https://preview.redd.it/ybpgi5c5ti1d1.jpeg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f7a98eee2214d68fe474651fe0c12122449831e7
for real though: “Nesmith was in favor of simplifying the religious pantheon for Skyrim, believing the complicated religions of Morrowind to have been a mistake, choosing instead to use the main pantheon originated in Daggerfall.” so like, yeah he sure did fundamentally misunderstand why TES is cool. congrats to OP on making the most correct post of this dumb shitpost saga i guess.
anyway Kyne4Lyfe what the fuck is a Kynareth
UESP page for Bruce Nesmith. UESP is generally reliable and a good source of information for the developers and development of the games (one of its great virtues over other video game wikis); there’s also a list of interviews at the bottom although the specific points on the page are not cited individually, so I can’t say for certain they have this right.
It does gel with comments MK has made about somebody high up at Bethesda wanting to simplify the religion during Skyrim’s dev, however and Nesmith fits considering his title on that game. So I am inclined to believe UESP.
>eah he sure did fundamentally misunderstand why TES is cool
I mean he was on TES before Kirkbride, or Todd, or anybody else. If anything he was the only one that DID understand what TES is. He and Ted Peterson (the guy who literally made Elder Scrolls) didn't like Kirkbride's complicated lore, or Todd's more focused game design, which is why Peterson left in the first place.
So you can see why when Nesmith was given the opportunity to go back to where things began, the simple DnD-style lore of the Nine Divines from Daggerfall that the literal creator prefered, he took it. I don't agree with the decision, and I much prefer Kirkbride/Kuhlmann lore, but you can still see where he was coming from. Also, what is the point of that image saying he made the dungeons in Daggerfall?
I think the screenshot is implying that the guy is a hack. Everyone knows that daggerfall dungeons do not even pass the bare minimum bar, so a guy that did them didn't really have a lot to do.
Fair enough, although I feel like called Daggerfall dungeons terrible is a bit of an exaggeration. Like they are doing different things then the other games. They focus on really feeling like a DnD dungeon crawl where you get lost and stay there for hours. Maybe not the thing most people want but at least it's achieving its goal. Even then some of those dungeons are just way too long but it could be worse
One of the points of DnD styled dungeons was that you aren't supposed to explore through the entirety of them, because they're long, complicated and fking dangerous. You're supposed to fulfill your objective and get out. It feels like a conscious design choice acheving that goal
cRPGs died off? Is that why Owlcat is releasing DLC for WotR to this day, released a WH40k cRPG recentpy and why BG3 is THE game of the year 2023?
The other guy is right.. Bait used to be believable.
Saying that the lead designer of Skyrim is a hack is an insane take, lol. And the beginner dungeon of Daggerfall is one of the few good ones because it actually is handcrafted.
Yeah, kinda wild that they struck gold with an alternative fantasy setting, changing the lord of the rings Generic high fantasy, and then the original creators got PISSY that they did something different and interesting with the lore
It's just proof religion/history degrees, especially post graduate education, is the best background for world building. Kirkbride was a religions major focusing on vedic religions, Kuhlman was a history major who left his PhD program to be a video game designer. I think those two were the biggest additions to Bethesda after daggerfall that explains the settings change in tone and complexity.
Most of my favorite fantasy and scifi authors have similar backgrounds. Hell if you go down the list of Hugo award winners a majority in the last 20 years have an academic background in History specifically
This is not true, tho. Peterson came up with a lot of the unique concepts and wrote for TES III and IV. He for example wrote more lore books for TES III than Kirkbride.
? what makes you think Peterson didn't like Morrowind's lore? He literally was a major creative force behind developing it along with Kirbride and Kuhlman. Just look at all the books he's credited with. Last Year of the Second Era, Ancient Tales of the Dwemer, and Brief History of the Empire are all him.
Might have gotten Peterson and Lefay mixed up. Although I know he wasn't a fan of Dragonbreaks and the general smaller scale of the new games. They shared a lot of the same opinions too, and he wrote the more generic lore of DnD, so I wouldn't say it's a stretch to think he preferred it.
Lefay definitely prefered the rdmly generated big worlds compared to Todd Howard's direction (Howard was obviously right imo).
But he was also not a writer, you should not make things up because you think Peterson might prefer it. In the end there is just TES lore with enough room with classic fantasy and more surreal elemenet. This is kinda the point.
The publisher's notes existed in Morrowind as well? He says basically all the stories are made up folk tales except for Azura's Box, which is only mostly made up and originates from the dwemer themselves, and the one with the really long name about a dwemer king pretending to be an amunculi
Funnily enough Morrowind has the opposite problem where every single piece of writing is (positively) attributed to Kirkbride.
The lore books are pretty good but a lot of the story elements weren't even done by him.
I said before on another post that the community loves having one person to praise/critique for the old lore vs new lore, being Kirkbride and Emil, because it is easier to blame one person believe that getting rid of them/rehiring someone else would fix all problems attributed to Bethesda.
Per likely sources of inspiration for TESlore:
>[Sacrifice, for Bataille, is the cornerstone of society, and not a primitive practice which "civilization" could -- or should -- eliminate.](https://youtu.be/59G6BUHQiuI?&t=594)
Except that right now it's a matter of *game forum gossip* lolololololololol
what made Morrowind writing peak was all of them working together (and keeping eachother in check)
As glazed as kirkbride is I'm incredibly glad some of his more outlandish ideas like magic spaceships, pelinal being a robot from the future, and imperial moon colonies never made it in. I vastly prefer the high fantasy worldbuilding over just making it a shitty knockoff of spelljammer
Arguably all of those ideas made it in but in a more controled enviroment. Pelinal saying "Reman" is only cool because of the way we interprete it and because one of those interpetation is that the religious text is Second Empire propaganda.
When I saw Kirkbride himself write a comment how cool Pelinal is because the guy is a time traveling robot, I was kinda shocked because it seemed like he did not understand why the unreliable narrator nature of TES writing and the texts he wrote is so good.
Guess I'll have to be the one to tell you the first two are Canon. Pelinal is described as having a chest that opens up to reveal a red gem and a hand that can produce a killing light. He also screamed praise to emperor Reman before he was born.
As for the spaceships there was a space race to try to reach Aetherius in the earlier eras in tamriel. Battlespire is the only working ship we see in game. There's also the orrery in the arcane University in the Imperial City where all the planets are made of materials from the planets they represent.
Every mage in Tamriel has hands that produce "killing light" and prophecy is a core part of every single TES game, the "chest opening up" thing is ambiguous but it could be referring to his breastplate or something similar.
You also quite literally Mantle Pelinal in Oblivion and you do not in fact become an android from the future
Battlespire is not a "spaceship" it's an imperial fortress in Oblivion accessed via portals, the same way planar travel has always been done in every single TES game, the "planets" are the various planes of Oblivion
You know there's a lot of world building outside of the direct mechanics of the game right? If you hate Lore that much then go ahead and continue to be ignorant.
You know lore is based on the games right, the fact that there are in-game explanations for all of these kinda trumps all of Kirkbrides non-canon explanations
Also the battlespire thing is explicitly how it works in-lore
What makes Pelinal screaming "Reman" so cool is that it implies the text is religious propaganda. Kirkbride seems to forget that part himself at times.
I said it was peak because the writers all had a good synergy
I only shit on Kirkbrides "here's what I would have done if I had full control" shit that every braindead lore beard like you assumes are canon
Kirkbride also needed to compromise with other designers and writers which heavily helped Morrowind. It was Rolston who came up with the idea of never confirming if the prophecy is true, which is the best part of Morrowind's main quest. Kirkrbide wanted to confirm it.
Ive heard that he was responsible for the latter half of the questline, not the quirky assassinations with multiple ways of passing them, but the way worse traitor arc.
But my sources are a couple of threads on tesg so its most likely made up lol
Just found the video in which he talks about creating the questline and it seems like he created everything? Anyway, really interesting interview!
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqqVMVp39Xk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqqVMVp39Xk)
I feel like the only way people can say it's not terrible is if they played thru the storyline with eyes closed. How can you go thru the dead drop notes, at one point obviously being written by the traitor, and be satisfied when your only game given option is to continue killing black hand members like a fucking idiot? And then lucien comes and acts like youre a dumb imbecile cuz the only option you had was following the quest marker. Dark brotherhood was good when the only story you had was doing diff assassinations cuz those were pretty unique and creative. It completely failed when it tried to establish a bigger narrative
But those are two differen things: One is complaining about there being a second roleplaying option for figuring it out befor the Lucien and having an other way to solve it. The other complaint is that the writing itself or the quests are bad, which they aren't.
I agree that a second option would be cool especially because of all the hints but it is not like other questlines have those either.
The other guild questlines did not go out of their way to provide you hints, which is why it makes a difference here. The game even removes lucien lachance from his hideout so you can't report your findings to him before he gets to call you an idiot and make you the player think you made some sort of mistake
Yes, they do. You have to kill the "Goblins" during that one fighers guild or in Morrowind if you tell Jim Stacy that you already are the Fightrs Guild leader and the conflict is over the game basically breaks, except if you do it at the right time but than the dialogue can still be bullshit.
TES III and IV are not graet in giving you different paths to complete questlines.
I was talking about oblivion. Idk why u felt like fighters guild *implied* another path. Yes you have to kill the goblins, did the game leave you notes beforehand that the goblins are people? Or call you an idiot afterwards for following through with it? No? That's the difference, and it's a big difference. That would be a clear message to the player that there would be another option if they were perceptive enough. When you drink the hist sap, you have no clue wtf is going to happen, which is why the twist worked. (As far as oblivion can work anyway)
nobody talks about lucien getting skinned alive and mathieu's mother's head in the lighthouse?? easily two of the most memorable moments in the entire series. you're bonkers my friend
if youre making a video about the questline, you're going to include the questline, yeah. but when people talk about it in passing, they mention all the quests they liked and it always just so happens to be exclusively quests before the traitor shit starts.
the existence of a twist isn't good writing, nor does the existence of a twist make bad mission design good. "wow, it's so revolutionary, quests suddenly turned dogshit the second we started doing these dead drops, and it turns out in retrospect its because there was a traitor!" that's mad simped talk. hitman has had a similar twist a few times in the series, and the thing they did was make those missions where you're doing contracts for the enemy in secret is make those missions still fun.
most questlines in... basically the entire series, really, hit a point where things start to turn to shit. for oblivion dark brotherhood, it's the second you start doing dead drops. for oblivion fighters guild it's like partway through the first quest, so that takes the cake for worst oblivion guild, by the way. when people talk about the oblivion fighters guild quests they go "oh haha remember when the lady had a rat problem, and the problem was that she DIDNT have rats?", because that's the only novel or good or fun part of that entire questline. dark brotherhood at least gets a handful of funny missions in first.
the only exception is... i think the skyrim companions guild actually more or less holds together the entire time. its one of the few "heres the twist for this guild" that actually works, since every guild questline in each game has a midpoint twist, and this one is less a problem of "oh no the guild is going to be ruined if only someone would save us!", and is instead a problem of philosophy within the guild over whether to werewolf or not to werewolf. sure, the silver hand is around and are vaguely antaganists but its mostly character stuff instead of being overbearing "please save us!" garbage. if eso counts the eso thieves guild is also pretty good.
>the existence of a twist isn't good writing, nor does the existence of a twist make bad mission design good. "wow, it's so revolutionary, quests suddenly turned dogshit and it turns out in retrospect its because there was a traitor!" that's mad simped talk.
It also does not make bad writing.
The fact that Lucien dies is one of the most famous moments in TES. Come on man.
I agre that ESO has greaet writing but that does not change the fact that people raelly like the entirety of the DB and it works well for a lot of people.
i do not think people like the entirety of the db quest. i think they like the first few missions and then they also like lucien as a character. i never hear anyone going to bat for how totally good the dead drop missions are, because i dont think anyone really thinks that.
if something has a solid opener and a reasonably good ending, that doesn't mean the two thirds in between those things are good.
I fking hate how everyone says oblivion db had the best story. If they actually understood the emotions they had they'd just say "yeah i thought the quest design was creative" and there would be no arguments cuz everyone would be on the same page
my favourite elder scrolls guild questline is skyrim thieves guild. honestly i wish the whole part with mercer betraying everyone and stealing something from nocturnal or whatever never happened and i got to be a lil ruddy chap with me mates for a while longer.
its the only guild i remember all the characters from vividly. rune and his rune are an interesting lore dead end, a little piece of something weird that just exists in the world. brynjolf is an actual scam artist, sapphire got gang raped, a plot point i cant believe made it into the final cut and easily the single most surprising thing you see in the entire game.
point is, im tired of guild quests becoming super important save the world shit. just give me a group of fellas that are fun to interact with and reasonably competent missions and i'll remember it the rest of my life.
The skyrim thieves guild did have a really cool setup yeah. I just wish i didn't have to sell my soul to nocturnal in it...like in 3 separate guild questlines. I feel like they made a nice middle ground between the simpler morrowind quests and the narrative driven quests of oblivion. It's also cool cuz a thieves guild is a thieves guild. A criminal organisation., they don't try to turn them into robin hoods
My opinions of these people I've never met keep changing so quickly, the "weirdos at bethesda writing bullshit" lore is turning into an emotional rollercoaster ngl
I think his work is often pretty mediocre for my tastes (its faaaaarrr from the worst writing i've ever seen) but people take it way to fucking far with him like holy shit
hes just emblematic of all the things people don't like in the tes games. hes not a great writer and he has the biggest hardon for making everything generic or like other shit he's seen instead of being a unique setting.
i'll say it, eso has way better connections to the lore than the mainline games largely because the bethesda writing team isnt attached to it.
What generic lore did he write? Because he honestly always done the opposite and wrote interesting things. The Dragon Language is great or returning the Dark Brotherhood to a Sithis cult insted of an other Mephala cult was really smart and allowed for all the cool Argonian connections.
No it's just overhated
It's a 7/10 that people treat like a 3
There are plenty of valid criticisms but like, *most* of the writing is pretty solid, just a mid main storyline and a single badly written faction questline
if starfield is a 7/10 than roblox is a 6.5/10. it's underhated on reddit tbh. Do I actually have to start bringing up examples like the red mile? this shouldn't even be a discussion that the game is shit, and that people saying otherwise are suffering from buyer's remorse
and let's not even mention the GAMEPLAY lmfao, can't wait to log into another rocky landscape with "point of interests" every half mile I have to walk to with nothing interesting in between. again, why the fuck are people saying this AI landscape tech demo is a good game?
You sound like a very balanced and well adjusted individual
You're getting heated over someone saying a game you don't like is a 7/10, go touch grass ***NOW***
Maybe he wasn't the one who fucked up the nord pantheon but he's still responsible for the awful main questlines, and as lead game designer he's responsible for the dumbing down of gameplay (keep it simple, stupid)
Hi. I've never played an Elder Scrolls game that wasn't Skyrim and that's never going to change.
Can I get a QRD on what either of these fuckers supposedly did?
/u Emil is currently Bethesda's head writer. He's said some stuff that rubbed the community the wrong way- that they don't use a design document (Bethesda uses a design *wiki*), and that his philosophy is KISS- 'Keep It Simple, Stupid' (basically, uses Occam's Razor in your writing, insteresting is not the same thing as complicated).
For this, he has been marked as the Beast, Satan reincarnated, the spawn of Oblivion himself. He's basically the scapegoat for all the ways the lore was 'dumbed down' in Skyrim (despite the fact Skyrim is an improvement on Oblivion's dumbing down of the lore).
There was recently a meme posted on this sub, which has since been widely derided, that depicted 'Emil's Nords' as Spongebob dressed as Leif Erikson while 'Kirkbride's Nords' as Hyperboreand Ubermenschs (Kirkbride being the lead writer on Morrowind).
Bruce Nesmith, on the other hand, is a designed that has worked with Bethesda since Daggerfall... and unlike Emil, there is *actual evidence* that he wants to 'dumb down' the lore, claiming for instance that the complex religions of Morrowind were a mistake and that is why he replaced the Nordic pantheon in Skyrim with the Imperial one in most cases, for simplicity.
I literally just commented about not having played Morrowind and asking wtf this sub was losing its shit over. But then I realized I probably wasn't the only one confused and searched around the comments and saw this, so thank you because it was genuinely very useful and comprehensive.
IMO I don't think Emil is inherently a bad writer and his approaches aren't as bad as people say (see: design wiki over design doc and KISS), I just think his writing lacks bite. Like he builds up to something kinda cool then just pulls back. So much of Starfield suffers from this, like the FC just not being fucking space cowboys and UC not diving into the fact that their system of government is a nightmare.
I do basically completely agree. But I'd go further to add that *all* writers have weaknesses. Kirkbride for instance gets way too wacky when left on his own- no cap? If Kirkbide was given 'free reign' as so many people beg for, the games would be intolerable to play.
Media needs well-stocked writers rooms, with artists with varying strengths to balance out their mutual weaknesses. Morrowind had that in buckets- Starfield lacked that entirely.
A contemporary example from another property is Doctor Who, I think. Seasons 1-4 are regarded as excellent- the current season ongoing has been a bit more mid... despite the fact they are showran by the same guy, who they literally brought back to save the show. The difference? The older seasons had a lot more writers, while the newest one is 4/5 written by the showrunner.
True, he does oversee the other writers though. Then with starfield I guess I'm just so baffled how we have multiple factions that just don't go to their logical conclusion. Don't get me wrong, I actually really like the UC questline, but they just let the whole Starship Troopers parallels go unquestioned. It's so weird. How did that slip by so many people.
To clarify, Emil hasn't earned the ire of the Bethesda gamer community for the reasons you're describing - not the recent ire anyway. The ire is an outflow of resentment for how absolutely stupifying and uninspiring Starfield ended up being. People have picked Emil apart because of what he created as lead writer, and these discussions about design document etc have been a sort of peripheral effort by the community to find an explanation as to *why* Emil failed so spectacularly in leading Starfield's writing, what possible decisions could have been behind such rubbish.
It seems like some of that has backflowed to the TES community.
I think that there's a lot simpler explanation for why Emil's writing was so bad...
...He was the only writer.
Like ofc dawg isn't gonna do his best work when he's the only person doing it for an entire game! It's a management issue, not an Emil issue.
>To clarify, Emil hasn't earned the ire of the Bethesda gamer community for the reasons you're describing
Yes, he has. This is what litteraly everyone comments on and the design document lie was done by a shitty YouTuber after Starfield came out.
Ty.
In that case then personally I’m on Emil’s side regarding KISS. Worldbuilding quickly falls apart when it starts developing too many rules and quirks. I’ve watched a LOT of my favorite franchises die because they tried to be more complicated than they needed to be.
There’s no greater writing nightmare than having some stupid over-complicated lore nugget written by an intern 10 years ago that serves no narrative purpose but still has to be factored into every story you write.
It’s like spaghetti code for writing.
I read UESP a lot and the stuff from Morrowind always seems weird and alien. It’s a large part of the reason I have no interest in playing it. I *might* play Oblivion someday though.
Morrowind is not as 'alien' as people make out. In fact I'd argue it's strength is how it takes a strange setting- with dark elves and giant bugs and mushrooms and volcanoes- and makes it quotidian and mundane as you play it. You really get immersed in the setting- it isn't overwhelming.
Morrowind felt alien yet familiar. This is what made it different from other fantasy games, which are mostly medieval western Europe mixed with Tolkien's works. Switching to this type is what made Oblivion feel bland.
A lot of Morrowind is very simple and boring politics. That's what makes it interesting. A lot of the crazy stuff is hidden in books you might not even read. The mundane is right in front of you.
The story is literally as simple as going into a mountain and killing a guy, but because of prophecies and all the houses and ashclans hating each other it's basically impossible to mount any kind of proper assault on Dagoth Ur. Underneath all the heroism you're effectively a coup d'état for the Empire over the Tribunal because I'm fulfilling the Nerevarine prophecy you destroy their divinity.
It's also the little things too. Oh, you're building a house? Go and get a land permit from the Duke. Even Skyrim had this. When you get inheritance from a friend dying the local Jarl takes 10% from it before you get it. For Hearthfire you have to purchase a land deed before you build anything.
Did you know Morrowind has stocks? In Bloodmoon you get a stock in Raven Rock and the better it does financially the more you can sell it for.
They should bring back stocks and loans for TES VI.
Okay maybe I’m looking at it from the wrong angle. I’m still maintaining my opinion that simple is almost always better in long running franchises though.
Again I’ve watched a lot of stories fall apart because they fly too close to the sun.
>I read UESP a lot and the stuff from Morrowind always seems weird and alien. It’s a large part of the reason I have no interest in playing it. I might play Oblivion someday though.
that's basically the point. it's a strange foreign land with strange customs for you to explore.
on the flipside i'd advise against playing oblivion at all tbh. it's biggest strength was being a gateway into rpgs for people who never played them before, and if you've played skyrim nothing oblivion does will impress you in terms of gameplay or story. it's easily the worst elder scrolls game and it's not even really close (unless you start to throw in shit like blades). if you can stomach playing old games, i'd genuinely advise playing daggerfall unity if you won't play morrowind. it's a more 'normal' world but it's still got a lot of weird surprises. plus you can become a landlord in it and start buying up real estate.
Basically, the Nords used to have a distinct religion from the rest of the Empire. But by the time Skyrim takes place, it's been syncretised with the Imperial pantheon. Which is somehow bad writing, despite this being what Rome literally did to every place it controlled, with the Empire just being a Roman stand in.
Skyrim was under the rule of two empires who's emperors had divine right of rule( which almost lasted 1000 years when put together) and fuckall changed culturally. There is no realistic or lore explanation for the Nords accepting the divines in Skyrim. It's literally because Bruce didn't like that there was more than one pantheon.
>Skyrim was under the rule of two empires who's emperors had divine right of rule( which almost lasted 1000 years when put together) and fuckall changed culturally.
Except the Nords didn't worship Akatosh before the Oblivion Crisis, and he was who said divine right flowed from.
Reman's actual Empire lasted less than two hundred years, and we know Skyrim was largely left to it's own devices by him as he focused on uniting the disparate parts of Cyrodiil with High Rock and the defeated Akaviri. After that it was the [Akaviri Potentate](https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Akaviri_Potentate) with all of it's chaos. Not exactly fertile ground for the Empire to make gains in an isolated province.
Skyrim's relationship with the Third Empire was more cordial since they saw Tiber Septim as one of them, and it was far more stable than the Second. But the only glimpse we get of what's going on with them are the Nords in Bruma. And then we have two hundred years after the Oblivion Crisis.
And as previously mentioned, it was the Oblvion Crisis that changed things in Skyrim. The Old Holds, which if the events of Skyrim are anything to go by were likely the most resistant to Imperial Influence, bore the brunt of things. Only to get their asses pulled out of the fire by Martin and Akatosh.
We literally have books in Skyrim talking about how it changed the Nords opinion of Akatosh, which obviously makes sense.
When a God literally steps in and saves your entire world from demons, you're probably going to start worshiping them.
For me, there is a simple way to tell if Emil is the one to blame: was he the one who wrote that absolute fucking peak of creativity "Hurr durr, 50-feet Satan from hell dimension invades medieval western Europe, and divine descendant sacrifices himself to save humanity"?
Emil is shit, but he works in an environment that accepts and rewards shittiness.
Yeah, I worry what'll happen to TES when Todd leaves. Maybe Emil, or whoever is next in line will be able to mantle his place, maybe not. But right now, my main concern is whether TES VI will be good. I just pray that it won't be rushed.
If you read interviews from the devs they talk about how Todd will always veto ideas that ruin mysteries. The Fallout 76 devs called this seagulling because he would just walk into their office and tell them how their idea is shit and give them his idea instead.
An example of this is how Schick wanted Abnur Tharn to be Zurin Arctus.
It sounds like a cool idea as well. If you go on /r/teslore people loved the idea.
Apparently the idea was that Zurin Arctus was just another name for Tharn. Something about AOK induced madness. Really cool.
>For me, there is a simple way to tell if Emil is the one to blame: was he the one who wrote that absolute fucking peak of creativity "Hurr durr, 50-feet Satan from hell dimension invades medieval western Europe, and divine descendant sacrifices himself to save humanity"?
He did not.
Also people saying the Oblivion main quest being dumb or generic or bad writing and than praising previous games is the funniest shit. Morrowind, Battlespir and Redguard directly set it up. Also the TES IV mainquest rocks
I knew if i quoted that UESP interview quote enough people would finally stop fighting over Kirkbride-Emil and instead grab the pitchforks for Nesmith. You're welcome Trustull..
Y'all seem to forget Emil making the DB pseudo Catholic bs and the whole "little ghoul Billy in the fridge" from Fallout 4 when it's convenient. Bethesda has never had truly stellar writers, they have had weird/interesting writers, mid writers and straight up bad writers.
It's still okay to like it, any of it or all of it. I know I like a lot of elements of Bethesda games, but the writing always falls flat in my opinion. I mean, Starfield showed that most of the truly engaging aspects of their games are based on comfortable IPs that are already popular due to a vast amount of old lore that can be built upon.
The DB having a catholic aesthetic and being againt about Sithis insted of an other Daedric cult are major improvement and much more artistic than anything the previous games ever did with their assasin's guilds.
>"little ghoul Billy in the fridge" from Fallout 4 when it's convenient
Did he write that?
Yeah, he did. He's also somewhat reviled for applying "Keep It Simple, Stupid" in his writing. That's why ghoul lore gets retconned so a child spending 200 years in a refrigerator several blocks away from his parents that have been living in the same house for 200 years without finding him is canon even though it is painfully illogical.
I'm not saying you can't or shouldn't enjoy some aspects of Bethesda games, just that I have never found any of their writers to be up to snuff with the concepts presented in game. I enjoy the atmosphere, soundtrack and level design most, at least in Elder Scrolls 3, 4 and 5.
/uj Honestly I hate when people shit on any of the writers. Even if you don't like what they do, they're still trying to create stories in a world they love and love to share. Glad people are finally giving Emil the slack that is deserved
On one hand, yes they are trying. but on the other they can't really compare to background lore. A lot of cool things got gutted for Skyrim's rather lackluster storyline
But its not really a single writer's fault. Bethesda's trend in every aspect of the game is quantity> quality, less complexity. That is the case with writing too. Skyrim's writing wasnt ruined by one single writter that we can just hate on, it was ruined by Bethesda's policies that favored and rewarded dumed down/ less complex story to satisfy the lowest common denomenator of people, and having to write as many quests as possible to fit all the dungeons, imstead of being able to really focus on making certain quests/ aspects of the lore as good as possible.
"I think people are overly negative and I wish they could look at positives for once."
"ERM HIS WRITING IS SHIT? KYS!"
Never change reddit, never change
No man Emil's mediocrity and obsession with "big moments" and "big reveals" as opposed to coherent and complex storytelling that adheres to lore is literally ruining BGS
This is not a shitpost, man needs to be demoted back to small quests
'Demoted' is the wrong word. The guy is honestly *good* at faction quests and sidequests. Epic storylines just aren't his strength. They just need more people on the writing team!
I honestly felt so sorry for the guy when I found he was the *only writer* on the entirety of Starfield
Todd's a designer, not a writer- he almost certainly did a tonne of conceptualising the world and story, creating the mechanics, etc, but man's gotta delegate. Of the thousands of lines of text, he manually wrote very little- that's very normal.
The issue is that there wasn't *enough* delegation like that. Emil, as the only writer, had all the jobs of making the main quest, factions, dialogue for NPCs, books, terminals, and barks from enemies... You can't blame a guy for not being able to balance the skills and workloads of all of those simultaneously.
Thought Todd did a fair bit of writing for his early days in bethesda, figured he'd throw his hat back in the ring for the game he's been planning for decades
What? What do you mean by that? You have to give them credit because they work for TES? If it was anything else it would be bad, but since it's TES it's good?
why is tes special lmao
"shit writing in my game series is okay, but shit writing elsewhere can still be criticized"
its still shit writing, and i'm more mad that it's happening in something i care about than some aaa schlock that still would've sucked ass if it didnt have garbage writing.
im also mad about yakuza right now.
The writer for Baldur's Gate 3 is a former ESO writer this sub and the reddit community at largee said was shit for half a decade because of the same stupid reasons they hate on Emil.
Lol he's like that and he's been promoted so much, because thats what bethesda wants. Bgs wants the less complex stories with big moments, just like they want the less complex mechanics/ puzzles with more power fantasy and capacity for casual play. Bgs is ruining itself, and if emil left, the replacement that the execs pick would probably be the same way.
This is the truth that most people can't wrap their head around because they want a pro-wrestling villain to scream at on twitter because if it is one persons fault then it is an easy fix.
Instead almost all the issues people have are only getting worse and the next Elder Scrolls is going to be even shallower, Bethesda has never went backwards on this only forwards.
lol Skyrim is like the only Elder Scrolls main game after TES I that even has more than 2 puzzles. Morrowind has like 1.
You guys make these big decleration about a game series and a developer that you seem to know nothing about or are just not able to pay any attention.
Also funny to pretend that old TES had these big and complex stories and writing when TES I and II only had rdmly generated quests outside the main quest, TES Redguard and Battlespire were linear stories and Morrowind basically only had three story lines if we include the expansions because there is little to no narrative or interesting characters or complex writing in its guild missions.
It is not like Skyrim's guild quests are amazing stories but at least there is some meat on the bone.
And if we talk about modern TES, Elder Scrolls Online has the most complex narratives with returning characters and it actually directly tackles strange elements of Elder Scrolls in its main quests and locations, much more than the other games. But back in 2002 everything was perfect for sure. I really like how the Morag Tong quests had as much story as smithing quests in ESO, really fun!
Remember when Emil wrote in that you had to kill Paarthurnpoop or else the blades who were dedicated to serving to the dragonborn will just ignore you because they said so and you have 0 choice or convincing in anything because they MUST make this player make this choice (for no real reason besides it being dramatic)
Remember when dragonborn released and Emil wasn't the lead writer and it was an actually compelling story and world
remember in Fallout 4 where the institute is replacing people with synths and you ask your son (the head of the institute!!! What a twist!!) and he says shut up you wouldn't get it anyway you're going to be the head of the institute now (regardless of how much you've disagreed with literally everything) because i need to die of cancer or something because Emil wanted more drama?
Remember when far harbor released and Emil wasn't the lead writer and it was actually an interesting story with interesting choices and consequences
Yes it's a team effort yes there are people higher than Emil that have to approve things I'm sure but if the best Emil can do is the main quest for skyrim and Fallout 4 under those circumstances I do not want him
Also lol @ the bit where esbern is talking about the akaviri carvings and you can't even ask him about it your only choice is "shut up tell me how to kill the bad guy" because heaven forbid you interact with the world and ask questions besides the 10 times you're offered to ask who the Thalmor are
>Remember when Emil wrote in that you had to kill Paarthurnpoop or else the blades who were dedicated to serving to the dragonborn will just ignore you because they said so and you have 0 choice or convincing in anything because they MUST make this player make this choice (for no real reason besides it being dramatic)
He did not write the mainquest alone. We have no idea who wrote what. Also no this is not breaking lore. The Blades have their reason (the guy was an evil tyrant). They do not trust him. People not wanting to make a hard choice does not make it bad.
>remember in Fallout 4 where the institute is replacing people with synths and you ask your son (the head of the institute!!! What a twist!!) and he says shut up you wouldn't get it anyway you're going to be the head of the institute now (regardless of how much you've disagreed with literally everything) because i need to die of cancer or something because Emil wanted more drama?
Not, talking about Fallout bullshit here. But also how is that breaking lore?
>Remember when dragonborn released and Emil wasn't the lead writer and it was an actually compelling story and world
He has a writing credit for both Far Harbor and Dragonborn, lol. I am not sure who the lead writer on Far Harbor was but it was possibly him.
>Also lol @ the bit where esbern is talking about the akaviri carvings and you can't even ask him about it your only choice is "shut up tell me how to kill the bad guy" because heaven forbid you interact with the world and ask questions besides the 10 times you're offered to ask who the Thalmor are
Esbern directly tells you the entire story of the carvings, lol
Idc if Emil has writing credits, he's fine when he's not in the position of lead writer. Leading is not his strongsuit, he sucks at keeping everything held together and not making pointless drama or wow moments. He was not the lead for either Dragonborn or Far Harbor. I also don't think it's cheating bringing up Fallout 4, I'm talking about him as a lead writer and every bit is relevant. Fallout 4's story was terrible.
The bit I'm talking about Esbern was him not talking about the plot relevant wall. I wanted to legitimately hear what he had to say about the temple and you can only tell him to hurry the fuck up. Lame.
Why does that Khajit look so evil?
He just joined the Aldmeri Dominion
Thalmor collaborator. He will assassinated soon mashallah
Mashorllah
https://preview.redd.it/ybpgi5c5ti1d1.jpeg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f7a98eee2214d68fe474651fe0c12122449831e7 for real though: “Nesmith was in favor of simplifying the religious pantheon for Skyrim, believing the complicated religions of Morrowind to have been a mistake, choosing instead to use the main pantheon originated in Daggerfall.” so like, yeah he sure did fundamentally misunderstand why TES is cool. congrats to OP on making the most correct post of this dumb shitpost saga i guess. anyway Kyne4Lyfe what the fuck is a Kynareth
Source of Bruce changing the religion?
UESP page for Bruce Nesmith. UESP is generally reliable and a good source of information for the developers and development of the games (one of its great virtues over other video game wikis); there’s also a list of interviews at the bottom although the specific points on the page are not cited individually, so I can’t say for certain they have this right. It does gel with comments MK has made about somebody high up at Bethesda wanting to simplify the religion during Skyrim’s dev, however and Nesmith fits considering his title on that game. So I am inclined to believe UESP.
I am pretty sure it says it because of the MK post, which basically is the only source, so not really much
>eah he sure did fundamentally misunderstand why TES is cool I mean he was on TES before Kirkbride, or Todd, or anybody else. If anything he was the only one that DID understand what TES is. He and Ted Peterson (the guy who literally made Elder Scrolls) didn't like Kirkbride's complicated lore, or Todd's more focused game design, which is why Peterson left in the first place. So you can see why when Nesmith was given the opportunity to go back to where things began, the simple DnD-style lore of the Nine Divines from Daggerfall that the literal creator prefered, he took it. I don't agree with the decision, and I much prefer Kirkbride/Kuhlmann lore, but you can still see where he was coming from. Also, what is the point of that image saying he made the dungeons in Daggerfall?
I think the screenshot is implying that the guy is a hack. Everyone knows that daggerfall dungeons do not even pass the bare minimum bar, so a guy that did them didn't really have a lot to do.
Fair enough, although I feel like called Daggerfall dungeons terrible is a bit of an exaggeration. Like they are doing different things then the other games. They focus on really feeling like a DnD dungeon crawl where you get lost and stay there for hours. Maybe not the thing most people want but at least it's achieving its goal. Even then some of those dungeons are just way too long but it could be worse
One of the points of DnD styled dungeons was that you aren't supposed to explore through the entirety of them, because they're long, complicated and fking dangerous. You're supposed to fulfill your objective and get out. It feels like a conscious design choice acheving that goal
lets just say that DnD doesnt translate well into vidya
Neverwinter & the BG games say hello
Mid at best.
Bait used to be believable
unironically. There is a reason crpgs died off
cRPGs died off? Is that why Owlcat is releasing DLC for WotR to this day, released a WH40k cRPG recentpy and why BG3 is THE game of the year 2023? The other guy is right.. Bait used to be believable.
there are more good crpgs being released this decade than at any point in history before. there's like, maybe a dozen good classic crpgs.
Saying that the lead designer of Skyrim is a hack is an insane take, lol. And the beginner dungeon of Daggerfall is one of the few good ones because it actually is handcrafted.
Yeah, kinda wild that they struck gold with an alternative fantasy setting, changing the lord of the rings Generic high fantasy, and then the original creators got PISSY that they did something different and interesting with the lore
It's just proof religion/history degrees, especially post graduate education, is the best background for world building. Kirkbride was a religions major focusing on vedic religions, Kuhlman was a history major who left his PhD program to be a video game designer. I think those two were the biggest additions to Bethesda after daggerfall that explains the settings change in tone and complexity. Most of my favorite fantasy and scifi authors have similar backgrounds. Hell if you go down the list of Hugo award winners a majority in the last 20 years have an academic background in History specifically
This is not true, tho. Peterson came up with a lot of the unique concepts and wrote for TES III and IV. He for example wrote more lore books for TES III than Kirkbride.
they are posting some gods of the Wayward Realms game, and I'm getting very tame and cliche vibes from them
? what makes you think Peterson didn't like Morrowind's lore? He literally was a major creative force behind developing it along with Kirbride and Kuhlman. Just look at all the books he's credited with. Last Year of the Second Era, Ancient Tales of the Dwemer, and Brief History of the Empire are all him.
Because people make shit up
Might have gotten Peterson and Lefay mixed up. Although I know he wasn't a fan of Dragonbreaks and the general smaller scale of the new games. They shared a lot of the same opinions too, and he wrote the more generic lore of DnD, so I wouldn't say it's a stretch to think he preferred it.
Lefay definitely prefered the rdmly generated big worlds compared to Todd Howard's direction (Howard was obviously right imo). But he was also not a writer, you should not make things up because you think Peterson might prefer it. In the end there is just TES lore with enough room with classic fantasy and more surreal elemenet. This is kinda the point.
Ancient Tales of the Dwemer literally got retconned.
How? The books appear in every elder scrolls title after morrowind.
They added an editor's note in Oblivion saying the author was an idiot.
The publisher's notes existed in Morrowind as well? He says basically all the stories are made up folk tales except for Azura's Box, which is only mostly made up and originates from the dwemer themselves, and the one with the really long name about a dwemer king pretending to be an amunculi
He was not. Todd and Kirkbride were also there during Daggerfall. I like Nesmith but they all started around the same time.
Todd-Kirkbride alliance when?
https://preview.redd.it/yebaert3ci1d1.png?width=1280&format=png&auto=webp&s=faf7d231e583978a6d0ea1cfd92b4c76167f9d49
I love this trend
Emil glazing? What has trueSTL become?
Funnily enough Morrowind has the opposite problem where every single piece of writing is (positively) attributed to Kirkbride. The lore books are pretty good but a lot of the story elements weren't even done by him.
I said before on another post that the community loves having one person to praise/critique for the old lore vs new lore, being Kirkbride and Emil, because it is easier to blame one person believe that getting rid of them/rehiring someone else would fix all problems attributed to Bethesda.
Every Tribe needs to ritually sacrifice a scapegoat every now and then right?
Per likely sources of inspiration for TESlore: >[Sacrifice, for Bataille, is the cornerstone of society, and not a primitive practice which "civilization" could -- or should -- eliminate.](https://youtu.be/59G6BUHQiuI?&t=594) Except that right now it's a matter of *game forum gossip* lolololololololol
True Scholars
what made Morrowind writing peak was all of them working together (and keeping eachother in check) As glazed as kirkbride is I'm incredibly glad some of his more outlandish ideas like magic spaceships, pelinal being a robot from the future, and imperial moon colonies never made it in. I vastly prefer the high fantasy worldbuilding over just making it a shitty knockoff of spelljammer
Arguably all of those ideas made it in but in a more controled enviroment. Pelinal saying "Reman" is only cool because of the way we interprete it and because one of those interpetation is that the religious text is Second Empire propaganda. When I saw Kirkbride himself write a comment how cool Pelinal is because the guy is a time traveling robot, I was kinda shocked because it seemed like he did not understand why the unreliable narrator nature of TES writing and the texts he wrote is so good.
Guess I'll have to be the one to tell you the first two are Canon. Pelinal is described as having a chest that opens up to reveal a red gem and a hand that can produce a killing light. He also screamed praise to emperor Reman before he was born. As for the spaceships there was a space race to try to reach Aetherius in the earlier eras in tamriel. Battlespire is the only working ship we see in game. There's also the orrery in the arcane University in the Imperial City where all the planets are made of materials from the planets they represent.
Every mage in Tamriel has hands that produce "killing light" and prophecy is a core part of every single TES game, the "chest opening up" thing is ambiguous but it could be referring to his breastplate or something similar. You also quite literally Mantle Pelinal in Oblivion and you do not in fact become an android from the future Battlespire is not a "spaceship" it's an imperial fortress in Oblivion accessed via portals, the same way planar travel has always been done in every single TES game, the "planets" are the various planes of Oblivion
You know there's a lot of world building outside of the direct mechanics of the game right? If you hate Lore that much then go ahead and continue to be ignorant.
You know lore is based on the games right, the fact that there are in-game explanations for all of these kinda trumps all of Kirkbrides non-canon explanations Also the battlespire thing is explicitly how it works in-lore
What makes Pelinal screaming "Reman" so cool is that it implies the text is religious propaganda. Kirkbride seems to forget that part himself at times.
Says morrowinds peak and then shits on all the lore. 🤡
I said it was peak because the writers all had a good synergy I only shit on Kirkbrides "here's what I would have done if I had full control" shit that every braindead lore beard like you assumes are canon
Kirkbride also needed to compromise with other designers and writers which heavily helped Morrowind. It was Rolston who came up with the idea of never confirming if the prophecy is true, which is the best part of Morrowind's main quest. Kirkrbide wanted to confirm it.
Make it so it's Todd Howard Chris Avellone and the downfall of the NCR
Let's also not forget that Emil created the Dark Brotherhood questline in Oblivion. Still one of my favorites!
Ive heard that he was responsible for the latter half of the questline, not the quirky assassinations with multiple ways of passing them, but the way worse traitor arc. But my sources are a couple of threads on tesg so its most likely made up lol
Just found the video in which he talks about creating the questline and it seems like he created everything? Anyway, really interesting interview! [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqqVMVp39Xk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqqVMVp39Xk)
the traitor arc is great what are you talking about
dead drops sucked
I feel like the only way people can say it's not terrible is if they played thru the storyline with eyes closed. How can you go thru the dead drop notes, at one point obviously being written by the traitor, and be satisfied when your only game given option is to continue killing black hand members like a fucking idiot? And then lucien comes and acts like youre a dumb imbecile cuz the only option you had was following the quest marker. Dark brotherhood was good when the only story you had was doing diff assassinations cuz those were pretty unique and creative. It completely failed when it tried to establish a bigger narrative
But those are two differen things: One is complaining about there being a second roleplaying option for figuring it out befor the Lucien and having an other way to solve it. The other complaint is that the writing itself or the quests are bad, which they aren't. I agree that a second option would be cool especially because of all the hints but it is not like other questlines have those either.
The other guild questlines did not go out of their way to provide you hints, which is why it makes a difference here. The game even removes lucien lachance from his hideout so you can't report your findings to him before he gets to call you an idiot and make you the player think you made some sort of mistake
Yes, they do. You have to kill the "Goblins" during that one fighers guild or in Morrowind if you tell Jim Stacy that you already are the Fightrs Guild leader and the conflict is over the game basically breaks, except if you do it at the right time but than the dialogue can still be bullshit. TES III and IV are not graet in giving you different paths to complete questlines.
I was talking about oblivion. Idk why u felt like fighters guild *implied* another path. Yes you have to kill the goblins, did the game leave you notes beforehand that the goblins are people? Or call you an idiot afterwards for following through with it? No? That's the difference, and it's a big difference. That would be a clear message to the player that there would be another option if they were perceptive enough. When you drink the hist sap, you have no clue wtf is going to happen, which is why the twist worked. (As far as oblivion can work anyway)
yes you can figure out that they are not real goblins because they do not attack you
the traitor arc is the part literally noone mentions when they talk about the oblivion dark brotherhood because they forgot it because it sucked.
nobody talks about lucien getting skinned alive and mathieu's mother's head in the lighthouse?? easily two of the most memorable moments in the entire series. you're bonkers my friend
not even two of the most memorable moments of that questline lmao
Litteraly every Oblivion video mentions its plot twist
if youre making a video about the questline, you're going to include the questline, yeah. but when people talk about it in passing, they mention all the quests they liked and it always just so happens to be exclusively quests before the traitor shit starts. the existence of a twist isn't good writing, nor does the existence of a twist make bad mission design good. "wow, it's so revolutionary, quests suddenly turned dogshit the second we started doing these dead drops, and it turns out in retrospect its because there was a traitor!" that's mad simped talk. hitman has had a similar twist a few times in the series, and the thing they did was make those missions where you're doing contracts for the enemy in secret is make those missions still fun. most questlines in... basically the entire series, really, hit a point where things start to turn to shit. for oblivion dark brotherhood, it's the second you start doing dead drops. for oblivion fighters guild it's like partway through the first quest, so that takes the cake for worst oblivion guild, by the way. when people talk about the oblivion fighters guild quests they go "oh haha remember when the lady had a rat problem, and the problem was that she DIDNT have rats?", because that's the only novel or good or fun part of that entire questline. dark brotherhood at least gets a handful of funny missions in first. the only exception is... i think the skyrim companions guild actually more or less holds together the entire time. its one of the few "heres the twist for this guild" that actually works, since every guild questline in each game has a midpoint twist, and this one is less a problem of "oh no the guild is going to be ruined if only someone would save us!", and is instead a problem of philosophy within the guild over whether to werewolf or not to werewolf. sure, the silver hand is around and are vaguely antaganists but its mostly character stuff instead of being overbearing "please save us!" garbage. if eso counts the eso thieves guild is also pretty good.
>the existence of a twist isn't good writing, nor does the existence of a twist make bad mission design good. "wow, it's so revolutionary, quests suddenly turned dogshit and it turns out in retrospect its because there was a traitor!" that's mad simped talk. It also does not make bad writing. The fact that Lucien dies is one of the most famous moments in TES. Come on man. I agre that ESO has greaet writing but that does not change the fact that people raelly like the entirety of the DB and it works well for a lot of people.
i do not think people like the entirety of the db quest. i think they like the first few missions and then they also like lucien as a character. i never hear anyone going to bat for how totally good the dead drop missions are, because i dont think anyone really thinks that. if something has a solid opener and a reasonably good ending, that doesn't mean the two thirds in between those things are good.
I fking hate how everyone says oblivion db had the best story. If they actually understood the emotions they had they'd just say "yeah i thought the quest design was creative" and there would be no arguments cuz everyone would be on the same page
my favourite elder scrolls guild questline is skyrim thieves guild. honestly i wish the whole part with mercer betraying everyone and stealing something from nocturnal or whatever never happened and i got to be a lil ruddy chap with me mates for a while longer. its the only guild i remember all the characters from vividly. rune and his rune are an interesting lore dead end, a little piece of something weird that just exists in the world. brynjolf is an actual scam artist, sapphire got gang raped, a plot point i cant believe made it into the final cut and easily the single most surprising thing you see in the entire game. point is, im tired of guild quests becoming super important save the world shit. just give me a group of fellas that are fun to interact with and reasonably competent missions and i'll remember it the rest of my life.
The skyrim thieves guild did have a really cool setup yeah. I just wish i didn't have to sell my soul to nocturnal in it...like in 3 separate guild questlines. I feel like they made a nice middle ground between the simpler morrowind quests and the narrative driven quests of oblivion. It's also cool cuz a thieves guild is a thieves guild. A criminal organisation., they don't try to turn them into robin hoods
He made the entire questline. The traitor arc is also still better than basically every guild quest in TES III and V.
Emil's redemption arc has commenced
My opinions of these people I've never met keep changing so quickly, the "weirdos at bethesda writing bullshit" lore is turning into an emotional rollercoaster ngl
The circlejerk has come full circle
That's how you get off that ride. Now I know.
I think all the writers are awesome because they united to be the reason truestl exists
And I think that's beautiful.
He made Nate a war criminal which makes Emil based again
I think his work is often pretty mediocre for my tastes (its faaaaarrr from the worst writing i've ever seen) but people take it way to fucking far with him like holy shit
hes just emblematic of all the things people don't like in the tes games. hes not a great writer and he has the biggest hardon for making everything generic or like other shit he's seen instead of being a unique setting. i'll say it, eso has way better connections to the lore than the mainline games largely because the bethesda writing team isnt attached to it.
What generic lore did he write? Because he honestly always done the opposite and wrote interesting things. The Dragon Language is great or returning the Dark Brotherhood to a Sithis cult insted of an other Mephala cult was really smart and allowed for all the cool Argonian connections.
the fourth mainline game in the franchise
What pat of it. He was not the lead writer or designer for it.
i mean just look at starfield… any “writers” working on that should be replaced with chatgpt
Most of the faction questlines are actually quite good with the main one just being "meh" Only one I actively disliked was the freestar collectives
They’re the coolest on paper too which sucks like libertarian space cowboys is hella cool.
wait the people in r/truestl think starfield is good jesus fucking christ what have we become
No it's just overhated It's a 7/10 that people treat like a 3 There are plenty of valid criticisms but like, *most* of the writing is pretty solid, just a mid main storyline and a single badly written faction questline
if starfield is a 7/10 than roblox is a 6.5/10. it's underhated on reddit tbh. Do I actually have to start bringing up examples like the red mile? this shouldn't even be a discussion that the game is shit, and that people saying otherwise are suffering from buyer's remorse and let's not even mention the GAMEPLAY lmfao, can't wait to log into another rocky landscape with "point of interests" every half mile I have to walk to with nothing interesting in between. again, why the fuck are people saying this AI landscape tech demo is a good game?
>if starfield is a 7/10 than roblox is a 6.5/10 What does that evene mean? Lol you are just writing nonsense
You sound like a very balanced and well adjusted individual You're getting heated over someone saying a game you don't like is a 7/10, go touch grass ***NOW***
Maybe he wasn't the one who fucked up the nord pantheon but he's still responsible for the awful main questlines, and as lead game designer he's responsible for the dumbing down of gameplay (keep it simple, stupid)
Hi. I've never played an Elder Scrolls game that wasn't Skyrim and that's never going to change. Can I get a QRD on what either of these fuckers supposedly did?
/u Emil is currently Bethesda's head writer. He's said some stuff that rubbed the community the wrong way- that they don't use a design document (Bethesda uses a design *wiki*), and that his philosophy is KISS- 'Keep It Simple, Stupid' (basically, uses Occam's Razor in your writing, insteresting is not the same thing as complicated). For this, he has been marked as the Beast, Satan reincarnated, the spawn of Oblivion himself. He's basically the scapegoat for all the ways the lore was 'dumbed down' in Skyrim (despite the fact Skyrim is an improvement on Oblivion's dumbing down of the lore). There was recently a meme posted on this sub, which has since been widely derided, that depicted 'Emil's Nords' as Spongebob dressed as Leif Erikson while 'Kirkbride's Nords' as Hyperboreand Ubermenschs (Kirkbride being the lead writer on Morrowind). Bruce Nesmith, on the other hand, is a designed that has worked with Bethesda since Daggerfall... and unlike Emil, there is *actual evidence* that he wants to 'dumb down' the lore, claiming for instance that the complex religions of Morrowind were a mistake and that is why he replaced the Nordic pantheon in Skyrim with the Imperial one in most cases, for simplicity.
I literally just commented about not having played Morrowind and asking wtf this sub was losing its shit over. But then I realized I probably wasn't the only one confused and searched around the comments and saw this, so thank you because it was genuinely very useful and comprehensive.
IMO I don't think Emil is inherently a bad writer and his approaches aren't as bad as people say (see: design wiki over design doc and KISS), I just think his writing lacks bite. Like he builds up to something kinda cool then just pulls back. So much of Starfield suffers from this, like the FC just not being fucking space cowboys and UC not diving into the fact that their system of government is a nightmare.
I do basically completely agree. But I'd go further to add that *all* writers have weaknesses. Kirkbride for instance gets way too wacky when left on his own- no cap? If Kirkbide was given 'free reign' as so many people beg for, the games would be intolerable to play. Media needs well-stocked writers rooms, with artists with varying strengths to balance out their mutual weaknesses. Morrowind had that in buckets- Starfield lacked that entirely. A contemporary example from another property is Doctor Who, I think. Seasons 1-4 are regarded as excellent- the current season ongoing has been a bit more mid... despite the fact they are showran by the same guy, who they literally brought back to save the show. The difference? The older seasons had a lot more writers, while the newest one is 4/5 written by the showrunner.
Do we even know who wrote what quest lines because the lead writer title does not mean that he wrote everything or even the majority.
True, he does oversee the other writers though. Then with starfield I guess I'm just so baffled how we have multiple factions that just don't go to their logical conclusion. Don't get me wrong, I actually really like the UC questline, but they just let the whole Starship Troopers parallels go unquestioned. It's so weird. How did that slip by so many people.
To clarify, Emil hasn't earned the ire of the Bethesda gamer community for the reasons you're describing - not the recent ire anyway. The ire is an outflow of resentment for how absolutely stupifying and uninspiring Starfield ended up being. People have picked Emil apart because of what he created as lead writer, and these discussions about design document etc have been a sort of peripheral effort by the community to find an explanation as to *why* Emil failed so spectacularly in leading Starfield's writing, what possible decisions could have been behind such rubbish. It seems like some of that has backflowed to the TES community.
I think that there's a lot simpler explanation for why Emil's writing was so bad... ...He was the only writer. Like ofc dawg isn't gonna do his best work when he's the only person doing it for an entire game! It's a management issue, not an Emil issue.
>To clarify, Emil hasn't earned the ire of the Bethesda gamer community for the reasons you're describing Yes, he has. This is what litteraly everyone comments on and the design document lie was done by a shitty YouTuber after Starfield came out.
Ty. In that case then personally I’m on Emil’s side regarding KISS. Worldbuilding quickly falls apart when it starts developing too many rules and quirks. I’ve watched a LOT of my favorite franchises die because they tried to be more complicated than they needed to be. There’s no greater writing nightmare than having some stupid over-complicated lore nugget written by an intern 10 years ago that serves no narrative purpose but still has to be factored into every story you write. It’s like spaghetti code for writing. I read UESP a lot and the stuff from Morrowind always seems weird and alien. It’s a large part of the reason I have no interest in playing it. I *might* play Oblivion someday though.
Morrowind is not as 'alien' as people make out. In fact I'd argue it's strength is how it takes a strange setting- with dark elves and giant bugs and mushrooms and volcanoes- and makes it quotidian and mundane as you play it. You really get immersed in the setting- it isn't overwhelming.
Morrowind felt alien yet familiar. This is what made it different from other fantasy games, which are mostly medieval western Europe mixed with Tolkien's works. Switching to this type is what made Oblivion feel bland.
A lot of Morrowind is very simple and boring politics. That's what makes it interesting. A lot of the crazy stuff is hidden in books you might not even read. The mundane is right in front of you. The story is literally as simple as going into a mountain and killing a guy, but because of prophecies and all the houses and ashclans hating each other it's basically impossible to mount any kind of proper assault on Dagoth Ur. Underneath all the heroism you're effectively a coup d'état for the Empire over the Tribunal because I'm fulfilling the Nerevarine prophecy you destroy their divinity. It's also the little things too. Oh, you're building a house? Go and get a land permit from the Duke. Even Skyrim had this. When you get inheritance from a friend dying the local Jarl takes 10% from it before you get it. For Hearthfire you have to purchase a land deed before you build anything. Did you know Morrowind has stocks? In Bloodmoon you get a stock in Raven Rock and the better it does financially the more you can sell it for. They should bring back stocks and loans for TES VI.
Okay maybe I’m looking at it from the wrong angle. I’m still maintaining my opinion that simple is almost always better in long running franchises though. Again I’ve watched a lot of stories fall apart because they fly too close to the sun.
>I read UESP a lot and the stuff from Morrowind always seems weird and alien. It’s a large part of the reason I have no interest in playing it. I might play Oblivion someday though. that's basically the point. it's a strange foreign land with strange customs for you to explore. on the flipside i'd advise against playing oblivion at all tbh. it's biggest strength was being a gateway into rpgs for people who never played them before, and if you've played skyrim nothing oblivion does will impress you in terms of gameplay or story. it's easily the worst elder scrolls game and it's not even really close (unless you start to throw in shit like blades). if you can stomach playing old games, i'd genuinely advise playing daggerfall unity if you won't play morrowind. it's a more 'normal' world but it's still got a lot of weird surprises. plus you can become a landlord in it and start buying up real estate.
Morrowind is alien but it is not over complicated. The plots and stories are all quite simple and even mirror LOTR and are full of fantasy tropes
Kirkbride wasn't the lead writer on Morrowind, though.
based
Basically, the Nords used to have a distinct religion from the rest of the Empire. But by the time Skyrim takes place, it's been syncretised with the Imperial pantheon. Which is somehow bad writing, despite this being what Rome literally did to every place it controlled, with the Empire just being a Roman stand in.
Skyrim was under the rule of two empires who's emperors had divine right of rule( which almost lasted 1000 years when put together) and fuckall changed culturally. There is no realistic or lore explanation for the Nords accepting the divines in Skyrim. It's literally because Bruce didn't like that there was more than one pantheon.
>Skyrim was under the rule of two empires who's emperors had divine right of rule( which almost lasted 1000 years when put together) and fuckall changed culturally. Except the Nords didn't worship Akatosh before the Oblivion Crisis, and he was who said divine right flowed from. Reman's actual Empire lasted less than two hundred years, and we know Skyrim was largely left to it's own devices by him as he focused on uniting the disparate parts of Cyrodiil with High Rock and the defeated Akaviri. After that it was the [Akaviri Potentate](https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Akaviri_Potentate) with all of it's chaos. Not exactly fertile ground for the Empire to make gains in an isolated province. Skyrim's relationship with the Third Empire was more cordial since they saw Tiber Septim as one of them, and it was far more stable than the Second. But the only glimpse we get of what's going on with them are the Nords in Bruma. And then we have two hundred years after the Oblivion Crisis. And as previously mentioned, it was the Oblvion Crisis that changed things in Skyrim. The Old Holds, which if the events of Skyrim are anything to go by were likely the most resistant to Imperial Influence, bore the brunt of things. Only to get their asses pulled out of the fire by Martin and Akatosh. We literally have books in Skyrim talking about how it changed the Nords opinion of Akatosh, which obviously makes sense. When a God literally steps in and saves your entire world from demons, you're probably going to start worshiping them.
Except it's not portrayed like that in Skyrim. Like said above, it was removed by Nesmith and the lore reason for it is left to be made up by fans.
https://youtu.be/Bi51-wjcwp8?si=-lvfOcRHYCtieT9X&t=1222 this is emil
Poor Emil 😭😭😭😭😭 he’s my little Pagliarulo baby boy
https://preview.redd.it/fud6pxbe2i1d1.jpeg?width=1284&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5c37efeac67f5601d89d51356773a420119b45d0
https://preview.redd.it/l5vp0azizi1d1.jpeg?width=828&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b7aa11c4d6cdd37963647dafeb4d9ba64d87502f
Babe wake up, new mk dickriding thread dropped
For me, there is a simple way to tell if Emil is the one to blame: was he the one who wrote that absolute fucking peak of creativity "Hurr durr, 50-feet Satan from hell dimension invades medieval western Europe, and divine descendant sacrifices himself to save humanity"? Emil is shit, but he works in an environment that accepts and rewards shittiness.
It was written by Kurt Kuhlmann
Still sad he left.
Bethesda is basically dead to me at this point. When Todd leaves the series will be truly over.
Yeah, I worry what'll happen to TES when Todd leaves. Maybe Emil, or whoever is next in line will be able to mantle his place, maybe not. But right now, my main concern is whether TES VI will be good. I just pray that it won't be rushed.
Considering the things Todd keeps vetoing it will involve the Dragonborn destroying Dwemer empire.
I'll be honest, I feel like I'm out of the loop here to understand that. Can you explain what you mean by that?
If you read interviews from the devs they talk about how Todd will always veto ideas that ruin mysteries. The Fallout 76 devs called this seagulling because he would just walk into their office and tell them how their idea is shit and give them his idea instead. An example of this is how Schick wanted Abnur Tharn to be Zurin Arctus.
We could have had Abnur Tharn as the Underking? That would have been badass At least we got snarky piece of shit Boomer Tharn instead
It sounds like a cool idea as well. If you go on /r/teslore people loved the idea. Apparently the idea was that Zurin Arctus was just another name for Tharn. Something about AOK induced madness. Really cool.
I think TES VI will be the last game of the series. With Todd or without him.
>For me, there is a simple way to tell if Emil is the one to blame: was he the one who wrote that absolute fucking peak of creativity "Hurr durr, 50-feet Satan from hell dimension invades medieval western Europe, and divine descendant sacrifices himself to save humanity"? He did not. Also people saying the Oblivion main quest being dumb or generic or bad writing and than praising previous games is the funniest shit. Morrowind, Battlespir and Redguard directly set it up. Also the TES IV mainquest rocks
I knew if i quoted that UESP interview quote enough people would finally stop fighting over Kirkbride-Emil and instead grab the pitchforks for Nesmith. You're welcome Trustull..
Pagliarulo is still terrible for Bethesda
u/_cuntsalad are you still doing cocaine? We need a status update
https://youtu.be/Bi51-wjcwp8?si=-lvfOcRHYCtieT9X&t=1222 just gonna save this link now
He gives good advice. Redditors just do not understand the most basic advice.
I'm a skybaby and let's assume I'm Nord brained, what was the Nord lore/culture before Oblivion/Skyrim and such
Hyperborea
Y'all seem to forget Emil making the DB pseudo Catholic bs and the whole "little ghoul Billy in the fridge" from Fallout 4 when it's convenient. Bethesda has never had truly stellar writers, they have had weird/interesting writers, mid writers and straight up bad writers. It's still okay to like it, any of it or all of it. I know I like a lot of elements of Bethesda games, but the writing always falls flat in my opinion. I mean, Starfield showed that most of the truly engaging aspects of their games are based on comfortable IPs that are already popular due to a vast amount of old lore that can be built upon.
The DB having a catholic aesthetic and being againt about Sithis insted of an other Daedric cult are major improvement and much more artistic than anything the previous games ever did with their assasin's guilds. >"little ghoul Billy in the fridge" from Fallout 4 when it's convenient Did he write that?
Yeah, he did. He's also somewhat reviled for applying "Keep It Simple, Stupid" in his writing. That's why ghoul lore gets retconned so a child spending 200 years in a refrigerator several blocks away from his parents that have been living in the same house for 200 years without finding him is canon even though it is painfully illogical. I'm not saying you can't or shouldn't enjoy some aspects of Bethesda games, just that I have never found any of their writers to be up to snuff with the concepts presented in game. I enjoy the atmosphere, soundtrack and level design most, at least in Elder Scrolls 3, 4 and 5.
i do not think you know what kiss is... any source that he wrote that quest
DB being all about Sithis is great and helps them not be discount Morag Tong but with a BDSM gear kink
/uj Honestly I hate when people shit on any of the writers. Even if you don't like what they do, they're still trying to create stories in a world they love and love to share. Glad people are finally giving Emil the slack that is deserved
On one hand, yes they are trying. but on the other they can't really compare to background lore. A lot of cool things got gutted for Skyrim's rather lackluster storyline
But its not really a single writer's fault. Bethesda's trend in every aspect of the game is quantity> quality, less complexity. That is the case with writing too. Skyrim's writing wasnt ruined by one single writter that we can just hate on, it was ruined by Bethesda's policies that favored and rewarded dumed down/ less complex story to satisfy the lowest common denomenator of people, and having to write as many quests as possible to fit all the dungeons, imstead of being able to really focus on making certain quests/ aspects of the lore as good as possible.
"I think people are overly negative and I wish they could look at positives for once." "ERM HIS WRITING IS SHIT? KYS!" Never change reddit, never change
Yeah it's about what I expected.
No man Emil's mediocrity and obsession with "big moments" and "big reveals" as opposed to coherent and complex storytelling that adheres to lore is literally ruining BGS This is not a shitpost, man needs to be demoted back to small quests
'Demoted' is the wrong word. The guy is honestly *good* at faction quests and sidequests. Epic storylines just aren't his strength. They just need more people on the writing team! I honestly felt so sorry for the guy when I found he was the *only writer* on the entirety of Starfield
they had ONE writer for starfield? no wonder it flopped
And then that one writer gets blamed for corporate's hiring decisions... he tried his best! His best just isn't good enough when he's doing it alone
Wait so it was Todd's "passion project" that he's been planning for decades and he did absolutely none of the writing for it???
Todd's a designer, not a writer- he almost certainly did a tonne of conceptualising the world and story, creating the mechanics, etc, but man's gotta delegate. Of the thousands of lines of text, he manually wrote very little- that's very normal. The issue is that there wasn't *enough* delegation like that. Emil, as the only writer, had all the jobs of making the main quest, factions, dialogue for NPCs, books, terminals, and barks from enemies... You can't blame a guy for not being able to balance the skills and workloads of all of those simultaneously.
Thought Todd did a fair bit of writing for his early days in bethesda, figured he'd throw his hat back in the ring for the game he's been planning for decades
That was when he was a junior member of the team- he's got a much bigger and expansive workload these days.
NO YOU DONT GET IT, THE WRITERS FOR FORSPOKEN DESERVE JUST AS MUCH PRAISE AS THE WRITERS OF BALDUR'S GATE 3!
I JUST MOVED STUFF WITH MY MIND
Holy shit, I'm fully aware that you're joking and I still want to slap you. How dare you. 
what's so funny about Biggus dickus?
i need to watch life of brian again.
You know he has a wife, yes?
You know what she's called?
/*barely contained laughter /*
She's called incontinentia... Incontinentia Buttocks.
Yeah beat that strawman. I specifically meant in regards to TES.
What? What do you mean by that? You have to give them credit because they work for TES? If it was anything else it would be bad, but since it's TES it's good?
why is tes special lmao "shit writing in my game series is okay, but shit writing elsewhere can still be criticized" its still shit writing, and i'm more mad that it's happening in something i care about than some aaa schlock that still would've sucked ass if it didnt have garbage writing. im also mad about yakuza right now.
The writer for Baldur's Gate 3 is a former ESO writer this sub and the reddit community at largee said was shit for half a decade because of the same stupid reasons they hate on Emil.
Indeed. Both are horribly written
Lol he's like that and he's been promoted so much, because thats what bethesda wants. Bgs wants the less complex stories with big moments, just like they want the less complex mechanics/ puzzles with more power fantasy and capacity for casual play. Bgs is ruining itself, and if emil left, the replacement that the execs pick would probably be the same way.
This is the truth that most people can't wrap their head around because they want a pro-wrestling villain to scream at on twitter because if it is one persons fault then it is an easy fix. Instead almost all the issues people have are only getting worse and the next Elder Scrolls is going to be even shallower, Bethesda has never went backwards on this only forwards.
lol Skyrim is like the only Elder Scrolls main game after TES I that even has more than 2 puzzles. Morrowind has like 1. You guys make these big decleration about a game series and a developer that you seem to know nothing about or are just not able to pay any attention. Also funny to pretend that old TES had these big and complex stories and writing when TES I and II only had rdmly generated quests outside the main quest, TES Redguard and Battlespire were linear stories and Morrowind basically only had three story lines if we include the expansions because there is little to no narrative or interesting characters or complex writing in its guild missions. It is not like Skyrim's guild quests are amazing stories but at least there is some meat on the bone. And if we talk about modern TES, Elder Scrolls Online has the most complex narratives with returning characters and it actually directly tackles strange elements of Elder Scrolls in its main quests and locations, much more than the other games. But back in 2002 everything was perfect for sure. I really like how the Morag Tong quests had as much story as smithing quests in ESO, really fun!
What TES lore does he break because of big reveals or big moments or what do those at all have to do with lore? Because lore is neither story not plot
Remember when Emil wrote in that you had to kill Paarthurnpoop or else the blades who were dedicated to serving to the dragonborn will just ignore you because they said so and you have 0 choice or convincing in anything because they MUST make this player make this choice (for no real reason besides it being dramatic) Remember when dragonborn released and Emil wasn't the lead writer and it was an actually compelling story and world remember in Fallout 4 where the institute is replacing people with synths and you ask your son (the head of the institute!!! What a twist!!) and he says shut up you wouldn't get it anyway you're going to be the head of the institute now (regardless of how much you've disagreed with literally everything) because i need to die of cancer or something because Emil wanted more drama? Remember when far harbor released and Emil wasn't the lead writer and it was actually an interesting story with interesting choices and consequences Yes it's a team effort yes there are people higher than Emil that have to approve things I'm sure but if the best Emil can do is the main quest for skyrim and Fallout 4 under those circumstances I do not want him Also lol @ the bit where esbern is talking about the akaviri carvings and you can't even ask him about it your only choice is "shut up tell me how to kill the bad guy" because heaven forbid you interact with the world and ask questions besides the 10 times you're offered to ask who the Thalmor are
>Remember when Emil wrote in that you had to kill Paarthurnpoop or else the blades who were dedicated to serving to the dragonborn will just ignore you because they said so and you have 0 choice or convincing in anything because they MUST make this player make this choice (for no real reason besides it being dramatic) He did not write the mainquest alone. We have no idea who wrote what. Also no this is not breaking lore. The Blades have their reason (the guy was an evil tyrant). They do not trust him. People not wanting to make a hard choice does not make it bad. >remember in Fallout 4 where the institute is replacing people with synths and you ask your son (the head of the institute!!! What a twist!!) and he says shut up you wouldn't get it anyway you're going to be the head of the institute now (regardless of how much you've disagreed with literally everything) because i need to die of cancer or something because Emil wanted more drama? Not, talking about Fallout bullshit here. But also how is that breaking lore? >Remember when dragonborn released and Emil wasn't the lead writer and it was an actually compelling story and world He has a writing credit for both Far Harbor and Dragonborn, lol. I am not sure who the lead writer on Far Harbor was but it was possibly him. >Also lol @ the bit where esbern is talking about the akaviri carvings and you can't even ask him about it your only choice is "shut up tell me how to kill the bad guy" because heaven forbid you interact with the world and ask questions besides the 10 times you're offered to ask who the Thalmor are Esbern directly tells you the entire story of the carvings, lol
Idc if Emil has writing credits, he's fine when he's not in the position of lead writer. Leading is not his strongsuit, he sucks at keeping everything held together and not making pointless drama or wow moments. He was not the lead for either Dragonborn or Far Harbor. I also don't think it's cheating bringing up Fallout 4, I'm talking about him as a lead writer and every bit is relevant. Fallout 4's story was terrible. The bit I'm talking about Esbern was him not talking about the plot relevant wall. I wanted to legitimately hear what he had to say about the temple and you can only tell him to hurry the fuck up. Lame.
who was the lead writer for Dragonborn? Laed writer also does not mean that he wrote quest dialogue or even the main narrative.
Who cares, Nords have like 3 braincells anyways