Why Skyrim's Empty Water is Wasted Potential

Pixels or Death's Sean McGeady explores the waters of Skyrim, finds absolutely nothing of interest, and talks about why this is a bad thing:

"For whatever reason, be it technical drawbacks or a critical misjudgment, Bethesda failed to realise Skyrim as well as they could have. Instead of being a frightening and truly challenging hostile environment, Skyrim’s water is but a thin veil of decorative pretense draped randomly across an otherwise interesting world, something the game and the player’s experience suffers for."

[ATi_Elite]

Skyrim will have lots to learn from the upcoming GUILD WARS 2.

GW2 makes full use of everything in the game including lakes and rivers. You have to explore and fight in the lakes and the combat and movements are totally different from land thus bringing a new dimension to the game.

Some creatures will even follow you from land to the depths of the ocean or vice versa and crafting proper water equipment is a must.

[gigreen]

Is Guild Wars 2 open world or will it have loading screens between areas?

[RedDead]

"Open world or loading screens between area's"

I don't know or don't care but...the fact that you're using that as an excuse is just wow. The game has an open world so you just let it's faults breeze by. But if Guild wars 2 is better an has way more depth. It won't matter will it? It's not open world. Like most other RPG's which have hub worlds. **** even Skyrim has to load it's cities.

[ATi_Elite]

Open world and totally seamless. The game world loads in teh background without you even noticing it. You can go from land to deep under water seamlessly and with no load screen. You will go from area to area with no load screen. Load screens only appear after death and the initial start.

and you can go from SP to MP on the fly unless your wanting to do a specific Raid with specific people then you have to group up but if you see some other people running around then you can just jump in with them without a load screen.

Guild Wars 2 is gonna be a game changer! All the disagrees i got are from people who have no clue just how epic GW2 is gonna be.

Guild Wars 2 is Skyrim but times a 10000 and that's a good thing for us Gamers.

[JohnnyMann420]

@ATi_Elite

You are getting disagrees for comparing apples to oranges.

GW2 is a online MMO

GW2's quest system is based off of public quests.

Skyrim is a completely different game and style of game.

That is why you get disagrees because you fail by talking about GW2 for no reason in a Skyrim article.

[Drake117]

Most retarded thing i have ever heard. GW 2 is an mmo, skyrim is and open world RPG they are completely and utterly different.

[MaxXAttaxX]

While I agree that they're very different games.
They still could have done more with it. It's just empty an empty waste.

[badz149]

Has huge open world and the water is full of enemies and collectibles

[WhittO]

^^^ Actually, Guild Wars 2 is classed as an RPGMMO, and although different, they have ALOT in common with each other.

At the end of the day, it comes to Guild Wars taking extra years to develop the game and get it right, and Skyrim taking a couple years shorter off dev time to push out.

There's no way round that, you get more from a game the longer they have to develop it.

Guild Wars is way more like Skyrim than it is WOW, which is just an MMO. It's more of an online RPG if anything, that just happens to have a huge world to explore... if you played GW1 you would know that.

Also, you all talk about these HUGE differences between the game, want to name EXACTLY some of these differences?
Instead of just saying "Public Quests", which makes no sense since GW quests do not have to be played with other people at all.

[chriski333]

U fail so hard bro

[MySwordIsHeavenly]

Dude...even Warcraft will be learning from Guild Wars 2. It looks freaking AMAZING!

[frostypants]

Guild Wars 2? Another MMORPG that will just be another big numbers game populated by schmucks on a hamster wheel. No thanks. That genre is dead to me until someone re-invents the fundamentals.

[Basjohn]

Oh silly willy. Gw2 IS REINVENTING THE FUNDAMENTALS. That's the whole point of it. Real-time aiming and dodging, dynamic events, personal stories, no subscription without being p2w, underwater combat and most of all....NO DPS/TANK/HEALER!

Of course this gentleman is deeply touched in the skull for comparing Skyrim to GW2 but you do appear to not be very informed about GW2 as the main reason we're all looking forward to it...is because it DOES re-invent the fundamentals.

[ljh217]

I think it could learn more from Monster Hunter Tri.

[NeoTribe]

Guild wars is like WOW, so why are u here in a skyrim article? Go to blizzard.com and start flaming the warcraft forums.

[MEsoJD]

I want a ride able boat, where I can fight sea monsters. That would be sweet... Oh wait the creation kits coming soon and I have a pc. Oh JOY!!!

[Ascalon94]

it would bad badass to load up in a viking ship filled with your best friends and ride around fighting giant sea serpents.

[Lex_Dangerously]

And you could name your character Ishmael. Lol sorry it's a Moby Dick reference.

But anyway, yeah I completely agree that that would be great....... Because I would totally name my character Ishmael lol.

[maniacmayhem]

I sometimes found a master or expert locked chest In the water, opened it to find 5 coins and a steel dagger.

Good times.

[Nitrox]

score!

[LakerGamerEnthusiast]

looks like someone beat you to it lol jk ^_^

[Ares84HU]

Yeah, that was my problem too in the game. You open up an Expert chest and there is close to nothing in it.

[PamPoovey]

You know that actually bugs me about Skyrim, I thought the whole point of getting the perks in Lockpicking and leveling up is so that I could get better stuff in Master/Expert treasure chests

[NeoTribe]

What was worst is lockpicks were so plentiful that i never had a reason to put perks in lockpicking. with about 10 picks or so i could open a master chest.

[banjadude]

That happens to me soooo much in regular dungeons, it's ridiculous!!!

[Colmshan1990]

Spot on, although I'd somehow failed to notice it. Until now.
Skyrim could do with a few more threats though.
Perhaps even an inability to swim while wearing armour would be an improvement...

[Lirky]

Quill pen, is the only great valuable thing in skyrims waters... i cant find that but its for a quest.

[banjadude]

It's right outside Riften...

[RavageX]

I always hope to find huge sea monsters or something in the water with open world games....it would be cool to see anyway....just for the "Oh %$&@!!!!" moment.

[Snookies12]

With ya there man. That's one thing I loved about WoW's Lich King. Out in that one area you'd be swimming in the ocean then a giant ass shark the size of a house would be right up on you. Scared the hell outta me the first time I saw that thing...

[HardCover]

There was a rumor about a sea monster in the northern waters of Skyrim. Sucks that it wasn't there.

[SITH]

Oh, it is there... I seen it with me own eyes I did. It rose out of the water as silent as the breeze. I thought it had not seen me nor know I saw it. But me eyes laid upon it sure enough. I stared at it as I stood on land shocked yet curious. I knew not what to do, draw me trusty sword and charge in at it, or run like the dickens. Before I could choose.... A dragon ate me.

;)

[Nevers]

I found a dead elf intentionally chained to a rock slab and drowned near a waterfall. His elven armor was really nice at my lvl. That was one of the only things I've found. It has been somewhat of a disappointment that there really isn't anything out there in the vast amounts of water.

[MySwordIsHeavenly]

I agree completely. It was one of the first things I noticed. Then again, maybe they're being authentic. How many creatures could survive in the almost frozen water? Actually...did they even have frozen water?!? Wow. Something else I missed.

Can we get DLC for underwater stuff, Bethesda?

[perdie]

When I first started playing skyrim I didn't want to go in the water because i have never played it before and everybody said its so vast so I thought there were some sort of creatures that kill/hurt you and stuff lol but there isnt't and now the water isn't as cool as I thought it would be.

[GraveLord]

Most likely console limitations.

[xVeZx]

getting in a boat and fighting a kraken on the way to some island....i never played skyrim but that sounds kinda cool

[kaveti6616]

Bethesda is releasing their official mod tools, if they haven't already.

If the tools are very powerful, I expect to see a lot of mods adding more types of monsters and things to the world.

[A-Glorious-Dawn]

Yeah it would be a simple mod to implement, in Oblivion we had the giant Slaughterfish mod.

Believe me when those fu*kers came at you in the water you knew about it....

[Paul85]

Sea creatures would have been an awesome idea fighting a giant kraken or sharks

[Arts1000]

Why hasn't anyone criticized Skyrims Guppies ..............
( that cute fish with a triangle tail )

They are cheap...... TROPICAL FISH ...... and most of us ( am I wrong ) have seen them . Salmon ok but come on Bethesda common tropical fish in a frozen nordic environment . Talk about yanking the player out of the moment .

[spartan_dx]

Amazing how the author stretched what he wanted to say, I stopped reading halfway but I wish i had his skills when I was writing papers.

[admiralthrawn87]

Vashj'ir from WoW laughs at skyrim and its water.

[iMpuTeD]

what happened to the slaughterfish or the dreughs???

[TheColbertinator]

I was hoping to do some pirating.Find random encounter boats to either trade with or pillage as you see fit.Some Imperial v. Stormcloak naval battles would have made some sense too.

[bujasem_89]

i love the picture you put man, Frozen planet style ;p

[SITH]

It would have been nice to fight a kraken in skyrim's water.

[bobrea]

Then make a mod.

[granfaloon]

All I can say is Leviathan. I just want to battle Leviathan.