TES V: Skyrim Discussion Thread

My setup:

(wallmounted L speaker)________________(wallmounted R speaker)
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____(laptop)__________(23'' 1080p monitor)
____________(mouse)
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_______________________(subwoofer)

Works great!

 

Is it just me or are the *recommended* system requirements a bit, hardcore?

Windows 7/Vista/XP PC (32 or 64 bit)
Processor: Quad-core Intel or AMD CPU
4GB System RAM
6GB free HDD space
DirectX 9 compatible NVIDIA or AMD ATI video card with 1GB of RAM (Nvidia GeForce GTX 260 or higher; ATI Radeon 4890 or higher).
DirectX compatible sound card
Internet access for Steam activation

You need a Quad core and you need a GTX 260 and above. A GTX 260 is a bit faster than Mobility 5870, which is in the same league as GTX 560M. Which means that for recommended gameplay (whatever that is) you will need either one of these GPUs: GTX 570M, GTX 580M, HD 6970M, HD 6990M.

 

They are either exaggerating or the Creation engine is THE MOST UNOPTIMIZED ENGINE IN THE HISTORY OF GAMING. Most people predict it will be a little more demanding than Gamebryo engine i.e. Fallout 3/NV.

 

I hope they are exaggerating a bit on the side of caution and Witcher 2 was exaggerating on the side of throwing caution to the wind. At any rate the "Minimum" specs for running Skyrim are any DX9 graphics card with 512MB VRAM. This is lower than Witcher 2's minimum specs, suggesting any laptop with a DX9 card and 512MB video memory can run Skyrim on low settings at 1920x1080.

I can run most 2010-2011 games on my laptop at 1920x1080 with no problem, usually with most settings maxed.

For example, with Fallout New Vegas, with anti-aliasing and water refracting/resampling dialed down, but most other settings maxed, including 16x AF, I'm averaging over 50 fps.

However, Witcher 2 runs like a slideshow with fps occasionally dipping below 20, even with all graphics options at the lowest possible setting. The game controls feel extremely unresponsive.

 

Well a few posts earlier, moviemarketing quoted Bethesda where they said the reason for smaller HDD requirements was because of much greater compression. Guess that is some of the reasons why a Quad core is needed

If it falls in the same cathegory as Witcher 2 (maybe slightly higher graphics requirements), there is no wonder why you need so good GPUs. That game chockes almost everything you have in a notebook.
But I hear ya, sick requirements. I thought it was only slightly more demanding than Oblivion.

Time to buy a new laptop

 

It's definitely MUCH MUCH lower req than Witcher 2, simply on this basis:

The minimum GPU req for Skyrim is ANY dx9 512mb card, meaning very very low end discrete GPUs with 512mb will do ok.

Meanwhile the min GPU req for W2 is GeForce 8800!!!! 8800 is top of the line in dx9 512mb cards.

The difference is gargantuan.

Translating this to recommended req and I think cards like 5650 / GT425 will do fine with Skyrim.

 

It depends. If you go after the recommended, which is probably 1080p with somewhat high resolution, then those GPUs will suffer real hard.
Minimum is probably like 900p with low details, and if it is like anything like BF3 and the comparison pics of low and high, then you wouldn`t want to play low. It would be a real shame to play such a fantastic game as Elder scrolls with low on 900p

 

According to Bethesda, the Minimum Specs were tested for "Low" settings at 1920x1080 and the Recommended Specs were tested for "High" settings at 1920x1080 resolution.

 

Source? If that is so, I think Skyrim will run fine (provided it doesn't release with game-breaking bugs, which is a huge risk esp with Bethesda).

 

OK, then I wasn`t too far away and I was only guessing. Hell no if I`m going to play it at low.

I think I will wait few weeks before buying it just to let everyone calm down and bethesda release patches to fix bugs etc. Gonna be hard though

 

what i dont get with these manufactures is they put 512 megs of video ram but dont say anything about the cards actual speed... i mean there are some lower end GPUs with 512mb that are actually slower then intel's integrated graphics.

 

Problem is it is hard to quantify a GPU's power without resorting to some third-party test i.e. 3DMark, and most people are not computer-savvy enough to even bother knowing about that.

 

Sure, but most laptops don't have enough power to let you really max out a full HD screen. And the ones that do are barely more portable than a small desktop.

Where are you guys bringing your laptops to, anyway? I only picked up my Clevo because I was moving between houses a lot for a period of about a year or so. Now that I've more or less settled into a permanent location, it seems to make much more sense to just use a desktop for all my gaming.

 

I'm bringing it to my living room so I can connect it to my HD projector via HDMI cable.

Also, I use it to work in the office, on the balcony, when traveling, etc. My "gaming" laptop is my general purpose work tool.

 

While travelling? That has to be a pain. My Clevo weighs about 3.3 kg all in, and it got to be a real pain carrying all that plus the brick-sized charger everywhere I went. And I'm normal-sized, too, as opposed to being a regular tiny Asian person.

 

In my case, the envy 15 is quite portable - only 1.04" thick and weighs around 5lbs, or 2.25 kg (thinner and lighter than the envy 14) .

I replaced the HP power brick with this slim travel charger: Amazon.com: Cooler Master USNA 95 Ultra Slim 95W Universal Notebook Adapter with USB 2.0 (RP095-USNAA1-US): Electronics

there are lots of relatively portable laptops on the market these days with graphics cards capable of handling most recent games at 1920x1080. Pretty much anything with NVIDIA 460m, 555m, 560m , AMD 5830m, 5850m, 6750m, 6770m, or better.

 

This is silly...
15" laptops with 570m/6970m or 580m/6990m are around 7-8lbs
17" laptops with 570m/6970m or 580m/6990m are around 8-9lbs

While I'd certainly admit those are heavier than the ultra-portables, its not by much. 5lbs difference is within most people's "won't even notice" ranges on their shoulder and even in the hand isn't that noticeable.

Anything under 10lbs is plenty portable assuming you are a healthy adult.

Frankly, I think this is another case of someone losing sight of what weight really means. I sincerely doubt if I handed you 10lbs (roughly a 12-pack) of your favorite beverage, you'd say it was too heavy or not portable.

The tradeoff for portability is a little potency now, and a decent price hike.

As for Skyrim... a reminder that this is an Xbox title first and a PC title second (even though they are being released simultaneously).

Odds are the PC version will still be limited by their primary development (xbox) and the title will run on anything recent at 720p.

 

Some people act like 7 pounds is BACKBREAKING WEIGHT.

 

I really hope this is a long, awesome game. I hope it's not like the recent RPG games I've tried, 5-7 hours of game. And then claiming 40-50 hours of gameplay with 35+ hours of side quests...

And from reading about Oblivion, I suspect Skyrim may be like that. I hope it isn't though. Side quests give more gameplay I admit, but I also find them boring.

I hope for more balance on Skyrim. 25 hours of game, and 20 hours of side quests.

 

I'm afraid your fear may very well be true about Skyrim. They specifically make games like this to be less RPG-like (with a movie-like main storyline and some obscure side-quests), and instead make it so that it's more of an adventure sandbox do-whatever-you-want game WITH quests IF you want to do quests. It's what made previous TES games so special and unique.

 

I have played Oblivion for a few years, with each playthough lasting hundreds of hours and barely even touched the main quest. (Hoping to complete it before Nov 11)

The concept of Bethesda's open world RPGs is that you can do your own thing and completely forget about the main quest if you feel so inclined.

If you want to do only the main quest, Skyrim's main quest is reportedly longer than the main quest in Oblivion and Morrowind.

In the case of Skyrim, I will probably only complete the main quest when I'm ready to stop playing the game, in other words, after playing a few different characters for hundreds of hours. Unless the main quest has some interesting branching paths in the vein of Fallout New Vegas.

 

I understand that concept of sandbox and having lots of sidequests to immerse a player into the world.

I just hope they provide also 25 hours of the main quest line, a really enthralling, captivating story as well. I'm just hoping for balance.

I consider BioWare games about 1 hour of gameplay, and 49 hours of sidequests.

Witcher 2 was great, with 25 hours of solid gameplay, but not enough side quests to really immerse you in the game, with that sandbox, open world feel. I felt every quest in Witcher 2 contribute to the overall main quest line, so not quite a side quest.

See what I'm getting at? Just looking for a blend of both is what I'm hoping for.

 

All my experience points at the Main quests of elder scrolls games being quite long. Morrowind's was so long I never even got close to finishing it. Oblivion's was also long, but I got so distracted by other quests I never finished it either... Maybe if you powered straight through the main quests they wouldnt seem like much, but I dont think many people play Elder Scrolls games that way.

You're also writing off "side quests" too easily. Each major guild or group will have a string of quests building off each other that im sure will please. Lots of engrossing story without ever necessarily having to touch the main quest at all. This isnt WoW with "find 10 shanks of boar meet, then high five me for a prize".

 

But the sidequests have interesting stories too. The Warriors' Guild quests in Oblivion involve taking down a rival mercenary guild that's using chemicals to make their members superhuman. The Mages' Guild quests involve rooting out necromancers that have infiltrated the Guild and eventually becoming Archmage. The sidequests aren't like The Witcher/Witcher 2 where you kill 3 kikimores and get 600 orens or plow an elf chick (the Witcher series is awesome, it's just fundamentally different).

 

Can anyone tell me if my laptop will be able to play this game and on what settings? Thanks!!!

CPU: Intel i3-2310M
VGA: NVIDIA GT 540M
RAM: 4GB

 

low settings i would of thought.

 

I think you should be fine with medium settings.

 

We don't even know what kind of settings it will have.

 

I think we know enough.

It's probably Gamebryo with some updates on the AI and something for large textures. About it.

It uses no DX11 features worth mentioning other than for some performance gains for those with DX11 hardware. For all others, it's a standard DX9 game.

This is a fully cross-platform game. It has flat textures... really has nothing to make a GPU work hard. Sure it may have some blur, some DOF, or some bloom, but all that can be turned off as it doesn't actually add anything to the visuals other than making it seem you are looking through a terrible terrible camera.

 

It's still ridiculous to say it will run at low/medium/high when you have absolutely no real idea what those settings will be.

 

I would speculate, based on what Bethesda has said, based on ALL the games Bethesda has released and published in the last few years, and based on the screenshots and all the videos they have released.

I would GUESS, deducing from the evidence above, you would be fine with a mix of low and medium settings with post processing on low.

If that fails above, just play it on a console. All the interface, and controls etc are optimized for consoles anyway. Based on the video I saw, of switching gear, switching skills etc, it's EXTREMELY consolized. Wouldn't even surprise me if Bethesda recommends the use of a controller on the PC version as well.

 

I'd use an XBOX 360 controller for this game *nods*

I use it for all the games I have, except for FPS'es. But I don't play FPS very often

Mr. Mysterious

 

Medium with a few on high.

Skyrim is nowhere near the level of graphics of the original Crysis, but since it is much newer, it is also more optimized. Your laptop could run Crysis on all medium + a few options on high; which means at the very least you can run Skyrim on that as well.

 

We would need to know your display resolution. Makes a huge difference.

In other Skyrim news today, Pete Hines confirmed that the PC version will unlock on Steam at 12am EST / 9pm PST.

http://twitter.com/#!/DCDeacon/status/130092793396858880

So PC gamers on the west coast will be able to play starting at 9pm on November 10.

 

1366x768

Thanks to everyone whose provided their insight! I'm thinking of just going ps3 on it since there seems to be a mixed idea on how it will perform on my machine. These games themselves take me a looooong time so I won't need any mods to expand it for a while. I plan on buying a new gaming desktop next year, so I can consider picking up the PC version then.

 

According to Bethesda, with a quad core CPU and GTX 260 equivalent laptop card (460m/560m), you can play on High settings at 1920x1080.

You should probably be able to play on Medium at 1366x768 with the 540m and SB dual core i3. There are lots more settings you can tweak on PC. Some have a big impact on frame rate, such as anti aliasing and others have minimal impact, such as AF, but result in great visual improvement.

Playing on PS3 will be worse IMO. It will be equivalent to playing on the lowest possible settings (perhaps 2xAA or no AA, no AF, low res textures, low graphics settings) at 1280x720 resolution.

http://forums.bethsoft.com/index.ph...-my-pc-run-skyrim-thread-45-w-hardware-guide/

It has been confirmed by Bethesda staff that the "Minimum" and "Recommended" specs correspond to "Low" and "High" settings at 1920x1080 resolution

 

Skyrim - first 25 mins leaked gameplay footage:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xm1bwa_skyrim-first-25min-part-1_videogames

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xm1cv1_skyrim-first-25min-part-2_videogames

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SKYRIM First 25Min Part 1


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SKYRIM First 25Min Part 2

 

NOPE. Not gonna watch it and ruin my experience playing the game 2 weeks from now (especially as these vids are low quality console capture videos with crappy graphics).

 

Thanks, my idea was to buy at launch and play through PS3 and then next year or so get GOTY edition for PC and delve into mods, etc. Is it believed that the PS3 version will be that much inferior? The graphics and mods are cool but not the highest priority. And I would be playing at 1366x768 on a 14" laptop compared with a big flat screen. I know I can hook my laptop up to the TV, but would that have an effect on the graphics output?

 

If your TV supports 1920x1080 display, it will probably support a 1366x768 display. According to Bethesda, your laptop should be able to handle "lowest" settings for 1920x1080 but I'm somewhat skeptical about this. Bethesda has indicated in order to run the game on "Low" at 1920x1080, all you need is the following:

Windows 7/Vista/XP PC (32 or 64 bit)
Processor: Dual Core 2.0GHz or equivalent processor
2GB System RAM
6GB free HDD Space
Direct X 9.0c compliant video card with 512 MB of RAM
DirectX compatible sound card
Internet access for Steam activation



You could also probably to tweak some settings and get a decent frame rate at 1600x900. And if your TV does not support 1080p or 900p, you can use 1280x720 on your laptop, which is the same resolution as your PS3.

 

Skyrim Making Of Trailer

 

Like someone else posted here, I won't be watching any videos. I've seen a few screenshots, maybe a snippet of the UI.

But I won't watch anything for Skyrim or Batman AC just because I want it so when I see it in game, it's the first time I've seen it. Means I haven't watched any trailers and won't be watching any advertisements for them

Personally I think Rage marketing was great. It was hush hush all the way until the day 1 release. And the game was great for it and I think it got great reviews because of it despite the technical issues. People were amazed when they saw it for the first time. If you see something well in advance over and over, your amazement isn't the same.

 

Some screens from the Making Of Trailer:

 

Really? Rage got mediocre reviews everywhere I looked (not the paid reviews e.g. IGN mind you); lots of people hate it for its linearity. The only innovation is at animations, graphics are horrible closeup.

 

I heard the combat AI was incredibly fluid and fast. That seems like innovation to me, but maybe I dont play enough shooters.

 

I really don't care for rage...tbh games like rage don't stand a chance against modern FPS games like COD and BF. HOWEVER, it sure was a beautiful game

So next friday boils and ghouls - anyone else super excited? I know I am, I'm taking off work to play it lol

 

Wow, it's already next Friday!

That doesn't seem so far away.

 

Ha! No it really doesn't, especially for me knowing that next week is a 4 day work week for me

 

It's bloody exciting, is what it is. Come Friday at noon, I'm going to be severing my connections with the world for a week or two.

 

Modern FPS games are snore... BORING.

I wasn't really into Skyrim. But I've played Witcher 2.5 times. Trying to do a 2nd play through of DA2, already played DA:O and all of it's DLCs... I'm itching for another RPG, so as time gets closer, getting more excited.