TES V: Skyrim Discussion Thread

I fail to see the mistake.....


Also *flex* here's my Skyrim play-station:





50" Plasma 3D HDTV, XPS 730x tower, i7-920 O/C to 3.2ghz on air, 6gb ram, creative soundcard w/optical out to Onkyo receiver, Nvidia GTX 580 vid card DVI-HDMI to tv.

Playing with Xbox 360 controller from the comfort of the chair...... life is good.

 

Haven't spent a lot of time with Skyrim yet, work weekends here, but so far I can honestly say...............not impressed ! And I should have known better, since I never could get into Boreblivion, but took the chance anyways.

Skyrim is a "CONSOLE" game..................period !
The UI is one of the worst I've ever seen !
Of course the first thing I looked for was Tweaks for Skyrim and lo and behold they were already out...............the first freakin' day !
Mouse lag..............wth ? I did purchase a game for "WINDOWS", not xbox or ps3.

FOV...............again........wth ?

Now , there are certain keys I "Can't" re-assign along with "TYPICAL" settings changes in almost every pc game ever made.

Been pc gaming since the 80's...........back when companys like Bethesda and Bioware made pc-only games, but it seems they've forgotten who was there at the beginning and could really care less if you bought any of their new sh!t.

If I wanted to play a console version of Skyrim, I would have purchased the PS3 version !

Guess I will be gaming a lot less in the future , since I will never again purchase a game that was made for more than just the pc platform !

 

rdalev, I feel a bit the same. But the game is wonderful.

Turn off vsync in the config file (will find it if you can't just too lazy to look atm) will help with mouse lag.

FOV is a pain, but can be adjusted before you start to play with a few keystrokes (~ / FOV 90 / ENTER) and done.

 

Thanks HT. Understand and have seen the tweaks, it's just that coming from a used-to-be pc only game developer, I believe having to do these tweaks , just shows their lack of respect or concern for pc-only gamers ! We're an after thought !

This game should have been optimized better coming out of the gate !

 

Preaching to the choir. Grew up with IBM PC monochrome computers, Kings Quest I, and Commodore 64, so know what you mean. Seems the standards have changed for the worse, and not much we can do about it, mainly because the console crowd (younger) are primarily what they're used to, and just don't care to vote with their wallet.

 

What if they decided to keep this one a console exclusive? I wonder how many would have preferred that....

 

Yeah, I hear you. Same for me. My earlier remarks were in some ways unfair. I knew going in that I would look at the console stuff and be disappointment as I always am with these games anymore. It doesn't mean its a bad game but the disappointment is there regardless. It would not have cost that much to put more work into a better optimized PC experience. It comes down to pride in craftsmanship. I am not happy with my work unless I feel like I did the best I could. Maybe it isn't there to do everything I want to do but I do my best with what I have. That is whats missing here, the pc experience was given the "good enough it'll work" treatment. If you compare this to say dragon age you still see console all over the place but you also see the effort put into making it a better pc experience.

 

All that said, I still find Skyrim a rewarding experience so far. Haven't played much but if I can get the hours I got in Oblivion, it will be well more than worth the money spent.

 

The last PC exclusive game Bethesda released was Daggerfall in 1996, so I'm not sure what you're talking about.

I'm absolutely amazed at the narrowmindedness of some people. Do you really expect companies to forego console revenues? These are public companies. They exist to make money.

 

It has nothing to with foregoing consoles for revenue. The point is that they don't take the time to adapt it properly for PC.

 

Look for SkyrimPrefs.ini in the skyrim folder and change the resolution of the shadow maps there (1024 default on Ultra, I doubled it to 2048).

I hear ya! I am obsessed with this game now. It has invaded my mind fully, and I walk around today feeling like a Viking of old

Vanilla Oblivion was definitely too easy and combat felt a bit repetitive after a while. I only enjoyed Oblivion combat after installing a very hefty list of mods for leveling and combat mechanics.

It does not happen to be the case with Skyrim so far, as I LOVE the combat system and it gives you that feeling that you are there, kind of like Dead Island did.

Your POV is constantly tumbling as you get hit and perform your moves and that is a touch of realism that I really appreciate. Also I really like the new spell system and how you have to assign spells to your hands.

Makes a lot of sense really and inspires me to combine magic and melee fighting like I never imagined before.

 

No, I agree with that point. But there are people complaining about the fact that big name titles aren't PC only and that makes zero sense to me.

Anyway, back to the point.

The dragon attacks are probably my favorite part of the game. I arrived in Morthal today, and was about to head into Highmoon Hall when I heard a RAAAAAGH. The guards were all like "everyone inside!" and the "Dovahkiin Dovahkiin" music kicked up. Then I FUS ROH DAHed that punk and sliced him up with my bound sword and he was dead.

Side note: I thought it was hilarious when the guard yelled at me for FUS ROHing all over Whiterun. My bad, bro.

I also think they nailed the feel of the world. My favorite time and place in Skyrim is twilight in Morthal. The navy blue sky with the snow flurries and the absolute silence is just hauntingly beautiful.

 

Soooo, I didn't bother reading through 67 pages of thread, so some dude got my hopes up saying my 9600m GT could do skyrim on low 1920x1080, but I seriously doubt it,

do you think I could get 60fps on 1280x800 on low? specs below (or point me to the post in this thread that answers this)

 

I can play at 20fps on my AMD E-350 netbook at 800x450 if that's any help! 30-40fps looks pretty fluid actually, and I'm sure at low you'd have no issues running at 1280x720.

 

lol you are cheating

 

Currently I have shadows on High, and the settings in ini seem to be:

iShadowMapResolutionSecondary=1024
iShadowMapResolutionPrimary=2048

What do I change? I tried changing the first value only, to 2048 but that didn't seem to do anything ingame.

 

Hehe here's the video if you didn't already catch it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EP_6PJLYeT0

Sorry, forgot to write that you also have to change this setting iBlurDeferredShadowMask=3 to 1

You can also add these values at the bottom of the list:
bUseWaterReflectionBlur=1
bReflectExplosions=1
iWaterBlurAmount=4
bAutoWaterSilhouetteReflections=0
bForceHighDetailReflections=1
fBlockLoadDistanceLow=50000.0000
fBlockLoadDistance=125000.0000
fHighBlockLoadDistanceLow=20000.0000

That will increase the quality of the far Lod meshes and make the water look even more gorgeous

Btw it's the .ini in the my documents/mygames/skyrim
folder not the one in the installation folder.

 

Why the ini in the my documents folder? All ini changes Ive read online stress that changes be made for the ini in the install folder.

Also, if I have shadow on ultra, the default shadow resolution is 4096, not 1024. So I'm not sure what to change now.

 

Game is gorgeously running at all high on a Radeon 5650. Hadn't had a wink of sleep for the last couple of days. Well done Bethesda.

 

Just do it, trust me. Make a backup, of course first. You'll see the difference immediately.

 

Oh ok, so the iBlurDeferredShadowMask is basically how much blurring is processed on all shadows, the lower it is, the crisper but less blurred the shadows are (aka better performance and arguably better / worse shadows depending on personal pref).

And my shadowmap resolution is already at 2048, like I said, that's the value for "High" shadow setting.

Tree shadows are pretty but gives a big performance hit though.

 

No. I expect AAA companies, like Bethesda to make games for the pc first, then remove whatever it takes to port it to consoles.

Again I'll state , if I wanted to play a console game I would have bought the PS3 version to play on my PS3 !

Why should I have to go into the ini files and make tweaks that should have been made already ?

 

If anyone having issue running this with their optimus processor try this:

I found this on nvidia fourm:
Skyrim GT 540M issue - NVIDIA Forums

 

Why would they do that, when the PC is by far the smallest hardcore gaming platform?

You're expecting companies to do extra work because you think they owe you something. Sort of ridiculous.

 

<param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/PCdX5oM2euw?version=3&amp;hl=nb_NO"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/PCdX5oM2euw?version=3&amp;hl=nb_NO" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width='640' height="360" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object>

 

I expect companies that "SELL" games for computers to "MAKE" them for computers ! Why is that so hard to understand ?

 

They also sell them for consoles and consoles are specialized computers. The cost to benefit ratio of putting MORE effort into the PC version does not make sense. I understand how a business works, but I'm not quite sure you do.

 

Which ini lines in the tweaked ini specifically target improving shadows? (more specifically, the blockiness of shadows)

That's the only grudge I have with the vanilla graphics.

 

Once upon a time gaming companies cared about the gaming community. I know that's a hard concept to grasp in today's materialistic society, but it was true at one point. At least for some companies anyways.

 

iBlurDeferredShadowMask=3

It improves the sharpness of the shadows and has a least effect on the performance so you may not see any FPS loss even when you have set it to high. You can set this value ranging from 1 – 3 (Low, Medium, High).

fTreesMidLODSwitchDist=0.0000

It improves tree LOD distance. You can change it to 10000000.0000 if you want to improve the LOD distance or keep it as it is.

fShadowLODStartFade=200.0000

It improves LOD distance of shadows. You can change it to ’1000.0000′.

bTransparencyMultisampling=0

Change it to 1 to enable Transparency MS.

iWaterMultiSamples=0

It improves Water AA sampling. You can change it from 1 to 4 (Low, Medium, High, Ultra). Change it either to improve the eye candy or to improve the performance or find a good balance between two.

bTreesReceiveShadows=0

It improves the tree shadows – You can change it to 1 to enable shadows on trees or keep the shadows disabled if you are looking to squeeze performance out of your machine.

bDrawLandShadows=0

It enables land shadows – You can change it to 1 to enable land shadows. Again, shadows eat a lot of system resources and video card memory, keep it disabled if you are looking to squeeze performance.

fGrassMinStartFadeDistance=0.0000

It improves grass distance. Greatly effects performance. I have tested it up to ’400.0000′ – you can tweak it this variable either for graphics or performance.

iWaterReflectHeight=512 / iWaterReflectWidth=512

It improves Water Reflection Resolution, which obviously will use your system resources. You can either keep it as it is, if you want to improve the performance or even lower it. Or change both to 1024 for eye candy.

bMouseAcceleration=1 If you want to disable mouse acceleration, you can change it to 0. You will need to increase the mouse sensitivity in-game when you disable the mouse acceleration.

uiMaxSkinnedTreesToRender=20 If you are experiencing low textures and other textures related graphics issues, you can tweak this variable to improve texture and skin rendering. You can set this value to 40 to start with. Or keep it as it is, if you are looking to squeeze performance.

 

I've been playing PC games for 25 years, and I can't ever remember a time when game development, or any other business, wasn't profit driven, so I don't understand your point.

 

I'm not saying businesses weren't always trying to make a profit, however, I'm saying that delivering quality was just as important, if not more important, than how much money they made.

If that's not true why were PC games ever made at all? I'm pretty sure there were more nintendo owners than pc owners in the late 80's/early 90's.

 

So really the only tweaks affecting shadow are 1) iBlurDeferredShadowMask, 2)treesreceive/landdrawshadows?

Somehow my default ini has iBlurDeferredShadowMask set at 5, does that mean it's turned off or very high by default>?

 

Sadly, that is the way it has gotten with almost everything. Money is the driving force behind almost any decision.

I'll agree that it would be nice to see PC games again, instead of console games ported to PC, but with the growing number of console gamers and shrinking number of PC gamers I don't expect it to change.

 

Console gamers might be increasing in numbers but most of that is just people who did not want to play video games before now starting to play. People who have been PC gamers know our advantage and there is zero reason to switch to consoles.

 

Have no idea. I tried googling for it and it seems like there are higher settings than up to 3, so I don`t think it is off.
I got that list from reddit thread, but there are more tweaks than the ones listed. From this video he also changed iShadowMaskQuarter=0.

I think you just need to test stuff out to find out.

<param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/wEKBVIL6IKs?version=3&amp;hl=nb_NO"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/wEKBVIL6IKs?version=3&amp;hl=nb_NO" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width='640' height="360" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object>

 

Eh I bumped both primary and secondary shadowmap resolutions to 4048 (ultra) and set shadow blurring to 5, and now shadows are perfect (shadow blurring below 5 is SHARPER but less realistic, in my opinion). Also it has a surprisingly low hit on my performance.

 

Love the snow bear

<param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/7ZIiDS_RYVY?version=3&amp;hl=en_US&amp;rel=0"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/7ZIiDS_RYVY?version=3&amp;hl=en_US&amp;rel=0" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width='640' height="360" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object>

 

I like how he managed to die.

 

I like how the game starts out making you feel like a god when you are around level 1-8 "Novice". Then when you hit 9-10 "Apprentice" level, everyone can own you hard old-school. I barely survived that one necromancer boss battle with what I got. Thank goodness I stockpile my potions!

 

Hm I'm level 11 and am having trouble getting into any sort of dangerous situation.

The second dragon I encountered did maybe 10% damage on my health before I took it down; snow troll did maybe 25% damage before I chugged a potion or two and took it down.

The only time I came close to death was when I ran into a snow sabertooth, while I was completely naked (heavy armor + running = stamina drain so I travel naked). Still managed to take it down.

A good trick that I've learned to automatically do during combat is continued side-strafing; I can avoid at least 1/2 of the damage output from an enemy this way.

 

Wait to you go to this one ruin filled with necromancers. They will kill you like that with Ice Shards. In fact, I might go and get that spell since it is that painful on me...

Also, did you fight a dragon near a town? If so the reason it was easy was that there was a lot of NPC's to distract it from attacking you directly. Try soloing one in the middle of nowhere. You won't make it.

 

No I fought one while I was climbing the 7000 steps. Is that dragon scripted to be weaker?

I just found a castle with some necromancers outside, haven't gone in yet but those necromancers are pesky, their magic did bare minimum damage to me though. Perhaps the "boss" necro inside will be tougher.

 

The dragons are cake. Go fight a giant or go fight Morokei. Actually Morokei might be easier because you probably don't have to worry too much about magicka drains, but for a character that relies on magic (like my battlemage that fights with lightning spells and Bound Sword) that whole dungeon sucks bad.

 

Being a Dark Brotherhood Assassin is awesome. One quest though, I found really creepy. The storyline for them is pretty good towards the end.

 

I think the scripted ones are easier, but the random ones are a pain in the behind. I think what made the necromancers so difficult was their Ice Spikes. I think I will have to counter them with bigger Wards and of course, Ice Spikes of my own!

Yeah mages are actually hard to play since you haven't buffed your skills in Stamina and Blocking. However, you need to always keep up the level of your spells and your Magicka in order to stay on top of stuff like Necros.

 

Hybrid is probably a little harder than it should be. I have no doubt that if I were focusing mainly on Sword and Board or magic I would be having a much easier go of it, but this is the way I like to play.

 

Apparently Dragons aren't that bad.

Giants and Woolly Mammoths will own you however.

Who knew fire breathing magical beasts were worse then mammoths?

I think the reason is Mammoths and Giants are unscaled, but dragons are scaled enemies.

 

Well I was in a field when I encountered one of their assassins. Tried to take me out, but he quickly fell to a few fireballs and from his cold dead hands I pried out a note ordering my assassination.

So I'll be taking them on later in the game...I hear there's a quest line to destroy the Brotherhood once and for all.

I've fought 4 dragons and only lost once (when I had almost no room to maneuver). The Mammoths are crazy tough...they're faster, tougher, and meaner than I am.

Giants are a funny story as they are just about a quick as an elf in light armor; if you let one chase you for a while you can get just enough ahead to take the time to shoot a spell or arrow. You don't want to be running around in unknown territory so let 'em chase you until you get near a town and then start running back and forth to stay in the area (circles are bad, they can catch up). 20 minutes later and I had my only giant-kill so far. I'm not going to attempt that again for a while...I got really lucky as three of them ambushed me yet only one gave chase.

 

Train a bunch of non-combat skills and it should get a lot harder. The game is pretty easy on adept though, going stealth kills pretty much anything in except in open combat.