one is a blood dragon, not sure what the difference is yet)
The first couple times was badass, after that it starts getting silly with how many dragon kills you rack up

But killing dragons is more fun then dealing with oblivion gates

This theives guild is less honorable, more like what i would think of when thinking of a theives guild, i like it more in some ways, overall i think its better
But even though they are less honorable, if you screw up and get caught they will throw you out of the guild till you pay 1k (the price may be different depending on what your caught for)
I was terrorizing Riften by going around pickpocketing everyone and got caught a bunch of times (i was trying to raise my pickpocket skill from 17), paid off the gaurds everytime (for 12 gold) and just kept going, i went back to the guild to fence all my stuff cause i was full on weight with stolen goods and the guild was like "screw you, you got caught"

I was trying to raise pickpocketing because i realized that if you buy training you can pickpocket the money you spent on training back, i was trying to get it high enough so that i could have a greater then 0% chance to take that much gold but it didnt work out since getting caught = 1k guild fine

Also the mages guild has the best quest line, of the 3 guilds
Mainly because of the places you go, 1 in particular
And you get a badass shout from it, but not badass in the way your thinking
I havent finished the thieves guild or the companions yet so they might have some surprises to


Most of the Misc quests are good, but then sometimes you get 1 that is like collect 25 special gems from around the world
The reward for that is probably incredible, but actually doing it is a pain
Then sometimes the reward isnt proportional to the effort that the quest required
I retrieved a staff for a guy so that he would give me an amulet for another guy and the guy i returned the amulet to gave me nothing
It wasnt easy getting that staff, had to kill more then a dozen adept mages
But then i got a big reward for an easy quest, just had to sneak into a house and put a ring in a dresser, took 3 mins (the place to put the ring was 2 mins away from the start of the quest) and got 800 gold


The game is alot better then Oblivion
The only thing i miss is the spell variety, it doesnt feel like theres that many spells, and theres no cool spells either, stuff like levitate and super jump, or nightvision, maybe spells like that exist but i havent found them, and i probably would have by now
And you cant craft spells yourself anymore, I can see why they removed spell crafting though, it was pretty OP in oblivion

i just finished downloading/installing it today. I probably wont be playing it too much because i have a really crappy graphics card... im guessing i had like 5-15 fps for the first bit of the game. it starts off alot like oblivion as far as customizing your character, although i havent even completed that yet and i played without sound.

wat lvl are you guys?

Did you put all the settings to low and turn off shadows?
Im running the game on high/ultra with an FXAA PPI mod and its running pretty well on my system, it runs better then SC2 (and looks better) which only has medium/high settings
Its not nearly as intensive as i thought it would be

You can try this "mod": http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=123
Its not really a mod, its a dx9 dll file stolen from fallout new vegas (though the "mod creator" denies this but its obvious)
The file doesnt call as many effects as the file skyrim uses by default so it should run better, i havent tested it myself but it only takes a second to give it a shot



The FXAA PPI mod i referred to is this: http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=131
It can improve the colors and sharpness of the game (dont use this mod if you use the "mod" i talked about above this, they arent compatible)

It comes with a file that you can use to customize the amount of color saturation, hue and sharpness
Theres several different presets to pick from, but they are all too saturated and loose the cold feeling skyrim has
I almost didnt get this mod because the pics/videos for it have the color saturation cranked way up which makes it look prettier but looses the atmosphere that skyrim is going for
I had to spend awhile with the config file to get the settings to my liking

As an example
Heres a scene as skyrim looks without the mod:


Heres the same scene with the mod using my settings:


The effect is subtle (which is what i was going for) but you can notice it easily if you view both at fullsize and compare them
Stuff in the background is easier to see and stuff in the foreground is more detailed, colors are more vibrant
Also stuff in motion (like water and spells) looks alot better
The quality settings are the same (high/ultra) so the performance is about the same, the mod takes 2 FPS (my FPS is 55 indoors and 35 outdoors)
My FPS is so bad outdoors because i have everything set to the highest range (grass/shadows/details/NPCs/etc) that you can set with the configuration tool
Setting the game on all ultra results in about the same quality graphics, but much worse performance (fps drops by about 15 making the game too slow to play when outdoors)

Heres an indoor comparison:
Without mod:


With mod:



And i recommend everyone get this mod: http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=98
It puts a realtime clock on the loading screen, so you can keep track of the time and not be late because you were playing skyrim too much

Theres already alot of mods out, which (if you didnt figure it out already) you can find here: http://www.skyrimnexus.com
Most are graphical improvements, almost all of which i didnt like ( like more detailed faces), thought it would take too much to run (like enhanced blood, or any of the 2000x2000+ textures), or just didnt fit into skyrim (like the enhanced night sky since its the night sky of earth, or the nude females)
Although i did get sunglare, even though i normally hate sunglare, it actually does improve the way the sun acts/looks

yah im running everthing on low except im not sure shadows can be turned off. the options in the launcher for shadows are low/medium/high/ultra. i'll test out the mod this weekend and see if it runs smoother

i played skyrim a good bit over christmas break
i got kinda high level (30) but not really since my 2 highest skills were armorer and enchant which took about an hour each to max.
i really liked a lot of the mechanics in oblivion and i thought skyrim improved those vastly. for example spell casting is actually fun. you can dual wield spells, and they have semi-interesting additional effects that makes one branch (fire, lite, ice) better than the others depending on the enemy for reasons other than natural weakness.
leveling up was much more fun even if it wasnt at all how i usually play games. most times i go for perfection, which is super boring and tedious. skyrim kinda just forces you to pick a style and enjoy the shit out of it. you can cross spec into a different field up to a point, but the limited amount of skill points keeps things interesting.

the gameplay (guilds, quests, and world) i thought were worse than oblivion for the most part. i got sick of the ice and jumping over mountains after about an hour and that just doesnt get better. the dungeon themselves though are visually stunning and creative, but the outside world sucks mostly. quests were very much a mixed bag... some were fantastic and some were really cookie cutter, but there were enough of the first that the 2nd didnt really get old. the guilds sucked pretty much all around. ive played through most of the thieves guild (which has side quests (which make you want to shoot yourself)) and all of the mages. i was very underawed by the mages guild except for one quest involving a nasty dungeon called "labyrinthian".
the daedric quests have been a bit of a let down as well. theyre mostly darker than the ones from oblivion (and that part definitely works) but theres nothing really great about em.