The Elder Scrolls Chapter II: Daggerfall
 

When I mention the Elder Scrolls most of you will think of games such as Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim but chances are that only a little of you have played the amazing game known as Daggerfall.

You start off the game with a map of "The Empire of Tamriel." In order to choose your class you have to click on one of the provinces and then a brief description of the race will pop-up. After choosing your race you can choose a class in three ways, by 1) choosing from the selected classes, 2) taking a quiz determining which class is best for you, and by 3) creating a custom-class. After doing this you notice that this game (like many role-playing games) is heavily involved with stats, you choose, from a limited number of points, which of them you uprage. After dealing with the character-creation mumbo-jumbo you are commanded by the emperor to free the ghost of the late King Lysandus (the former king of Daggerfall) and too find out what happened a certain letter that was sent by him. After this you are then released into the open world of The Elder Scrolls Chapter II: Daggerfall.


DAGGERFALL PROS:
Open-world and Exploration
If you have ever played an Elder Scrolls game you know that exploration is key to the experience, but if you have ever played Daggerfall you know that exploration is very important to the game. After going through the first dungeon you notice that there is a world of 15,000 towns, cities, villages, and dungeons along with a world around 487,000 km squared. Although this is achieved via randomly generated land between cities, towns, dungeons, etc, it is still amazing to think of a game of this scale. Not only this but no matter where you go you'll find quests to do, things to kill, and music to captivate you.

DAT MUSIC
I don't know what it is about the music in this game, but it causes the correct emotions to stir within me at the right time. In the dungeons I feel erie and unsure of things, while exploring I feel like an epic traveller, and while in the temple I feel spiritual. The only problem with the music I found was the wretched shop music... well it wasn't that bad, it just doesn't transition well. While I am in a city exploring and what not, I suddenly hear this. I mean it does make me feel happy and stuff, but it just doesn't transition well.

THEY SEE ME LOOTIN', THEY HATING
In this game there are a lot of items for you to find, magical clothes, books, potions, ingredients, weapons, crystals, and SO MUCH MORE. Hopefully you have the weight capacity for all of this or if you are rich - a wagon!

DAGGERFALL CONS:
Stuck in the Labyrinth
Do not be fooled by the first dungeon, most dungeons in this game are pretty much just mazes. At times you may go through so many forks in the dungeon that you'll get lost. You frequently have to find yourself looking at the map (which takes some time getting useful) to find places that you haven't explored. If you are in a very labyrinthine dungeon you'll find yourself getting frustrated and you may even regret doing the mission altogether. Although most dungeons (if not all) in this game have a bit of labyrinth in them, you may, at times, find out that some things are relatively easy to find. The maze-like levels in this game aren't always negative, they may at times be very rewarding.

1-Dimension Characters
I found myself getting bored (not at the game) but at the characters in this game. Although they do have a back-story, I still don't get to know the characters in this game so well. Whether they are sarcastic or not, whether they are calm or very hyperactive. Usually in this game you are just giving a huge textwall to read that has the character telling you to do something. Although I do guess that this is the main disadvantage of a game of such scale.

BUGZILLA
Although this game has been patched... it is still filled with a lot of bugs. The may even crawl on you, IN THE REAL WORLD!

OVERALL
Overall this game is amazing. The dungeons to crawl, the quests to do, the magic to learn (and create), the guilds to join, the daedra to kill. All of these things make this game amazing for those who are willing to put its flaws aside. If you love computer role-playing games and like exploration, then this game is a must download.

Thats pretty much Daggerfall in a nutshell.

I have mixed feelings about the dungeons. They're so cool and deep and even if they're randomly build out of set of specific blocks they look great. But they're so overly large and confusing that right after you finish the quest part of it, you'll immediately stop caring and head straight to exit....provided that you havent got lost and already given up on doing the quest in the first place.

And yeah, characters are almost literally a cardboard cut-outs that offer quest, information and services. Some of the notable one's actually have more detailed backstory, which can be found in books and sequels. For example, the Prince in the dining hall of Castle Daggerfall? Thats the future king of Morrowind as seen in Mournhold expansion pack.

At times I even felt like some of the NPCs had more emotion than the actual characters. Thankfully these problems that I mentioned are fixed in later games (maybe except the bugs).

It's pretty much a trend - the tavern/shop music in all of the existent CRPGs is horrible. That applies to Neverwinter Nights, to Baldur's Gate, to Divine Divinity, and now I know it does to Daggerfall as well.

I agree about the dungeons, but the only thing wrong about them is that the innovative 3D maps would have been a good idea if resolution were higher than 320x200. At that low resolution those maps are too hard to look at, and good old 2D maps with levels like in Arena would have been better. Also the buildings don't make architectural sense (unlike Arena): even castles and such are like caverns, passages with halls but a lot of vacuum space outside.

On the NPCs' lack of individuality outside quest giving (so common in RPGs) I have a funny image from Daggerfall:

http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m...l/fall_017.png

And do I hate magic:

http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m.../fall_0062.png http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m...l/fall_000.png

PS A bad joke:

http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m...l/fall_025.png

Another good thing about Daggerfall is the amount naked females there are! :gigity:

Case in point:

http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m...l/fall_033.png

Dungeons in Daggerfall are very tricky. I've found that the anchor/recall spell can save your day (and player's nerves), as you can teleport back to exit, Diablo-style, presto!

My dear European friend - then how do you imagine music played by medieval minstrels? Because that's what you'd expect in a tavern. Maybe a choir of drunk men, too...

I just save with different slots. One in the entrance and one for dungeon crawling.