We're always talking about new games on this blog and making wild speculation upon titles with which I have no first-hand experience. It makes it difficult for me to get my thoughts together as I always feel like I'm out of my depth and screaming into the void. (Well I'm kind a doing that regardless but that's besides the point.) Today, however, I found a decent excuse to talk about a title with which I am incredibly, uncomfortably familiar with, and that is the Elder Scrolls Online; due to some light teasing that they pulled off regarding a brand new expansion to be revealed later this year. The tease was especially vague, however, so I may ramble.
As it would just so happen I am incredibly involved with The Elder Scrolls franchise as a whole, having played these games for over a decade now and- whoops, sorry lost my train of thought. (My own mortality caught up with me for a second there.) I feel like I must have mentioned it at least once before, but I credit the Elder Scrolls as the very first fantasy franchise that I truly got into at a visceral level and it's one of the only fictional worlds that I would truly want to live in. (Ohh, that'd be a good idea for a blog in the future! Actually, that'd make a more fun discussion but it's not like I really have that option...) When it comes to the world of Tamriel I can recount the races of the land, both playable and otherwise, and recall the historical moments of the founding of the empire. I can name the Septim Dynasty practically from founding to dissolution and I can reliably recite the opening 5 minutes of Skyrim from memory. In fact in matters vegetable, animal and mineral I am the very model of a fan who's ES hysterical.
It would come to the surprise of no-one then, that I was a very devout player of The Elder Scrolls Online back in my day, but interestingly enough I didn't hop on at initial inception. Just like with the trajectory of modern Bethesda, Zenimax's ESO launched in a fairly dire strait, and people lambasted the title enough to keep me far away. It was only after the first major overhaul to the game that I was tempted to give the title a shot with the promise of getting to play an MMO with actual friends. In truth I was always curious how the team could handle a Massive Multiplayer title from a lore perspective given how previous Scrolls protagonists were renowned for the scarcity of their type. (Those that they call 'Fateless' are only supposed to show up once a generation or so, for this title there were thousands!) That curiosity would turn into a feverish passion as I found myself swept up in my very first MMO love-affair. (Former WOW-Addicts will know how intense the first time always is.)
My time with ESO was perhaps the first time that I truly began to get into the concept of min-maxing, (Not that I ever got anywhere close to that with ESO, but it taught me how to apply that knowledge to over RPGs) raids, and communicating with other players in the game for coordination purposes. (There's an experience that I never want to go through again.) So it's safe to say that this title held an exceedingly precious place in my heart for a decent couple of years and those are the kind of gaming memories that I'll take into the joy stick afterlife, or whatever. The bubble would have to burst eventually, however, and for me it was when I realized that I was the only one who liked playing this game, everybody else was just in it for grinding the best loot and that sort of sucked all of the fun out. I liked the idea of role playing and not taking everything so darn seriously, (Unless we're talking about the 'Planar Inhibitor', because she was demanding of the utmost seriousness.) but I was alone in that desire and it meant that I ended up being alone in playing the game. It's no fun playing an MMO by yourself, and so I gave up the title. But I still pay attention every now and then to see what's going on with updates, not to gauge whether I'd jump back in, but to fantasize about what it would be like if I'd never left. (Does that sound weird? Reading it myself it comes across as weird.)
Good thing I got out when I did, however, as the year after I left ESO was the time when Zenimax decided to assassinate the lore with their 'Elesweyr' expansion. The one which introduced dragons into ESO. The game which is, let me remind you, the prequel to all of the single player Elder Scrolls games. (Warning: I'm about to get all nerdy about Elder Scrolls lore so this your last chance to duck out.) Can I just say how sad it is that no one in Zenimax's writing staff could figure out a way to up the stakes from last year without resummoning the dragons several thousand years early? You have a universe brimming with ancient demon gods, (Daedra) mysterious vanished super-races (Dwemer) and iconic storied locations that we've still yet to explore in exhaustive detail. (Sancre Tor. Yeah, there was that one mission but there's got to be more to it than that!) But some moron came in and said "People want dragons, right?" and so they pulled all the majesty out of the canon of Skyrim whilst simultaneously invalidating the prophecy on which Skyrim's story is premised. (Sure, they didn't awaken the World Eater early but they still knocked the wind out of that poem's sails.)
Okay, I know I'm getting too deep into this but I need to rant about this to someone and all my contacts have blocked me so this is my only outlet. In the lore, the dragons had the run of the land in ancient days and thus enslaved the first men under a despotic rule. Man couldn't fight back due to the dual fact that the dragon's held a powerful magic in their very voices that could tear men apart and that the dragon's ruler, Alduin, had the power to fly into the land of souls. (Essentially meaning that he could revive any Dovah that men managed to slay.) It was only through the combined forces of the greatest heroes of their day (and the help of a traitor) that the first men banished Alduin through time and thus got the upperhand in the war. For the preceding centuries, the descendants of those heroes worked to slay every single dragon in existence in the knowledge that they couldn't be revived without the work of 'Alduin the World Eater'. The only dragons who supposedly survived was the traitor, because he earned some reprieve from the slaughter at least, and Nafaalilgarus, because he lived in secrecy and even his existence could very well have been a myth.
From a point of storytelling convention, it really helped distinguish the world of Elder Scrolls that they didn't rely on dragons to be their ultimate bad like every fantasy has done since 'Beowulf'. That was a story in which 'the dragon' is utilized as a personification of all of man's struggles into one beast that one may do battle with, but will never entirely triumph against. A powerful and evocative metaphor, no doubt, but one that has lost it's edge and fundamental meaning with constant reimaginings. Skyrim, however, managed to tap back into that mythical original by introducing 'Alduin' the dragon destined to destroy the world. Even when you are victorious at the end of the game, you've only delayed the inevitable, not stopped it. Just like the legend of Surtur's role in Ragnarok, his ultimate destiny to be the end of all things: he is the World Eater.
"But screw that noise, let's throw in dragons!" the executives must have argued, reasoning that the bottom-line was more important than narrative integrity. You may have picked up on the fact that I'm actually really ticked off by Zenimax for how they handled 'Elesweyr', but that doesn't mean I didn't get a little bit excited to see where they're taking the story next. And that is because at the VGA's us fans were provided with the vague tease that the next part of the story would be taking place in a previously unexplored corner of 'Skyrim'; my single favourite Elder Scrolls province. I've always been a huge fan of Scandanavian and Nordic mythos, so any more attempts to feed into that fandom is absolutely fine by me. I'm also excited to see another side of a landscape that I know like the back of my hand at this point, so ESO has me curious.
At the end of the day is this going to be enough to get me back into The Elder Scrolls Online? Probably not, but that's okay. The gaming world has been completely taking over with time-sink live-services so folk like me just plain don't have time to sink into an MMO. Even one in which I'm already well established. Perhaps this'll make for a nice treat for those who are still loyal to those Zenimax folk, but I'd rather wait until the next full fledged entry to sink my money. Wait a minute- does that mean I have to depend on Bethesda to get their next game right? Oh boy, maybe I should get back into ESO, soon it might be the only game keeping this franchise afloat...
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