I’ve been playing Elder Scrolls Online on Xbox One for weeks now and have delved deeper into the game. The title offers a lot of content and there are a multitude of missions and options I love. However, there are also some flaws that have become apparent after spending so much time with it. I break down what I love and hate about ESO. The points also include tips on how to get involved with other players in the game.
Love:
1) Delves and Dungeons: Now I don’t know about anyone else, but who doesn’t love dungeon crawling? Each area in ESO has a selection of dungeons and at least six delves (smaller, open to all) in which the prospect of treasure and a boss fight is always imminent. Each delve contains a sky shard so make sure you pick them up for them extra skill points to pad out them passives.
2) Character Diversity: You know how in most MMOs or even RPGs for that matter you choose your class and that’s that? Normally if you choose the dragon knight type character you’d only ever be the tank, however this is not the case in ESO. The skill lines are open and the sky’s the limit. If you want to add some restoration or destruction staff skills then you can.
3) Cyrodiil: Cyrodiil is ESO’s answer to PvP and it’s simply marvellous. I wouldn’t advise going solo though. Group up with your friends and guild and grab yourself a trebuchet and you’ll be good to go. You also have a choice of a home and guest campaign so make an early choice on where you and your friends want to make their mark. I personally chose Chillrend and Azura’s star as they both offer different challenges.
4) Guilds: If you’re not in a guild and having a laugh while taking down Molag Bal, then you’re doing it wrong. Playing a game with others is always far more fun than playing alone…at least for these types of games. There are a plethora of guilds to invest in be it a trading, casual or a hardcore PvP guild there’ll be the one or five for you. That being said, if you are looking for a guild on the European server, send me a message or leave a comment for an invite. The more the merrier.
5) Crafting Awesome Gear: Find yourself a craft or two. Find a craft that compliment’s your class or what you consume such as provisions and alchemy. This ultimately reduces costs and crafts such as blacksmithing means you can kit yourself and your guild out in the best gear. Keep an eye out for those racial motifs and you’ll also be able to craft in other styles too!
What I Hate:
1) The story isn’t engaging enough. Now call me spoiled but after sinking a couple of hundred hours into The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt I feel that it’s fairly bare bones in comparison. You may be thinking…hang on a second…ESO has loads of lore and yes that’s true however, every “decision” you make doesn’t feel like a big deal. Whether someone lives or dies has no obvious impact from what I’ve seen.
2) Overwhelming for Newcomers: In my experience, the beginning of your journey doesn’t do much to engage you in what ESO truly has to offer. The first island after Cold Harbour should offer teases or tastes of delves and dungeons to come and should coax you towards them. Many friends of mine believed you had to get to a certain level before dungeoneering because the game doesn’t do a great job of showing what’s available…at least at the start.
3) Area Chat: Area chat, for all the laughs it can provide, is just unwanted noise over someone’s Kinect or mic. I’ve lost count on how many times I find myself leaving area chat because of one reason or another. It’s a shame as this often means I wont hear the people who are generally looking for help.
4) The Bank and Guild Banking: Something that is a genuine annoyance is the way items don’t automatically stack. Now this is fine at the start, but when you have 70+ guild members depositing into the bank suddenly 500 slots fill up. The lack of auto stack then requires you to have to individually withdraw from the guild bank deposit in your own and then withdraw for them to stack. This is just too lengthy and becomes a minor annoyance, as who wants to be stacking when you could be questing?
5) Buggy Main Quests: For anyone who has tried “saving the silvenar” you’ll empathize with me. Unfortunately some main quests bug out when too many people are in the specific area stopping respawning of enemies which can get tedious. I’ve found the only way around this is just to go when its quiet which is often late at night.
Now I’ve given you a run down of my experience and if, like me, despite those minor annoyances you’ve still sunk way too much time into this, let me know what you love and hate so far in the comments below.
^Jack, @Jack_XboxMAD
Jack contributed 16 articles to ICXM between 2014–2015, covering game reviews, and Xbox news with a focus on hands-on impressions and verified-source reporting. Their bylines on the site span the Xbox One’s first full year of post-launch coverage, including the early days of Backwards Compatibility and Windows 10 gaming. They post on X as @Jack_XboxMAD.