The Elder Scrolls Online Preview

Ars Technica has doled out a hands-on preview of The Elder Scrolls Online after taking ZeniMax Online’s fantasy MMORPG for a spin during its latest beta testing period this past weekend. While they remain “skeptical” of its design, the article points out both strengths and weaknesses in its current format:

As I was starting, I noticed a loading screen that said (Pick a direction and start walking.) It’s an indication that the design team did know about that critically important part of Elder Scrolls design. But the game itself doesn’t actually support that directive. First of all, its geography isn’t particularly open. Instead, it uses the typical MMORPG geography of having small, open zones connected by passes and channels. Here’s a graveyard filled with zombies, now walk down a hill via a narrow road into a valley of mages and assassins. The enemies are also spaced in typical MMORPG fashion, hanging out in just enough space that it’s difficult to simply avoid them. It’s a far cry from the wandering or sparse monsters of a single-player Elder Scrolls game. There’s also no real emergent conflict; you can’t pull a monster next to an enemy mage or a guard until they fight.

The biggest issue, however, is that those enemies all have specific levels. If your level five character wanders into an area with level 15 monsters, you’re not going to be able to do much of anything. This, combined with quests, is the chief way that MMORPGs control their players: by making it clear that you don’t belong and you can’t do anything of note in areas that are above your level. It would be tempting to declare that’s just conventional design in the massively multiplayer genre, but refining those concepts has been an important source of MMO innovation since World Of Warcraft’s release. TESO, by and large, lacks that innovation. The enemies are simply there.

Quests, meanwhile, tie players to specific regions by saying that the story and rewards are only available there. As in most MMORPGs, these quests form the basic structure for playing the game: get quest, follow arrow, complete quest. While it was possible to play Skyrim like that, there was still a level of travel that made it difficult, especially as many of those quests were far across the map with dozens of distractions along the way. In TESO, the quest structure is used to lead you around by a very short leash. The geography of the world is only important as it might be in your way to find that next monster.