Are arena/daggerfall worth trying out?

[Vex Hilarius]

I havent really got into elder scrolls 3-5 but i have them all but I dont like to jump into a series halfway so are the first 2 games worth playing?

Like is there really any need to play them? does the story of the first games really matter in the later games? any characters that i might miss?

[EgoMaster]

Things you need to know:

* Arena and Daggerfall are late 90s pseudo 3D first person games and pretty much reflect the era they came out in terms movement mechanics. Mouse look (which was a new thing at the time) is possible though.
* All installments of the Elder Scrolls franchise tell contained stories. They don't continue where the previous game left off. So playing them isn't required.
* That being said, playing them will provide you a better insight to the lore and history written in in-game books.
* They're both free and some people bundled them with official and unofficial fixes and enhancements into neat installers. So you can try them out, see if they appeal to you. This[wiwiki.wiwiland.net] is the link to Daggerfall Setup. Arena setup can be found on the same site.

[A Rock Seller]

Arena is a valuable piece of RPG history so I think you'd have a bit to learn if you read about it. As for playing it... It might click for you. It's clunky however. Perhaps more so than other classic dungeon crawlers. The stories of TES games are usually pretty containted so you probably won't miss out on any important characters that you won't learn about in the later games.

Daggerfall is pretty much Arena but more refined. The gameplay and control scheme is overall much smoother. Also let's just get one thing out of the way - Daggerfall is pretty much what Skyrim -should- have been (rendering Skyrim obsolete), a large open fantasy world that you can explore and do whatever you want in. The choices all being yours. Make your own spells and enchantments, travel aimlessly and see what you'll find, do small jobs for random citizens or do big jobs for random citizens if you want the extra danger, buy one of the many houses in the game, buy a ship (yes), join a knightly order and so on. All this freedom comes at the cost of some lacking combat which hinders the overall challenge of the game. Still, you could argue that the real challenge in the game is not how you perform in combat but rather how you approach it. It's really a question of how well prepared you are for a fight rather than how you swing your sword in it.

Morrowind is Daggerfall-lite. It has significantly less content in it but spends more time to refine what it has. It still has some great features like making your own spells and enchantments (yes, you are reading that correctly) and overall being able to just go about everything as you see fit. The lore is a lot more established here so if you move past this game you -might- miss some important names.

Oblivion is what I like to call "The beginning of the end". Watered and dumbed down gameplay, several features like custom spells and enchantments -gone-, boring and uninteresting world with pretty much nothing but grass and bushes to find (gotta give them credit for the atmosphere though), enemy level scaling, a pretty braindead combat system that people really only like because it isn't the dice roll combat of the previous games (because I guess following the formula of classic RPGs is pretty bad for a game that aims to be an -RPG-).

I feel like the level scaling and combat need some elaboration. Enemy level scaling is, in a nutshell, being level 100 yourself and all of a sudden seeing -bandits- with the best armor and weapons in the game and at the same level as you. Yes, when the developers are too lazy to add things that would be interesting to a high level character they just make low level stuff scale with them. Brilliant, no? No, it isn't. Then there's the combat. Get this, before the combat consisted of you building your character in a way that would allow them to fight properly. You had to know which skills to invest in for the best performance. Yes, during the actual combat all you had to do was swing which admittedly doesn't look too great and gives graphics wh*res seizures, however it makes sense. In Oblivion all it is is just swinging your weapon until you hit something. No point in managing your stamina or anything, not even any point in being concerned about your character's stats. They. Will. Hit. Good luck failing in this game. Everything is pretty much handed to you. If you somehow manage to find an enemy that -isn't- scaled to your level and is actually 2 or 3 levels higher than you, you might actually find a bit of a challenge. Doesn't last though and the rest of the game is still the developer pampering you and telling you how awesome you are despite you having done nothing that a toddler couldn't.

And now onto Skyrim... it's Oblivion but even worse. Do I need to say anything else? This time the developers put extra effort into completely destroying the game world by selling it as this "super dangerous dragon infested land that is technically inches away from an apocalypse". That's all fine. How did they try to actually -implement- this? By adding dragons that -scale to your level-. Yes, dragons are essentially flying bandits. You have this whole world that keeps hammering "dragons are dangerous!" into your head and then when you finally encounter one it feels like a dumb joke. Infact, this whole game is probably a joke from the developers.

Reason why I wrote all this despite you just asking if you should play the first two games is to show you just how much -better- they might end up being. Minus Arena since some would deem it lacking even for it's era. Daggerfall and Morrowind however are certainly worth it and I'd even go as far as saying you shouldn't even bother with the last two games. Seriously, Oblivion and Skyrim were designed to insult you without you realizing it. The entire game pretty much make fun of your intelligence with the things it throws at you.

Whatever you end up doing I hope you have fun with it. Sorry for the wall of text.

[Octogenarian]

It's a great wall of text though. Fair and to the point.

[demo.client]

holy sh*t Velox Banks, this wall of text was actually helpful and not a waste of time to read.

[Vex Hilarius]

Originally posted by Velox Banks:

Arena is a valuable piece of RPG history so I think you'd have a bit to learn if you read about it. As for playing it... It might click for you. It's clunky however. Perhaps more so than other classic dungeon crawlers. The stories of TES games are usually pretty containted so you probably won't miss out on any important characters that you won't learn about in the later games.

Daggerfall is pretty much Arena but more refined. The gameplay and control scheme is overall much smoother. Also let's just get one thing out of the way - Daggerfall is pretty much what Skyrim -should- have been (rendering Skyrim obsolete), a large open fantasy world that you can explore and do whatever you want in. The choices all being yours. Make your own spells and enchantments, travel aimlessly and see what you'll find, do small jobs for random citizens or do big jobs for random citizens if you want the extra danger, buy one of the many houses in the game, buy a ship (yes), join a knightly order and so on. All this freedom comes at the cost of some lacking combat which hinders the overall challenge of the game. Still, you could argue that the real challenge in the game is not how you perform in combat but rather how you approach it. It's really a question of how well prepared you are for a fight rather than how you swing your sword in it.

Morrowind is Daggerfall-lite. It has significantly less content in it but spends more time to refine what it has. It still has some great features like making your own spells and enchantments (yes, you are reading that correctly) and overall being able to just go about everything as you see fit. The lore is a lot more established here so if you move past this game you -might- miss some important names.

Oblivion is what I like to call "The beginning of the end". Watered and dumbed down gameplay, several features like custom spells and enchantments -gone-, boring and uninteresting world with pretty much nothing but grass and bushes to find (gotta give them credit for the atmosphere though), enemy level scaling, a pretty braindead combat system that people really only like because it isn't the dice roll combat of the previous games (because I guess following the formula of classic RPGs is pretty bad for a game that aims to be an -RPG-).

I feel like the level scaling and combat need some elaboration. Enemy level scaling is, in a nutshell, being level 100 yourself and all of a sudden seeing -bandits- with the best armor and weapons in the game and at the same level as you. Yes, when the developers are too lazy to add things that would be interesting to a high level character they just make low level stuff scale with them. Brilliant, no? No, it isn't. Then there's the combat. Get this, before the combat consisted of you building your character in a way that would allow them to fight properly. You had to know which skills to invest in for the best performance. Yes, during the actual combat all you had to do was swing which admittedly doesn't look too great and gives graphics wh*res seizures, however it makes sense. In Oblivion all it is is just swinging your weapon until you hit something. No point in managing your stamina or anything, not even any point in being concerned about your character's stats. They. Will. Hit. Good luck failing in this game. Everything is pretty much handed to you. If you somehow manage to find an enemy that -isn't- scaled to your level and is actually 2 or 3 levels higher than you, you might actually find a bit of a challenge. Doesn't last though and the rest of the game is still the developer pampering you and telling you how awesome you are despite you having done nothing that a toddler couldn't.

And now onto Skyrim... it's Oblivion but even worse. Do I need to say anything else? This time the developers put extra effort into completely destroying the game world by selling it as this "super dangerous dragon infested land that is technically inches away from an apocalypse". That's all fine. How did they try to actually -implement- this? By adding dragons that -scale to your level-. Yes, dragons are essentially flying bandits. You have this whole world that keeps hammering "dragons are dangerous!" into your head and then when you finally encounter one it feels like a dumb joke. Infact, this whole game is probably a joke from the developers.

Reason why I wrote all this despite you just asking if you should play the first two games is to show you just how much -better- they might end up being. Minus Arena since some would deem it lacking even for it's era. Daggerfall and Morrowind however are certainly worth it and I'd even go as far as saying you shouldn't even bother with the last two games. Seriously, Oblivion and Skyrim were designed to insult you without you realizing it. The entire game pretty much make fun of your intelligence with the things it throws at you.

Whatever you end up doing I hope you have fun with it. Sorry for the wall of text.

Well its definetly not what I asked really lol, but it is appreciated. I like it when i get actual reasons and stuff as to why I should play a game, instead of "yes its a good game". I prefer details.

I can see where you are coming from though with your opinions. Although i never really got into the elder scrolls, I played the crap out of Fallout and it seems the series have alot more in common than just sharing an engine. I played f1, f3, and new vegas and your right, bethesda has a way of "dumbing down" the rp in a rpg.

So based on what you said, in a certain way, Arena and Daggerfall are essentially the "rpgs" of the series, kind of like how f1 and f2 are in Fallout. Morrowind is new vegas, where the rp is there, but has more emphasis in other parts too, so it evens out more, i guess? And obivion and skyrim are f3 and f4. Thats just how i see it.

Still though, i enjoyed f3 and f4 so I will probably like oblivion and skyrim but i just need to go into those games a little differently. Thanks for the info though, i will probably start with morrowind, because graphics dont bother me at all, so if i like what it gives me, ill go from there. it seems like morrowind is a good balance to see what others i will enjoy.

[Medican]

Hi, Trauma, following your fallout example, Fallout III, New Vegas and IV are similar in focus but more "simple" (less factions, npcs, locations, actions, skills, etc) than Oblivion and Skyrim and Oblivion and Skyrim in turn are similar but very simplified Morrowind-Daggerfall, so if you enjoyed the freedom, factions, unique npcs or exploration parts in Fallout III/IV probably you will enjoy Daggerfall and Morrowind, but... still the game mechanics in Daggerfall/Morrowind are very different (only vaguely similar) to Fallout III/IV or New Vegas. With far more factions, hundreds of in game books, far more actions, more skill based combat wiht less player reflexes importance, etc, the experience is... different. Fallout I and II are another story.

Focusing on your first question, contrary to Baldur's Gate, Gothic, The Witcher or Mass Effect series, where every chapter is a step in the same main story, Elder Scrolls series isn't about a story divided in some chapters or consecutive events, but really independent games only sharing world/lore. There are some conections of course, but are minimal. The main focus in 4 last TEs games isn't the main story, but the "world itself", they are true open worlds, where people enjoy to freely explore, join different factions, etc, so you can enjoy playing Morrowind, later Skyrim, later Oblivion and finally Daggerfall if you like.

The 4 last TES (Daggerfall, Morrowind, Oblivion and Skyrim) are similar in focus and gameplay even with the aforementioned differences (and much more) cited by Velox Banks, but contrary to what Velox said, Daggerfall isn't "an Arena but more refined". Arena is simple dungeon crawler, without factions, only 20 unique npcs, wit far less actions to do, far less enemy types, etc, etc. Personally, I enjoyed to play Arena only to see the world and lore evolution or to see the " true world distances" (Arena is the only game that shows the true distances in Kilometers)·

Daggerfall definitivelly deserves a try, specially for people interested in "Open Worlds" and "Open path" games, it's a must try for Crpg lovers as well. Daggerfall's character creation is one of the most complex ever, the number of locations is the largest in videogame History (15.000!!), you can do far more different actions than in Oblivion/Skyrim, but it's an old game, and new players usually have difficulties addapting to its graphics and controls.

-For players interested in the typical TES experience ("free path", thousand options and actions, many factions to join, many locations to explore, deep lore, in game books and texts, etc: Only the last 4 main series games deserve a try, Morrowind, Daggerfall, Oblivion and Skyrim, in order of "perfection" in these features.

-For players interested in "immersion" and "uniqueness" in videogames, with deep worldbuilding, unique npcs, world objects and creatures diversity, etc : The last 3 games deserve a try, Morrowind, Skyrim and Oblivion, in order of importance of that "uniqueness and immersion".

-For a Elder Scrolls fans: All games deserve a try. Not only 5 of the main series, but Redguard adventure game, Battlespire "experiment" and maybe even TESO.

-For a player interested in video-game general evolution and to play only "masterpieces" or "top -whatever feature- games": Only Daggerfall and Morrowind deserve a try.

[clean carp]

Originally posted by Trauma:

I havent really got into elder scrolls 3-5 but i have them all but I dont like to jump into a series halfway so are the first 2 games worth playing?

Like is there really any need to play them? does the story of the first games really matter in the later games? any characters that i might miss?

Yes, they are worth playing, but I suggest you trying the later games first, to get a sense of what is happening in the universe of ES. Daggerfall and especially Arena might put you off with their old gameplay, weird controls and randomly generated terrain. Heck, even Morrowind is hard to play for a newcomer nowadays and it can't be blamed.
Daggerfall is still the most complex game in the series, regarding economics, politics and faction relationships. If you really intend to play ES 1-2, skip Arena, go straight to Daggerfall, it's a better constructed world, with better controls and complex gameplay mechanics. The problem with Arena and Daggerfall is that in 94-96 the world of Elder Scrolls was just beggining to take a shape and there are many lore elements you won't see later in the series.
My personal opinion is that Morrowind is a great place to start for a newcomer (and I am not saying that as a fanboy - because we are on the Morrowind discussion forums). That is if you can only withstand weird graphics and the crappy combat system for a very good story (probably the best in the series, Arena might be a contender). Also Morrowind does a much better job than Oblivion and Skyrim at presenting the universe and the lore. You can actually install some mods to make Morrowind more "modern" in terms of graphics and combat.
Oblivion and Skyrim are much more action oriented, so in that sense you might miss plenty of lore information because you bash the enemies and do quests and all that Todd Howard GTA-like crap.
All ES games are awesome anyways, it's up to you what to play. If I could give you one very short advice: stay away from Arena right now. Daggerfall is just much more than Arena if you really want to play ES 1-2.

[clean carp]

Also, keep in mind that there is no linear story in the series, every main quest from every game is just an event at a certain moment during Tamriel's history. So you can skip any game in the series without any second thought.

[The Dude]

I would most def test them both out but I will warn you that arena is not that great of a game because of the controls but Daggerfall is my fav then Morrowind is next. anyways Daggerfall really is a great game and if I were you I would download the Daggerfall unity

[Aiyoki]

Daggerfall in all honesty is one of my favorite games. Every few years I go back to it like an old friend. It's also probably one of the biggest games out there, so you never run out of things to do.

[Teralitha]

Originally posted by Mystiana:

Daggerfall in all honesty is one of my favorite games. Every few years I go back to it like an old friend. It's also probably one of the biggest games out there, so you never run out of things to do.

daggerfall may have a large land mass, but its not like its chock full of diverse quests and npcs and content. It has a limited number of quests that get randomly recycled, so you are doing many quests over and over, but with slightly different random dialogues. Dungeons are the same way. But, it is a good game though and I too play it again from time to time, including arena. The dungeons in arena are the biggest ever in any game.

[Mr. Whiskers]

They're free so there's no reason not to try them. Give then a try, if you don't like them just uninstall and go back to whatever else you were doing.