Quests will see you crossing fields and fjords, plumbing the depths of cave networks and dwarven ruins, and scaling ancient Nordic fortresses built into snow-capped mountains. Multiple cities over seeing specific areas - Winterhold in the North, Falkreath in the South, Riften in the East and Markarth in the West, and more - each conveying the cultural particularities of the slice of Skyrim they occupy, made the game’s setting feel like a fully-fledged fantasy nation rather than just a map to explore.Īnd while the main storyline wasn't the most dynamic, the myriad of side quests - from full-fat secondary stories of the Thieves' Guild, Dark Brotherhood and The Companions, to simple tasks - gave the expanse of Skyrim real character and depth. While the Witcher 3 felt like you were dropped in a county, Skyrim conveyed the feeling of moving across an entire country on a large continent. But there really aren't many games, at least outside of developer Bethesda’s library, that give you the feeling of being in a whole country to explore. Sure, The Witcher 3 offers a more compelling story to frame its open-world, Red Dead Redemption 2 provides smarter systems and more dynamic environments, and Breath of the Wild makes traversing its ruined landscape an utter joy.

But while I bemoan the delay of PS5 exclusives, seeing Digital Dreams’ video serves as a reminder that there's so much that I could still wring out of Skyrim.īut it also gave me a dose of nostalgia and reminded me of just how good Skyrim really was.

While I like to play games as the developers intended, having ploughed hundreds of hours into Skyrim I’ve got to the point where there’s not much else to explore. Then I started to dig further, tweaking map markers, audio, and adding extra content into the game. But as I polished off the main campaign and the multitude of major side quests, I started to look at ways to tweak some of the annoyances out of Skyrim, and mod support was the answer.Īfter hearing various guards tell me for the hundredth time tell me “I used to be an adventurer like you, until I took an arrow to the knee,” I found a mod that got rid of the repetitive voice lines. I’ve not flirted too heavily with mods myself, simply opting for the official high-res textures for my first major playthrough of Skyrim.

Skyrim mods for switch