The Guildmasters

The reason I took so long to write this review is because I wanted to play the game for a while first. This gives me the opportunity to write a decent review, unbiased, with no guess work.

When trying to write a good review it almost always includes a downside, Skyrim is no exception but any downsides to this game are not that bad that it spoils the overall gameplay, and you can improve on any negative issues just by taking a little extra time to do a couple of things that will make it better.

First off, you will get instances where the game will lag, quite badly at times. I have found the best way to cut down on this is to not overload your chests in your houses, this helps for some reason. I found this out because I was putting everything in one chest, which appears to be a bottomless pit, it doesn’t fill up. The game was lagging a lot, then I went to a dresser and starting putting stuff in there and it was running quick again.

Another option which pays is to delete all the autosaves, these seem to build up and don’t overwrite the previous autosaves, at least on mine they were all seperate, so I had my game save, and about 6 autosaves, as soon as I started deleting the autosaves the game didn’t suffer from lag anymore.

Apart from above there really isn’t anything else, apart from the odd glitch which most won’t even come across.

Basically Bethesda has taken everything good about all their previous games and incorporated it into this one huge game, then they have added a bunch of other stuff to improve on it even more.

This game is probably more open ended than anything previous. The added randomness of everything just gives it a ton more playability. Dragons free roaming and random encounters makes it more “real” because you can visit the same area time after time and get a different encounter or outcome.

Bethesda obviously listened to previous advice from their players because they have added all the things that everyone wanted to see and then some.

Instead of owning a house, you can own a house in every city, 9 in total, with some extra free residences which you will acquire by completing a line of questing, like the thieves guild, or becoming arch mage. You can also put your books in bookcases now, something I previously saw a lot of posts on where players were saying this would be a good idea.

Although there is a lot of randomness in the game, it is organized, you don’t just come across an animal in the middle of nowhere that seems out of place, you will come across deer or elk grazing, then you might see a pack of wolves attacking it which gives it a more sense of reality than a basic random encounter, you can watch or dive in and kill for the materials.

The other new aspect of creating weapons from scratch by using smithing is a great addition, it makes you want to experiment with everything. I think I spent a couple of days creating, sharpening and enhancing weapons, and if that wasn’t enough you can make a tidy profit when you sell them.

Everything about this game involves you, it is impossible to get bored of a game like this. I played for more than a week before I rode my first horse, I just didn’t want to ride one, I wanted to explore everywhere by foot because you can miss so much just by traveling by horse.

The towns are so interactive and with virtually endless quests I can honestly see me playing this game off and on for years, this is the kind of game you can just cut yourself off from reality for a few hours and become immersed in something extremely enjoyable, like a really good movie.

The list is endless on what this game can do for you, and what you can do in the game. Harvest flowers, catch insects to make potions, kill animals and use the hides, kill dragons for some of the best armor in the game, join all the factions, buy a house, decorate your house however you want, explore dungeons, ruins and caves which are not small by any means, some caves and ruins can take up the best part of a day to explore.

Overall Bethesda did not let fans down this time around in any way, I would go as far as to say that what most of us expected was nothing compared to what we got, me personally? I’m extremely impressed, and if this game had $100 price tag i’d still buy it, can’t wait for the game of the year edition, you know there will be one.

Rating out of 5 = 5 simply because it’s as close to perfection as you can get right now with a game, and that is based on graphics, main storyline, playability and the amount of things you can do to keep you wanting to play more.

Tony:)

What a cool feeling, making Guild Rank 12. Sorry I didn’t post this two days ago when I actually made it but once again i’ve been caught up in this game.

It’s been interesting playing online these last couple of days, had a lot of help from a fellow player and I wish I could remember her name because now my attacks are much more powerful because I have now started to find out which creatures are weak against which elements and have started to enhance different weapons accordingly.

So if you think your seeing things when during a battle in WKC someone seems to change their weapon it is for real. There are several quests in which there are up to 4 or even 5 boss battles, some will be weak against water and others will be weak against fire. Because you can only enhance one weapon with one element it sometimes requires you to switch weapons.

Guild Rank 13 happens to be about 10 million more away from when you hit GR12 so it’s not too bad as GR12 opens up a bunch more new quests some of which give you over 60,000 GR points. I’ve just been questing for items to upgrade and i’ve already hit two million since GR12. Hopefully i’ll be at GR13 by the time my birthday gets here on Monday.

Another huge shock for me was when loading up the game last night I noticed my save game was showing 750 hours play time, that’s unreal. It actually means i’ve spent more time on this game than I did on Morrowind and Oblivion put together and i’ve still got another three guild rank levels. That is awesome playability.

Tony 🙂