The Elder Scrolls -- play in sequence?

[Gapporin]

Thanks to today's Steam deal, I picked up both The Elder Scrolls Morrowind and Oblivion with all of their DLC add-ons (Thanks, Steam!). I do have a question, though, before I jump right in: Is it better to go back and play the first games Arena and Daggerfall before moving into the current-gen sequels? I ask not only as a plot point, but also because I know that the later games allow you to use a character from one game to the next, and I was just wondering if, theoretically, you could start at the first game and use the same character through all four (soon, five) games.

tl;dr - Are there any benefits to starting at the beginning of the series rather than jumping in at the middle?

[Leo_A]

The games are independent of each other. There might be the occasional reference to something from an earlier game, but there is absolutely no need to go back and start from the beginning to fully appreciate any game in the series. And we're talking about games that spanned the better part of a decade. There is no way to use the same character across all of them like you can do in the modern Mass Effect series, for instance.

I think if you try to go back beyond Morrowind, you might never get anywhere in the series since you'll just stop. Heck, even Morrowind can be a bit hard to get into these days, although I hear there are plenty of 3rd party modifications that make the PC version easier on the eyes.

[Dobie]

Play them in whatever order you see fit... I played Oblivion years before I got to Morrowind, I didn't really make a direct connection between the two. As far as I'm concerned, they're wholly seperate experiences from one another, much like I expect Skyrim to be as well.

[YoshiM]

Other than getting a nice retro flashback of DOS games gone by, there's no need to go back to the original. You're not going to get any insight into what's going on in Morrowind or Oblivion. It's not nearly as fun meandering around the world in the earlier games as I think it was rather barren to some degree.

[calthaer]

I had the same question, once, and started looking it up. Started reading about those old games. I eventually found - and cannot find again - a developer interview (perhaps it was about one of the later games, and he was just reminiscing) that said that he, one of the original creators of the earlier game (not sure if it was Todd Howard), fired it up and tried to get out of the starter dungeon, and could only do it 50% of the time, or something.

Back in the day, those games were pretty cool, but they don't really hold up too well now. Once Morrowind hit, it seems like the games became a lot more story / adventure / exploration driven, with interesting things to do and see. The earlier ones were pretty same-y, as you can see if you check up some playthroughs of them on youtube or something.

Otherwise, the Elder Scrolls wiki can give you the synopsis of the story. Some of them are sort of interesting, but - meh.

Morrowind is worth playing, but you need some mods to make up for some of its deficiencies. I remember posting...ah, here:
http://www.digitpress.com/forum/showthread.php?t=102340

Haven't played Oblivion, but from what I hear, it needs mods as well to overcome some of the more glaring deficiencies (like all enemies auto-leveling with you a la Final Fantasy 8 - which I always hated).

[boatofcar]

Haven't played Oblivion, but from what I hear, it needs mods as well to overcome some of the more glaring deficiencies (like all enemies auto-leveling with you a la Final Fantasy 8 - which I always hated).

There's a difficulty slider in Oblivion that keeps things from getting too hairy.

I've posted this before, but I put 60 hours into Oblivion and hardly touched the main quest. There's just that much stuff to do, and it's all fun. I can't wait for Skyrim!

[YoshiM]

Back in the day, those games were pretty cool, but they don't really hold up too well now. Once Morrowind hit, it seems like the games became a lot more story / adventure / exploration driven, with interesting things to do and see. The earlier ones were pretty same-y, as you can see if you check up some playthroughs of them on youtube or something.

Yep. I remember going on lots of FedEx quests for people in the game to help build cash and experience. You could explore and find things (dungeons and such) but it just wasn't that interesting, even for me back then.

[Emuaust]

Am I the only one who cant play Elder Scrolls after playing Fallout 3, for some reasons it has ruined my enjoyment of the series, it may just be I much prefer the theme of Fallout 3 Im not really sure.

[Edmond Dantes]

With Elder Scrolls it really doesn't matter. I started with Bugg... errr, excuse me, Daggerfall, went backwards to Arena, and finally skipped ahead to Oblivion.

Arena is the only game in the series I've actually beaten, for whatever it's worth.

[Snapple]

I've only played Morrowind and Oblivion (and the expansions for those games). Each game basically takes place on its own continent with its own factions and government and whatnot, so there's no reason you can't play them out of order, I think.

Some of the lore will carry over between games, and Elder Scrolls does have as rich a lore as any series ever made. In Oblivion, you'll hear some gossip about Morrowind, and you'll see the same pantheon of gods. Mehrunes Dagon and Sheogorath, for example, have huge roles in Oblivion, and are also present in much smaller roles in Morrowind.

But at the same time, there's a very strong separation. Aside from the gods, I don't think there are any characters shared between the two games.

Actually, I take that back. The argonian who owns the Fork of Horripilation is in both games, I think. "Umbra" is in both games, although it's really two different people who were both consumed by the aura of the sword.

King Uriel Septim is in both Arena and Oblivion. Only played by Patrick Stewart in Oblivion.

I've heard that Arena has not aged well. That it's almost unplayable and generally not fun anymore. Some people still play Daggerfall though. Daggerfall's world is huge.

[Gapporin]

Thanks for the input, guys. I dove into Morrowind for a few hours ago last night. I think I'm digging it. Obviously, a lot of trial and error was involved for a n00b like me (and a lot of autoloading), but I think I'm on the right track now. It's funny, normally I don't care for RPG's, but make it into an FPS (first-person slasher?) and I'm all over it.

Yep. I remember going on lots of FedEx quests for people in the game to help build cash and experience. You could explore and find things (dungeons and such) but it just wasn't that interesting, even for me back then.

Heh, "FedEx quests." I like that.

[calthaer]

I dove into Morrowind for a few hours ago last night. I think I'm digging it. Obviously, a lot of trial and error was involved for a n00b like me (and a lot of autoloading), but I think I'm on the right track now.

A lot of the Morrowind mods that make the game better can't be loaded on a current game - you have to start a new one. It might be a good idea to check out what mods you'd enjoy before going too too far. I myself play with "Living Cities of Vvardenfell" (gives people a day / night schedule, and locks doors at night), one of the several that decreases the population of Cliff Racers (SO annoying; you really shouldn't play without this), one that lets you buy houses and furniture to decorate them with, and a botany & mining mod that has plants disappear when harvested, regrow, you can get seeds to plant new ones, and ore is mined with a pickaxe & re-appears after a while, too.

But that was just my own personal preference; I was playing as an alchemist, and wanted the houses to store all the phat lewt.