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Elder Scrolls Online’s new Gold Road expansion might just make me an MMO convertAfter a brief muck about in its mad jungles and autumnal estates, I’m ready to go whole hog
After a brief muck about in its mad jungles and autumnal estates, I’m ready to go whole hog
Image credit:Zenimax Online Studios
Image credit:Zenimax Online Studios
Yesterday, if you can believe it, marked the tenth anniversary ofThe Elder Scrolls Online. That’s a whole decade of tromping across Tamriel with your mates, and a whole decade in which I’ve watched tentatively from the sidelines, thinking about dipping my toes into theMMOpool, but never quite building up the courage (or lining the walls of my bank account) to fully take the plunge. I’ve heard all thehorror storiesabout starting a new MMO from other members of the RPS Treehouse - particularly when it comes to thelore-laden shackles of World Of Warcraftand thebloated MMO-service-hybrid Destiny- and quite honestly, it’s enough to put me off them all entirely. But The Elder Scrolls Online might just be the exception to the rule.
The Elder Scrolls Online Gold Road – Cinematic Announcement TrailerWatch on YouTube
The Elder Scrolls Online Gold Road – Cinematic Announcement Trailer
Still, the Necrom preamble aside, Gold Road makes a very amenable first impression. Developers Zenimax Online Studios definitely haven’t mucked about with the titular colour palette here, as on the ascent up from the portal, you’re greeted with an almost perpetual sunset falling over fields of rich vineyards (with nary asingle low-poly grape in sight- don’t worry, I checked), colourful autumnal trees and large, stately manor houses. It’s a place that screams, ‘Yes, nothing bad could possibly happen here, no sirree.’ That is, until a woman gets spat out of another portal in front of you that’s lined with black, oozing tentacles and oval-goat-like green eyes bubbling around its edges. Her name is Valaria Calidius, and she’s here to tell you about the Lucent Citadel, the game’s latest 12-player trial activity. She makes it sound all very urgent and important, but given the limited time I have, I bid her and her no-thank-you-eyeball-portal good day and about face. I want to get as far away from those tentacles as possible, and as I quickly scan my navigation bar in search of an emergency waypoint, it turns out I missed another important quest giver back down the hill.
Image credit:Zenimax Online Studios
In case you weren’t sure of the exact chapter title, the colour palette says it all. |Image credit:Zenimax Online Studios
First, though, some fingers are being pointed at me, which means it’s fight time. ESO’s combat still has thatSkyrimweightlessness that makes each sword strike feel like the waft of a feather when you’re right up in the thick of it, and most of my encounters descended into a maddened frenzy of simple mouse-mashing. Class specific skills earned through levelling can be mapped to 1-5 on your keyboard to spice things up a notch, as well as an Ultimate set to R - though thanks to my preview character’s exceedingly generous stat base, this too felt like I could simply rinse-and-repeat them all in order without really eating into my magic or stamina bars. Still, while I wouldn’t say there’s a lot of skill involved in any given combat encounter, I do like how active they are, as I was always circling my opponent to stay out of harm’s way, dodging area-of-effect attacks laid out in red zones on the floor, dashing out of the way of charges, blocking big swings, and occasionally hammering both mouse buttons together to interrupt their next attack. Yes, it’s all a bit mindless, but certainly a touch more engaging than what I remember aboutthe fisticuffs I had in Skyrim.
The forest jungles of Ostumir really draw the eye in all directions. |Image credit:Zenimax Online Studios
Razg is an NPC painter you might meet on the road to Ostumir - he’s a good lad, musing that he really wants to lean at the same angle as the house to capture its proper essence, but that might also make painting rather difficult. |Image credit:Zenimax Online Studios
Besides, with Gold Road’s new Scribing system in tow as well, this promises to let you customise your character’s skills even further, giving them additional abilities, buffs and debuff effects, and even altering their appearance for that extra personal touch. Again, as a new player, I’ll admit that the precise ins and outs that scribing can have on the game’s combat was somewhat lost on me. But I do like the idea of being able to tweak your build even further toward your own particular playstyle, and I look forward to tinkering about with them more in the future. I just hope the consumable Ink resources you’ll need to scribe them in the first place - along with the grimoires and scripts to make them and add specific effects - won’t be too burdensome to find, earn or collect.
To partake in scribing, you’ll need to find special scribing altars to work your magic. |Image credit:Zenimax Online Studios
But even if I was playing alone, I can also see ESO being a good podcast game, or something to unwind with. Combat isn’t so difficult as to require a huge amount of concentration, for example, and the dripfeed rhythm of its ‘one more thing’ story beats were enough to keep me firmly in its grip as I ploughed forward - so much so that when my demo handler told me it was time to stop, I felt genuinely bereft that I wasn’t going to be able to see the quest through to its conclusion. That, and also mildly relieved that my impromptu co-op partner hadn’t just stopped following me out of boredom or disdain over my fire-staff-wielding abilities a moment ago, but that they, too, had probably been booted from their demo PC.
My time with Gold Road was brief, but it’s a place I’m eager to return to, especially when I now know I won’t have to grind through umpteen other expansions first (looking at you, Final Fantasy 14) before I can even get my toes wet. It’s quite a tall order, starting a new MMO in the year of our Horace, 2024, let alone one that’s been going for ten years already. But The Elder Scrolls Online feels like the one that’s arguably the most beginner-friendly, both in how it lets you pick and choose from its bevy of Chapter expansions in whatever order you like, and the fact that you don’t need to pay a subscription, have hit a certain level cap, or have a ready-made band of friends with you to tackle its main story quests. Instead, each Chapter is a one-off, upfront cost, and you can tackle as few or as many as you like to get your fill.
