…Just read the blasted post.
Okay, So I have been working on a lot more quests over the past few hours, and I am actually really happy about that as it makes me feel like I am getting things done, learning more about the world, seeing more characters, and making progress when I am at a point, from a character perspective, where the endgame should be happening. But oh no, I still haven’t done a single quest in three of the nine holds Skyrim possesses, mostly due to how I enjoy entering a brand new area in this game, and cleaning it up to the best of my abilities. And that makes sense, at least to me, seep in through the world and do not get too off track just because you wanted to do X before anything else. However, I really do wish for some more structure in a game as gargantuan as this. Yes, yes, boundless freedom is fun, but not when there are hundreds of things to do even after my character is a few as of yet unobtained enchantments and maybe a crossbow from being set in stone. …And a new Destruction spell… and a new guard spell… and a new magicka regeneration ring… but those are fairly minor.
However, the fact that even getting to those things are bogged down as much as they are really do make the whole concept of an open world where anything can be done come across as, well, unappealing to me. As I can’t seem to interpret the statement of freedom to become a checklist that I am left to fill out, as I am the type of person who catalogued and organized all of his items in this blasted game, when I know fully well that I will not need 84 amethyst gems or eighty ingots of gold. Hell, going back on what I said about money, I don’t even know how much I have anymore, as I will never, ever, ever run into a situation where I cannot afford something. I mean, if I could just buy in game power using in game money, there would no longer be any problems, but I reached the point where I really cannot do that. Partially due to how I ignored trainers for longer than I should have, and partially because my equipment can only be upgraded, and only be upgraded by a skill I honestly should be spending my time upgrading. But no, instead of resetting my smithing skill, which I no longer need and making a bunch of crappy gear to both grind the stat and then enchant it, grinding up that skill, and getting money for more materials, I am going on adventures, even though the game’s formula has become extraordinarily apparent at this point, lessening the impact of every environment as much as how I’d seen them before.
I suppose that could also attribute to how none of the quests have grabbed me, but that is more due to how Skyrim is a great game for people with ADD and OCD, as you can easily wander around a world and find ways to make what could be called progress, but is more akin to doing side quests when the main storyline could be cleared in less than twenty hours, no problem. Yet all of the side quests I am doing at this point reward me with either more useless money or gear that is only good for me when sold. While money is, as I said before, only good for raising skills. There are exceptions, such as finding the missing instruments of the Bards’ College, which rewards the player with a level up for 8 of their 24 skills, and one involving an ancient ruined city that rewarded me with a permanent passive perk, which are the best type of rewards in my opinion. Meaning it is a shame that there are only nine to obtain, or to be more accurate, seven, with one of them being invisible… I can accept this type of crap at launch, but that’s just inexcusable.
Oh, but I suppose I can still get plenty of invisible ones by actually investing the skill points I hoarded from excessive leveling, yet all of the ones I have available at this point are, well, very minor effects that I need to invest in before I can obtain things that are worthwhile. I would love to get something that increases the power of the shield spell I use, but I don’t want to spend four skill points getting to it. This is why I prefer skill trees that one is expected to max out if they do everything in the game, while in order to achieve that in Skyrim, you would need to mix and match so much with your playstyle, and likely get creamed as you lack a strong suit for a game that can and will be relentless, well, at least whenever high level mages are involved.
On that subject, I’m still not entirely sure how it is expected to balance magic and melee well at the point I am at, as I have been struggling to give magic much worth for the majority of the game as it is put at a disadvantage compared to melee from the game’s inception. I mean, there is little to not love about the many skills, but you must invest so many points to get the skills to amount to much, have a wardrobe tailored to enhance your magic abilities, and use a staff. While I can’t say I used them very much, the basic concept behind using a weapon that requires the player to constantly refill it has never ever sounded appealing to me. Hell, back when I was properly introduced to ammo being tied to the primary weapon, with Half Life 2, in 2009, when I was 15, I had trouble using weapons if I was not aware of when the game would bestow upon me more bullets. Yes, it is logical that the game would offer chances for the player to refill their usable items, but that level of caution still seeps into my mind even after knowing that I can just cast Soul Trap on any random bandit I come across and be able to refill any blasted weapon.
However, I still very much was able to max out a magic skill, and that was illusion, a skill that does not take numerical values into much consideration, and is the most easy skill to grind if you have a spell tome for Muffle. Seriously, I managed to go from level 15 after resetting the skill to level 55 in about five hours, and likely earned at least half of a level thanks to that ability, while ones I would love to be better than they are, such as Destruction, require such an investment and specialization that I wonder how the blazes I ever maxed that skill out in my original run, as even fighting weaker enemies results in my mana being drained faster than my opponent’s’ life bar. And by the way, I’m not sure who decided this for any reason other than introducing a flavor of very minimalistic user interface that I am honestly not too fond of in fantasy RPGs, with Shadows of Mordor being the worst offender from what I’ve seen, but the decision to have all health bars be centered as opposed to very clearly draining from one side, normally right to left, is baffling to me. It’s the simple matter of visual clarity that can be offered by having a designated end point and stopping point that are separated by not two distances, but one. I honestly wouldn’t mind it so much if it were for the lesser used Stamina or Mana meters.
And yes, I know it is called Magicka, it’s just that the term Magicka sounds so forced and uncreative, much like how much of the world is looking to be as I play onwards. Although, from a lore point of view, lore created by what I like to believe a bunch of drunk DND nerds, Skyrim is suppose to be an underpopulated vacant shithole that while beautiful is sorta boring to simply go out and explore. Yes, there are unique environments, but the game reuses so much that it acts as a very good example in favor of creating a smaller world than a larger one, as so much of the game is unfocused or samey that it may as well not have half of its 15 square miles. And I am only partially saying that because, if that were the case, I would be playing Revengeance on Easy while having fun with a Platinum game for the first time in my shitty life… Actually, screw it, Skyrim Adventures are done, review coming on Tuesday!
THE END OF THIS ADVENTURE!!
GET DRUNK, GRAB A GUN, BUT DON’T KILL ANY TRANSGENDER INDIVIDUALS!!