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hi all,
I was wondering if skyrim for the pc would be a good substitute for world of warcraft? Im getting a little bored with wow and am looking for an alternative. One of my favorite things about wow is customizing how my toon looks. Is there a lot of that in skyrim? it may sound silly but i hate anything that makes me think too much. are there a lot of "you have to find a little pebble and throw it in an obscure hole" scenarios in skyrim? when i get home from work i just want to run around killing things rather than figure out how to break in to fort knox if that make sense.

thanks in advance.

If you are playing on the PC there are plenty of 3rd party armours and clothes to download to make your character look interesting.

You can just run around killing things and doing the odd quest and none of the quests are particularly hard to figure out how to complete.

Skyrim is pretty fun, and you can customise your avatar quite a lot from the start. Mods increase the customisability enormously. Though as a first person game, you often don't see the customisation!

It's not too cerebral really. You can just run around and smash things in the face as much as you want and most quests are pretty straightforward. There are quests that are a little more difficult to figure out, but you can pretty much ignore those for the most part. In fact, it's possible to play the game with very minimal questing, and just explore the world.

It's well worth getting and giving a try in any case.

Skyrim comes thoroughly recommended from me. You can literally make any kind of character, from an Orc assassin-mage to a broadswords winning Wood Elf Beserker, and there are so many quests, events and dungeons you can replay it a dozen times and never get bored. I've not played WoW so can't compare them, but Skyrim gets 10/10 in my book, only rivalled by Halo Reach and Black Flag for Best Game Ever.

 Da Boss wrote:
Though as a first person game, you often don't see the customisation!

You can put it in 3rd person view but I find it a pain to play that way.

Yeah the third person view is pretty clunky, I don't enjoy playing it that way at all. YMMV of course!

Skryim and Elder Scrolls games in general get a resounding "Ehhhh" from me. The worlds look nice and are plenty big, but they always feel somewhat cardboard. The same can be said of the combat too, it always feels rather dry and really lacking in any depth. I always buy them and fool around with them for a bit but I think I enjoy the idea of the games more than actually playing them.

If all you want is to watch an animation of a sword or hammer move up against the model of a monster/bandit and then the monster or bandit falls down, it'll scratch that itch for sure. There are plenty of ways to customize your character too, way more than in WoW all things taken as a whole. That said if you like having a lot of abilities with different effects, and using your rotation, and having clear mechanics with interesting mechanical differences Skyrim will not scratch that itch at all.

They're also pretty different kinds of games. This question is bit beyond saying "I'm getting bored of apples, do you think I'd like oranges" and more like saying "I'm getting bored of apples, do you think I'd like Brown Rice".

Well yes, usually the superior product is a good replacement for the inferior one

Actually, I prefer the third person view for melee combat, only preferring first person for bow/magic use.

Yeah, combat isnt terribly deep in Skyrim. The nice thing though: THeres a mod for that. Plenty, really. Skyrim has tens of thousands of mods, some ranging from simply adding a piece of armour, a weapon or an unvoiced npc, to questlines and landmasses that rival the main game itself, and possibly surpassing it.
Hell, modders are currently rebuilding morrowind, from scratch, in the skyrim engine. Its really the best thing about the TES series: If you dont like something, you can mod it away.

 Tyr13 wrote:
Yeah, combat isnt terribly deep in Skyrim. The nice thing though: THeres a mod for that. Plenty, really. Skyrim has tens of thousands of mods, some ranging from simply adding a piece of armour, a weapon or an unvoiced npc, to questlines and landmasses that rival the main game itself, and possibly surpassing it.
Hell, modders are currently rebuilding morrowind, from scratch, in the skyrim engine. Its really the best thing about the TES series: If you dont like something, you can mod it away.

A lot of these aren't exactly one-click experiences though, and can be incompatible. I mean it really isn't a matter of "just mod it" it's matter of, "There is probably a mod, it may not work with others. At any rate be ready to sit down for an all-day project, and make sure you back up your install".

 Da Boss wrote:
Skyrim is pretty fun, and you can customise your avatar quite a lot from the start. Mods increase the customisability enormously. Though as a first person game, you often don't see the customisation!

It's not too cerebral really. You can just run around and smash things in the face as much as you want and most quests are pretty straightforward. There are quests that are a little more difficult to figure out, but you can pretty much ignore those for the most part. In fact, it's possible to play the game with very minimal questing, and just explore the world.

It's well worth getting and giving a try in any case.

que?

Pretty much every quest is "follow the arrow". Even the murder investigation quest can be completed by just following the arrow.

Is skyrim a substitute to wow? I'd say yes. Skyrim is pretty much like an offline mmo. While combat is the best part of skyrim it still is really boring and no mod really fixes that. If you stick to ranged it isn't so bad and sneaking is ok if you don't care about cheating.

There are a couple of quests, as you admit yourself, that take a little more than "following the arrow". But nothing very taxing at all.

Would be interesting to get a mod that turns the arrow off, and see if the quest design holds up when there is no direction like that.

thanks a lot guys. I think that ill check it out.
what could it hurt right

It might go on sale during the winter sale that begins tomorrow, so might wait until then.

 Da Boss wrote:
There are a couple of quests, as you admit yourself, that take a little more than "following the arrow". But nothing very taxing at all.

Would be interesting to get a mod that turns the arrow off, and see if the quest design holds up when there is no direction like that.

But what are these "quests that are a little more difficult"?

On top of my head the only quest I can remember without a quest arrow is "go get 10 bear skins".

 Melissia wrote:
It might go on sale during the winter sale that begins tomorrow, so might wait until then.

Wise words. Skyrim Legendary Edition will be on sale for at least (!) -75%. Sale starts tomorrow!

Meant to say "might as well" but the same thing got across so eh.

 Chongara wrote:
Skryim and Elder Scrolls games in general get a resounding "Ehhhh" from me. The worlds look nice and are plenty big, but they always feel somewhat cardboard. The same can be said of the combat too, it always feels rather dry and really lacking in any depth.

I tend to agree, there's a lot to see but not as much interaction as I would have liked. Skyrim is worth a look but it's almost too permissive and choice/consequence isn't always there, it's a bit too permissive. The combat definitely needs modding. If you enjoy a challenge, be prepared to spend half the game in your inventory screen.

Must-have mods:

3DNPCs
Inconsequential NPCs
Falskar
Companion Vilja
Vilja in Solsteheim (if you have the Dragonborn DLC)
A body replacer of your choice (UNP, 7Base, CH-something-or-other are all popular choices)
The armor/clothing replacer for said body-type
Eyes of Beauty
Apachii SkyHair

If you like challenge:
Frostfall (now you can freeze to death if you aren't careful)
Requiem (a total overhaul of just about every aspect of the game)
Civil War Overhaul (this will ensure that you can actually lose the Civil War)
College of Winterhold Immersive (makes this an actual school, with requirements, more akin to the Mages' Guild of Morrowind)

... the rest can be as-you-like-it.

Oooh, the College one sounds awesome. Will have to try that!

The Civl War one is actually really cool, too, because it makes the attacks on the cities not auto-win for whatever faction the Dragonborn is part of. Additionally, during such battles, you can "die" but, instead of having to reload the game, you wake up at a camp near the next-closest holding of your faction, having been dragged away from the losing battle.

Lemme tell ya, siding with the Empire, I about gakked myself when the Stormcloaks deployed *two* Giants against Whiterun, along with their massed infantry.

 Da Boss wrote:
Yeah the third person view is pretty clunky, I don't enjoy playing it that way at all. YMMV of course!

Then just get a first person perspective mod so you can see your body in first person, or play as a werewolf in first person.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Psienesis wrote:
Must-have mods:

3DNPCs
Inconsequential NPCs
Falskar
Companion Vilja
Vilja in Solsteheim (if you have the Dragonborn DLC)
A body replacer of your choice (UNP, 7Base, CH-something-or-other are all popular choices)
The armor/clothing replacer for said body-type
Eyes of Beauty
Apachii SkyHair

If you like challenge:
Frostfall (now you can freeze to death if you aren't careful)
Requiem (a total overhaul of just about every aspect of the game)
Civil War Overhaul (this will ensure that you can actually lose the Civil War)
College of Winterhold Immersive (makes this an actual school, with requirements, more akin to the Mages' Guild of Morrowind)

... the rest can be as-you-like-it.

Huehuehuehue.

All body mods are worth a "huehuehue".

Live another life or something similar was my preferred mod. It allows you an alternative start of the game. Novice at the Collage, new recruit for the Thief's guild, refugee and so on. I'd recommend it, even, if you haven't played it.

It's one of the things that rather bothered me as I was playing it for the first time. I wanted to start as someone else, even though the official start of the game is something of a similar tune to Morrowind and Oblivion.

 Knight wrote:
Live another life or something similar was my preferred mod. It allows you an alternative start of the game. Novice at the Collage, new recruit for the Thief's guild, refugee and so on. I'd recommend it, even, if you haven't played it.

It's one of the things that rather bothered me as I was playing it for the first time. I wanted to start as someone else, even though the official start of the game is something of a similar tune to Morrowind and Oblivion.

Yeah, that one is key after your first playthrough. Starting out on that stupid cart can get annoying.

I second Frostfall; Immersive HUD is nice too - it gets rid of your compass and quest arrows and stuff unless you turn them on. Immersive weapons and armors are good. Bandolier Bags and Pouches is a good, immersive way of improving your carrying capacity.

Supreme Storms and Volumetric Fog w/ Climates of Tamriel, High Level Enemies, When Vampires Attack and Run for your Lives are all good - the last two make townsfolk run and hide when dragons/vampires attack towns.

Immersive Patrols is really good - all the major factions actually patrol the world and fight each other. Stumbling on a battle between Imperials and Stormcloaks early on is a great way to get some starting gear/cash.

Character Creation Overhaul is good if you liked previous Elder Scrolls games way of creating characters.

And of course Sky UI.

 thenoobbomb wrote:
All body mods are worth a "huehuehue".

I provided the names of those as examples... UNP is, with default install, not a nude mod. I don't know about 7Base or CHBBP.