Ranking of Elder Scrolls Games

[cytochrome]

I haven't found too many people who have played a lot of the Elders Scrolls (back since Hammerfall), but I'm curious what others think about the rankings of these games.

Personally, I'd have to say Morrowind > Skyrim >>> Daggerfall > Arena=Oblivion

******My reasoning does not include things that mods can't fix*********
Most of the cons for each game can be fixed with mods, so I'm talking about general overall playability. I'm not listing anything about bugs because every game has its annoying bugs

REASONING:
***Morrowind***
Pros - Way more skills/spells, better character development when it comes to skills and spells
- More quests (yes, there are more than Skyrim)
- Unique environment unlike other RPG games (Vvardenfall is an extremely unique place that has a tribal feeling with the dark elf tribes etc.), not like typical RPGs of today
- Graphics modding makes it look better than Skyrim
- Text communication with NPCs give a great sense of classical RPG feeling
Cons - Can't block manually
- Poor physical character development
- Graphics are crap compared to newer Elder Scrolls

***Skyrim***
Pros - BEAUTIFUL landscape and graphics
- cozy "wintery" feeling, I really enjoyed this game when it came out in the winter because of that
- DOUBLE HANDED WEAPONS AND SPELLS
- Make your own armor and spells
- Dragons, giants, and other great enemies
Cons - Can't really think of any serious ones... why did I put Morrowind first?

***Daggerfall***
Pros - Same as Morrowind
- If you actually play through this game it's a rewarding experience!
- 6 unique endings! (Reminds me of Chrono Cross)
- Whatever is not supplied in graphics is definitely made up for with the story!
Cons - We are comparing a pre-21st century game to freaking Skyrim

***Arena***
Same as Daggerfall except OLDER (1994)
Another rewarding experience if it is played through! But can we compare this to Skyrim? (no)
This is like the Final Fantasy 1 of the Elder Scrolls games
Pros - Good ol RPG feel
Cons - Story is OK... Main quest is going around collecting artifacts

***Oblivion***
Pros - Good graphics?
- Cool quests?
- Make spells
- Control blocking
- I guess it's pretty cool, why did I put it down here?
Cons - It just seemed "empty" to me, I don't know, this may be personal
- Characters looked like dough boys
- The Imperial style is not as cool as the tribal/savage styles of Morrowind and Skyrim (again, this is an opinion)





Anyways, I'm not trying to ARGUE that one is better than the other. However, I'd like to know other opinions!

[blacksinow]

***Skyrim***
Pros - BEAUTIFUL landscape and graphics
- Beautiful scenery, it's environment and creatures are simply spectacular
- Dual Wielding of weapons and spells
- Make your own armor. (You can't really make your own spells, but you CAN still enchant your gear.)
- Dragons, giants, and other great enemies
- Radiant Story engine adds the capability for random generated quests and takes the persistent world mechanic to new levels previously unimaginable
Cons
- The map really doesn't work as well as it should, it becomes a challenge traveling from point a to point b via fast travel because the icons can be so difficult to locate
- When walking along the roads, they aren't as functional as they should be. Again, getting from point a to point b seems more challenging then it should. Not because it takes effort to move or anything of that sort, but because the signs marking the way to specific locations seem like they are placed at the wrong locations, getting you lost in the process.
- For a game that takes place five hundred years in the future, there seems to be no evolution of technology aside from being able to forge dwemmer and daedric weapons. I would preferably love to see crossbows added to the game. But I may be looking too much into this con.

The first two cons I had listed are things that I feel are really wrong with the game. So many people out there seem to agree with me, that they had spent so much time making the map look pretty, instead of making it more useful. I would have preferred a 2D map system that Oblivion had, atleast the fast travel markers are useful in the game. I had also corrected some of the points that you had made.

[Nate DaZombie]

I really can't rank the Elder Scrolls games, simply because they're all great in their own way.

Skyrim is by far the most accessible, while still maintaining what makes the Elder Scrolls fun

Oblivion was the first "next-gen" Scrolls game, but it had quite a few glitches and problems

Morrowind was great, and the environment and creatures were pretty unique. I still find people who prefer this game over the newer titles.

etc...

[ccgr]

I started with Morrowind so I can't compare the older ones

I'd rank like this:


Morrowind
Oblivion
Skyrim

[ChickenSoup]

Haven't played Daggerfall or Arena, but... I dunno, for some reason I feel almost as though Morrowind is detached from the rest of the series. It really had... SOMETHING. It was dark, it was tribal, it was.... well, sometimes it was even creepy. I feel like, without fast travel in the map, no horses, and just a couple options like Silt Striders or ferries to get you places, the world felt so much bigger than in Oblivion or even Skyrim. I don't know why, but I feel like Morrowind was like a crown jewel of the series, but that's probably just because I loved the environment of Vvardenfell. Man, I need to play that game again.

Skyrim... oh goodness. Skyrim. It's.... it's just so good XD I'd just be repeating what everyone else has already said if I went on about it, but... yeah. It's also the only one I don't own on PC.

I know a lot of people dislike Oblivion, but man. I sunk so many hours into this game. The world felt smaller to me, yes, and the main storyline wasn't the best out of all the games in the series, and it definitely "felt" different than the rest of the game (a more Medieval feeling instead of Elder Scrolls Lore type feeling... IMO), but I still thoroughly enjoyed this game. I dunno XD

but honestly, I dunno. I feel like it's too hard to rank them because each of them set out in a different world (well, region of Tamriel) with vastly different environments and cultures with different goals and each of them achieved those goals, IMO. Well, you could argue that Oblivion's main story was lacking, but aside from that, I think each of them have their pros and cons but are all excellent, excellent games that stand well on their own. I can't rank them in relation to each other XD

[blacksinow]

To be fair, Oblivion WAS involved in the birth of one of the best open-world rpgs on the market, Fallout New Vegas. I will probably pass out from being overexcited if they use the Skyrim engine for Fallout 4.