The Elder Scrolls Online: Retail Overview

I feel like I’m unintentionally becoming something of a guinea pig for the MMO (“Massively Multiplayer Online” game) genre here at Ready Up. After several enjoyable years with World of Warcraft, I took to the stars in Star Wars: The Old Republic, stretched the limits of job systems in the reborn Final Fantasy XIV (if you want to read more about that, Carly already has you covered), and now, it’s back to the grind again with The Elder Scrolls Online.

After showing a great deal of promise (but also reinforcing early concerns) during two beta weekends in March, I was eager to check out the retail release of ESO and see if developers ZeniMax Online have successfully created an MMO which respects the weighty lineage of Bethesda’s single-player-focused Elder Scrolls franchise. More than 60 hours of playtime later, here are my impressions.

As with all things The Elder Scrolls, your experience inevitably begins as a prisoner. After creating and customising an avatar (from one of nine races, split into three warring factions), it’s then up to the player to escape the Daedric realm of Coldharbour and make it to the shores of Tamriel to begin their adventures proper. Of course, you can expect more than a little assistance; you’ll be guided through the story-driven tutorial by a star-studded cast of characters (voiced by the likes Michael Gambon, Jennifer Hale and John Cleese), who help explain the basics of fighting and quest waypoints. While brief, the tutorial does a good job of getting the player comfortable with their equipment – everyone is outfitted with three different weapons suitable for your base class, encouraging experimentation – and sets up the main plot thread for the core quest-line in the game.

Everyone is outfitted with three different weapons suitable for your base class, encouraging experimentation.

Regardless of your starting faction, all of Tamriel faces the same threat: some 400 years before the “Third Era” of the main Elder Scrolls games, the Daedric prince Molag Bal has set in motion a plan to meld Oblivion and the rest of reality together and ascend as its supreme ruler. As you hit major level milestones in the game, you’ll check back in on the Five Companions – a band of adventurers previously betrayed by a servant of Molag Bal – and team up with them in order to thwart the plans of the Big Bad. Naturally, it’s up to you what you do in the interim, although you’re heavily encouraged to follow the quest-line of your chosen faction, whether it be the Aldmeri Dominion (the Altmer, Bosmer and Khajiit); the Daggerfall Covenant (the Orcs, Bretons and Redguards) or the Ebonheart Pact (the Dunmer, Argonians and Nords).

As for me, my Imperial (a pre-order exclusive race that can join any faction; more on that later) opted to follow the rule of the newly-returned Queen Ayrenn, leader of the Dominion. Naturally, after only a couple of introductory quests, you somehow end up involved in a plot to assassinate ol’ Queeny and must prevent it with the aide of a roguish Khajiit by the name of Razum-dar. Special mention should be given to this guy; his sarcasm and wit display a level of confidence in written dialogue rarely seen in Elder Scrolls games, and it was always a delight to discover what crazy scheme he had up his sleeve next (a worrying number of which involved using me as bait in prison escapes).

 In a “twist” that came up time and time again, you can expect to run into at least one quest-giver in any area who will ultimately be the cause of the problem they want you to solve.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of the rest of the text. A common criticism I saw pop up repeatedly in early impressions of ESO concerned these adventures, singling them out as being just a little too cliché, and while I think they’re as competent as anything in World of Warcraft, it’s hard to argue against this point. In a “twist” that came up time and time again, you can expect to run into at least one quest-giver in any area who will ultimately be the cause of the problem they want you to solve, whether that was enslaving the town with corrupted magic, angering a nearby troll chieftain or feeding the local populace to their vampiric son (though I’ve got to admit, that last one did make me laugh).

Then again, someone more pedantic might argue that the base writing in The Elder Scrolls has never been its strongest suit. On the plus side, quest objectives fair better. While you will have to engage the odd fetch request, I can count on my hand the number of times a NPC asked me to simply “kill x Mudcrabs”; most other objectives involve actually doing something (like, say, preventing a Daedric invasion, or raiding a pirate ship). And while I’ve yet to see anything as strong as the Dark Brotherhood quest-line from Oblivion (you know the one), the requisite Mages and Fighters guilds have adventures available if you’re looking to unlock new skills or to learn more about what else is going on in the world during the Molag Bal conflict. In any case, if you’re a hardcore fan and here primarily to geek out about Elder Scrolls lore, it’s here in spades; I was practically tripping over books during my time in the dungeons and cities of Tamriel, many of which revealed the kind of world-building and amusing side-stories you’d expect of the series.

 I was practically tripping over books during my time in the dungeons and cities of Tamriel, many of which revealed the kind of world-building and amusing side-stories you’d expect of the series.

And in defence of ZeniMax, they’ve clearly taken another look at some of the issues highlighted during previous betas, going so far as to radically alter the game’s progression system in time for retail launch. For a start, you can now pretty much ignore the suggested quest-lines following the tutorial; provided you can survive in higher-level areas, you can go exploring whenever you like, bringing progression more in line with core Elder Scrolls games. If you tire of just following the problems highlighted in your journal, it’s quite likely you’ll fine something of interest – such as a loaded enemy camp, a world-boss carrying rare loot, or an unexplored dungeon – just by travelling the land and taking in the sights. Perhaps you’ll even discover a treasure map; in a fantastic touch inspired by Red Dead Redemption, significant loot crates can be unearthed by carefully examining hand-drawn maps and identifying where X marks the spot.

Combat is another area where improvements have been made over past builds of the game. Most significantly, both in and out of skirmishes, non-player characters now have a physical form; no longer do I constantly trip through enemy Dreughs or accidentally walk into a pony. Combat, in general, still feels like a somewhat-floaty interpretation of Skyrim’s base mechanics, but being able to attack in real-time and block assaults in an MMO is a definite victory, even if it has some issues. Visual cues, such as a ground-based, warning “attack cone” (similar to Guild Wars 2 and Final Fantasy XIV), as well as an interrupt indicator, definitely help in making combat more engaging. Though latency issues often pulled me out of the experience (wherein a heavy mace swing would whiff right through a vulnerable Skeever); at a base level, it’s still one of the more immersive MMO combat systems around.

 Being able to attack in real-time and block assaults in an MMO is a definite victory, even if it has some issues.

A large part of the Elder Scrolls experience has always been the way you can build out your character, testing out new tactics and equipment as you adapt to individual challenges. I was a little concerned when I rolled my first avatar and encountered the usual cookie-cutter set of RPG stereotypes on the class selection screen: the Dragonborn-inspired Dragon Knight; the wizardy Sorcerer; the paladin-esque Templar; and the stealth-focused Nightblade. Thankfully, much like Guild Wars 2, the “holy trinity” of MMOs (healer, tank, damage-per-second) is not in effect; you can spec your character to handle any role, regardless of base class. For example, it’s entirely viable to have a heavily-armoured Sorcerer raining fire down upon groups of enemies, or a lightweight Dragon Knight who buffs and heals his party. Your base class, instead, slightly tailors the “flavour” of your skills for your chosen weapon or armour set.

Speaking of skills, allocating skill points appropriately is vital in the long-term. While you can, in grand Elder Scrolls tradition, just pick up any old weapon and start attacking nearby mobs to improve your proficiency with it, special techniques, spells, crafting bonuses and passive buffs require you to spend skill points. Players are given a skill point at every level gained and as a reward for completing certain quest chains, so they can appear plentiful early on.

Don’t go too crazy buying up every attack you can, however; you can only slot five attack skills at one time while out in the field, though you do unlock a second set of skills (which pair with a second weapon set) at level 15, allowing you to dual-spec your character. In my case, this allowed me to take my Dragon Knight, who was previously heading towards a tanky, sword and shield build, and give him a ranged option through a fancy new bow. Elder Scrolls purists might be disappointed to learn that you can’t switch between a long list of favourite equipment pre-sets during battle, but this might give a little too much player flexibility in an MMO environment, especially where PvP (“Player versus Player”) modes are concerned.

If you find that you’ve wasted your skill points on a play-style you’re not comfortable with, more can be acquired through the discovery of Skyshards, hidden treasure node-like jewels littered throughout Tamriel. Alternatively, filthy-rich players can opt to pay an exuberant fee to refund all their skill points, but as you’re forced to do this for all your skill points, the cost is so astronomically high that it might just be better to start over.

Simply approach a crafting table, pick the piece of armour or weapon you wish to build, and dump as much refined material as you can into it to bump up its level.

One aspect of The Elder Scrolls Online that consistently impressed me was its crafting system, which is a (mostly) successful attempt to blend the depth of item customisation present in games like EVE or SWTOR with the simplicity of single-player RPG experiences like Skyrim. For a start, there are no recipes here; simply approach a crafting table, pick the piece of armour or weapon you wish to build, and dump as much refined material as you can into it to bump up its level. Once you outstrip your current armour tier, it’s time to upgrade to higher-quality materials, which given the amount of exploring you’ll do in ESO, you might find you already have.

But what’s even cooler is mixing and matching armour styles, and I’m not just talking about the light, medium and heavy armour sets you’ve come to expect from most Elder Scrolls games. Every player can naturally produce an item in the style of their selected race, but through the acquisition of the elusive “style motifs”, it’s possible to learn the tricks of another race’s art. For example: a Redguard who happens across the Nord motif will be able to give all of their items that distinctive, Viking-esque Nord look. With a little luck and a little time, it’s quite feasible to have a low-level character of any race running around in the gear that best represents your favourite Elder Scrolls entry, and the look of the armour does evolve as you obtain higher quality materials.

Every player can naturally produce an item in the style of their selected race, but through the acquisition of the elusive “style motifs”, it’s possible to learn the tricks of another race’s art.

Of course, it wouldn’t be an MMO if there wasn’t the potential to min/max your stats, and for this ESO provides the trait system. By destroying an item, it’s possible to extract either the materials from it, or unique attributes of its construction, which take time to research. There’s a catch, though: as you spend time researching a particular item, the cost associated with researching new traits on that new item increases; if you want to be a master tailor of rawhide shoulder pads, for example, expect to spend well over a week acquiring everything necessary to make adjustments for every character type. This might sound annoying long-term, but it does encourage players to specialise in a particular crafting fields, and certainly adds an addictive, “daily quest”-like element to the game, where it becomes all too easy to log in just to check the progress of that final research trait, only to get sucked into another quest chain…

Finally, while the game places a heavy emphasis on the player economy and crafting, traditional quest rewards and item sets do still exist, the latter also feeding into item creation. Research any two or more traits on a particular piece of armour or weaponry and you can start building item sets with interesting buffs – such as the Night’s Silence boon, a set that allows sneaky players to regenerate health faster – which are unlocked by discovering specific crafting stations hidden throughout Tamriel. This low research requirement also means that you really only need to invest into two traits per item overall to complete a set (so, about a day per item), though it should be noted that some of the later (and more powerful) item sets require more than two traits to be unlocked in order to apply them.

The early community often displays a genuine enthusiasm that dies down as everyone maps out the secrets of the game world.

I’ve always considered the early stages of an MMO’s life to be its most exciting. While many online experiences don’t quite hit their stride until a certain game balance has been achieved, and those initial quest-ending bugs have been squashed (which are many in ESO, sadly), the early community often displays a genuine enthusiasm that dies down as everyone maps out the secrets of the game world. And with early-adopters still riding off their 30 days of free game-time, the servers are almost always bustling with activity. In general, things haven’t been any different with The Elder Scrolls Online, though watching the economy and guild interaction evolve has from the beta weekends in March through to this post-launch period has given me an interesting comparison against my time with more traditional experiences like The Old Republic or Final Fantasy XIV.

This is primarily because crafting isn’t the only area where ZeniMax Online have taken some risks in breaking MMO formulae. Controversially, ESO does not feature an auction house, which power-levellers and “twinks” (players who mix/max their stats for PvP level-caps) often rely on in other games. Instead, the majority of player trading happens in two ways: either through traditional zone chat channels, or through guild banks, which allow players in larger guilds to band together and sell items to each other at their own discretion.

Controversially, ESO does not feature a auction house, which power-levellers and twinks often rely on in other games.

To facilitate this, as with the likes of Guild Wars 2, ESO allows you to enroll in multiple player guilds (up to five), which you can switch at will based on utility and your current needs. This system has caused a sort of guild competition to develop in zone chat, with many guilds vying to “make us one of your five!”, attracting players with their large stock of crafting materials or style motifs. Rolling on an American server, I spent time with not only the “Pax Arcadia” guild (made up of forumers from Penny Arcade), but three separate trading and crafting guilds in order to buff my blacksmithing. On the subject of the latter: in a move possibly inspired by Pokemon trading, it was discovered that destroying items built by other players yields greater crafting experience, which has led to the emergence of guilds solely dedicated to trading low-cost weapons and armours (usually iron daggers, which will come as no surprise to Skyrim veterans).

With the rise of MOBA titles such as League of Legends and Dota 2, competitive Player versus Player modes have also seen a marked revival in recent years in MMOs, acting as an effective way to keep subscribers interested as well as promote the game through the e-sports/streaming scene. Rather than section off areas of the world map for battle (such as arenas, à la World of Warcraft), ESO transports combatants to a dedicated PvP environment: Cyrodiil.

Yep, the grassy landscapes from 2006’s smash-hit The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion return as one massive war zone. With Tamriel caught between three warring factions and no central Imperial army in control, the ultimate objective of PvP is to capture the Imperial City at the heart of the province, allowing a single player to seize the position of emperor/empress.

Those interested in conquest can travel to Cyrodiil as early as level 10, with players below level 50 receiving a significant stat buff to try and balance out any level disadvantages. Granted, this doesn’t quite account for the skill point and gear difference between players, but this is offset somewhat through the generous number of Skyshards available in Cyrodiil, not to mention the rewards available to those who complete PvP missions. It’s true that the variety of activities on offer certainly stand out as one of the strengths of this mode. Not only can players go after the expected capture points, but they can also engage in siege combat and even individual missions.

Travelling horseback alongside a small army of 20+ players as you caravan an Elder Scroll to safety is easily one of the highlights of the whole game.

Regarding the missions, this is one area where ESO manages to feel more structured than the otherwise-similar “World versus World” of Guild Wars 2. Bounty boards and NPCs at key waypoints provide specific quest-like objectives, paying successful players in kind with Alliance Points, a PvP-exclusive currency that can be exchanged for replacement siege equipment or yet more gear. The titular Elder Scrolls also make a surprise appearance in PvP, acting as unique, zone-wide buffs that can be passed between opponents or allies like a baton, before finally being secured in player-defended keeps. Travelling horseback alongside a small army of 20+ players as you caravan an Elder Scroll to safety is easily one of the highlights of the whole game.

Ultimately, while PvP is an engaging distraction (and at least worth taking a look at for its excellent tutorial and free Skyshards), I often felt like only higher-level players really get the most out of its multi-week campaigns, with maximum-level commanders able to easily dominate lowly recruits with their legendary gear and exclusive skill lines.

Unfortunately, it’s impossible not to talk about ESO without addressing its (at times) game-breaking bugs.

Unfortunately, it’s impossible not to talk about ESO without addressing its (at times) game-breaking bugs. The Banished Cells, an early multiplayer dungeon which rewards co-ordinated players with cool treasure and surprisingly-engaging boss encounters, was broken for more than a week following the launch of the game, preventing players from exploring everything on the island of Auridon.

And though The Banished Cells issue was probably the most inconvenient hurdle during my time with the game, it’s hardly the worst I’ve heard about from other players; everything from avatars falling endlessly through the world (this did happen to me once), to player banks decreasing in size, to game clients refusing to connect, to corrupted installations (and at a 25GB download, that’s no joke) were common complaints in zone chat on any given day. All of this is ignoring the recent discovery of an item duping bug, which has potentially done incalculable damage to the game’s economy.

Another area that is always a concern when a new MMO launches is the end game. Some might say that the downfall of SWTOR came as players concluded their primary storyline (which in my case, it should be said, was excellent) and were left with only the occasional dungeon to overcome. Guild Wars 2 has tackled this with its monthly “Living Story” updates, while Final Fantasy XIV continues to meld lore from its franchise’s storied history into the online experience to entice players to stick around. ZeniMax have started to address this, with the recent announcement of 12-person “Trials”, raid-like encounters that will test the mettle of even experienced dungeoneers.

More significantly, players who attain a character level of 50 will be able to progress to “Veteran” rank, much like the prestige system in Call of Duty. In the world of ESO, becoming a Veteran allows a player to travel to the areas of Tamriel governed by other factions, unlocking a whole heap of new content that is automatically scaled to their level. However, with several dedicated (and/or possibly obsessed) players having already achieved the maximum Veteran rank of 10, it remains to be seen how successful this strategy will be in keeping subscriptions in the long-run, especially as the 30-days free trial will soon expire for the majority of users.

Which, problematic bugs aside, leads us to the greatest obstacle facing The Elder Scrolls Online: its price.

Which, problematic bugs aside, leads us to the greatest obstacle facing The Elder Scrolls Online: its price. There’s no beating around the bush here; ZeniMax’s ambitious RPG requires an (almost as) ambitious financial investment. To even begin your journey you’ll have to plop down somewhere around £29.99 to £49.99, and then pony up a subscription of £8.99 a month for continued play. Worse still, if you want to start as an Imperial and unlock the other bonuses associated with the Imperial Edition – including an ultra-cheap horse mount, a mudcrab pet, and some exclusive treasure maps – be prepared to spend a massive £69.99 for a digital copy (and for full disclosure, we were provided this for this feature).

In an age where Free-to-Play dominates the marketplace and even the mighty World of Warcraft finds its subscription numbers dwindling, it’s not hard to be a cynic and imagine that ZeniMax and Bethesda are simply trying to recoup development costs with a retail release, and will later switch to a free-to-play model later once they’ve drained the early-adopters.

And that’s a real shame. For all its faults, The Elder Scrolls Online manages to get a surprising amount right.

And that’s a real shame. For all its faults, The Elder Scrolls Online manages to get a surprising amount right: charting the map of Tamriel and discovering new adventures can be as addictive as ever; character customisation is flexible and fun; the crafting system (sans enchanting) is generally exceptional; multiplayer isn’t as intrusive as you’d think, and even enhances parts of the experience; and the ongoing war in Cryodiil offers some potential innovations when it comes to redefining Player versus Player. But without a realistic pricing model and some serious tender love and care, even The Elder Scrolls label might not be enough to save this experience.