Look, I enjoyed Skyrim, but I miss the days when Bethesda made RPGs
The thing about Morrowind for me was that it was so completely alien. It wasn’t just more sword and sorcery in the British countryside but instead unleashed ridiculous magic where people lived in giant shells/mushrooms and the fauna was like nothing I had ever seen. To say nothing of the mechanics which I found more engrossing than the follow on games.
And then you get to Oblivion and Skyrim and they’re Britain and Norway. Cool.
I’ve been slowly working through Morrowind, and while some of the mechanics and gameplay feel dated, there’s so much to love about it.
Aside from the world building, and the storyline where you have to earn your prophetic self instead of being handed it like in TESV… having to actually listen to people in the game and work out the details of quests feels so rewarding when it gets accomplished.
Also, the game gives such a guilty feeling that when you’re looting ancestral tombs, making sure the players know they’re grave robbing from families and their heritage …
No cliff racers is a good thing, though.
Morrowind was the essential piece of media that actually taught me about the “unreliable narrator” and how awesome it can be used.
Skyrim added some cool lore. Not as much as morrowind sure but the Thalmor, the dragon priests, and the vampire stuff was all awesome in my opinion.
I’ve watched multi hour video essays that have failed to make this point so well. Morrowind truly was where the series peaked.
Morrowind is a good story wrapped in terrible game mechanics. Skyrim is a moderate story wrapped in pretty good game mechanics. I do miss levitation though, even if it negated as many things as it helped.
Morrowind has excellent game mechanics. It’s just that combat is not one of those excellent mechanics.
Y’know everyone really snarls at Morrowind’s game mechanics, and I can see why they don’t have mass appeal but…idk, I built a character that had a combat proficiency as a major skill, and didn’t try to fight things when my fatigue was near zero, and I found myself enjoying it for what it was even early game.
When you kinda see it as a sometimes jank simulation that abstracts all the crazy in-depth combat the devs WISH they could include at the time, like a tabletop game does, it feels more fun to accept (and eventually break lol).
What are the excellent mechanics? It’s not leveling, quest journal, inventory management, stealing from vendors, walking speed being a stat you level, etc.
This sort of comes down to the classic debate of “Depth vs Quality of Life”. To quote Steak Bently in his excellent video essay on Metal Gear Solid 4:
Depth of game play, to boil it down, is usually defined by the number of ways a player can approach any given scenario. More tools with more unique properties. More hardcore players tend to value depth more and consider additional depth to be generally how you measure improvement in game play.
But more casual players value ease of play and think additional depth and challenge at the cost of accessibility is more of a downgrade. Hence why the general public considers Bayonetta 2 a straight upgrade from Bayonetta 1, but the crazy combo junkies don’t like it as much.
Morrowind’s mechanics have a level of depth that vastly exceeds Skyrim’s in almost every conceivable way, but is often referred to as “janky” and “clunky”. Skyrim’s mechanics are far more intuitive accessible, but is often referred to as “shallow as a puddle”. Which of these you prefer will largely dictate which game you think has the “better” mechanics.
