Topic: The thing about? Elderscrolls Online

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Hello folks. This is going to be another quite long post. It's about a different view of Elderscrolls Online (ESO in short from hereon). I've been anticipating the release of this game on PS4 for a while now and followed the reports and reviews closely. Mainly reviews such as that of AngryJoe put me off the game and I had all my hopes shattered that it is any good. Now, there are many ways to play an MMO and one's way to play it and look at things is not necessarily the way I do.

I got a friend who is totally into Elderscrolls, the franchise. I'm - don't stone me - not so much. I didn't play Morrowind, I played a fair share of Oblivion but never ever felt connected to it or got into it and I got bored of Skyrim after about 20 hours of gameplay. I know I know… But I so WANT to like Elderscrolls as I'm starved for some fantasy/medieval epic RPG for quite a while now. Certain mechanics about the Elderscrolls games always put me off, as most of you might think they are deep and engaging for me they were always boring, bland and had a clunky menue system and combat. Didn't like it at all. I can't connect with the NPCs and don't care for their dialogue, funnily enough as I am a vivid reader of fiction and old texts in real life, I just can't get interested in the Elderscrolls lore. I might just be used to get my narration presented in a more engaging way - just like in the Last of Us - as I really enjoy a good story but it has to come with a fitting narration. Anyways, so much for the premise. With that mindset, basicly having ESO written off after reading and watching all the reviews, that said friend of mine got it for his shiny new PC. Obviously he wanted to show it off to me and invited me over.

Being more interested in him as a friend than in seeing ESO I agreed to spend an hour over at his place. What he showed me then, completely changed my mind about ESO and as we speak (or as I write and you read) I'm playing ESO already, loving it. I'll tell you exactly what changed my mind, things that you don't read about in official reviews and things you should know, you can probably relate or connect to and find some enjoyment in a truly awesome game. Having said all that it's fair to note that I haven't reached endgame yet (luckily as I like to enjoy my time and not rush through it). As many of you know ESO got delayed on PS4, but if you get it now on PC and start playing, you can then upgrade to PS4 version for 20,- and have your characters transferred. That's the route I'm planning to take. My PC is more than capable of running it on high settings - it's really not taxing, even runs quite nicely on my Mac Mini - but still I'd enjoy it on console more (considering they nail the controls just right).

Okay, here we go.

What convinced me to get ESO is many little things that most people in reviews fail to mention. I have plenty of knowledge about MMOs in general (played everything from UO, EQ back in the day, Asherons Call, WoW, … up until the more recent Rift, RaiderZ, Guildwars 2, Tera, Wildstar Beta, etc…) and I know exactly what I like about an MMO and what I don't like. Let's start with the combat. I Like tactical combat. I like options. I like somewhat realistic combat and ESO got it all right. What do I mean by that?

Well, for example. I enjoyed RIFT a great deal, I liked the world. the setting and the spells and skills were all interesting, but… in the long run, meaningless. Why? Because when you entered a dungeon, all the people in there, they could go wild on their skilltress, skill however they wanted and also switch between 3 builds on the fly. That meant that there were no distinct roles and hardly any organization, you basicly just „damage-clouded" through the dungeon and that was it. It was not necessary in most cases to pull carefully, make use of your skills, slow, stun, disorient etc… if you were enough people just make damage fast, done. Boring.

I hail back from a time when Everquest was the hot thing and in there combat was meaningful (yes, slow, clunky, outdated by todays standards) as you had set classes with distinct abilities and had to work together to stand any chance against the punishing world around you. I like that a lot.

Another example. Guildwars 2, marketed as the „this is the one game to rule them all MMO" it had many great ideas, I liked the graphical style but also couldn't connect with its lore or anything. The skills were very limited and dungeons a pain (many of you will think differently on this one) as they were ultra hard and the tactical combat you could do was very limited as basicly every character was designed to take care of themselves (with healing abilities and such) and all the special skills you had only did something for a very short duration (2 seconds stun, 3 seconds slow, etc…). All in all it ended up being a very elitistic, quick, frantic, meaningless gameplay that I didn't enjoy at all.

In ESO (yes finally talking about ESO) you have 4 predefined classes from which you can branch out into other skill trees. Weapons give you certain skills you can level, upgrade (morph) and mix and match however you see fit. It gives you lots of freedom while still maintaining a sort of „skill pillar" in your build. You can be a rogue or more like a ranger, or hunter, or be a templar play him as Paladin, or pure healer, or spellcaster/healer, or play him as tank with protective spells, etc… It really works well. And you have all the tools of the trade. Want to do extra damage to undead and deidra creatures? Sure go for it, silver bolts with knockdown! Need some distance between you and the monster you're fighting? Sure there are knockbacks, snares, fears, etc.. you can fight tactically. Put a dot (damage over time) spell on a big monster, slow it down, run it around (kiting it) rinse repeat until it's dead. Group buffs, heals, … everything is there. And I haven't even started on the potions yet, or the awesome crafting. Crafting where you can really upgrade each and every part, research certain aspects and become known for your craftmanship among the players. The combat and the crafting got me hooked. The beautiful (many say they suck but they are wrong, graphics are scaled down on polygon count but the effects, lighting, atmosphere is all wonderful) graphics that run nicely on even older systems, the characters that are all voice-acted, many funny references. It's a nice game indeed.

Still, I can't connect with the story yet (but the lore slowly grows on me) and I don't care for most dialogue (I know, a shame) but everything around it is awesome. You can roleplay (and luckily many people do) with a plethora of emotes and sweet animations. Looking for something in your backpack? Your character grabs into his bag or looks at a map when you (the player) check out a location. Treasure hunting? It's there! Bounty hunting? It's there! The combat, especially the melee combat feels much more fluid than in the singleplayer games. Sure, it's all a bit „scaled down" but the hits have impact and you can use certain attacks to knock your foes over, stun them, shield bash them in an animation to land a nice counter. It's a bit like Dark Souls. Which is a VERY good thing. Your skills and spells don't have a timer on them, you can cast them as much and often as you want as long as you have stamina/magicka. Provided you got a few potions with you, you can really break lose all hell!

And yeah, people are complaining that the ingame items are so expensive. Well. They are not cheap, but they are not expensive. For example. A horse costs some 17.000 gold. After a certain level (when your skill options, hunting grounds etc… open up) you can easily make 1-2000 gold in an hour, no sweat broken. In my book this is a pretty spot on pace for an MMO.

Some may call me a heretic but here it comes: I Like ESO more than the singleplayer games. It's not as tedious and clunky, a bit more lighthearted but also more accessible. Most of the complaints I heard from AngryJoe and others - I just don't see them. I like this game. A lot. Heck I enjoyed Star Wars Galaxies and that was the most broken game I've ever played... As for ESO, I can connect with my friends and have  great time. I really really like it and I can't wait to play it on PS4. All of you who have written the game off, give it another look and another chance if you can only connect to something that I wrote here. If you have questions, just ask away. Only know one thing, and I think that's one of the big reasons why ESO didn't fare so well in most reviews. I call it „MMO-burnout". Most people are burned out by certain aspects of an MMO. Gameplay wise there are just things, every MMO does. That's because they all are the same genre. Like shooting a weapon in an FPS. You will do your fetch-quests (even though they mostly package them with nice voice acting and a funny twist) and you will also have to put up with idiot players, but if you have a bunch of likeminded people around you that do NOT rush through the game, but rather take the scenery in, maybe roleplay a bit, take things slow, it's totally enjoyable. I bought my game for 39,- including a free month and I am really sure that I will get my 39,- worth of fun during that free month and should - for whatever reason I can't see yet - I lose my interest in this game during that time, I spent a good month playing for 39,- - good enough for me as I've bought more „duds" for more money in the past (Army of Two III anyone?).

I hope I could give you an alternate insight into the game and if you are also interested in meaningful combat, big and deep crafting and a wonderful streamlined Elderscrolls game, give it another chance. Yes there are little bugs here and there, some graphical glitches, yes Skyrim on a highend PC looks better, etc… but all those things don't affect MY personal enjoyment. The grouping is nice, guilds rock, the skills/abilities are awesome, the combat feels meaningful and you have just SO many options. People who just rush to the level cap as quickly as possible not looking back will probably not enjoy this game too much. I, taking it slow, do very much! If you want to not care for any story and just become strong fast and do lots of damage, go with Diablo III, which is perfect for that. If you're looking for something more substantial, ESO might be for you!

Thank you for reading this!