Elder Scrolls Online

This is the MMORPG (Massively-multiplayer online role playing game) set in the Elder Scrolls world. There are a lot of concessions that needed to happen to get the world working with a lot of players, so how does it feel? Does it work? Is it worth your time?

For the most part, it feels like most modern MMO’s. You have quests, combat and a hotbar with skills. Is it Elder Scrolls? It tries about as much as possible, but not that much. It’s solid and competent, though. What it tries to do, it does well enough, though nothing feels outstanding. But it’s a good MMORPG to play if you need that itch scratched. Best part, no monthly fee, just buy and go.

Find it at the official site.

One thing the game does differently than any other MMO I’ve seen is that you scale to everything. No zone is off limits. You want to skip the first zone and go to the fifth? Sure. The game will scale you. You, a new player, want to play with your veteran friend? Join up. You’ll contribute.

It does remove the fear of wandering into a high level zone, but it does feel pretty freeing. There is some light plot tying the zones together in a certain other, but the each zone has a self-contained story. Each one probably feels about what guild questline story was in the main games.

You can also steal things and sell them to fences. Homes are filled with random trinkets worth some gold and food items.

As for the main quest? You’re trying to stop Molag Bal from taking over Tamriel. You know, the supreme jerk of the Daedric Princes? That guy. Good luck. Again, it feels on par with a guild questline from the main games. Oh, there are still a Mages Guild and a Fighter’s Guild, but they don’t feel any different from other quests. They do give you a different skill line, though.

In Elder Scrolls Online, each level up gives you a skillpoint to spend on a variety of skill lines. Much like Skyrim, each weapon style has a skill line, as does each armor. To help along with that, there is a skill recommender.

Now there are classes with class skills, but any class can wear any armor and use any weapon. Want your sorcerer to dual-wield? Yes. Want your nightblade to heal? Ok. Want a templar that uses a bow? Fantastic.

So, see that portal thing two screenshots up? I am over there trying to destroy the anchors of Molag Bal. They are equivalent to popup group quests, though they are faceroll easy once enough players are there.

Combat in the game feels like a mixture between Skyrim and more traditional MMO’s. You have a stamina bar for dodging, sprinting, other stuff. A magicka bar for magic. And health for not dying.  I don’t melee, much, but it feels sort of like Skyrim. You have to be in range and aiming in the general area. Magic and staffs have auto-targetting as long as your start off aiming at an enemy. Oh, and you can cast while moving!

It’s more active than a normal hotbar, but it’s still standard MMO fare. Nothing too out there. Move out of the bad stuff. Pew pew away.

As I said previously, each zone has it’s own questline, and they’re pretty cool. There’s not that much in the way of choice and reprucussions, but that’s never been a strong suit of the Elder Scrolls. You’ll typically have a few choices over the zone that’s referred to later, but nothing that majorly changes anything.

So, the game is buy to play. They also give you a subscription option, so why do you want to subscribe? For one, crafting.

Crafting is a huge bag space hog. Subscribing alleviates that by giving materials their own bag. If not, expect to haul around runestones, wood, yerba mates, ore and more in your backpack. And they fill up fast.

Oh, and also materials to increase item quality. Materials to add traits to crafted items. Good thing you can store things in your bank and still use them at the crafting stations.

Subscribing also gives you the DLCs and enough in-game currency equal to the subscription cost. DLCs are new zones, but not full expansion style stuff. I don’t have any so I can’t say how those zones are, but they sound cool from the description.

So is the Elder Scrolls Online worth the time? For fans of MMORPGs, it’s a good choice. For those wanting an Elder Scrolls experience, probably not. You’re not the sole hero, so the world can’t be your oyster. It needs to be everyone’s oyster.

The UI is also pretty simple. There are lots of information I want to have, and I think there are add-ons to do that. I don’t have any add-ons, though.

There is housing, and it seems pretty robust. I don’t have the resources to get anything cool, though. So all I have is a chest and a brazier.

The Elder Scrolls Online is decent in the online world space. Can you explore the entirety of Tamriel? No. But there’s a good portion of it in game. Time to go check out the Rift.

Find it at the official site.