Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Sordid]

Yeeeeaaaah, what everyone else said. It's hideous, obviously designed to be used by people sitting across the room from their TV (ie. everything's HUUUUGE, and knowing Bethsoft they won't bother fixing that for the PC), and I'm betting the "cascading menu system" is going to be a bitch to navigate. Unless they only have one level of it, in which case it'll be exactly the same as Oblivion's tabs, just rotated 90 degrees.
I chuckled a bit at that quote where he says they tried to imagine what a fantasy game would look like if Apple made it. Well firstly that's just a sneaky way of saying they ripped it off, and a rip off can never be as good as the real thing, so that wasn't such a smart thing to say, was it. Secondly, if Apple made a fantasy game it wouldn't be a very good fantasy game. Glossy surfaces and radioactive blue hues don't really go all that well with the sword and sorcery theme. You can kinda pull it off if you're subtle about it (ie. Neverwinter Nights 1), but judging by that screenshot Skyrim's anything but.

Did you notice that the entire thing was written from the perspective of a console controller?  Not a good sign...

What was so wrong with Morrowind's menu system?  Everything was on one single screen with a single press of the right-mouse button.

How about the fact that it didn't fit on the screen? You either had to have overlapping windows or annoying scroll bars (or a very powerful computer to run the game in a high enough resolution, which at the time wasn't really an option). Not saying that I like the new approach, just that the old one wasn't exactly flawless either.

Also, what's so wrong with console controllers? I love them, even bought myself one to use with my PC. They're analog, for one thing, and you can slouch comfortably in your chair without having to keep your arms stretched forward to reach the keyboard and mouse all the time. I honestly wish more PC games would use them properly. I don't think the control method is necessarily indicative of the level of quality or complexity of the game. In princple, at least. I've already steeled myself against the inevitable realization that Skyrim is even more dumbed down than Oblivion, but I see no reason why a complex game couldn't be made with a console controller as its primary control method.

Oh well, I'm sure that someone will have modded in a new menu anyway within the first month or two.

I wouldn't be so sure of that, AFAIK this kind of stuff tends to be hard-coded.

[GaelicVigil]

Did you notice that the entire thing was written from the perspective of a console controller?  Not a good sign...

What was so wrong with Morrowind's menu system?  Everything was on one single screen with a single press of the right-mouse button.

How about the fact that it didn't fit on the screen? You either had to have overlapping windows or annoying scroll bars (or a very powerful computer to run the game in a high enough resolution, which at the time wasn't really an option). Not saying that I like the new approach, just that the old one wasn't exactly flawless either.

It didn't fit on the screen if you were too lazy to use your mouse and resize your interface windows.  Morrowind's stat screen was catered to people who like customization.  I could make each window as big or as small as I wanted.  That kind of thinking feeds straight into the psyche of old-school Role Players who love to tweak things.   What Skyrim's UI does is it limits you and caters to the common denominator FPS player.  Morrowind's system wasn't perfect, but it was among the best PC menu interfaces I had ever seen.

I've already steeled myself against the inevitable realization that Skyrim is even more dumbed down than Oblivion, but I see no reason why a complex game couldn't be made with a console controller as its primary control method.

I think you're living in a dream world if you think a Triple-A developer is going to make a controller-based video game for your PC (aka complex games platform).  They do this for no other reason than to port their games to consoles, end of story.

[G-Flex]

I'm starting to think that what Final Fantasy 7 did to JRPGs is the same as what Oblivion has done to Western RPGs.

I wouldn't be so quick to blame Oblivion. They were following trends well-established before Oblivion existed, and many of the trends FF7 turned cliche were still fairly original to the FF series at the time.


Oh, by the way, from the article:

Finally, pressing up in the compass menu turns your gaze up toward the heavens. In previous games, astrology played a large role in character creation. Though Skyrim abandons the class structure in favor of a "you are what you play" philosophy, Bethesda is preserving the player’s ties to star signs.

So yeah. No more star signs, favored skills, or favored attributes, it looks like. Hooray!?

[Virtz]

Oh well, I'm sure that someone will have modded in a new menu anyway within the first month or two.

I wouldn't be so sure of that, AFAIK this kind of stuff tends to be hard-coded.

I'm not sure. Some people managed to make the pipboy in New Vegas into a handheld device rather than something grafted onto your arm. Not to mention all the overhauls, like adding item text descriptions. Though I don't think anyone's managed to make a Fallout-like interface with all stats on one screen, so I dunno.

[Sordid]

It didn't fit on the screen if you were too lazy to use your mouse and resize your interface windows.  Morrowind's stat screen was catered to people who like customization.  I could make each window as big or as small as I wanted.  That kind of thinking feeds straight into the psyche of old-school Role Players who love to tweak things.   What Skyrim's UI does is it limits you and caters to the common denominator FPS player.  Morrowind's system wasn't perfect, but it was among the best PC menu interfaces I had ever seen.

I fiddled with it endlessly and I'm telling you it would not fit properly. Yeah, sure, you can make it fit, but then your inventory and map windows are so small that you have to constantly scroll them to see stuff. Customizability is good, but it has to make sense. Dumping all the info onto one screen and then having you muck about with it just didn't work. Skyrim seems to be taking the opposite approach, one piece of information per screen. All I'm saying is that either extreme is bad.

I've already steeled myself against the inevitable realization that Skyrim is even more dumbed down than Oblivion, but I see no reason why a complex game couldn't be made with a console controller as its primary control method.

I think you're living in a dream world if you think a Triple-A developer is going to make a controller-based video game for your PC (aka complex games platform).  They do this for no other reason than to port their games to consoles, end of story.

I'm not thinking that they're going to, I'm just saying there's no reason why they couldn't. There's not even any reason why they couldn't make a complex console game. There's no reason to hate the controller, it's not its fault that it's mostly used to control dumbed down games for console kiddies.

[Chutney]

Oh, by the way, from the article:

Finally, pressing up in the compass menu turns your gaze up toward the heavens. In previous games, astrology played a large role in character creation. Though Skyrim abandons the class structure in favor of a "you are what you play" philosophy, Bethesda is preserving the player’s ties to star signs.

So yeah. No more star signs, favored skills, or favored attributes, it looks like. Hooray!?

I'm not seeing your line of logic when you say "No more star signs".

[G-Flex]

Judging by the language of the quote, they wouldn't be saying what they were saying if you still chose a star sign for your character. There's a reason they're saying "Though [...], Bethesda is preserving the player's ties to star signs." Read just past that quote and you'll see that the way they're preserving it is by having skills and perks tied to the constellations and their stars; I guess the meaning is more clear if you take that into account.

[Sensei]

...pressing up on the D-pad pauses the action and pulls up a favorites menu. Anything from your spell library or item inventory can be “bookmarked” to the favorites menu with the press of a button. How many items appear on that menu is up to each player. Bethesda isn’t placing a cap on the number of favorite items, so theoretically you could muck it up with every single item you own. Though you can choose how many items appear, you can’t determine the order; items and spells are listed alphabetically.

This better not be the case on the PC.


I seriously think it won't be a proper elder scrolls game at all, if it's even more console-focused than Oblivion was.
Also, Apple UI sucks.

[G-Flex]

No "class" system (lack of star sign is pretty much out in the open, and I doubt you'll get favored attributes/skills either or else it would be a class system and they wouldn't be talking about how "you are what you play"), even fewer skills ("Two-Handed Weapons"? Really?), a menu system evidently designed for an iPod... yeah, this is shaping up pretty much how I expected.

[Sordid]

Well I'm not so sure. Frankly I think the no-class system is a good idea. You say lumping all two-handed weapons into a single skill is oversimplified. Well in earlier TES games you pick some skills to be your class, right? And then you increase them and gain a level. So by getting better at mixing potions and casting spells (or, in Daggerfall, speaking different languages) the character gains more health? And that makes sense how, exactly?
It's a game, there are always going to be some abstractions. Stealth and pickpocketing got lumped into a single skill in Morrowind too, even though they're vastly different activities. Do we really need to have them separately? I don't think so. I'm okay with that if it means it plays better. Because that's all that really matters, isn't it?
Getting rid of pointless skills in favor of something the players actually use is a long-time trend with this series. That was the way with language skills in Daggerfall, they went away because they were pointless. You know why spears went away in Oblivion? Because they're useless and nobody likes them. Face it, 99.9% of players outfit their character with a sword. The blunt weapons skill is useless for the same reason, and if Bethsoft are getting rid of it in favor of something actually useful, then I say that's a good thing. See, nobody ever uses maces. Therefore the character is not skilled with them, and therefore if there ever comes a situation in which using a mace would be advantageous the player still won't use one because their character sucks with them. If they lump maces and swords into a single skill, then the player is free to swap to a mace if facing some skeletons (not that maces have bonuses against the undead in TES, it's just an example). See what I mean? It seems like dumbing down, but actually it enables the player to use something they wouldn't have used otherwise and gives them more usable options.
Ditto for magic schools. I don't get what the furor was about getting rid of Mysticism, I think half the schools could go. Too many schools, too few effects per school.

[AntiAntiMatter]

If I am very good with a sword, it might make using a mace easier, but my master swordsmanship skills aren't going to translate into master macemanship skills. It makes no sense if skill with a dagger is also skill with an axe. For that matter, if I want to use a spear, I should be able to use one. You can't cull things from a game just because the majority don't use them.

[Tellemurius]

uh dude hate break it but stealth and lock pick is separate for morrowind, its sneak and security but i do agree with you on how bethesda switched up the system.

[Sordid]

If I am very good with a sword, it might make using a mace easier, but my master swordsmanship skills aren't going to translate into master macemanship skills.

Game. Abstractions.

You can't cull things from a game just because the majority don't use them.

Actually, Bethsoft's been doing that for the past fifteen years, so yeah, you kinda can. Perhaps what you mean is that they shouldn't do that, in which case see previous post in which I explain some of my reasons for thinking that they should. If you think otherwise, perhaps you'd like the language skills back..?
TES is a game. If you want a reality simulator, play Dwarf Fortress.

uh dude hate break it but stealth and lock pick is separate for morrowind, its sneak and security but i do agree with you on how bethesda switched up the system.

Hate to break it to you, but I was talking about stealth and pickpocketing, not lockpicking. They were separate skills in Daggerfall. Pay more attention to what you're reading.

[Tellemurius]

well shit, thank you for that comment you ass.

[Sordid]

well shit, thank you for that comment you ass.

You're the one who started being snide, I'm merely responding in kind.