People still defend Bethesda.
Even Ubisoft can make cities that are alive and real in size compared to Bethesda. Doesn't that tell you something?
no one defends bethesda here
nor even jewbisoft cause everything you may see in their trailers will just be in the trailers alone
How many inconsequential no-name NPC houses would you have had the devs waste their time on?
Not saying Skyrim isn't overrated, it is, but this is a stupid thing to be upset about.
There have been plenty of cities in RPGs with even less than 11 houses, but better content and NPC direction. The problem with Bethesda is they focus on world building, but suck at it.
A town can be as simple as four houses and an Inn, if you actually have something meaningful in there. Whereas a place like Riften has a dozen houses, a pub, a thayne keep and etc. But what is there to do in there? Listen to annoying NPCs talk for hours and then steal their books. Wow, such fun...
>>340455797
yea yea houses and you can enter those house and interact with objects in those houses
there's a case to be made for smaller "cities" and not having no name npcs
pfffhhhah yea let's discuss open world video game design on /v/
>>340455789
>Blizzdrones in full force the post
Idiot. What about something like pic related?
Half the npcs in Solitude are inconsequential, unless you haven't at least tried to play the absolute shitfest that it is. Funny thing is people keep eating it up.
>>340455789
Also WHY shouldn't they make the cities larger with inconsequential NPCs.
Do you think that everyone you walk past in a city would want to talk too you or have the time of day to have indepth discussion about life and their problems? If you view Skyrim as an RPG and don't realise what i'm writing makes complete sense, you're a retard.
>>340454742
I want you to imagine Todd Howard schooling the pleb who made that image.
You think that was not a design choice that was made at some point probably early in development?
>>340456721
>Also WHY shouldn't they make the cities larger with inconsequential NPCs.
Because Skyrim is already 80% pointless NPCs and buildings. That's one of its biggest problems. Why do you want them to add more?
>>340457140
I understand you realise the flaws if you're the anon above, but excusing shit because its shit is stupid.
The game SHOULD have more npcs and buildings, but it SHOULD have done better with those that aren't. So don't argue the point that "Its already shit, why do i want more shit" but instead argue "It's shit, i want it to be good by doing this"
>>340456573
Am I suppose to know what that is a map of?
lolno, ubisoft cities are boring and feel like a themepark.
skyrim's cities had a cool aesethtic but i agree they were too small and needed to be bigger but not crazily bigger. endlessly walking through a city when you just want to sell some loot is tedious and not fun.
luckily we've got mods.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UztnB91xaWg
Hold up let me give you guys this thing you need it to play Skyrim
>>340457140
Not him but you clearly don't get his point, he was saying there's no reason for every npc to have dialogue. Better to have a large city with pedestrians you can't talk to (you don't even have a reason to talk to them) than a walled "city" with 6 houses in them and 12 npc's that have (uninteresting) dialogue. See Novigrad vs Solitude.
>>340454742
I got Skyrim as a gift back on the 360. I was actually surprised by it until after I got to whiterun or whatever and realized that the game's big "cities" were just a handful of huts.
They're both equal amounts of cancer.
Bethesda just deserve worse for ruining Fallout.
>>340457302
No, you're supposed to have an actual brain and realise that it looks like a medieval city, and its size is something that Bethesda should be leaning towards for its major holds.
>>340457829
Final Fantasy XII is what you get when you have huge cities, but can only go into a handful of buildings and talk to 3-4 people. I think that's just as bad for a different reason.
>>340454742
There are literally just empty building models that you can't explore and non-interactable crowd in Ass Creed games.
>>340457829
Novigrad and Beauclair were utter sex. Bethesda got btfo by CDPR with Witcher 3.
>>340458247
For what reason? I don't see any reason for wanting to enter literally every house in a city and talk to every person on the street, do you do that as well in real life?
>>340454742
>people still make this thread
It's 2016, how long can you carry that butthurt before it destroys you?
>>340458015
It has architecture from at least four different cultures, that were all relevant at different time periods.
What fucking medieval city had a Greek style temple, a mosaic dome temple, a standard European castle, a marble pool of some sort, and a fucking Italian style tower? Its a hogpog of random shit dreamed up by some moron that doesn't understand time periods
>>340457302
Baldur's Gate, brosef.
>>340457140
Because 10 pointless npcs make a city feel empty while 100 makes the city actually feel alive because you can make them do mundane shit like work a field or fish or sit around in a tavern getting drunk. Not every person in the world has to be important or a quest giver and the pointless people doing pointless shit makes the world feel alive which is something Bethesda can't do.
>>340458271
>>340458247
You people are either being completely ignorant or are cancerous. I refuse to believe people don't understand this.
The point that's being made is this (I'll keep it as simple as possible for you);
The cities in all Bethesda games don't feel like cities. They're small and are more relatable to villages/hamlets. These places in the LORE of Elder Scrolls are described as big, bustling and full of activity (being major strongholds of ports). Yet we don't get that feeling when exploring them.
Furthermore why WOULD you speak to everyone you might. Why WOULD you enter the house of a family/strangers on your quest. If you want to argue 'Well you should', then dont expect to find anything worthwhile (Even Skyrim with its lack in size suffers from this).
The point is i'd much rather explore a city much like this >>340457829 or at least have cities with inconsequantial npcs so it at least FEELS like a living city that was described in the lore and what we SHOULD expect to see from a seasoned world building developer.
>>340458247
That is literally not a problem in an rpg though. It's not a requirement for every house to have a purpose. Logically most shouldn't. What is important though at the very least is the illusion that you are actually in a city and not a fucking hamlet like in the OP.
But have you bought Fallout 4 yet?
>>340454742
i will say this, Diamond city is so bad it actually makes Skyrim's cities retroactively better.
>rpg codex shitters still trying to do damage control after abysmally bad DLC expansion of witcher launched
>>340458513
But it felt like a city, rather than the essentially identical little showpieces in Skyrim.
>>340458015
How about no?
How about they do it the Elder Scrolls way small sized "cities" not necessarily grounded in reality.
Every single house needs to be open to the player in TES therefore you have a smaller population of named npcs right. These named NPCs have a schedule, a job , a quest for you and you'll probably remember most of them.
>>340458496
>I don't see any reason for wanting to enter literally every house in a city and talk to every person on the street
Plenty of RPGs do it. My favorite thing in RPGs is being able to search barrels/crates/shelves/cupboards/etc for items or clues. And it just feels like a waste when game developers spend hundreds of hours making a city look good, but then there's nothing to interact with and you just run past everything.
>do you do that as well in real life?
Its not real life. Do you compare every single thing in a game to your real life experiences? If that's the case, you should stop playing RPGs and go play a German simulation game.
>>340458792
>Bringing a Witcher is shit arguement into this thread
Why? Go back to the Witcher Threads and shitpost in there kid.
>>340458792
Blood and Wine was very fun tho
>>340458886
>How about they do it the Elder Scrolls way small sized "cities" not necessarily grounded in reality.
I've spotted the Bethesda fan boy!
>hese named NPCs have a schedule, a job , a quest for you and you'll probably remember most of them.
Brilliant, please tell me more.
>>340458645
It is probably to do with their engine limitations. Actual cities according to TES lore are much bigger. I doubt Gamebryo can handle cities like Novigrad from Witcher 3.
I am hoping TESVI to have large cities.
>>340454742
I like Bethesda as a publisher, and even then their track record has some massive holes in it.
Honestly if the options are tons of bethesda style cities or very few/one but large towns ala Novigrad i'd rather have the latter. Novigrad's still smaller than it probably 'should' be but it feels like an actual fucking town actual people made a city out of. Bethesda cities are so painfully functional abstraction it's getting hard to ignore. diamond city is too goddamn tiny for these 'upper balcony' elites to be a thing, ever.
>>340458645
The lore and the games aren't the same
You really think a country with 200 or less citizens that takes 12 minutes to walk across would be having a civil war?
>>340458662
But isn't Skyrim's whole gimmick that everyone talks and every building has an interior and whatnot?
Sure, disposable pedestrian NPCs add to the realism of the city somewhat, but the thing I remember most about Skyrim wasn't the story or the setting. It was a random dragon attack on a town that killed the blacksmith and a couple sidequest-key NPCs, so I kept reloading my save and trying to kill this dragon while keeping all of the townsfolk safe so I didn't lose quests and gear.
If the people in the town were multitudinous and disposable, moments like that wouldn't happen.
Is the setting's veracity worth giving up the "total interactivity see that mountain you can climb it" thing that makes Skyrim what it is?
>>340459175
They could work around this by splitting the city up though right? There's probably ways around it but bethesda is just a lazy developer.
>>340458645
I understood your point perfectly. But you need to stop claiming I'm ignoring your point when you're ignoring my points.
>Furthermore why WOULD you speak to everyone you might. Why WOULD you enter the house of a family/strangers on your quest.
This has been a staple of RPGs since Ultima. And many people play RPGs to do this exact thing. I understand you don't care about it. But you aren't everybody.
And if you care so much about the scale of the world over actual gameplay, then there's plenty of games out there for you. Skyrim was just bad because it tried to have both a huge detailed world, but also make everything have a gameplay trigger. and purpose. And so it ended up not pleasing either side.
>>340458792
TW3 is overrated as fuck and CDProject's lies in trailers were obvious since day 1. Still a great RPG though.
>>340457302
My childhood.
>>340458513
Rome you fucking retarded amerilard
If Bethesda uses a new engine which engine should they use?
>>340459175
yeah let's not kid ourselves, their trend has been to go even smaller still. Diamond city is one of the most pathetically tiny cities they've ever done, and it's still it's own magic cell outside the rest of the world.
our luck they are more likely to try and recreate Daggerfall's random town layout and make 'radiant towns'
"it just populates!"
>>340458886
I'm not a Bethesda fanboy at all anon
I'm just saying maybe you think you know better but you really don't. There's a reason why Bethesda does it this way there's always a design decision to be made.
>>340459175
>implying they will ever change the engine
They will use it literally till the end of time and beyond. Why create a new engine when you can make more money by using the old one?
>>340459175
It's not like anyone is forcing them to use Gamebryo. Don't know whether you meant it as an excuse or just a reason, but I've seen people say it as if it was totally out of Bethesda's control.
>>340459467
They won't
>>340459494
this was for
>>340459139
>>340459467
Gamebryo
Wouldn't an actual city be the size of the entire map?
>>340459330
exactly oblivions imperial city while still small felt reasonably sized and when it came out i even managed to get lost before i discovered fast travel
>>340459447
>Rome
>Greek style temple
>>340456573
>Blizzdrones
When was Blizzard brought up even once?
>>340458645
Why would you want to run for 15 minutes through a city and not interact with any NPC or building? You could play Assassins Creed for that. You obviously don't know the very basics of game design. If you make a huge city with only a few NPCs and buildings, you either need to have big flashing indicators to get people to go to those places or it becomes a shitty hide and seek puzzle for the player. And after spending 10 minutes not finding the next quest trigger, the average player will just quit the game and go sell it to Gamestop.
Skyrim already had too much empty space and pointless NPCs. What you're suggesting they do would make it worse.
>>340459286
Skyrim painfully draws back the amount of interesting interactivity to streamline everything due the engine. the problem is that while it seems more impressive to have a town of 12 people with 12 exact houses, when the game starts acting like it's the biggest, most impressive city it starts creating disconnect.
Novigrad is smaller than it probably should be for true scale, jsut like beth cities, but it 'feels' like a huge city because of it's scope, and even having fully visible districts and obvious changes in the area. you can't enter ever building in novigrad, but you feel like a lot of people live there even if you rarely see all of them.
>>340455075
>he hasn't been to witcher threads
>tfw no video game city has topped Novigrad.
Bethesda hired some new game engine programmers and graphics programmers just after Fallout 4 release. So there is still hope we might see something new in the next Elder Scrolls.
Where are you Todd, I can smell you. I'm not buying your Fallout 4 or your Fallout 4 DLC. Fuck you Todd, you lied again.
>>340459262
>You really think a country with 200 or less citizens that takes 12 minutes to walk across would be having a civil war?
Literal autism here folks.
You're defending a bad point in a games design even though you know it's bad. Why?
The lore and the game are the same fucking thing since the law comes from the games!
Hate to sound like a CDProjektShill but look what they did with the Witcher Lore (Based on books, not their own made up universe like Bethesda) yet still managing to make a huge city that felt life like.
>>340459175
How does he get away with it?
>>340459750
A modern one yes, not one for that time period.
>>340459934
what is so special about it?
>>340454742
Actually the Imperial City is in Cyrodiil
Im surprised people on /v/ get confused like that
>>340459854
>You obviously don't know the very basics of game design. If you make a huge city with only a few NPCs and buildings, you either need to have big flashing indicators to get people to go to those places or it becomes a shitty hide and seek puzzle for the player
>Gameplay should not get in the way of progression
This generation in a nutshell.
>>340459467
they will NEVER use a new engine, they are so unable to use a new engine they would sooner suicide pact than try. even the normies have caught on to it and every single time they try to pretend they made a 'new' engine, but all they ever do is change everything around' the core engine
every single time he says it's a new engine, he always least renders, lighting, everything ancilary tot he engine, they never touch the core scripting system
>>340459854
Because you're supposed to feel immersed in the world? That's the point.
How am i meant to feel immersed in a game that doesn't even represent the lore its based off on properly?
>>340454742
>Even Ubisoft can make cities that are alive and real in size
>Ubisoft
Are you by any chance retarded?
Both are terrible devs. Seriously just play something else.
>>340458662
>It's not a requirement for every house to have a purpose.
I don't think you understand what kind of franchise the Elder Scrolls became after Morrowind and forward.
>>340454742
Dragon's Dogma's starting town felt bigger than that shit.
>>340459494
Design decision?
And that was to make Cities into hamlets? Right? And make all the NPCS in those cities interactable, but completely forgetable and uninteresting.
So basically they failed on both counts?
>>340457829
How many of those buildings can you enter? How many NPCs can you speak to?
>>340459175
>I am hoping TESVI to have large cities.
That's never going to happen because every single house needs to be open to the player.
One large city that's a maybe
>>340459342
>And if you care so much about the scale of the world over actual gameplay, then there's plenty of games out there for you. Skyrim was just bad because it tried to have both a huge detailed world, but also make everything have a gameplay trigger. and purpose. And so it ended up not pleasing either side.
I agree with you on this.
The issue i'm saying is as you've said yourself some RPGs (Not all of them, don't like) focus on making everything relevant. But can you tell me which ones in recent times that aren't 2D based have suceeded in this?
What if they just made the whole map just one giant city, and the game takes place in that?
>>340459819
How can you tell wether thats a greek or roman style temple in the picture? Roman is basically pimped out Greek anyway
>>340459819
>america education
>>340460171
>How am i meant to feel immersed in a game that doesn't even represent the lore its based off on properly?
You realize its a game and it has limitations. Are you the kid who complained an SNES game didn't look as good as a movie?
>>340460318
and you forgot
How many objects in those building can you interact with
>>340460318
Skyrim cities are a joke compared to Novigrad, it is true anon. There are tons of building that you can enter. You can talk to every npc.
Witcher 3's engine is superior. It loads up the city/stuff in the background while you are playing.
>>340460171
honestly i think part of it is their cutting back so much it's really starting to work against their very design ideas.
design idea wise diamond city sounds awesome, but it's execution is so godamn purely functional it makes it even worse.
>>340460179
>Are you by any chance retarded?
I'm talking about Assassins Creed you idiot, and i'm not defending them you spaz. I'm just saying as shitty as they are at least in Assassins Creed i felt like i was in a moving city.
>>340460442
Dragon Quest VIII is a 3D RPG. And every single area has NPCs and searchable items that were relevant.
But aside from that game, there are few games which have ever done it well. Even modern Zelda can't do it. Skyrim had an even bigger scope. It couldn't make 350+ NPCs and every single bookshelf relevant to the world it tried to create.
>>340460548
>You realize its a game and it has limitations.
Your point is clearly irrelevant and you know i'm right.
As i said before, if i can feel like i'm in a city and get immersed within that city that the game is basing said city on it works. I also love how you're trying to go on a tangent with a childish insult.
Good attempt, heres the (you).
>>340460318
I'd say you can enter about 20 buildings at all times + `30 that are opened for story reasons at some point. People's private homes are closed because why wouldn't they be, and you're a witcher not a thief so you have no business going in there
You can speak to 20-30ish npcs
>>340460271
It was bigger sadly.
>>340460649
it's not super great sometimes though, and it clearly seems to assume loading south to north. if you fast travel to that center market, the swordsmith due south won't be in his shop unless you meditate once, but he's always there if you approach the city from a southern entrance
>>340460864
>Your point is clearly irrelevant and you know i'm right.
Your point is clearly irrelevant and you know i'm right. Make a stupid deflection and you'll get one right back.
>>340458936
>Plenty of RPGs do it
And that makes it acceptable?
I also love searching for clues / items as long as they make sense in the game world. If developers made every house in a city (and not bethesda cities but actual cities) entry-able I'm sure it would be a waste of time for the developers, time they could have spent on designing interesting dungeons and locations with good level design instead. Also if every house was entry-able I'm sure you would start seeing patterns of copy pasted and re-used models very quickly, I doubt developers have the time to make every house unique.
Same with npc's, what would you rather have: 100 npc's with shared voice actors you can talk to and deliver a few lines or 5 interesting characters in a city with each their own backstory and character progression. Which one of the two takes more time to make? You can clearly see why Bethesda went with the former option.
>>340454742
Actually, there are only 7 houses in Solitude
Weirdly though, this image labels three houses as one
>>340460931
>>340460318
oh yeah, also you can try talking to every npc but they most likely won't have a reason to want to talk to you, and every enterable interior you enter without any loading screens
>>340460318
About half of them can be entered , all NPCs can be talked to , but only select ones have dialogue options , the others just giving quips and one-liners.
Yet it still has tonnes of variation.
>>340454742
But most of those "Houses" are Hotels or shops. It's almost like you never played, and took this picture as fact...
>>340460976
(You)
>>340460078
It feels like an actual city and not some walled hamlet.
>>340460649
anon please
Witcher has some good qualities to it but let's stop overrating it
I doubt the game has truly impressed anyone around here
The variety of gameplay is just not there and the core gameplay isn't that great I'm afraid.
I guess it makes for some nice screenshots though
>>340460504
I'm not the dumb shit who said a greek style temple was to be found in rome you inbred fuck
>>340460179
The division has a wealth of potential, but walking great distances very slowly through lower manhattan is punishment. Also, the game forces you to grind terrible miniquests for level ups. What were they thinking?
>>340460670
AC does give you good feeling of being in a city.
>>340461091
Houses as in buildings you abortion
>>340461190
>I doubt the game has truly impressed anyone around here
You don't browse /v/ alot, do you?
There are plenty of appreciation threads on /v/ every time of the day, even when the kids come home from school.
>>340455789
why shouldn't they make bigger cities with more consequential houses you stupid horse fucker?
people that excuse bethesda's laziness should be shot
>>340461190
Are you fucking eating glue right now? All he said was that the city in Witcher 3 is more impressive than the ones in Skyrim and that the engine handles it better.
Jesus fucking Christ some people on this board.
>>340461190
>I doubt the game has truly impressed anyone around here
>implying
>>340461190
>Saying Witcher 3 is better than Skyrim is overrating it
>>340461032
>If developers made every house in a city (and not bethesda cities but actual cities) entry-able I'm sure it would be a waste of time for the developers, time they could have spent on designing interesting dungeons and locations with good level design instead. Also if every house was entry-able I'm sure you would start seeing patterns of copy pasted and re-used models very quickly, I doubt developers have the time to make every house unique.
Which is exactly why Skyrim was bad. Because it had this exact flaw. Tried to make 100+ dungeons and every building was able to be entered. But because there was so much, most of it lacked detail or purpose.
>
Same with npc's, what would you rather have: 100 npc's with shared voice actors you can talk to and deliver a few lines or 5 interesting characters in a city with each their own backstory and character progression.
The 5 interesting characters. But your example is an extreme. A game like Dragon Quest VIII or Red Dead Redemption had dozens of NPCs. They just put more effort on making them relevant, rather than making a ton of extra houses. So yes, it does have to do with how a developer allocates their resources. Skyrim just allocated more of its resources into making lots of buildings and dungeons, not so much the NPCs.
You're kind of cementing my point.
>>340461032
really the problem is beth keep cutting further and further back.
if we were talking about like a capital that's supposed to be the size of Manhattan but is the size of novigraad in tw3 that's clearly shrank for practicality, but beth cities are starting to not even be interesting. diamond cities market isn't interesting, it's just the vendors you need in a lazy circle, one being a dedicated one note joke, and two 'houses' next to a porch that represent the 'nobles'
while Novigraad had a full dock warehouse area, a clear market area, slums, a rich district, a religious district, multiple inn's, 2 brothels, one for upper class one for poor, etc. sure you couldn't enter every building, but diamond city has 4 houses, one is main story related, 2 are the 'nobles' and one is your buyable lot.
>>340461124
>quotes someone
>(You)
>>340461190
What in the fuck are you even on about
>Capital city
>no districts
>every building looks the same
>more merchants than citizens
i wonder why people play these games for 6 hours and never touch them again
>>340460318
Not too many, but there will be random events were you can hear NPCs talking about how to kill a monster or the location of things. Again, the point of a city isn't to give the player access to every home(unless there is a thieving aspect), but to create a sense of immersion. If I told about a remote hotspring that very few people know about and you visited this hot spring, but found it overrun with people you'd feel disappointed because it's the opposite of what you expected. It's the same with games when they tell you you are about to visit the capital of a city: you expect to see it be a busy city with lots of people, most of whom are just going about their day. You don't need to talk with everyone, but it gives you what you'd expect form a big busy city.
>>340458886
>These named NPCs have a schedule, a job , a quest for you and you'll probably remember most of them.
lmao
>>340460179
>Both are terrible devs.
THAT'S HIS ENTIRE FUCKING POINT
ARE YOU THIS RETARDED
JESUS
FUCKING
CHRIST
>>340457403
>endlessly walking through a city when you just want to sell some loot is tedious
Sounds like you should stick with ARPGs, sport.
>>340460931
>People's private homes are closed because why wouldn't they be, and you're a witcher not a thief so you have no business going in there
That's what I'm getting at. The Witcher games can get away with having dozens of filler buildings that serve no other purpose than to look nice because there is no gameplay reason to interact with them. TES can't do that. You must be able to enter every building for gameplay reasons. Classes specifically. If you're a thief and you want to enter just some random building in TES to steal shit, having that building be just filler would break the game.
>>340460318
Neither of those are important since Sky rim doesn't have a single interesting house or NPC to its name. More importantly, Novigrad has:
>NPCs that react to being bumped or shoved
>Town guards that don't require you to go on a killing spree before taking action
>Visible differences between rich and poor districts
>More quests and quest variety
>The ability to trot through the streets on your horse, but not at breakneck speeds
>Gwent
>>340461190
(You)
>>340459494
Are you seriously fucking implying that it's not possible to have a larger city than the ones in Skyrim?
Yeah there's a reason Bethesda does it this way. They cut corners every way they can and aborted fucksticks like you still lap it up. Doesn't mean it's good.
>>340461671
Daily reminder that Elder Scrolls would have been 10,000 times better if they had stuck with improving the Daggerfall experience instead of taking the OMG AAA GRAPHIX route.
>>340458792
Shame about the particle effects, but the draw distance can probably be fixed and people have corrected the color already.
>>340461802
the two games discussed in this thread are skyrim and the witcher, both arpgs.
>>340461909
they also react to the rain.
>>340456573
>Blizzdrones
The way you're bringing that up out of nowhere makes it seem you're just flinging it around without even knowing what it means. 2/10 - Try harder.
>>340461553
Witcher 3 is not a better game than Skyrim nor do I overrate Skyrim.
really makes you think
>>340461563
When I said interesting dungeons and locations I wasn't talking about the quantity, I was talking about the quality clearly.
This thread turned from a simple TES city discussion thread to a Witcher 3 shilling thread. Literally what the fuck is wrong with everyone.
>>340462003
While there are still slight differences between them and Torchlight II or Grim Dawn, I guess there's not much difference anymore, you're right.
>>340461981
the true irony is if you look at every post dagger fall game it's basically trying to get parts of Daggerfall's ambition to actually work without all the bugs
morrowwind
>make a game work in true 3d
Oblivion
>make npc scheduling.ai work at all
Skyrim
>improve general NPC ai, try and make Daggerfall random questing work
Easily why oblivion is better. It didn't have that problem.possibly morrowind too? I havent played it
>>340461889
Why. Why does every house have top be filled with "dude woah epic"? Most people don't have legendary weapons and stacks of gold in their homes, they have regular, "filler content" shit
I mean bethesda games always had the ability to enter every building and all of them had a story which is great. They choos to make smaller but more detailed cities. This is a design choice. The problem is that their execution is shit, its not their choice. In my memories of oblivion the imperial city didnt feel small at all
You can definitely have a city with 11 houses for a game like this. It's more than enough, senpai.
>>340462306
I completely disagree. Every post-Daggerfall game was about removing complexity or rpg mechanics for the sake of increasing graphics quality in order to create mass-market appeal. That's how all of these franchises end up becoming trash.
The thing is, you don't even have to make them real in size. It's enough to just make them FEEL large through moderately clever level design (i.e. don't just have one road that crosses through the entire town).
But Bethesda can't even do that right.
I wish they'd just pick a city/county, make it huge, add the countryside+villages and stick to that. They don't have to make whole provinces whilst making them look like shit.
>>340462329
Oblivion isn't any better in that regard.
>>340456273
>you can enter those house and interact with objects in those houses
Only SOME objects, most objects in Skyrim can't be interacted with if you have no mods.
>>340462378
>Most people don't have legendary weapons and stacks of gold in their homes, they have regular
Yeah, that's how it is in TES.
>>340457140
Some of the most popular mods are those that add useless NPCs to the game.
>>340462640
i hated oblivion cities and they all felt the same to me
>>340461665
(You)
Skyrim has dungeons. Tons of dungeons. They probably focused too much on dungeons to give a fuck about cities.
>>340456721
How will the player tell the difference between inconsequential filler NPCs with no dialogue and NPCs they can actually talk to?
>>340458015
>it looks like a medieval city
Why is there a pagoda there?
>>340462185
...and I was pointing out the same thing.
I truly don't understand the argument that Bethesda can't have a Novigrad sized city with all buildings enterable.
>It's too much work
Well they seemed to have no issue creating a million Draugr dungeons with nothing in them, so maybe next time channel those resources into making a bigger fucking capital city.
>Engine limitations
Not a real argument since it's Bethesda's choice to stick to a 15 year old engine, but they could divide it into separate cells like Oblivion. Slums, market, temple, political, and noble districts, along with a dedicated cell for every building. Include some nameless, randomly generated NPCs to fill the streets while making named ones visually distinct in some way.
>>340462640
That's already larger than OP. Also OP is the capital city. If you get Skyrim's other cities they're the size of Oblivion villages.
>>340462614
beth are stuck on a 'quantity is quality' design set. Falliut 4's map is technically bigger, has tons and tons of locations but they are so closely crammed together it makes the map 'feel' half the size.
>>340463061
>they could divide it into separate cells like Oblivion.
>Slums, market, temple, political, and noble districts, along with a dedicated cell for every building.
>Include some nameless, randomly generated NPCs to fill the streets while making named ones visually distinct in some way.
In other words, remake Daggerfall with modern technology.
was this big enough /v/?
>>340463061
We will see that in the next TES. Skyrim is more comparable to Witcher 2, both released in 2011.
>>340462502
>Every post-Daggerfall game was about removing complexity or rpg mechanics for the sake of increasing graphics quality
While every game is guilty of this, Skyrim took it a step further by simplifying mechanics not just because of graphics, but also for the sake of simplifying the game.
>>340462884
they focused so much on dungeons,t hey forgot to put shit worth finding in them.
>>340462640
I won't lie Oblivion suffers from the same mistakes as Skyrim BUT
Unlike Skyrim at least Oblivion had unique architecture per city while Skyrim had only the 4 main holds feel anything but Unique.
Morthal was supposed to be a city port but looked and felt like a hovel. Falkreath was just shit in general for a hunting town.
Markath was the only decent looking City in Skyrim (I can't even remember some of the other terrible ones) but at least in Oblivion i can remember most of them due to their unique appearance and interesting quest chains.
Fuck, why was Skyrim (minus graphics and kill moves) such a downgrade from Oblivion
>No Imperial Guards
>Shitty Voice Acting
>Shitty Radiant Quests
>Shitty Main Quest
>Shitty City Designs
>Same Shitty Scaling.
Also why were NONE of the Skyrim Dark Brotherhood characters anywhere near as cool as those in Oblivion (except Cicero)?
>>340459330
>They could work around this by splitting the city up though right?
Yes, they could easily do that, and I wouldn't mind at all. That's what they did for the Imperial City in Oblivion. If a few loading screens are the tradeoff for getting cities that feel like real cities, I'm okay with it.
>>340461207
>Skyrim hate thread devolves into shitting on others for not having studied greco-roman architecture
I love you /v/
>b-but but but Bethesda is lazyyyyy
>WHY CAN'T WE HAVE GTA/MEDIEVAL GTA STYLE CITIES?
yea totally smart ass
let's close every single building except the one you have to enter for the main quest and maybe a shop
let's add more pointless no name npcs that'll make the game better surely
Why not focus on the real problem?
Like loading screens too many loading screens for entering and leaving buildings,towns whatever
That hurts the experience more it's really annoying and immerion breaking
>>340462614
>vanilla game = Imperial city + surrounding areas/villages
>expansion 1 = Colovia
>expansion 2 = Nibenay basin
Why can't they do something like that? The whole map would be a lot bigger. If they did it for Oblivion I bet the Colovia/Nibenese cultural differences would have been explored much further.
>>340463302
Yeah, that's absolutely true. Skyrim really took "streamlining" to the next level. To me it's the final proof that Bethesda has given up on making a good rpg. All they're doing now is making shineys to grab kiddiedollars.
>>340463249
I didn't play Daggerfall, but if that's what it was like then I understand the people saying Bethesda has been cutting back. It's not perfect, but it's hard to worse than Solitude, which was just a straight fucking line with shit sprinkled off to the sides like a cul de sac.
>>340462915
See what this anon wrote >>340463061
>>340454742
>Empty thalmor offices in solitude
What was it gonna be /v/, I felt sneaking around that embassy far away was fun as fuck but after that, finding the elf guy in windhelm and seeing the women at a meeting, nothing much is really ever done with the thalmor despite the way NPCs hype them up to be some illuminati shit that kidnaps you in your sleep
>>340463181
Difference is, Skyrim is the capital of a frozen shithole province. The Imperial province on the other hand is the center and most populated province of the empire.
Also it's a good thing you bring up the Imperial City because I think it is an even bigger insult to the Elder Scrolls lore than Solitude. The Imperial City is supposed to the capital of an empire that spreads an entire continent. What kind of capital has a harbor in it with only one sailable ship?
>>340463427
Skyrim's dark brotherhood is trying to hard to top the Oblivion guys, who we're way simpler, but exactly the right crew of people to enjoy.
I mean the main plot of the Skyrim DB is you being the whisperer and plotting to kill the emperor, if that isn't a trying to one up someone plot i have no idea what is. they even threw a vampire loli at you.
>>340463285
When was the last time Bethesda improved their city design in a sequel? Skyrim was worse than Oblivion, and Fallout 3 was far worse than 1 and 2. For fuck's sake, 4 just gave up and made us build them ourselves. How you can be in any way optimistic mystifies me.
>>340463580
You can download and play it for free now. There's even a utility that makes it easy to install:
wiwiki.wiwiland.net/index.php?title=Daggerfall_:_DaggerfallSetup_EN
Be warned, the game came out in 1996, but if you give it a shot I think you'll see what I mean about taking the Daggerfall route vs. taking the AAA graphics route. Bethesda really should have stuck to improving on Daggerfall in the ways that you mentioned.
>>340461981
The series works better in 3D
>>340463061
>Well they seemed to have no issue creating a million Draugr dungeons with nothing in them, so maybe next time channel those resources into making a bigger fucking capital city.
This is so fucking true. All quests involve raiding some dumb draugr ruin. Why can't we have more quest that involve content in a large city?
>>340463427
Markarth*
Whiterun
Solitude
Windhelm
Riften
All have a unique architectural style
>>340463835
Solitude is smaller than Bruma.
>>340454742
Skyrim was just a disappointment and a half all the way through.
>>340463868
they keep cutting back presentation for function. Diamond city is the most painfully functional city design ever \they even add a 24/7 vendor so you don't need to wait for shops to open.
>>340464015
I want to play a game, not look at a pretty painting. Elder Scrolls should have scaled graphics way back, only improving them as much as a deep set of mechanics would have allowed.
I would much rather have huge, procedurally-generated environments, living world mechanics, complex character stats and skills, etc. instead of fucking Skyrim. And I really don't care if it's not as pretty.
>>340464068
Scripting would break and they'd have to make a bunch of essential npc's to prevent further quest breaking.
>smaller than FO4 map
>packed with unique locations
>not just 200 buildings with raiders and super mutants
>>340463835
alright so the in game imperial city had the same ratio to the lore one as the in game solitude to the lore one so its fine? If the lore solitude is at least as big as the imperial city was in oblivion they should have made a city at least as big as that
>>340462209
It's pretty much impossible to mention any fantasy RPG without some jerk coming along to tell you that Witcher 3 is a million times better in every way.
>>340464070
Markarth basically uses the same style as Dwarven dungeons. Whiterun is pretty much the vanilla style used everywhere else in the game. Solitude architecture barely has anything memorable. Riften is insultingly small and uses vanilla style for houses. Most architectural changes are simply different roof coloring.
>>340454742
People can bitch and moan about Witcher 3's combat, but goddamn all the villages and cities felt really alive
>>340456721
>World is unimaginative to me, let's have unimaginativevideogamesand be ok with that too
>>340464070
No, they don't.
Stop posting shit.
Also
>Thinking he's cool for naming Skyrim cities.
Bet the pussy loves you anon.
>>340462378
All he was saying is that being able to enter houses is important in TES because it's possible to play a thief. He said nothing about having every house contain thousands of gold worth of stuff, and indeed, most houses in TES only have mundane things in them.
>>340464635
I dunno if i'd say truly alive, but defiantly more 'living' than what bethesda cities have become
>>340464667
Your point?
>>340464070
yes they do stop being ignorant
you're not cooler
only the lesser hold cities like Morthal,Dawnstar,Falkreath,Winterhold are samey in architecture
>>340464874
for you
>>340464715
>>340454742
Why did Bethesda drop the concept of splitting the capital up into sections like with the Imperial City? It allowed the city to perform well and also feel large at the same time, they didn't even bother with anything like that in Skyrim. Solitude and Windhelm should have been at least double the size, they're each only about the size of a single Imperial City quadrant, it's pathetic.
>>340464070
>All have a unique architectural style
What? The houses in Whiterun and Riften look the same. They're just a typical wood buildings. Many of the Inns also look cloned.
>>340464874
>only half the cities in the game are samey in architecture
>>340464504
The Witcher 3 has some flaws, but world and city design is not in that list. People bring it up here because Novigrad is essentially what everyone wanted Solitude to be. It has poor districts, rich districts, a market district, and a bustling port area. There are quests that let you explore and interact with the city rather than sending you away to Draugr Dungeon #418 to collect a magical dog shit for less gold than the potions you used up getting it were worth.
wouldn't adding more NPCs with unique dialogue cost more money because of the VAs?
>>340464980
Thanks kid
>>340463061
>making named ones visually distinct in some way
But in what way, exactly? How do you make them stand out enough that the player gets the hint, but not so much that they might as well have exclamation points over their heads?
>>340465020
>The houses in Whiterun and Riften look the same
no they dont
>>340465076
That's right you cut corners in video game development. The less important stuff gets the generic nord town architecture treatment.
>>340465123
I'm pretty sure that if Bethesda ACTUALLY were passionate about their game and wanted it to be the best it could be they would hire VAs for misceallenous characters for free who wanted to participate in the games advancement.
Just looking at Skywind as an example of free VAs who are passionate about the Elder Scrolls Universe.
>>340461190
I was pretty fucking impressed
>having a smaller city is okay because it makes the NPCs more memorable
No, it literally fucking doesn't. I've spent days playing Skyrim and outside that dumb rich nigger and Heimskr in Whiterun I literally don't remember any NPC from a city. They all have unique jobs, names and homes and all fourteen of them in each city are entirely fucking forgettable despite that.
When I walk into a city, I want it to feel like a city, not a goddamned village with a castle at the end like a fucking Ren Faire theme park. If that means you had a shitload of buildings you can't actually enter and people you can't talk to then so be it. It's more immersive to have an actual city of nobodies than 6 houses and a castle full of people that are supposed to represent the biggest city in the realm. You want to know what immersion in a city is? It's getting lost in the streets, it's seeing massive throngs of people you could never speak with the entirety of in a year if you tried, it's buildings of every shape and size sprawling out as far as you can see. It's not six houses and a fucking castle.
>>340465123
The only NPCs that need voice actors are significant ones. Does anybody honestly give a shit about generic quest NPC #4815's voice? 90% of the NPCs in both Oblivion and Skyrim (and any other open world Bethesda title) could be left unvoiced to no loss in gameplay value.
>>340465205
most players are pretty good at grasping when a set up hook is playing, you just add the ! after it's obvious as a reminder rather. Hell witcher quest people sometimes even just say 'hey can you help me?' when you walk by.
>>340464991
>why did they want to reduce the number of loading screens
>>340465123
They only hired like fifteen to voice the entire NPC cast anyway - what's making them say a few more lines?
>>340463061
>Slums, market, temple, political, and noble districts, along with a dedicated cell for every building.
I would be perfectly fine with this, but a lot of people seem to get really upset at the very existence of loading screens or separate cells.
>>340465123
Yes, another reason why voice acting is utter cancer in the industry.
>>340465308
>Anonymous 06/09/16(Thu)01:13:38 No.340465308â–¶
> >>340465076
>That's right you cut corners in video game development. The less important stuff gets the generic nord town architecture treatment.
I'm defending a shit game made by a shit company by saying its okay to be shit and cut corners!
You're the cancer thats killing the gaming industry and making it what it is. Consider suicide.
>>340465308
>That's right you cut corners in video game development
Right, they invest more into marketing rather than making the game actually good.
>>340465417
People who totally get it: this guy
Is the GOTYAY thread?
>>340465524
The loading screens in Skyrim are like 4 seconds each, do you have ADHD?
>>340454742
But why would I want to walk around in a pretend large city? Yes Solitude is small but at least you do interact with all of it, I don't want to fast travel inside a city.
>>340465535
I'd be fine with separate cells honestly. It never bothered me in the Imperial City or in Freeside/the Strip.
>>340465314
it's probably more likely a lazy scripting issue than pure amount of va's if every guard has the same amount of lines and all are identical, it's less likely to cause some sort of random bork when something happens.
>>340465459
>>340465314
I'd rather do away with voice acting completely if it meant having better dialogue/story and more dialogue options, but I don't think that's realistic in this day and age
>>340465417
Amen.
>>340465642
Did you play that shit on consoles: their main market?
Last i heard, they cant even 30 fps fallout 4.
>skyrim remaster
literally why, the game is fine
>>340465524
They might as well not make the game at all so that the player won't have to deal with any loading screens.
>>340463427
>Same Shitty Scaling
That's just flat out wrong. Skyrim's scaling is nowhere near as bad as Oblivion's. For example, no bandit will ever wear anything better than steel plate armor, and even that's rare. They basically fixed it, unless you're one of those people who hates scaling on principle.
>>340465689
What was wrong with the size of the Imperial City? I found it entirely memorable, as were most of the characters in it, and it was larger than Whiterun and Solitude combined.
At the very least the capital of Skyrim should look like a capital, it should not just be the size of every other village in the area.
>>340465823
>They basically fixed it, unless you're one of those people who hates scaling on principle.
Kind of am. I prefer how Morrowind worked it but i agree, Skyrim did do it better in that regard.
>>340465751
>it meant having better dialogue/story and more dialogue options,
neither of the last 3 TES titles had any of this
>>340465689
this guys right
>>340465579
yes. witcher series is seriously kicking ass.
>>340455075
i do
bethesda games arecomfy
>>340464068
>Why can't we have more quest that involve content in a large city?
Because then Bethesda would have to actually write stories for their quests instead of plugging variables into their Radiant Quest Creator.
>>340465823
Scaling is bad with beth because they handle it retardely, difficultly to them was always 'they do more damage, you do less' and that's it. fallout 4 survival is literally the first time they've ever even remotely tried to make things difficult in a way outside of nerfing your damage and buffing theirs.
>>340466040
>bethesda game stories
nice meme
>>340466091
Oblivion had some great quest stories, they are perfectly capable of it, but just choose not to do it.
>>340454742
Great architecture though.
>>340466159
they've gotten to obsessed with 'amount' of content and have gutted everything else substantive.
Fallout 4 has infinite levels, but good luck feeling like playing more than one character because of how bland the entire thing is.
>>340465689
Why have any distance between points of interests then? Its just pretending to walk there. Why have an open world then? Just choose what you want to load next its youre just pretending to go to the next quest anyway
>>340465689
>>340465951
See >>340465417
Also interacting with all NPCs in Skyrim? Wow!
Its a shame they're stale as shit and unmemorable.
I actually remember the placements of guards in Witcher 3 and side characters from side quests. But i don't remember any of the npcs in Solitude except for the Civil War 2 main Imperial characters and that guy that goes pssssst over here! .
>>340466159
>they are perfectly capable of it, but just choose not to do it.
they might have ran out of trick that's why. they have had the same lead writer for 3 recent games.
>>340465118
That's fair enough. I've just gotten fed up with people who think things like having to play a predefined character and not being able to play any class besides "swordsman alchemist" aren't legitimate issues for someone to have with an RPG.
>>340466443
This.
How can i not remember the names or recognisible personalities of Lizardmen and CatPeople but CAN remember generic farmer #13 from that side quest to slay a ghost.
Maybe its becuase even side characters had character and personalities and were memorable due the quest they gave you compared to the raidiant generic shit you get in Bethesda games.
Who the fuck wants to be able to enter to every single house full of fucking nothing to begin with?
>>340466431
It is an optimization problem, what you describe is not enjoyable either and I agree with that. You may like doing chores but if the landscape does not offer anything new it gets boring.
>>340466553
I guess.
It must take some serious lack of skill to make a quest where you literally kill the Emperor boring and fairly unmemorable. The quest in Oblivion where you get taken out to sea on the boat-bar thing after you fall asleep in it is more memorable than the entirety of the Dark Brotherhood quest line in Skyrim.
>>340466890
gtafags and ocd autist.
>>340466890
People who play theif characters usually,
>>340466890
It's important in TES games.
>>340461980
Oblivion's imperial city was bigger than all the holds in skyrim combined.
>>340465471
I've only played up to the third chapter of Witcher 1, but even then, I've already had a few cases where an NPC with actual dialogue looked no different from any of the others and didn't even have a unique name. Relying on dialogue barks when you pass by isn't a good idea, if for no other reason than because there could very well be ambient conversations or sounds going on that will drown them out.
>>340466704
>>340466443
Bethesda NPCs blend together like crazy because all of them are voiced by the same six people barring plot characters like Tullius and Ulfric. They're also bland as fuck and don't do much regardless but it's hard to differentiate them in your mind when literally every old Nord is voiced by the guy who voiced Tigger on Winnie the Pooh.
>>340454742
>11 houses
Fucking jap porn games have better developed cities than skyrim ell emm ayyy ohh
>>340466987
"thief" gameplay is about cheeki breeki with a bow and dagger, kind anon.
>>340466890
someone who wants to play as a thief, not that stealth isnt stupidly broken in all tes games but still
its ok in witcher where you are always a gruff dude with 2 swords, but a tes game should let you enter everything and anything desu
>>340465417
It actually makes everything more memorable that design choice and also it's easier for the player to create a mental map of the world they are in.
You want a game that simulates a somewhat realistic medieval city which is fair but this being an Elder Scrolls game it's not feasible.
>>340466890
People who wanna steal everything that isn't nailed down.
>>340466987
But there is nothing to steal. Every house is filled with the same worthless shit and "valuable" items only appear on "steal the generic golden cup from this house" quest of the thieves guild.
