The Elder Scrolls (also called simply Elder Scrolls) is a computer role-playing game series developed by Bethesda Softworks. It is often abbreviated TES.

Series overview

The development of the series began in 1992, when the staff of Bethesda Softworks, which had until then been a predominantly sports game-producing company, decided to shift the focus of their upcoming Arena from arena combat into role-playing. The team, pulling influences from Ultima Underworld and Dungeons & Dragons, released the massive, open, but ultimately derivative, first-person RPG The Elder Scrolls: Arena in 1994 for DOS PC systems. The game began a tradition of games based on the principles of "[being] who you want and [doing] what you want"^[1] that have persisted throughout the series' history.

The next Elder Scrolls series game—The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall—was published in 1996. Fueled by the modest success of Arena, Daggerfall was even more ambitious than its predecessor. Daggerfall attempted to create a game world twice the size of Great Britain, rendered in a truly 3D engine, and build a skill-system that revolved around skill building rather than experience gains. Daggerfall suffered from that very ambition: Daggerfall, rushed to publication, was found "tortuously buggy," and prohibitively hardware-intensive. In the opinion of one commentator, despite Daggerfall's commercial success, "the game still bears the mark of bad code".^[2]

Following Daggerfall's release, Bethesda ceased any development on any numbered series title until 1998, developing in the interim The Elder Scrolls Legends: Battlespire, released in 1997, and The Elder Scrolls Adventures: Redguard, released in 1998. Both games had a smaller focus than the numbered series titles: Battlespire limited itself to dungeon-romping; Redguard was a linear third-person action-adventure game. The games sold poorly, and Bethesda flirted with bankruptcy. Only with the cash influx brought by Bethesda's acquisition by the well-funded Zenimax in 1999, did Bethesda return to the fore.

With The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, Bethesda tripled their staff and pushed again towards hardware-intensive gaming. Morrowind saw a return to the old-style expansive and non-linear gameplay, but also a shift towards individually detailed landscapes and items, and a smaller game-world than past titles. Morrowind was released on both the Xbox and the PC, and saw popular and critical success on both, selling upwards of 4 million units by mid 2005. Two expansion packs were quickly released for Morrowind between late 2002 and early 2003: The Elder Scrolls III: Tribunal, and The Elder Scrolls III: Bloodmoon.

Work began on The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion in 2002, immediately after Morrowind's publication. Oblivion focused on providing a tighter storyline; improved AI, courtesy of Bethesda's proprietary Radiant AI; improved physics, courtesy of the Havok engine (used in Half-Life 2); and impressive graphics. The game was released, following much press coverage, on the PC and Xbox 360 in early 2006, and the PS3 in early 2007. Bethesda released two expansion packs for Oblivion in late 2006 and early 2007: The Elder Scrolls IV: Knights of the Nine and The Elder Scrolls IV: Shivering Isles. Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion got a 9.5/10 on average out of many different gaming site's reviews, with or without the expansions.

Currently the next installment is tentatively titled The Elder Scrolls V. Development will begin on the game after Bethesda completes work on Fallout 3

Game mechanics

The Elder Scrolls games can be safely categorised as role-playing games, although they do include elements taken from action and adventure games. However, in contrast to other games of the genre, The Elder Scrolls maintains a unique, skill-based approach to character advancement. A multitude of skills can be raised through use, and once a character's skills have increased sufficiently, their level increases in reflection of those skills. Because of this, players are allowed immense flexibility and choice in character advancement. This is perceived as both a strength and a weakness in the series by gamers, although the flexibility of the games' engines has facilitated the release of game extensions (or mods) through The Elder Scrolls Construction Set that change the skill and level mechanics.

The Elder Scrolls main series of games emphasizes different aspects of the gaming experience than most computer role-playing games. A brief by Joystiq in early November 2006 compared BioWare's creations to Bethesda's by noting a difference in emphasis. Bethesda's creations focused on "aesthetic presentation and open-ended adventuring"; BioWare's on a combat system and modular architecture.^[3] The series' overarching aim has been noted by their designers as well. Bethesda has described their motivations in creating the first series game, Arena, as those of any good pen-and-paper RPG: creating an environment in which the player could be what the player wants and do what the player wants.^[4] Daggerfall's manual begins with a sort of design manifesto, declaring the developers' intention to "create a book with blank pages", and "a game designed to encourage exploration and reward curiosity". Choices, in the form of paths taken by the player, to do good, to chase after evil, are left open to the player, "just like in real life".^[5] This design trend continued with Morrowind, following the hiatus of similarly epic games in the interim, though Joystiq's previously noted insistence on graphics came again to the fore. During the development of Morrowind, Bethesda tripled its staff, so as to perfectly color its newly hand-made world. In their own words, "We knew we had to exceed the visual polish of the other games on the market, and we made it our goal to put The Elder Scrolls back into the forefront of game innovation."^[6] The Elder Scrolls series' emphasis on freedom remained. In the words of Bethesda's Morrowind Prophecies, "Experience it as you wish."^[7]

The series' grand ambitions have put some members of the gaming press into an apparent position of subdued skepticism prior to the release of each new game, incredulous as to Bethesda's capacity to surmount its obstacles. Nonetheless, whether this be a grab for reader interest or a true sentiment on behalf of the game press, such feelings evaporate by the end of each unvaryingly warm review the series' games receive.^[8]

These mechanics exist in contrast to most RPGs, where experience points are the sole measure of a character's advancement, and levelling up drives skill increases.

The World of The Elder Scrolls

The world of TES is known for its attention to detail, realism, and the long, complex lists of names, dates, and places. They constitute its extensive history and the vast, interconnected structure of its various societies, cultures, and religions much more than most players are familiar with.

Furthermore, there is no one compilation of all information pertaining to TES, and, within the games, historical references are often vague or unsure. Players are encouraged to draw their own conclusions about situations and events for which the records are few and incomplete or when competing viewpoints obscure the truth. This has spawned a subculture amongst TES players of history and philosophy debaters affectionately called loremasters.

The Elder Scrolls games take place on the continent of Tamriel, a large landmass divided into nine provinces. An exception is The Elder Scrolls Legends: Battlespire, which takes place between the realm of Oblivion, an alternate dimension ruled by the Daedra, and the mortal realm of Mundus. It is known that there are continents besides Tamriel in the Elder Scrolls planet known as Nirn, but there is yet to be an official game that takes place in one.

The nine provinces of Tamriel are:

• Cyrodiil, homeland of the Imperial
• Black Marsh, homeland of the Argonians
• Elsweyr, homeland of the Khajiit
• Hammerfell, homeland of the Redguards
• High Rock, homeland of the Bretons and the Orsimer or Orcs
• Morrowind, homeland of the Dunmer or Dark Elves
• Skyrim, homeland of the Nords
• Summerset Isles, homeland of the Altmer or High Elves
• Valenwood, homeland of the Bosmer or Wood Elves

While each of the ten playable races has a "home province" or province of origin, they are not limited to this province and can be found outside its borders, though they are a minority. It should also be noted that the home province of the Orcs is, in fact, a city-state called Orsinium, which lies within the borders of High Rock.

Other races included in TES lore are Ayleid, Chimer, Dwemer, Ehlnofey, Falmer, Hist, Imga, Kamal, Ka Po' Tun, Maormer, Sload, Tang Mo, and Tsaesci. The Dwemer were destroyed for unknown reasons before Arena, but this is explained in Morrowind (Elder Scrolls III).

The Elder Scrolls places great emphasis on the idea of the dualism and equality of opposites. This dualism is not the Abrahamic dualism of good and evil, but more closely resembles a fusion of Eastern and pre-Christian Western beliefs on the subject, being the duality of order and chaos. According to Elder Scrolls Lore, the concepts of order and chaos can be translated collectively into everything. These notions might be more exactly approximated using the words stasis (unchanging continuity) and force (unknowable energy). Almost all Tamrielic religions strongly feature the idea that the world was created through an intermingling of these two things, some saying that time is a synthesis of continuity and alteration, and most religious creation-theories deal with one or more mythological characters representing these absolutes either procreating or engaging in combat (or both, as the case may be). The thought experiment of the irresistible force is often invoked, and much of the Elder Scrolls theosophical lore is devoted to developing and examining hypotheses as to how such a thought experiment might actually play out on all levels, were it metaphysically possible.

The Elder Scrolls themselves

These scrolls are said to be scrolls of both prophecy and history. It is hinted that most of the events of the series have been inspired by those who have read one (or more) of the Elder Scrolls. In TES lore, it takes a powerful mystic to read the Scrolls, and interpretations are never absolute. They are used much like an over-complex and difficult Tarot set. One "tunes" them to a specific time and place through a mystical ritual, and then interprets the assorted symbology and iconography which appear on the otherwise blank parchment. It has been hinted that reading the Elder Scrolls too much actually causes literal blindness. In Oblivion, there is a sect of monks, known as the Order of the Ancestor Moths, that devote their lives to the reading and interpreting of the Scrolls. The more advanced members who actually read the scrolls wear blindfolds at all times when they are not divining the Elder Scrolls, and are instructed to use their eyes for this purpose only. Retired Moth Priests are completely blind and continue to wear the blindfold, apparently for ceremonial purposes. At times, however, cosmically important individuals, or individuals the subject of prophecy, have been able to see writing on the Scrolls without the associated rituals. It is said in Elder Scrolls IV that when an event has actually occurred then it sets itself unchangeably into the scrolls.

In Oblivion, the Elder Scrolls themselves are the object of the final Thieves Guild quest, "The Ultimate Heist", where the player must steal an Elder Scroll from the Imperial Palace, located in Imperial City, Cyrodiil. Though the player can pick it up in his/her inventory, and is told that it contains prophecy, he/she cannot read it: the scroll appears as an incomprehensible chart containing glyphs transcribed upon an arrangement closely resembling the constellation known as The Thief.

The Gray Fox uses the scroll to remove the negative effects of his Gray Cowl, allowing him to live in a way he was previously unable to. The fate of the stolen scroll, once given to the Gray Fox, is left unknown.

Notes

External links

Official Website links

• The Elder Scrolls official site
• Bethesda Softworks official site

Game Archive and Review sites

• Elder Scrolls series at MobyGames
• Gaming Target: The Elder Scrolls Retrospective

Fan Sites

• The Unofficial Elder Scrolls Pages – Classic Elder Scrolls wiki page featuring a lot of info on all the games.
• The Imperial Library – Library of lore and legends of the series, news and forums.
• The Elder Scrolls Wiki - Fan wiki dedicated to The Elder Scrols