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Not Telling
This is a review of Skyrim that I wrote last year, originally as my AS English language coursework (It was marked 50/50
).
Spoiler
I’m running. Where, I do not know, nor have I considered such a minor detail. I clumsily amble forth from the Imperial-occupied city of Solitude, all the while I am pursued by legionaries, eager to close the gap on their unwitting prey. Why? I pickpocketed – yes, I do mean that – an executioner’s axe, killed him with it and watched as the man I attempted to save is mauled in an unsophisticated agro-fest of rowdy guardsmen. That’s when I left Mr. Kyle’s stage.
They keep coming. Three of them, by my hastily established count, a euphoric body of glistening steel and prominent red linen – somewhat resembling a Lady Gaga cosplay convention, but they’re pretty mad and I doubt such an unflattering comparison would keep my internal organs particularly snug. Against a backdrop of snowy mountainside vistas, they wade into the glum marshland, stumbling through the haphazard craters through which I attempt to weave. ‘Attempt’ being the operative word.
I scramble further south. I finally reach the border of Markarth, leaving the confines of the marshes, I stride towards the city. A beacon of glimmering light, a haven in which I can rally my thoughts and muster my strength. I could probably nick a few things, too. Bollocks. I have taken a hit, a swift thrust of an authentically modelled gladius strikes my lightweight leather jerkin, gashing across my back. The legionaries have caught up with me and I foolishly made the ‘sprint’ key redundant in my poorly-timed awe.
I make for the city. Utterly shaken by the obscene rate at which my health bar is shrinking, I curse at the monitor, I am tense and angry, perhaps even slightly fearful. I find it fascinating that a virtual creation may have such an effect, how could I possibly recommend something that could so easily quell the user as entertain them? I am engrossed.
Skyrim, Bethesda’s fifth development in the critically-acclaimed Elder Scrolls series, is all about choices and consequences. If you make the wrong choice, well, there is something fundamentally wrong with your manner of thinking. Nothing is as black and white as wrong and right, or good and evil. Do not expect to be given a sword, an orb of all-dominating incandescent death and a full suit of armour, crafted by some stereotypical high fantasy race that was destroyed centuries ago – this game is very relaxed in the way it directs the player; “All right, there are some dragons about, feel free to do something about that, if you like. It’s cool either way, bro.”
You see, Skyrim is not so much a game as a world, a world that is open to you and all of your potential exploits. It’s one of the few games that does not expect you to save the world if you don’t want to – you may even choose to join the Dark Brotherhood and kill the innocent and holy for a liberally copious mass of gold. Despite the petty theft, banditry and civil war that encircles the Nordic province of Skyrim, it never falters in its splendour and curiously perfect imperfections. Think of a Winter wonderland with the crime rates of Colombia.
The world is separated into nine different regions, or ‘holds’. Each hold has its own city, each bustling with activity, stores and problems to be solved. These side quests often tell magnificent stories and yield unique rewards, they practically beg for your attention and I strongly urge you to throw some change in that beautifully crafted hat if you wish to uncover the true strengths of this game. Allow me to regale you of the first time I entered Riften, a city in the far south-east, controlled by the ‘Stormcloak’ rebels who protest Imperial reign.
Inside, the city was fairly underwhelming. Streets are paved with beggars and thieves who occasionally feel the need to swipe from the market stalls in the town centre, they’re like magpies with opposable thumbs. Upon my immediate entry, I was threatened by a representative of the ‘Black Briar’ brewery, renowned for producing the best mead in this gorgeously dismal land, but a few metres away I catch a glance of what appears to be a death threat. The victim, named Shade – pronounced ‘shard’ – owes a thief some money, he shipped in some goods to amend this monetary foray and, much to his absolute pleasure, the bugger robbed it. Whilst you have to admire the thief’s persistence, you can’t help but feel uneasy during your first few wanderings.
Like any good Nord, I make for the inn. I feel a little shallow for abdicating from Shade’s predicament, but it would be an insult not to at least see what the fuss is about with this Black Briar concoction, besides, I don’t have the necessary speech skill to sway the thief to do good. Oh, that’s when I wound up in the thieves’ guild as – and I quote – a ‘toad’. This later develops into one of the most spectacular storylines in gaming, but I fret that it would be sheer callous dereliction of duty to spoil it for you.
These snippets of adventure are not confined to the tiled streets of civilisation, in the same way in which an aggravated can of Pepsi cannot be expected to contain its foamy wrath. Forts, ruins and caves generously plague the landscape, with a welcome splattering of picturesque villages and maliciously malignant giant camps and (ex) dragon burial mounds.
A steel-tipped arrow rips past my face, harmlessly ricocheting off the grey cobblestone wall to my left with an indignant clatter. The monotone darkness unveils for but a fraction of a second, revealing a blazing orange hue, before abruptly vanishing around a turn. Bandits. I continue a score or more paces before the yelling starts. “I’ll kill you, outsider!” A burly figure springs out of the beyond and sprints towards me, battleaxe in hand.
I raise my iron shield, which I had unceremoniously pilfered from a pleasant chap, back in Riften, and brace myself for the intercept, parry and counter routine that has been drilled into me with more autonomy than fastening Velcro. “Here, take this! I’ll be back for it later.” A thief suddenly approaches me, opening a dialogue window in which I cannot move. He rapidly spouts his request and dashes off, without waiting for an answer, closely pursued by an armed hunter. The hunter is presumably the owner of this enchanted dagger I have had thrust upon my inventory. Do well.
Unfortunately, my barbaric chum here has not grasped simple social etiquette and has been merrily turning my flesh into tagliatelle. I furiously turn and chant “FUS-ROH-DAH!” The player is a ‘dragonborn’, supposedly descended from the emperor’s lineage itself, granting the power of ‘the Voice’. In essence, it basically means that a hoarse shout can serve more than a headache. I loot the corpse and stroll away – nonchalantly, of course.
We’ve established that it is a rich world, well realised both aesthetically and historically. The game looks splendid in Bethesda’s own ‘Creation’ engine and it can certainly hold a candle to other games of its time. However, graphically it is not groundbreaking and it relies more heavily on the content of the world than the finalised visuals – Crysis 2, for instance, has a much sharper appearance. This is a meagre criticism and, as a result, it can run on reasonably-priced machines and the emphasis on substance over style is a refreshing change from the stagnating ‘triple A’ titles that have already swamped the deteriorating console market. Whilst on the topic of consoles and of complaints, the interface, whilst slick, does not feel natural with a mouse and keyboard, which leads one to believe that Skyrim hoped to accumulate a sizable following in Consoltopia.
Further bouts of creativity spurt from Skyrim like a deep wound with no tourniquet, creating a plethora of crafting avenues for you to explore. Forge your own weapons, sew your own clothing, it’s all a bit familiar… wait, fret not! Skyrim is scattered with a bountiful selection of diverse ingredients, from the humble carrot to the very heart of a daedra. These allow you to cook and, infinitely more importantly, to brew potions for ludicrous riches or hilarious abilities, worthy of a ‘man’ suffix. Invisibility, water-breathing, invulnerability to fire? Pah! It’s all yours, if you can find the necessary ingredients. You may also harvest the souls of your enemies and use them to enchant your weapons or armour, which is brutally effective, if not a little clichéd. Whilst, ultimately, this is a mere aid in the combat orientated nature of Skyrim, it’s a pleasant and – mostly – relaxing distraction from bashing bandits and looting livelihoods.
Characters are offered loving voiceovers, that unlike Skyrim’s predecessor’s mere three actors, offers variation and a unique feeling to every one of the hundreds, if not thousands of interactive citizens of Skyrim. Cities no longer feel like the outside of a garden centre and architecture has definitely developed since The Elder Scrolls IV – take Markarth, it is an ex-Dwemer (A dwarf-like race that mysteriously met an end) hall carved into a mountainside. It takes much inspiration from Petra.
In summary, Skyrim unleashes you into a masterfully crafted world of near endless opportunity for heroism, barbarism and crime, convincingly executed and utterly consuming at times. It’s not afraid to work you a little for your entertainment, but if you are willing to venture from the beaten track and make a few irrelevant decisions, you should have a warcry of a time.
They keep coming. Three of them, by my hastily established count, a euphoric body of glistening steel and prominent red linen – somewhat resembling a Lady Gaga cosplay convention, but they’re pretty mad and I doubt such an unflattering comparison would keep my internal organs particularly snug. Against a backdrop of snowy mountainside vistas, they wade into the glum marshland, stumbling through the haphazard craters through which I attempt to weave. ‘Attempt’ being the operative word.
I scramble further south. I finally reach the border of Markarth, leaving the confines of the marshes, I stride towards the city. A beacon of glimmering light, a haven in which I can rally my thoughts and muster my strength. I could probably nick a few things, too. Bollocks. I have taken a hit, a swift thrust of an authentically modelled gladius strikes my lightweight leather jerkin, gashing across my back. The legionaries have caught up with me and I foolishly made the ‘sprint’ key redundant in my poorly-timed awe.
I make for the city. Utterly shaken by the obscene rate at which my health bar is shrinking, I curse at the monitor, I am tense and angry, perhaps even slightly fearful. I find it fascinating that a virtual creation may have such an effect, how could I possibly recommend something that could so easily quell the user as entertain them? I am engrossed.
Skyrim, Bethesda’s fifth development in the critically-acclaimed Elder Scrolls series, is all about choices and consequences. If you make the wrong choice, well, there is something fundamentally wrong with your manner of thinking. Nothing is as black and white as wrong and right, or good and evil. Do not expect to be given a sword, an orb of all-dominating incandescent death and a full suit of armour, crafted by some stereotypical high fantasy race that was destroyed centuries ago – this game is very relaxed in the way it directs the player; “All right, there are some dragons about, feel free to do something about that, if you like. It’s cool either way, bro.”
You see, Skyrim is not so much a game as a world, a world that is open to you and all of your potential exploits. It’s one of the few games that does not expect you to save the world if you don’t want to – you may even choose to join the Dark Brotherhood and kill the innocent and holy for a liberally copious mass of gold. Despite the petty theft, banditry and civil war that encircles the Nordic province of Skyrim, it never falters in its splendour and curiously perfect imperfections. Think of a Winter wonderland with the crime rates of Colombia.
The world is separated into nine different regions, or ‘holds’. Each hold has its own city, each bustling with activity, stores and problems to be solved. These side quests often tell magnificent stories and yield unique rewards, they practically beg for your attention and I strongly urge you to throw some change in that beautifully crafted hat if you wish to uncover the true strengths of this game. Allow me to regale you of the first time I entered Riften, a city in the far south-east, controlled by the ‘Stormcloak’ rebels who protest Imperial reign.
Inside, the city was fairly underwhelming. Streets are paved with beggars and thieves who occasionally feel the need to swipe from the market stalls in the town centre, they’re like magpies with opposable thumbs. Upon my immediate entry, I was threatened by a representative of the ‘Black Briar’ brewery, renowned for producing the best mead in this gorgeously dismal land, but a few metres away I catch a glance of what appears to be a death threat. The victim, named Shade – pronounced ‘shard’ – owes a thief some money, he shipped in some goods to amend this monetary foray and, much to his absolute pleasure, the bugger robbed it. Whilst you have to admire the thief’s persistence, you can’t help but feel uneasy during your first few wanderings.
Like any good Nord, I make for the inn. I feel a little shallow for abdicating from Shade’s predicament, but it would be an insult not to at least see what the fuss is about with this Black Briar concoction, besides, I don’t have the necessary speech skill to sway the thief to do good. Oh, that’s when I wound up in the thieves’ guild as – and I quote – a ‘toad’. This later develops into one of the most spectacular storylines in gaming, but I fret that it would be sheer callous dereliction of duty to spoil it for you.
These snippets of adventure are not confined to the tiled streets of civilisation, in the same way in which an aggravated can of Pepsi cannot be expected to contain its foamy wrath. Forts, ruins and caves generously plague the landscape, with a welcome splattering of picturesque villages and maliciously malignant giant camps and (ex) dragon burial mounds.
A steel-tipped arrow rips past my face, harmlessly ricocheting off the grey cobblestone wall to my left with an indignant clatter. The monotone darkness unveils for but a fraction of a second, revealing a blazing orange hue, before abruptly vanishing around a turn. Bandits. I continue a score or more paces before the yelling starts. “I’ll kill you, outsider!” A burly figure springs out of the beyond and sprints towards me, battleaxe in hand.
I raise my iron shield, which I had unceremoniously pilfered from a pleasant chap, back in Riften, and brace myself for the intercept, parry and counter routine that has been drilled into me with more autonomy than fastening Velcro. “Here, take this! I’ll be back for it later.” A thief suddenly approaches me, opening a dialogue window in which I cannot move. He rapidly spouts his request and dashes off, without waiting for an answer, closely pursued by an armed hunter. The hunter is presumably the owner of this enchanted dagger I have had thrust upon my inventory. Do well.
Unfortunately, my barbaric chum here has not grasped simple social etiquette and has been merrily turning my flesh into tagliatelle. I furiously turn and chant “FUS-ROH-DAH!” The player is a ‘dragonborn’, supposedly descended from the emperor’s lineage itself, granting the power of ‘the Voice’. In essence, it basically means that a hoarse shout can serve more than a headache. I loot the corpse and stroll away – nonchalantly, of course.
We’ve established that it is a rich world, well realised both aesthetically and historically. The game looks splendid in Bethesda’s own ‘Creation’ engine and it can certainly hold a candle to other games of its time. However, graphically it is not groundbreaking and it relies more heavily on the content of the world than the finalised visuals – Crysis 2, for instance, has a much sharper appearance. This is a meagre criticism and, as a result, it can run on reasonably-priced machines and the emphasis on substance over style is a refreshing change from the stagnating ‘triple A’ titles that have already swamped the deteriorating console market. Whilst on the topic of consoles and of complaints, the interface, whilst slick, does not feel natural with a mouse and keyboard, which leads one to believe that Skyrim hoped to accumulate a sizable following in Consoltopia.
Further bouts of creativity spurt from Skyrim like a deep wound with no tourniquet, creating a plethora of crafting avenues for you to explore. Forge your own weapons, sew your own clothing, it’s all a bit familiar… wait, fret not! Skyrim is scattered with a bountiful selection of diverse ingredients, from the humble carrot to the very heart of a daedra. These allow you to cook and, infinitely more importantly, to brew potions for ludicrous riches or hilarious abilities, worthy of a ‘man’ suffix. Invisibility, water-breathing, invulnerability to fire? Pah! It’s all yours, if you can find the necessary ingredients. You may also harvest the souls of your enemies and use them to enchant your weapons or armour, which is brutally effective, if not a little clichéd. Whilst, ultimately, this is a mere aid in the combat orientated nature of Skyrim, it’s a pleasant and – mostly – relaxing distraction from bashing bandits and looting livelihoods.
Characters are offered loving voiceovers, that unlike Skyrim’s predecessor’s mere three actors, offers variation and a unique feeling to every one of the hundreds, if not thousands of interactive citizens of Skyrim. Cities no longer feel like the outside of a garden centre and architecture has definitely developed since The Elder Scrolls IV – take Markarth, it is an ex-Dwemer (A dwarf-like race that mysteriously met an end) hall carved into a mountainside. It takes much inspiration from Petra.
In summary, Skyrim unleashes you into a masterfully crafted world of near endless opportunity for heroism, barbarism and crime, convincingly executed and utterly consuming at times. It’s not afraid to work you a little for your entertainment, but if you are willing to venture from the beaten track and make a few irrelevant decisions, you should have a warcry of a time.
