The Elder Scrolls Online recently scrapped its subscription fees and added Tamriel Unlimited to its name. If this means nothing to you so far, the remainder of this review won't make much sense either. It may be best to cut your losses and move along.
If you've stayed, you may be aware that ESO is currently in the midst of a Welcome Back Weekend, a chance for beta testers who haven't purchased the full game to download and play for free for a few days.
I officially playtested the game's beta a while back, and didn't manage to pass the initial dialogue without the game crashing dramatically on my ancient laptop. Since then I've watched from a distance as updates were released, character builds published, and subscriptions scrapped. This last point was particularly exciting for me - a former WoW player who couldn't justify the constant financial drain of another MMORPG - but with a hefty price tag I still wasn't keen to commit to this game. The day off work yesterday therefore perfectly coincided with this free-to-play event, and I left my brand new laptop to download the 80GB file overnight.
I awoke eager and excited and jumped straight in to Bethesda's famously detailed character creator. I can only imagine that if Bethesda and Maxis ever joined forces they could create entire games based on detailed character creation. My favourite slider in ESO turned out to be 'Posterior Dimensions' where you can decide whether your character is flat as a plank or has the sort of junk Sir Mix-A-Lot would like, no lie.
After half an hour of arguing with my flatmates about how large a gut my biographical character should have, I released him into the world. Well, into prison. This is an Elder Scrolls game after all. I'll skip the walkthrough since this is supposed to be a review, and start talking about key points.
I have played for one day so far and would give these tips to new players:
1. Whilst there is plenty of time and space for experimentation with builds, do a bit of pre-research. You can't approach this game in the same way we approach Skyrim: hoarde everything until it may be useful. It doesn't work. You run out of space quickly and 'dropping' for later retrieval isn't an option. Think before you boot up the game, what race and class do I want to be? What weapons do I want to use, what armour? You can read the basics of most all of this on the ESO website. From there you'll have a grounding and know which of those weapons you want to loot early on, which you'll want to sell, because unlike other MMOs which limit your weapons based on class, ESO is completely open to your imagination. Greatsword-wielding mage? Go for it. Duel-wielding warrior with group-healing spells? Why not. Restrictions just aren't in Bethesda's rulebook.*
2. Be prepared for the MMO. This is not Skyrim Online. It will not feel, look, or behave like Skyrim did. This is a completely new game with new mechanics and new skills. And no pause button (that's right, you can be attacked whilst looking through your inventory. No more quick banquets if your health is running low). Skyrim fanatics may find things a little unfamiliar at first, even I did, but the controls are easy enough to make sense of and the first-person view makes the transition more comfortable.
3. Quests. So many quests. MMO players will be used to this, but as a Skyrim player I had to tear myself away from the New Quest markers so as not to overfill my quest log (which, like the inventory, has limited slots). One of the most interesting and unique features (I've never seen it before) ESO has added is that quest NPCs can only be seen by players doing the quest. As far as I can tell it's to do with the way the MegaServer technology works, but I'm not here to be technical. It's cool that once you've completed a quest for a guy who then says he'll head back to town, he actually goes back to town. And you can talk to him in town. But for players who haven't done the quest, he's still sitting by his tent in the wilderness. Very clever coding which infinitely improves the realism and immersiveness of the world.
4. Crafting. Much like other MMOs (and Skyrim), ESO allows you to focus on honing skills other than combat. Unlike Skyrim, you can't expect to do absolutely everything. Levelling up in general is a whole different ball game, as are the skill trees. If you want to know about them it would be better if you looked at the official site or a fan wiki. In my experience thus far, crafting is a fun passtime when you're bored of wolves and mudcrabs**. I decided that my mace-and-shield wielding group-healing Nord Templar would wear medium (leather-based) armour, so a crafting skill allowing me to craft and improve that would be useful. Lo and behold, a noticeboard told me of a crafting master who could certify me as a Clothier, so off I went. Even if you haven't done a year's worth of research and planning (I checked the date of my beta test - 09/01/14), quests like this one point you to NPCs who can explain each crafting skill to you (there are six in total) in enough detail that you can decide what to dedicate your time and skill points to.
5. As there were in Skyrim, so glitches can be found in ESO. I've only found one so far (but considering I only played for one day, who knows what else I might stumble across) which led to me plummeting through the floor of a building I was trying to enter. No damage was done, the game reset me back to my last loading screen so I could test the glitch multiple times to make sure it wasn't a one-off. There is an easy-to-access in-game bug reporter for just these scenarios - Bethesda know there is still work to be done.
All in all, I very much enjoyed playing for free. Would I pay £15 a month to continue playing? Probably not. But since that fee is now an optional membership bonus, I had no hesitation charging the £50 price tag to my PayPal account. Now I can play forever.
There is one warning to dole out though - and it only really applies to Steam users. If you want to play the game through Steam, granting access to the Steam Achievements, trading cards, etc, you have to purchase and create you're ESO account through Steam. Combining previously created accounts with Steam purchased software is for some reason a no-go. A shame, but from what I can tell there is no restriction on players from Steam interacting with non-Steam, since there are no individual servers.
My recommendation: if you're an MMO fan, you'll enjoy what this game brings to the table. Strategy, long-term playability, replayability, all there. Without a subscription.
If you're a fan of the previous Elder Scrolls games, you'll enjoy this game, if you're open to a new experience. This is a new game, not a Skyrim upgrade, not a sequel, a completely new standalone with very different mechanics. You, like me, probably forked out for all the Skyrim DLC, and the truth is it can be 'completed'. Try a game with no discernable end, and an even larger map.
If you've never played Elder Scrolls games or an MMO before, this whole thing probably made about as much sense as Klingon. But this could be the safest way to get into a new genre. Without a subscription fee the most you stand to lose (should you hate the game) is the £50 price tag, and most of us have spent more than that on unplayed games or uncomfortable sofas already.
Of course, this is all personal opinion. Your own adventure will lead you to unique discoveries and untrodden paths, whatever form that adventure might take.
Footnotes:
*With up to 8 characters available per account, there's plenty of chance to try new combinations once you're more used to the game mechanics.
**I don't know why everyone was going on about the swarms of mudcrabs. I've seen about 3 so far.. maybe I just need to find more rivers.
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