Some Incoherent Thoughts about Open Worlds (and Skyrim)

Note: This is a sister piece to a short rant on Lightning Returns that I will be posting on Pop Trends.

I still remember the first time I played a well crafted open world game. It was The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind (PC). I created my character, followed the soldier up the stairs and into the office to get documents stamped by the Imperial authorities. They sent me on a mission to deliver something – I can’t recall what – to a city called Balmora. Once I completed my mission, I was free. That’s what the NPC said. It was something along the lines of “you can now do whatever you want”. And so, I did.



After bumbling my way through Morrowind, I managed to join the Fighter’s Guild and the Thieves’ Guild. During my travels, I slew a host of bandits and assassins, hunted countless monsters, explored many dungeons and caves, and even stumbled into some sort of magical robe of regeneration that made me all but immortal.

After visiting all the major cities, fighting all the worthy opponents, and exploring what I know is surely only a fraction of Morrowind, I finally made my way to an underground space to face off against Dagoth Ur.

My next memorable experience with an open world game was with The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. This one I played on my X-Box 360, as my PC at the time could not run it in anything other than horridly low settings at 20 frames per second on a good day. I created my character, went through the tutorial dungeon, and was set free into the land of Cyrodil. There, as I had done in Morrowind, I explored. I recall with fondness and awe when I explored the vast land – surely Morrowind had been nothing but a fraction! My first destination, one that I found by chance, was a small harbor with some run down shacks behind. As any do-gooder would, I engaged a group of brigands, took their stuff, and bought a house to keep my loot. I then kept exploring the world. I joined the fighter’s guild, the thieve’s guild, the dark brotherhood, and every other guild I could find. I quested, and I went into a number of Oblivion portals, until finally Martin Septim turned into a giant dragon of fire and fought some Daedric lord. I then downloaded the expansion packs and became enthralled with the Arthurian quest of the Nine and was awed by whatever it was that happened in the Shivering Isles. It was simply sublime.

By this time I had grown to love fantasy and medieval-themed videogames and grown bored of shooters. Still, when I learned that the makers of those incredible open world games Morrowind and Oblivion were making what critics were calling “The Elder Scrolls with Guns”, my curiosity was piqued. I tried Fallout III, and in my first playthrough I made the biggest mistake anyone can make – I brought a gun to a knife fight. Equipped with my trusty vault jacked and a handful of melee weapons, I stepped outside the vault, and was promptly annihilated. I tried again, this time with guns. It was the most sublime gaming experience I had during the 7th generation. Exploring the Capitol Wasteland, fighting supermutants, roaming through the uncanny setting… it was magical. Needless to say that I downloaded all the expansions and brought the sequel, New Vegas, which I played to completion along with its downloadable content (I HATE Dead Money). I loved New Vegas so much, in fact, that when I found a conference that took place on Vegas, I promptly submitted a paper. There, I presented on… Fallout: New Vegas. I thought that Bethesda could do no wrong.
And then The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim came out.

The much hyped game features lush visuals and highly detailed worlds. The NPCs populating the world are numerous and diverse. It is by no means a bad game – it’s great. It’s one of the best games this generation. However, at the same time, it’s not. Unlike the previous titles, which made their worlds interesting and engaging, Skyrim has several major problems that make it feel… well… boring.

The first one is that the world “feels” too big and empty. Even though as far as size is concerned the Skyrim map is roughly about the same size as the Oblivion map, and despite the fact that there are slightly less places to explore in Skyrim than in Oblivion, the way in which the maps are designed make Skyrim troublesome to navigate. While in Oblivion there are open fields, lush yet navigable forests, and mountains with clearly worn paths, almost everywhere in Skyrim felt like the road less traveled by. Skyrim always forces the player to take “the long way around. This “long way” involves discovering small paths hidden behind rocks or going through caves to get into a hidden grotto where the gate to the temple that the player wants  is located. And doing this the first time around is fine. This is part of the exploration, and The Elder Scrolls would not be The Elder Scrolls without the discovery element. However, while traversing the countryside in Oblivion was a joy, in Skyrim it feels like a chore. This was further made worse by the relative lack of encounters. While in Oblivion one could expect to run into a few patrols and some bears, in Skyrim - even at the later stages - a Mudcrab or lone wolf feel like a breath of fresh air from the frozen mountains. After a while, I found myself simply fast-traveling from place to place. When I had not discovered a place yet, I would fast travel to the nearest high point and jump off cliffs in order to avoid having to walk through paths. Getting to The Reach, for example, was a three hour (real time) walk. TL;DR: the map FEELS too big and empty for its own good. Again, it’s not because of the distance, but because of being forced to take the long way.

Another major flaw with Skyrim is that there is too much to do. I understand that this may seem contradictory to the "empty map" comments above, but please stay tuned and you'll see what I mean. The problem is that almost every other citizen (NPC) will approach the player with a quest. Small, menial, insignificant fetch quests. Some of these quests include going to places with no locations around (therefore preventing fast travel) in order to fetch some plant.

Certainly, every ruler has a quest. Every faction has several quests. Even small groups that might seem inconsequential have quests. I have so far logged on over 90 hours of play in Skyrim and have still a list of over 30 quests pending. These are all quests that I simply “picked up” along the way and didn't care to do because, honestly, the Dragonborn should be above picking flowers.

What all of these quests do is make the player lose focus. Players will only forget that their quest has something to do with dragons because everyone calls them “Dragonborn” and because when a dragon is slain, the player absorbs their power. However, the difference in narrative focus between the previous Bethesda games and Skyrim is obvious. In Oblivion, everything the player does and every quest taken, as well as almost every conversation had, is consistent with the situation. The player is a thief / murderer convict of some sort who just happens to find himself in the right place at the right time. The events lead up to a climactic battle in which the player needs to find the actual "hero" and help him turn the tide against invading Daedra (demons). There is no inherent Great Destiny pushing the player forward. He just stumbles into it while exploring the world. Still, as the narrative advances, the game reminds players of their mission. Many of the side quests players can do point back to "find Martin". Furthermore, later in the game, the sporadic appearance of Oblivion portals in the countryside reinforce the sense of urgency presented in the narrative. Likewise, in Fallout III players are given an open world to explore with a premise of exploring the world: your father is somewhere out there, go find him. This allows players to suspend disbelief and perform even the most menial fetch quest, as "they said they might know where my father is". At the same time, after being given a purpose later in the game (to purify the waters of the wasteland), the environment itself reinforces the need to cleanse the waters. More importantly, everything the player does – even sidequests that apparently have nothing to do with the main quest – have some sort of repercussion on the game world. The local DJ, Three Dog, reminding the player what he or she has done and what needs to be done is also a great way of reminding the player of what’s at stake. Letting a group of radiated mutant humans (ghouls) into a building - an event that has little to do with the main storyline - is explained as having had some sort of effect on the residents of that space. In Skyrim, however, players will have a hard time keeping the main purpose in focus.

In Skyrim, players will have so many meaningless things to do that are disconnected from each other and from the main quest, that there is some danger that they, as I did, may forget the main quest. Fetching some ivory tusk from a mammoth? Not related to any of the main quests. Fetching some Nightshade for some alchemist? Not related to any of the main quests. Rescuing some guy from the Battle-Born family? Nope. Not that either. Yes, the player can choose to side with Stormcloaks or Imperials, and there are some other similar choices that help shape the player’s narrative throughout the world, but they are not really linked to the main story premise – Become a Dragonborn Shoutmaster and ??? I don’t know? Kill some evil? Slay some dragons? While in other games players start off as "just another person" and are given a world to explore with a premise that prompts the player to look at every nook and cranny the developers placed in the game (find Martin, find your dad) and while exploring discover an opportunity to join a group and serve some greater purpose, in Skyrim players are given a Great Purpose and are sent on an urgent mystical grail hunt, but end up being downgraded from Dragonborn and Savior of Humanity to a pretty good fighter that joins the Legion or the Stormcloacks to "a stranger passing by who maybe can get me my nightshade from over yonder".

Ok, I know, I know, I’m being unfair. Their main quest is actually fairly good. The player takes control of The Dragonborn, goes questing for dragon powers, and ultimately faces off against a dragon in what is probably one of the most anti climatic fights in videogame history. However, the focus of Skyrim isn’t THE quest. It’s “a” quest. It’s the “player’s story”. And this doesn't work well with grandiose premises.



Now, as I previously stated, Skyrim is not a bad game. It’s good. I clocked in 80 or so hours in it before I decided that I had forgotten “the point” and stopped playing. At the very least, it doesn’t make some of the errors that other open world games have done. Unlike GTA 3, Skyrim doesn’t distract the player with encouragement to wreck the world. In GTA 3, players were actively encouraged by the game to run around punching prostitutes. I even recall with some fondness the odd “let’s see who can last longer with 5 stars” competitions that my friends and I used to have. In Skyrim, doing this will land the player in jail or dead. Furthermore, the openness and lack of direction is not as bad as that from Saga Frontier.

Ah, Saga Frontier. When I played that game back on 1998 I was baffled. I selected a character called “Red” (which is odd because he was mostly blue). I walked around not knowing where to go, turned into a superhero, then gave up. That was a game that gave players no direction. Skyrim tugs in all directions. That is why it feels larger and emptier, yet busier than the other Elder Scrolls games. And that’s why, when compared to them, it fails.