The Elder Scrolls Online has been as hotly debated by critics as it’s been hotly anticipated by the series’ fans, making a verdict on its worthiness an automatic point of contention. Complicating matters is the fact that MMORPGs are a tricky breed to review, because you never really have the finished product in your hand, since in the days down the line patches and expansions will invariably come out which can change how the game plays in significant ways. How much do you factor in the game as it is now versus its potential? Whether you should pick up the game probably depends on how you answer that question.

Unfortunately, for those who care about such academic matters, the main story itself isn’t much to boast about. TESO is set about 1000 years before the events of Skyrim, and mostly revolves around a Daedric prince’s attempt to meld Tamriel with Oblivion, enveloping it in darkness forever and yada yada yada. As far as I could tell, each faction’s start differs mostly in the cosmetic excuses to send you into your first dungeon and save the town. However, the game actually does a half decent job of replicating the typical Elder Scrolls experience, to the point where one almost wouldn’t miss a beat going to this game straight from Skyrim if you stick to the default first person perspective. Leveling, experience, and crafting nearly work identically to the previous games in the series, though with not as much depth. You only have a handful classes to choose from, but the skills are divided in such a way that you have a plethora of choices in deciding how to develop your character. Unfortunately, this has the side effect of causing both decision paralysis and a general sense of game imbalance. For example, in my experience with three different characters I rolled (Khajiit Nightblade, Wood Elf Templar, and Argonian Sorcerer) I found myself soon overwhelmed by a spike in difficulty of the bosses once I reached the quests in the level 8-10 range. In each case I was never sure if it’s because I chose the wrong talents, did not have the right gear, or because the game was nudging me to group with others. Currently the UI and the lack of tutorials does not seem to enable much cooperative play in the PvE game, and everything seems to be trial and (lots of) error. This is something that will hopefully be improved on in the future, though some of you might actually enjoy having to figure this stuff out without too much handholding. Still at least at first I had some fun mostly playing it the way I would have played any Elder Scrolls game, and that including exploring the generously sized maps that make other games like FFXIV feel positively claustrophobic, doing all sorts of side quests including joining the fighters guild, picking locks to treasure chests with the nifty mini game, and figuring out what I could craft from all the items I scavenged along the way. The problem in the end though is it feels too obviously MMOish (or specifically like WoW), almost a theme park like experience with everything carefully laid out. There’s not the sort of spontaneous encounters you’d find in Skyrim and previous Elder Scrolls games. My other problem with the game is the combat, which diverges from previous TES games with its reliance on quickbar abilities, of which there aren’t nearly enough, leaving you stuck with an undesirable compromise of floaty sword swinging and a repetitive ability rotation. It’s amazing how quickly the fighting got to be a chore I preferred to avoid compared to other games, and yet because the leveling from quests alone is so slow it really can’t be.

Let’s move on to the PvP, where things actually are a lot more promising and where TESO really sets itself apart. While many hardcore PvPers feel anything short of being able to PK everyone at the drop of the hat anywhere in-world is a disappointment, they should take heart that Zenimax did not merely limit the action to a set of pitifully sized instances with a minimal number of players (say only a handful a side at most like WoW or FFXIV). Instead they set aside the entire imperial province of Cyrodiil, an enormously sized map, for their PvP campaign. And it is a campaign indeed, with quests of its own to embark on, dozens of keeps and resource points like lumber mills, farms, and mines to capture as well as the overall goal of recovering the scrolls from the enemy. For WoW players, think of it as Arathi Basin and Alterac Valley combined and on steroids. Former DAoC playsers might feel at home in this as well as the scale of PvP is basically realm vs. realm, with Aldmeri Dominion, Daggerfall Covenant, and Ebonheart Pact all squaring off over vast swathes of territory. It’s the sheer size of the map that makes seizing each keep critical, as there is a teleport system that can only be used between areas of the map that are well under your control, making defense much harder to pull off if one base is cut off from the rest. While the game lets you start participating at level 10, it’s difficult to contribute much to the proceedings without a horse and enough power to take on the higher level players. Still, you can contribute in other ways, particularly with siege vehicles like catapults and trebuchets, which you can purchase at your home base and deploy just about anywhere. Much like the scale of the map, the battles within this zone are immense. Even when losing there’s a measure of entertainment in managing to hold off a horde of invaders until they finally give up and go for a less well defended outpost instead, only to see them ominously return from the hills in the distance and finally succumb to their forces. The amount of siege vehicles are plenty enough to make the entire sequence almost look like a scene out of the LOTR movies. The game also does a good job of rewarding participation with loot and experience, and the PvP has its own set of skill points and trees to spend them in that only increases the customization of your character even further. While I typically don’t play an MMO for PvP and don’t have a lot of experience to compare to, I feel that this side of the game has enough potential to really be worth considering for those who prefer this style of gameplay over PvE.

For an MMO, The Elder Scrolls Online is fairly ahead of the curve visually. It’s hard to tell whether it really does fall short of Skyrim’s graphical prowess or if it’s just the brighter colors and increased variation that only makes it seem less gritty and realistic, though. At the same time there’s a lot of graphical settings to tweak that make it scalable to more older platforms, which is good to see. The animations do feel a bit chintzy, however, though that could just be the floaty combat rearing its ugly head again. Almost every interaction I had with an NPC so far has been accompanied with voice acting, so the production value is certainly there as well, and the soundtrack is solid for the most part. In the end though, I feel the presentation falls short of its big brother single player games, and other MMOs like FFXIV as well, which still holds the crown in my opinion.

It’s hard to think of an audience to recommend this game to with confidence, which doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a bad game outright. Seasoned Elder Scrolls players may find that Elder Scrolls Online lies squarely in an uncanny valley of sorts, enough like a Elder Scrolls game to draw your attention, but different enough to ultimately be anathema. MMO veterans are always looking to try something new, but may run into confusing combat and skill trees, as well as the sense that this is just WoW with a different camera and unnecessary complexity. About the only people I think will have a blast with this game as it is right now are the sort who enjoy large scale PvP, even if it’s limited to a single large instance. That said, there’s enough of a game here that it could also find a PvE niche with some updates in the future.

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