The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Official announcement Options

[mALX]

As many will know the Gamebryo formally used by Oblivion and Fallout 3 has been dying a slow death of late. On November 10th 2010 the assets of the engine were put up for sale. Such events have raised questions about Bethesda's choice of engine for TES V and the modability of any new engine that Bethesda might choose to use.

The most likely engine candidate was thought to be the id Tech5 engine that is currently being used for the upcoming RAGE game by id as well as the next Doom game. With Zenimax's (Bethesda's parent company) acquisition of id Software earlier on in the year TES V on the id Tech5 seemed like a very real possibility. Unfortunately the engine is not great for open world games and is even worse for modders due in no small part to the massive texture system the id Tech5 engine employs.

Since the announcement of TES V last night Nick Breckon has tweeted that TES V will use an all-new engine:


QUOTEWe can now confirm that the TES V: Skyrim engine is all-new. And it looks fantastic.


This coincides with a recent interview with Todd Howard on Eurogamer:


QUOTEEurogamer: Is it fair to say then that it's based on existing technology?

Todd Howard: The technology is ours and it is inspired by the technology we have. We have a lot of it. But that's our starting point - the Fallout 3 tech. It started with Morrowind, we went to Oblivion, we did a lot between Oblivion and Fallout 3 because now we had final hardware - with Oblivion we had six months on final hardware, so Fallout 3 technically does a lot more than Oblivion. The new stuff is an even bigger jump from that.


And finally an IGN interview with Todd Howard should put the rumours to bed:


QUOTEBethesda Game Director Todd Howard explained in a separate interview with IGN that his game would not use id Tech 5. The studio's new engine built for its upcoming title is more beneficial to creating huge, open-world games, such as Fallout 3 and The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, while id Tech 5 is better for more contained environments.

"We decided to really reboot our technology after Fallout 3, so we had been making plans for that and started doing some things. The id thing came along later, so it's a mix of that plus the kinds of games we do are a bit bigger and more dynamic.

"Id Tech 5 is the best thing in the world at doing a very static environment that looks pretty and you're going to run through. But for the kinds of things I like to do, I like the world to be more dynamic."


While we have no details on this new engine it sounds like it has been specifically tailored for the Elder Scrolls series and games of similar ilk. We can only hope that Bethesda still love us, the modding community, enough to develop their tools with the end user in mind as well.

As it is an SDK is always at the furthest edges of a developer's mind so I wouldn't expect to hear anything about it (modding) way in to the new year and much closer to the release date. I would love Bethesda to prove me wrong though.

[Thomas Kaira]

That news both makes me happy and skeptical.

I'm happy because Bethesda is finally ditching NetImmerse/Gamebryo (or rather, the Frankensteinien hack-job they used for Oblivion and Fallout 3/NV), but Bethesda has a bit of a track record with poor coding, especially on the main TES releases. Morrowind had a number of coding flaws (some were serious), Oblivion is extremely twitchy and inefficient, and both of those plus Daggerfall (which incidentally also ran on an engine Bethsoft made in-house: Xngine) have problems with savegame corruption.

I really don't know what to make of that announcement. I'm mostly just hoping that they put as much emphasis on stability and debugging as they did on improved rendering capabilities.

This post has been edited by Thomas Kaira: Dec 20 2010, 05:57 AM

[mALX]

That news both makes me happy and skeptical.

I'm happy because Bethesda is finally ditching NetImmerse/Gamebryo (or rather, the Frankensteinien hack-job they used for Oblivion and Fallout 3/NV), but Bethesda has a bit of a track record with poor coding, especially on the main TES releases. Morrowind had a number of coding flaws (some were serious), Oblivion is extremely twitchy and inefficient, and both of those plus Daggerfall (which incidentally also ran on an engine Bethsoft made in-house: Xngine) have problems with savegame corruption.

I really don't know what to make of that announcement. I'm mostly just hoping that they put as much emphasis on stability and debugging as they did on improved rendering capabilities.

I agree. They said it will be made to work on the current game systems - but that is all they have given out. The team at Obsidion was in the process of building their own when Black Isles was canceled, maybe they have been working with them on that.

[Florodine of Hlaalu]

I'm super pumped about this but I don't even know if I'll be able to run it on my computer.

[mALX]

Does anyone know what engine the Fallout: New Vegas was made on? I don't think it was the Gamebryo, but could be wrong. How will it effect our beloved modders to change from the Gamebryo? Some really good modders were given opportunities at Bethesda because of their abilities with the Gamebryo, they had learned all its quirks and work-a-rounds.

[Thomas Kaira]

It was made on the exact same engine as Fallout 3.

This post has been edited by Thomas Kaira: Dec 22 2010, 05:00 AM

[mALX]

It was made on the exact same engine as Fallout 3.

You are right, I just looked it up.

[grif11]

Im hoping at some point there gonna make an online mode or something.

maybe they'll make a kinect mode!"xbox,murder peasant"

[Thomas Kaira]

Well, what I want most is simple improved combat skill diversity, particularly with weapons:

-Blade (Dagger, Shortsword, Longsword, Claymore) <-Pretty much OK as it is.
-Haft (War Axe, Battle Axe, Mace, Warhammer) <-Name changed so the axes make more sense.
-Spear (Short Spear, Long Spear, Halberd) <-Needs to come back.
-Archery (Shortbow, Longbow, Crossbow) <-What happened to my crossbow in Oblivion? I want it back, too.

[Olen]

Reintroducing the division between short-blade and long-blade would be good. Daggers and the like just weren't as good in Oblivion.

Some rebalancing could make it better too, then they could bring back medium armour

[Black Hand]

If anything They'll oversimplify it even more....

Heavy Armor
Light Armor

Armor Skill

Blade
Blunt
Marksman

Damage you can inflict skill.

Mercantile
Speechcraft
Sneak
Security
Alchemy
Armorer

Do's it skillz!set....

And to make up for it, well have everyone call you Dovahkiin, Dragonborn!! Look at my watch..I mean, Shield!

[SubRosa]

I prefer keeping it simple. I wear armor based on how it looks. So in Oblivion my characters tend to gravitate to Iron at low level, then Elven at higher, as those are my favorites. But the game penalizes you because one is heavy and the other light. To get around that I had to mod the game to make a version of Iron armor that is Light. I would much rather just have one armor skill. Perhaps one unarmored skill to go with it might be nice though.

This post has been edited by SubRosa: Dec 25 2010, 01:54 AM

[saqin]

Really happy to finally hear something, not as happy upon entering the webpage of the company I buy games from though(the only company in Sweden(that I've found+trusts) that have got reasonable prices on new games.). Just looked it up a few days ago, and the release date said 2012!

Apart from that, I'm hoping for more weapons and armors in game, as long as it doesn't go agaist the lore. And it would be cool with dragons, just hoping they aren't making the beastraces less beastie.

(beastie??? Is that even a word? )

[Kiln]

After reading about Skyrim I have to say that it sounds just as disappointing if not more than Oblivion was. They keep removing skills and moving further towards the mainstream and for me that is very heartbreaking, Morrowind was my first true video game love. I played it more than any other game that I've owned since and maybe more than any game I'll ever own again.

[Olen]

I'm afraid I agree. No Classes, less skills (mysticism was one I actually used, OTOH enchant I never saw the point of). Keeping that dire quest leveling system which ruined oblivion, I much prefered morrowind's just having some dungeons/quests which were too hard to do at low levels. I suppose I will buy it because someone will patch it to make it halfway to fun and the story *might* be good, but honestly what I'm reading is failing to excite me.

Saying that Mammoths sound sort of cool as enemies and those trees look awesome. They look like they might have sorted out the faces too.

[Rane]

Moved to fancy new subforum.

[mALX]

WOO HOO !!! A Skyrim forum !!! Thanks Rane !!! Happy New Year !!!

[RagingMudcrab]

Glad its finally here.

I'm also glad you good folks didn't ban me outright for posting my little article. Forgot about that hazy little legal issue.

Anyway, on with the Skyrim fun.

[bene]

After reading about Skyrim I have to say that it sounds just as disappointing if not more than Oblivion was. They keep removing skills and moving further towards the mainstream and for me that is very heartbreaking, Morrowind was my first true video game love. I played it more than any other game that I've owned since and maybe more than any game I'll ever own again.

That's my fear. Oblivion was not a bad game, and Skyrim probably won't be either, but Oblivion was very different from Morrowind. It didn't meet my expectations of what an Elder Scrolls experience should be. Oblivion felt like a world away from Morrowind (and not just because of the horses and trees); I'm afraid Skyrim will feel like a solar system.

[Wrothken Bear-Scar]

Finally I can continue with the children of the famed nord bet you cant guess who.One thing I really hope for is that you actually fight the final boss if their is one.Cause seriously Martin could suck an egg sitting in his chair bleh .