Having spent countless hours playing games like Oblivion and Skyrim, I could only imagine how good a game with no limitations could be coming out of Zenimax Online Studios. There was a lot of potential to be had with that idea. The world that Zenimax wanted to create and the experience they wanted you to have was pretty self-evident from the get-go. They just didn’t want to throw a shallow storyline on top of the pile so that you could run out and spend the majority of the time leveling up. Nay, they wanted you to go through the same type of experience that you had previously gone through with titles in the ES series.
The story goes like this, your character wakes up inside a Daedric world, ruled by a prince named Molag Bal, but the wonder/horror doesn’t last long as you’re immediately thrown into a jailbreak. You go through various caves and caverns, drop some enemies and look to free a blind man named the Prophet, who helps you get back to the world of the living. Once back in said world, you are thrown lands apart from the Prophet and must find your way back to him, so that you can continue the main quest. Of course, you have to go through a series of missions before you eventually find the Prophet, who gives you the skinny on how the covenant (a group of extremely evil folks) is trying to ravage the world in the name of Molag Bal. Like any good ES game, it’s pretty straightforward with the story that involves some sort of terrible disaster about to unfold on the lands.
Again, this is on par with what you would be introduced to with a typical non-MMO Elder Scrolls title.
The real beef of this game, and something that will draw fans of the previous series into it, will be the side quests. I’ve had this game since before April 4th, folks. I’ve been playing side quests since that time and most recently decided that I should get back on the main storyline, so I could provide a proper review. I spent a good majority of my leveling simply running into random dungeons, finding random quests or (and this is a huge part of the game) having random quests find me. You read that last part right, NPCs will randomly run up to you out of nowhere asking for your assistance with something. You can either reject their requests or move forward with it. Regardless of you decision, you won’t affect any part of the main story. For example, there was a village that had three factions in it that were near the brink of war. I had an NPC run up to me and ask for my assistance, which I gave and it took me nearly 45 minutes to complete the quest of bringing said factions back together. I have lived and died by side quests with basically every ES game and every Fallout game, so this type of stuff was absolute heaven for me — and it’s freaking everywhere.
The fact that you don’t have to go searching for these quests is what makes this game special to me. I played a helluva lot of Final Fantasy XIV this year (and last) and I can say that searching for jobs/quests can become somewhat stale. I don’t mind traveling from town to town looking for new adventures, but sometimes you just want the adventure to find you — and more adventurous than Fates. With The Elder Scrolls Online you get that adventure finding you type feeling. You get that gigantic world to explore with nearly no limitations. You get what you were expecting from the single-player experience that you’re used to having with Elder Scrolls titles. That is what makes this game particularly different and special to me. It’s the portion of the game that is intact from the games we all know.
Let’s discuss a little about the PvE in this game.
The PvE is pretty fair when it comes to what level you’re on in comparison to what level your enemy is at when you’re fighting them. ESO gives you maybe a two level padding when you’re out in the world fighting. That means that if you’re a level 10 then you won’t have much trouble taking down a level 12 enemy. That formula is pretty consistent throughout the game, but also add in the variable of what your armor/weapon strength is at that point in the game. If you don’t wear armor (and I’ve seen more than a few naked folks online — well, naked with a loin cloth) then you’re going to get killed quite a bit. You know what I’m getting at with this.
The only caveat to this, and a big complaint I have had with the game since beta, is that when you get to a boss character in a dungeon and they’re leveled just like his/her minions you’ve bowled through, their level of damage is incredibly skewed in comparison to other enemies in that dungeon. This means that if the boss is at level 10 and everyone else you fought was at 10, then they are more difficult to take down. I fully understand that boss characters should be much harder than your typical enemy, but not as hard as ESO makes them. I can’t tell you how many times I have died at the hands of bosses in dungeons or on quests that were the same level as the enemies I took down to get there. It’s absolutely frustrating at times when you run into this type of situation. This is the portion of the game that feels like an MMO. This is the portion of the game where you are required to have other players help you out and the single-player experience is no longer an option. This is the point in the game where it separates itself from being a standard Elder Scrolls title and let’s you know in full that it’s an MMO.
This is the portion of the game I dislike the most, though I do understand what the game is supposed to be this way.
The portion of my Elder Scrolls self that wants to go solo in this game is very disappointed with this uneven leveling. I want to complete quests without bringing in friends. The option to party in the game is a tough one when you have to depend on strangers to help out. I don’t have the patience or trust to band together with complete strangers to get the job done. That’s FFXI, FFXIV, World of Warcraft and Old Republic crap. I want to go in with no attachments, get the job done and come out the victor. Why can’t I do that with ESO? Well, it has to do this so it doesn’t turn out to be another single-player experience in online form. Thankfully, that need to form a party is optional, while getting help from strangers is optional at the same time. Confused? Let me explain.
If you see a group of people going into a dungeon then you can just hang right with them the entire way without the need of banding together. This not only helps you when you’re wanting to get through the dungeon’s minions, but it also helps when you’re needing to take down a boss. Again, you don’t have to form a party to do it; you simply run with them. You will obtain the same amount of reward for getting the job done this way and you don’t have to create any awkward amount of conversations on the way through. This helps my uneven leveling complaint. This also satisfies the need to avoid creating parties with strangers. I like this route and I appreciate the Zenimax folks for including it in ESO. It makes life a lot easier and faster within the game. Of course, the only caveat to this method is that you might have to wait on folks to get to the dungeon or mission, which could take some time. The price you pay for being a loner, though.
Other elements that will help you out and improve your adventuring/dungeon raiding experience is the ability and option to discover lots of objects/items. You can find books, gems, stones and even do a little mining. The amount of extra things, like finding/reading books, is insane. Someone reported that there were 3000+ books to dive into, which would explain the amount of development time this took (kidding, but not really). You also have the ability to forge better armor and improve weapons as you progress through the game. It’s incredibly engaging to do this and it will help you out in fights when you need a bit of extra help on standard weapons/armor. To succeed and proceed you will have to look into this in some way, shape or form.
Shifting gears just a bit, let’s discuss presentation.
The look and feel to ESO is seamless when it compares to Skyrim and Oblivion. The landscapes are endless and the structures of the environments are scaled up pretty well. This means you will find large hills, shallow valleys and plenty of castles and houses to explore. Along the way you’ll find random dungeons and caves that pretty much spring out of nowhere sometimes. The girth of it all is pretty impressive for start-up MMO.
Now, depending on how you have your settings, and what process/card/RAM you have equipped, you’ve got a selection of resolution choices. The two top choices are ‘high’ and ‘ultra high’. During the beta version of this title I had no issues running the ultra high setting. The only issue I had was that my battery was draining during gameplay — even with my AC adapter hooked up. It was odd and the beta ran my laptop pretty darn hot. This isn’t unusual with Macintosh laptops, as they probably have never experienced gaming before in their lives. Anyway, here are my mac specs:
Processor: 2.6Ghz Intel Core i7
Memory: 8gb 1600 MHz DDR3
Graphics: nVidia GeForce GT 650m 1gb
When the retail version of the game appeared, it felt a bit heavier on the computer. The frame rate, which was 20-30 fps in beta, has dropped to 15-20 fps in retail. Granted, there’s a lot more going on in the game in the retail version and lot more things to deal with graphically, but I still really wanted the ultra high setting because it was simply gorgeous. Having said that, I do realize that most of you out there have monster systems and you will run this game just fine on ultra high.
For me, I relied on the high setting which provided more than enough details for my struggling MacBook Pro. The game gave me a high frame rate, plenty of textures and structural details in the game, as well as beautiful particle effects. There was plenty of pretty to see on the high settings of this game. It also gave me background depth with little to no pop-up of structures in said background. So, in short, you get the same sort of looks that you would find in Skyrim or Oblivion, except better depending on system resources.
As for audio in the game, the music is gorgeous. You get a fully orchestrated soundtrack that works with place to place. You also get some in-game dialogue that, while it might be goofy at times, is still intriguing. It’s no worse or better than what you’ll find in the stand-alone ES titles. I’m surprised folks are complaining about this, as it’s just a bit nit-picky.
So, is this game worth the price of admission? The version I saw at E3 2013 was unimpressive and not quite worth the asking price. The updates and improvement by the time the beta hit was significant enough to warrant interest and money. The stability of the final retail version (and we’re talking about a separation of weeks between when the beta ended and the retail began) was far better and more complete. Was it perfect? No, but I haven’t run into any significant bugs yet (some weird graphic issues here and there, but nothing major), even the ones that made the interweb news lately. I’m sure they’re out there, as it’s tough to fully bring perfection to an MMO at the get-go (set up one domino, another falls somewhere). As it stands, The Elder Scrolls Online is worth the asking price, even the monthly price. It’s good the way it is right now, but it has set itself up to be great in the future, if done correctly.
To wrap this up, let me just add that I didn’t participate in any PvP (not interested to be honest, but I’m sure some of you are — so enjoy), but the rest I completely found fun. I’m still going to play this game until my 30 days runs out. Once E3 2014 is out of the way, I’m sure I’m going to return to it for a brief period of time before the holiday rush begins. If you have time and you love MMOs, you must check ESO out, give it a shot for at least a free period (I’m assuming the game comes with 30 days free). It’s more impressive than it’s currently getting credit for being.
