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this post was submitted on 11 Nov 2024
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I think they really don't believe in storytelling in the way traditional game writers do. They think enough simulation can replace good writing.
Personally I'm certain they are wrong, and it's tragic that they own the Elder Scrolls IP.
Simulation? What? That's the one aspect that has been gotten worse with every Bethesda title. Their storytelling was always garbage. I never finished the main quest in Skyrim even, and the one in Oblivion was trash, the one in Morrowind barely existing. This was never the strong suit of their games.
Hot take, Michael Kirkbride carried TES lore. Even the interesting parts of Skyrim is based from his writing.
Agreed. TES just hasn't had good world design and lore since Morrowind. If I remember correctly, he also wrote much of the books in the TES universe which are still used in Skyrim.
ESO might be an exception. I don't think it has the best writing but it does have much more interesting lore and world design than Oblivion and Skyrim.
ESO has interesting stuff in it. Some of the basic quests in each region are written pretty well, or at least are entertaining. They need some of those writers on the ES6 team to at least have a baseline.
I mean it's not really a hot take since it's been the consensus among long-time TES fans since 2006. Shivering Isles is the only good lore/story contribution TES has had without Kirkbrides involvement, and even that was basically just trying to Mantle his style from Morrowind.
I don't agree that all of it has always been trash, but the quest writing mostly always has. For your Skyrim example, I went to the midnight release. I completed the main quest within a 24h period IIRC and I remember just being incredibly disappointed. I haven't finished it again since. Honestly, Skyrim in general is a letdown besides the world they built, although they could have done a lot more to make it more interesting and feel more lived in and real instead of an amusement park.
Their writing in the past has been really strong in world building. They've had really interesting lore and reasons for us to be doing what we're doing. Most of the people who did that are gone now though, and they have been for a while, so I don't expect it in the future.
I should have said more, for once. I meant simulation more to describe the Bethesda house style, which seems to be this idea that having apples that can roll around on a table or whatever is immersive and engaging enough that you don't need Michael Kirkbride hanging around putting weird metaphysical shit all over the place, actually. I wasn't saying they were good at it, only that it appears to be what they think.