October 11 2009
The Elder Scrolls speculations, TES novel, Tamriel Chronicles, and more - discuss on the forums
The site did not have any news or updates for quite a long time now. I am busy with a large gaming project,
Discovery mod for Freelancer, and no particularly important news came from Bethesda these days. However, I did finally complete the main quest of Oblivion earlier this year, and after that... well, you can guess, got back to playing Morrowind. The 7-year-old game still looks more immersive and visually appealing (with FPS Optimizer turned on), although I won't deny beauties of Oblivion architecture that I finally had a chance to see in full detail.
Despite the lack of any confirmed news on the next Elder Scrolls game, multiple interviews and blog posts of Bethesda employees had raised a vast number of rumors and speculations. Some of the more exciting and trustworthy are the rumors on an Elder Scrolls online game being produced by ZeniMax Online Studio headed by Matt Firor, who worked in the multiplayer gaming space since 1987 and was a producer in Mythic Entertainment all the way since the company's foundation in 1995. He produced most of the Mythic's titles developed during this time, including a successful MMORPG Dark Ages of Camelot which is still live after 8 years since its release. In 2007, he was hired to head ZeniMax Online and is currently working on an unannounced project. Additionally, the domain name ElderScrollsOnline.com was purchased by ZeniMax according to sources like
endsights.com and UESP.net, although the
whois information on the domain now has enabled privacy and does not list any information on the actual owner, and the
list of domains that use ns1.zenimax.com as a nameserver lacks any names related to TES online games as well. The company took care to remove all what should be hidden from our curious eyes, which is possibly better for us gamers: official announcements are far more trustworthy than vague rumors.
In any case, simple role-playing mechanics, vast worlds, extensive lore, and incredible attention to detail all make The Elder Scrolls a perfect foundation for a massive multiplayer game.
Existence of the next Elder Scrolls single-player game was put in doubt after the recent Todd Howard interview report by bigdownload.com, yet the news that another game of the series is not being developed was later disapproved by Pete Hines in a
bethblog.com post. The post also noted that Todd Howard's team is not making any online games, however, reminded once again about ZeniMax Online and its currently unannounced project. Those few points of reliable information on where the next single-player TES game could be located is collected on
this page of UESP.net. Earlier this year, Bethesda publishing executive Paul Oughton
told gameindustry.biz that the next Elder Scrolls game is going to follow in 2010, without specifying any further details.
Apart from rumors, there are some confirmed developments related to TES universe: the first Elder Scrolls novel, The Infernal City by Greg Keyes, will be released by Del Rey Publishing on November 24, confirmed by
this press release from Bethesda and
Amazon.com listing. Four decades after the Oblivion Crisis, Tamriel is threatened anew by an ancient and all-consuming evil. It is Umbriel, a floating city that casts a terrifying shadow-for wherever it falls, people die and rise again. The author had previously worked on a number of novelizations, including Babylon 5 (the Psi Corps Trilogy), and Star Wars (the New Jedi Order), plus several non-franchise series. The book is available for pre-order, and the cover image for the book is already available on the net.
On July 9, Bethesda announced that it is now giving away The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall for free to celebrate the 15th anniversary of Elder Scrolls franchise (much like it was done for TES: Arena 5 years ago). To run the game, you need DOS emulator like DOSBox that Bethesda recommends; you can download both games on Bethesda's download page, with installation instructions available next to it. One more guide is available at
UESP.net.
Meanwhile, the highly successful Fallout 3 RPG game had a number of downloadable content packs released by Bethesda this year, named Operation: Anchorage, The Pitt, Broken Steel, Point Lookout, and Mothership Zeta. The Mothership, released on August 3, is the fifth and final content pack. All five are distinctly different from Oblivion content packs, being much larger than the latter, and were reviewed as actual game addons.
Last thing to mention: as you probably already noticed, the site is undergoing some changes as well. The focus on Oblivion proved to be quite a lackluster one. A website solely maintained by one person can hardly prosper when the person is not particularly interested in the subject. Ironically, the site had experienced its busiest times prior to Oblivion release and shortly afterwards, and the huge traffic increase even resulted in some financial difficulties for me before a new host was found. Luckily, hosting gets cheaper as years go by, and now the site could certainly handle far more traffic than it acquires.
Hereby I rename the site to Tamriel Chronicles, replacing Cyrodiil Chronicles. The site now has a new tamrielchronicles.com domain name. The old domain still works just as it did before, and I won't give it up cause it grew to be somewhat familiar with our visitors. The wait continues, and I will post occasional news on Bethesda and Elder Scrolls once they appear. Hopefully, the next game (or games?) will take place somewhere in Tamriel, and there won't be a need to rename the Chronicles again.
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