Reviews: The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Video Review

you guys need some...different background music for video reviews.

Review beard in full effect! Or at least in development.

@Branthog said:

That said, I would suggest waiting awhile. Until the crashing, the glitches, and the broken UI are all fixed (not only broken in that sometimes things just don't work, but broken in regards to it something contradicting itself on how it's supposed to perform). Personally, I'll probably give it about a year before I play any more of it.

What platform are you playing on? I've played 21 hours and have only had the game crash on me once. Other than that, pretty much smooth sailing on maxed settings.

I can see this being GOTY. Just seems like too good of a package to not get the title.

Good job Brad. Your review style has really gotten good over the years, and I know you spent a long time trying not to be awkward years ago ^^

Skyrim (IMO!) looks average, is full of glitches, has mediocre animations and freezes/serious framerate drops...

...but when I started playing on Sunday early morning I realised it's evening because it started getting dark outside and I was getting hungry. Time's flying fast when you play Skyrim and not many games can do that to me. However, I don't agree with 5/5 or 100% scores.

@christ0phe said:

What's the point of a video review days after the written review is released?

What's the point of anything.

So after spending some time with the game, I think I can safely say Skyrim isn't nearly as good as New Vegas. The world's just pretty bland in comparison and several skills (especially Speech) are handled much worse in Skyrim.

In The Elder Scrolls the Orcs are actually technically another race of Elves. Also, nice review.

Great review! What's with the video quality on Brad specifically though? The game footage looks about HD and Brad looks all pixelated off the side...

@krabboss said:

So after spending some time with the game, I think I can safely say Skyrim isn't nearly as good as New Vegas. The world's just pretty bland in comparison and several skills (especially Speech) are handled much worse in Skyrim.

Skyrims world is bland in comparison to New Vegas? That's cute.

All the nord shenanigans in skyrim have slowly starting to have an effect on Brad, he's becoming a viking.

If you have a decent PC, I'd highly recommend buying Skyrim for that instead of the consoles. It looks much better and I have encounter very few glitches. One time I couldn't back out of a conversation until after I alt-tabbed and it's crashed to desktop twice. 3 minor hitches after 30+ hours. Also playing around with the console commands is always fun and people love modding these games. And it's not a very demanding game. I'm sure if you visited srtest.com , you'd be pleasantly surprised.

FUCKKKK i wasn't going to get this but now I may have to. damn you shoemaker

@Landon: Yep, it is. The landscapes are designed better in Skyrim but they sit in a world that's mostly uninteresting in comparison. The characters in the game aren't great and the quests aren't nearly as interesting. And, like I said, not being able to talk your way out of/through a bunch of situations like you could in New Vegas is a big step down. Every now and then there's a persuasion check but they're pretty uncommon and they're never meaningful, really.

So what I'm saying is the writing in this game is pretty bland, basically.

So did he actually play through 100% of the content to be able to say "every bit is worth playing through"? I've played Bethesda RPGs, there are good parts and there are always not good parts that I always regret starting. Maybe he meant that the good makes the bad feel inconsequential to the overall experience?

Maybe this is nitpicking. Blah.

@krabboss said:

So after spending some time with the game, I think I can safely say Skyrim isn't nearly as good as New Vegas. The world's just pretty bland in comparison and several skills (especially Speech) are handled much worse in Skyrim.

Thats definitly a perspective as i found the world of New Vegaz scripted and bland.

Best ending ever

Great review

I am conflicted if i should get this or Saints row the third. On one hand i like huge expansive RPGs but I also like sheer absurdity. WHICH ONE SHOULD I GET!!!!!! AHHHHHH VIDEO GAMES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well said Brad! Indeed it is truly an epic game of epicnessnicity....

@Slaneesh: Skyrim feels pretty scripted to me, man. Every time you walk into a new town you'll see the NPCs carrying out some sort of event - no matter the time. You'll walk into a town at 2am and see them executing a guy or discussing politics outside of the town hall. Dragons are pretty scripted too, given they have set spawn points and will respawn after a while. The only time I remember something so awkward happening in New Vegas was when you first encounter Caesar's Legion. At the very least, they're as scripted as eachother.

I've spent so much time with this game (30+ hours so far), it's insane.

@krabboss: New Vegas had one thing to look at :The Wasteland. Add that to the fact that we saw it all before in Fallout 3, I'm having trouble wrapping my head around your bizarre comment. How much of Skyrim have you actually played? Have you even seen the more fantastical areas? It's not all just forest and snow. But I suppose that doesn't matter, since you feel that barren wasteland is so much fun to look at...

I wont argue with you on the quests and characters, because pretty much everyone else and myself say they are great so I'll just put you in the minority.

Woo! Dragons!

Seriously, buy this game. It's fucking awesome.

Hmmm...most of this footage is from the quick look. Kinda odd. Makes sense, sure, but still.

@Landon: There's no need to get so defensive about somebody not liking a game as much as you, child. And I've played maybe 35 hours at this point and I've at least visited most of the areas on the map. It looks like the Finnish Lapland and it's pretty to look at. I don't think it's as atmospheric as the Wasteland though. I don't really find "just seeing the Wasteland" as a fault really, I think it just makes for a more interesting world and allows for more varied stories to be told. I also think some of the less important dungeons in the game get kind of repetitive. I'd rather explore a dilapidated building than a bandit camp/cave or another tomb filled with draugrs, really. And I found backstory is more often given in New Vegas (and even FO3) to these sorts of things as well.

And no, it isn't universally agreed upon that the writing is great. I've seen a fair few complaints about it really, mostly from people outside of the gaming press though.

Good review. Great ending.

Oh Bradley- No!!! Don't participate in "No Shave November" D: You look better without your scruff

That was Techno Viking's great-great-grandfather at the end. =D

So the combat is still dull and bugs can still destroy your game at any time? Cool, get back to me when Bethesda can take their amazing world-building skills and apply them to a game with the same basic playability as everything else out there.

great ending

@krabboss: Lesser dungeons in Skyrim are repetitive? How about in New Vegas where every abandoned building looks like every other abandoned building? Or every cave looks like every other cave? Or every Vault looks like every other Vault? Every fault you are listing that Skyrim has, New Vegas suffers from it twice over. Is that why New Vegas is more interesting to look at than Skyrim? Because you see one good area and the rest of the game is kind enough to mimic it?

I'm being a jerk at this point. I apologize if I sounded like a child, you just have a weird way of looking at things.

Great review. Great ending. Great game.

Fine review. I agree, everyone needs to have this game in them.

So this year's last GOTY podcast will be an half hour long, right?

Bearded up!

@Landon: Yeah, they feel pretty repetitive to me. It's usually mining camps, forts with prisons and maybe a mining camp/spider nest under it or an ancient nordic tomb. There's definitely more work put into their design than what we saw in FO3 and NV, but there isn't that much variety between them, really. It's always the same aesthetic at least, so it never feels like I'm exploring something especially unique.

And yep, New Vegas has the same problems. The difference though is that these places usually feel lived in in the Fallouts. For example: There's a bandit fort and its keep has been overrun with spiders. Deadly, huge, massive spiders. There are several dead bandits down there. The bandits up above don't seem to care and little effort has been made to either kill these spiders or at least keep them from getting up top. It just feels weird and unnatural and it could have been remedied with at least some recognition from those living in the fort. The school you visit early on in FO3 did the same thing with those giant ants living in the basement - the only difference is that they acknowledged it. And this is a problem I encounter often in Skyrim, really, in different ways.

It all comes down to the writing for me. Well, the writing and the lack of speech checks.

I'm very dosappointed in this review. I feel like if it wasn't Bethesda then this game would be panned for being a buggy piece of shit and yet they get away with crashed and game ruining bugs in all of their games and still have phrases like "Game of the year" thrown at them. Surely as a reviewer it's your job to judge a game for it's technical ability as well as it's content and Bethesda doesn't stand up to that.

That sabre cat getting launched is maybe the greatest Quick Look moment ever.

@FictionalHippo:

What the hell are you on about? Given the scope of this game, it hardly has any bugs. And as Brad pointed out, compared to all previous Bethesda games, this game is much more stable (shit, I've hardly had any problems with the other ones too, even NV).

I'm mildly concerned by the increasing amount of machinima-esque outtakes sneaking into GB videos. 
Jeff streaming some bike guns in Garry's Mod would be pretty cool, but if one day there's a premium feature called Make My Machinima, I'm out.

@FictionalHippo: ive played 20 hours and have had one lock up... there has been some clipping and small famerate drops once or twice.. and yes so far this is my game of the year.

Everything is not better with dragons.

Yes, Skyrim is better and has dragons, but correlation does not imply causation.

@Brackynews said:

I'm mildly concerned by the increasing amount of machinima-esque outtakes sneaking into GB videos. Jeff streaming some bike guns in Garry's Mod would be pretty cool, but if one day there's a premium feature called Make My Machinima, I'm out.

They've always done that. Where have you been?

Awesome ending. Now someone put that ending up with the Party rock Anthem!

Brad, you nailed it! GOTY!!

@TheHBK: I'm kind of surprised they didn't go with that (or some royalty-free music reminiscent of it).

The Nords have invented one funky new dance for sure. This is still easily my game of the year though.

I want a Skyrim dedicated podcast like they have done for specific games they have all sunk time into.

Great stuff, will be picking it up for the weekend

This sure sounds awesome