Skyrim is a huge fantasy land in the nation of Tamriel, and the whole idea of Skyrim is to see how would you live your life in this place, as a legendary adventurer, in the dragons tongue, known as Dovakiin (Dragonborn! FUS RO DAH!) LOL. You have options ranging from joining an assassin's guild, becoming a Werewolf, disguising as a guard, becoming a serial killer, to much more that serve as positive role-models (Lol, actually, you can do some good things too, like rescue people and beat-up bad guys). For parents reading this review, Skyrim is OKAY to give to a teenage youth if they can separate fantasy from reality. This game may not be suitable for ages under 12 due to occasional swearing, violence, and ideas of fantasy life. For kids who imitate everything they see on a T.V. , you may want to wait until they mature a bit. But getting on, Skyrim is the best single-player game for anyone willing to waste a little time.
Gameplay (9.8): Skyrim's gameplay is none other than addicting and fun. You will spend hours immersing yourself in make-believe places that feel real to you when your character has developed a personality. Skyrim is a FPRPG, which is short for, First Person Role Playing Game. You see out of your character's eyes like in Halo, or Call of Duty, but you wield swords, axes, bows, maces, magical spells and etc. in your hands instead of some kinda tricked out boom-stick. Combat is the meat of the gameplay, where you clash swords, snipe with bows, and stun with spells. It's actually incredibly deep gameplay with the combat, where choosing to wield a shield could make a difference between life and death. You have many options to attack, you could akimbo-wield daggers and go in for a cinematic killing spree, you could decimate everything in your path with a warhammer, or you could have a spell in one hand with a shield in the other. Each setup provides with different moves. You have a shield? Well bam! You have yourself some extra armor, ability to block well, and a shield bash! Dual swords? You have an amazing array of power attacks and killer cinematic animations, but oh no! YOU CAN'T BLOCK! Skyrim's gameplay with combat is very strategic to say the least, and that's not even all of the game play there is! There's lockpicking, alchemy, archery, smithing, and much more that I don't have time to talk about. The only flaw is that once you chose a style of playing, there's really no going back and it's hard to switch later in the game. It needs to feels less stiff.
Graphics (9.1): Skyrim's graphics are pretty nice. The landscapes are divine and the draw distance is pretty far. Shading is nice and armor is well detailed. I kind of have a problem with it though. A lot of the characters (especially kids) look stock. They all look like the same body type with different clothes and hair. They really need to upgrade the amount of customization to face details on their own NPCs. Dragonborn looks good, but Braith and Lars look practically the same LOL.
Music (9.5): The trailer's music for "Song of The Dragonborn" was phenomenal. The rest of the music in the game was just pretty good. Nothing more to say about it except that it's mostly ambient. Not during combat though, it sounds like the "Duel of Fates" song from Star Wars III when you are kicking Bandit butt.
Controls (9.2): The game controls just as well as regular FPS games but maybe even more, like when you're riding on a horse and shooting a bow. I thought there would be limitations on that! Drawbacks are few though, since in 3rd person, it's a little hard to do combat. Also, it's kind of weird to use Y as jump. Speaking of which, jumping is a little clunky.
Fun(10): THIS IS THE FIRST TEN A GAME HAS RECEIVED! YAY! Skyrim is the ultimate drug for anyone's want to be immersed in a fantasy RPG. Even when you're done questing, you can go mammoth hunting, annoy towns people, or throw cabbages at horses! IT'S AWESOME! There's nothing like that feeling of taking out a whole encampment of Stormcloak soldiers without being detected!
Result... 9.5/10 (A)
Skyrim gets a solid A. It's addictive, immersing, fun, and intense. Perfect for a casual gamer on the verge of being a hardcore one. But it's hard to be satisfied after you're done playing Skyrim for the day, there's always one more camp of bandits to take out with a... FUS RO DAH!
This is Jeff for 1-Up Games.com! CYA!
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