The mighty RPG that released many years ago on Xbox 360, Elder Scrolls took itself to the internet not long ago, expanding ever more in to the universe.

Elder Scrolls Online is a huge game where next to nothing is linear and is so massive you can play within the world of Elder Scrolls Online (ESO) for a millennia and still not see it all.

It is also expanding and now a new DLC has been released, High Isle.

If you’ve not played ESO before it starts out as most RPG’s do.

Choose a race, create and fully customise a character. Select a class and then get to grips with the gameplay, picking up items, using and equipping from your Inventory and before you know it, you’ll be wearing your big boy (or girl) armour and out there in the wilds of Elder Scrolls taking on larger than life foes.

Missions and directives are generally picked up via talking with NPC’s or you can take on missions that the game offers up, or simply kick back and explore to your hearts content.

High Isle is, as mentioned, a further expansion to the already endless world of ESO.

Furthering on from Tamriel, High Isle is infact not just one, but two islands for you to make your way too and envelop yourself in to a new narrative.

The islands of Amenos and High Isle are within the Systres archipelago, west of Tamriel.

There has been three warring alliances that have secretly been in talks for peace. But it is not meant to be when the Ascendant Order intervenes and creates havoc.

You’ll need to assist the alliances at restoring some sort of peace by ridding the islands of the Order.

In the High Isle expansion there’s a lot to do and a lot to be done. The islands a re massive and full of treasure and secrets and of course a truck load of side missions.

Along with the two new islands, Bethesda also added a card mini-game called Tales of Tribute and a new trial Dreadsail Reef and of course new characters.

Whether you’re a lone wolf or want to pair up online there’s more than enough to get through with the High Isle expansion, it’s pretty much a full sized game within itself.

If you’ve been within the world of ESO for a while now, High Isle is a mega sized new series of maps that need plundering.

If you haven’t stepped foot in to ESO yet, I fully recommend you do and work your way to the islands. There’s so much to be found, looted and killed.

The post Elder Scrolls Online: High Isle (Xbox Series X) Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

This year’s expansion for The Elder Scrolls Online has launched. The Elder Scrolls Online: Blackwood kicks off the year-long Gates of Oblivion storyline.

Players can explore not only the new region of Blackwood but also have the opportunity to return to the Daedric realm of Oblivion from The Elder Scrolls IV.

The Mehrunes Dagon Premium Bundle is only available from the Bethesda store and is likely to be in short supply, especially in this part of the world. Bethesda ANZ knowing that I’m a collector of these sort of thing send one over for me to look at with a few other goodies.

First Launched in 2014 The Elder Scrolls Online has gone from strength-to-strength positioning itself as the essential free-to-play massively multiplayer game. After purchasing the game, the persistent world is free to explore without a monthly subscription. New DLC content is dropped throughout which needs to be purchased separately, the same with the yearly major expansions. ESO Plus subscribers get all this content fee, plus a little bit more as part of their monthly subscription.

ESO is packed with things to do and quests to complete. The massive world invited exploration. Over the years, the game engine has been improved and upgraded keeping the game looking fresh and new.

The Blackwood expansion adds another huge area to the game as well as the realm of Oblivion. One of the benefits of ESO is that it can be played relatively easily solo. Blackwood gives solo players a boost with the ability to take an AI companion with them on their journey. The Blackwood Expansion can be purchased as an upgrade or in a bundle along with the contact from the base game plus the five expansions.

Sadly, Blackwood bucks a trend that started with the very first release of ESO. This year the game does not have a collector’s edition. Whilst it’s fair to say that the contents of the collectors’ editions have varied in quality, each has contained a nice-looking statue relating to the instalment.

I’ve been collecting The Elder Scroll’s Collectors Editions since Oblivion (I missed out on the Morrowind CE). But it was with Skyrim and its bold statue of the dragon Alduin, the World Eater, that Bethesda went all out. As well as statues the ESO collector’s editions have included books, coins, and maps associated with the new content.

Whilst there’s no collector’s edition game bundle, Blackwood does have a collector’s edition of sorts in the Mehrunes Dagon Premium Bundle.

The package contains a statue of the Daedric prince, Mehrunes Dagon, a replica Ambitions token, and a lithograph.

The first, and very exciting thing that I noticed about the package was the weight. On opening, my suspicions were confirmed. Unlike all the other Elder Scrolls statues, not only was Mehrunes Dagon realistically painted but it was also made from weighty polystone and not plastic. The statue is the smallest one that Bethesda has produced for The Elder Scrolls Online, but it’s also the most detailed.

The contents were well packaged, encapsulated in a molded Styrofoam case with the exposed hands of the statue having an extra bit of protection. The coin was in a protective plastic bag and the lithograph rolled up in another bag, more on this later.

The statue comes in three parts, the main figure perched between two rock outcrops, a plastic axe, and a plastic axe pommel. The axe handle slides into one of Prince Dagon’s four hands with the pommel sliding on the end. The tiny pommel is a bit loose and could probably do with a bit of glue to better keep it in place.

The statue has a lot of detail, a stark contrast to the muted features of the last Collector’s Edition figure, that of the Greymore Vampire Lord. As I mentioned, the figure is polystone, but Dogon’s chainmail skirt seems to be hard plastic, and likely easily broken.

The figure looks hand-painted as a true-to-life representation of the Daedric Prince rather than a statue of the character, as with the previous collector’s pieces. Dogon’s red body has muscles and features lightly dry-brushed with black to make them stand out. His chainmail skirt is also meticulously detailed to give it a fatigued metallic look.

By and large, the paint job is pretty good. No effort, however, has been made to paint the eyes or teeth, which are red the same as the head and body. It’s a pretty minor complaint, though.

The bottom of the figure has rubber feet to stop it from scratching your shelf. This is what you should expect from a premium statue.

The next item, the Ambition token, is rather special. Unlike the four coins in the Greymore CE, or even the Septim included in the Oblivion CE, this metal coin looks really old.

The two-sided oversized coin is inscribed with Daeric text and symbols. The coin has been designed to look badly cast with the irregular shape you would expect from an ancient artifact.

The final item in the package is the least impressive. I enjoy a good lithograph, but the litho included with the Mehrunes Dagon Bundle is disappointing. Firstly, the lithograph has been rolled up.

It’s a mission to even look at it without damaging it as the paper had been rolled so tightly. The lithograph is quite long, so you’ll likely not have a book long enough that you can use to flatten it. I get that with the size of the box, rolling is the only option, but I’d have sooner had a small flat picture than a large rolled one.

The image itself, of Mehrunes Dagon, looks more like a promo picture than an actual lithograph. Being rolled up it comes across as more of a little poster than a piece of premium artwork.

At US$120 the Mehrunes Dagon Premium Bundle is not cheap. But saying that all of the ESO CEs have been a bit overpriced. The figure being polystone was a nice surprise. Even though its smaller size makes it initially less impressive than say the huge Dwarven statue that came with the Morrowind CE, up close the detail is outstanding.

I’d say it was the best ESO statue yet. Similarly, the Ambition token looks great and very authentic. Even though the lithograph is disappointing, I can see the Mehrunes Dagon Premium Bundle being a very sought-after item for The Elder Scroll fans and collectors.

The Elder Scrolls Online: Blackwood expansion gives players another opportunity to become part of the lore that shaped the continent of Tamriel. These legends are only spoken of in the single-layer Elder Scrolls games set much later. As such Blackwood continues to make ESO an essential title for fans of The Elder Scrolls.

The post The Elder Scrolls Online: Blackwood Mehrunes Dagon Premium Bundle Unboxing appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Few games have as much of a prowess behind them as the Elder Scrolls series – the iconic fantasy games, known for their expansive and engrossing worlds, and complete gameplay freedom.

Everything this franchise touches tends to turn to gold – with massive hits in Morrowind, Oblivion and Skyrim, marking milestones of gaming excellence on their respective console generations.

With that in mind, it only makes sense that Bethesda would try their hand at expanding their already engrossing world even further, by creating a fully actualised, MMORPG version of Cyrodil.

But where does it stand in relation to its titanic brothers? The answer, despite its best efforts, is that Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited doesn’t quite live up to what you’ll expect from the series, managing to deliver an OK experience that’s neither a great Elder Scrolls game, not a great MMO, but rather a generic combination of the two.

The game begins with somewhat of a whimper, while you find yourself creating a character, by without the vast range of races, classes and visual choices that the previous entries in the series have afforded you.

Four races and classes simply isn’t enough to make you feel like you’re playing in the vastly complex world of Elders, but one has to suppose that it’s probably more than enough variety when compared to other MMOs – the first generation of WoW, for example.

You find yourself trapped in a dungeon, inside what is roughly explained as the Cyrodil equivalent of Hell. Luckily, you are sprung from this prison by someone who recognises you as part of an ancient prophecy (a classic trope of the ES universe), and it’s not long until you’re back in Cyrodil, ready to head off on a series of adventures.

At first, it’s somewhat impressive how completely fleshed out the world of ES Online feels.

When you first hit a major city, the setting is alive with activity. Townsfolk are eager to talk and offer up exciting quests for you to tackle – each character is fully voiced and engages you in conversation much like in Skyrim before.

However, this soon becomes tiresome as you realise that not only are there around 6 voice actors in the entire game, but also that many of the quests follow the exact same frame work. Many of the quests offer some sort of intriguing mystery or interesting element, but these come few and far between once you proceed further with the stilted and simple main single player story.

Perhaps the hardest part of this game would be to try and sell to fans of the series just how limiting it is.

The best part about Skyrim was the ability to literally do whatever you felt like in your own little world. Here we find ourselves sharing this world with countless other adventures – so gone are the days that you can rob guards, murder helpless chickens or break into people’s houses willy nilly.

This is one of many examples of the game trying to shoehorn the ES universe into a more standard MMO space, and it only serves to hurt the overall gameplay.

The same can be said of the combat mechanism too. The basics of swordplay and archery are the same, but in the interest of making this PC port workable, all the magic you have access to is hot keyed to one of your buttons, meaning you only have access to a certain amount of spells at any given time.

If your style of play doesn’t fit in with this system, as is the case with me and my battle Mage style, you’ll find yourself severely hampered and unable to play the way you might like to.

The controls on the Xbox One version, while fine, are limiting. Graphically, the Xbox version looks appalling and you can see how this was released for PC a year ago. The sound, however, holds up incredibly well and sounds exactly as good as you’d hope.

Based on the above review, you might think that ES Online is a bad game. But it’s not, it’s perfectly fine.

It’s fun enough with moments of sheer brilliance and some great elements. But unfortunately, it’s less than the sum of its parts and not a worthy successor to the last ES game.

The post Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

For those of you unaware, Besthesda had its first ever conference at E3 this year.

Fortunately, they started with quite some flare. As many fans have been waiting for it, Bethesda finally showcased some serious Doom gameplay and it was spectacular.

The gameplay looked very solid with many weapons shown off resulting in a great amount of gore and disembowelment of a large array of enemies. The visuals were stunning and the world shown was just as impressive blending an interesting combination of science fiction and supernatural themes.

There were also a few other aspects showcased including the arena style multiplayer, similar to Halo. The bigger and more unique idea they were putting forward in this regards was SnapMap which is a game and Level editor. In SnapMap players can easily create and modify their own playing fields and game modes. The small section shown appeared easy to use while allowing a good amount of modification.

Bethesda announced this bad boy to be released early 2016 world wide. Their overall showing of Doom was impressive and somewhat surprisingly for me was easily the highlight of their event.

BattleCry Studios showcased their first ever game, named, would you believe, BATTLECRY.

This third person team based multiplayer action game is a new IP for Bethesda. Unfortunately the small snippet of the game shown off did not exactly leave us blown away. The combat looked lacking and there was nothing else about the game that looked particularly exciting. The game is still in development however so there is still time for that to change. If you are interested in giving the game a go, a worldwide Beta will take place this year.

One prediction I had for Bethesda’s E3 was Dishonoured 2 and as luck would have it, it was officially announced. (Win for Jude).

An intriguing cut-scene introduced the game showing events fifteen years on from the first Dishonoured. The world is thrown back into chaos by troublesome men. One new aspect was the choice of playing as one of two characters. Each character has their own unique gadgets, abilities and weapons.

Staying on a similar note Dishonoured Definitive Edition was also announced including all current DLC for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. The game is set for release in August 2015 and if you haven’t played the game previously, I would definitely recommend you pick it up this time around.

Another prediction I had going was new content for The Elder Scrolls Online, which was shown, to my excitement. With the launch of The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited on the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 it only made sense to be providing more content for new players.

Some DLC mentioned included ‘Fallen Tamriel Capital’ and a ‘Realm of Orcs’. While we didn’t get to see too much of this upcoming content, as a fan of ESO, I’m excited to get my hands on it.

While we were hoping for a slightly bigger title release from the Elder Scrolls series we were happily surprised with a strategy card game instead, The Elder Scrolls: Legends. Not much was shown but the idea is welcomed. The Elder Scrolls: Legends will available on PC and iOS although hopefully more platforms will be announced soon.

Lastly, Bethesda’s most well covered title of the conference, Fallout 4. The initial showcase revealed a lot of concept art displaying the large amount of work and detail that went into the planning of this game and also offered glimpses of what to expect.

They also showed off parts of the intro sequence which showcased some interesting features of the game including the ability to choose a male or female character, a detailed character customisation screen, your dog companion, Pip-Boy (the in-game gadget that basically acts as the Menu) and the combat system.

While I wasn’t the biggest fan of the combat system in Fallout 3, I was somewhat optimistic about what they showed off. It also gave some glimpses about the story.

Bethesda also showcased more detailed sections of the game focusing on customisation and crafting.

Throughout the world there are several areas featured where you are able to build and customise your own town. This was involved building, demolishing and customising house’s rooms as well as providing food and protection for your people.

The level of detail of this aspect of the game seemed very extensive while remaining simple. The feature will not be mandatory but it is something that Bethesda seemed quite proud of and definitely something that appeals to me. Likewise the customisation of weaponary as well was another focus showing the almost ridiculous number of combinations and level of customisation available in game.

Fallout 4 is due for release on the 10th of November, 2015 which should have many fans already clearing out their current Christmas plans.

Another Fallout game was also announce called Fallout Shelter.

While the game is a free to play mobile game, something that would normally lose my attention immediately, it actually looked very interesting. The game revolves around looking after a group of people in a vault, drawing on influences from many games, most notably for me XCOM. The game launched at the end of the conference for iOS. No word was given about an Android or Windows Phone release.

Bethesda managed to show us some really impressive games, unfortunately not too many surprises as such, but an exciting line up all the same. From Doom to Fallout 4 we have good amount of things to look forward to from Bethesda in the near future.

Stay with us while we have more exclusive E3 2015 coverage coming!

The post Bethesda E3 Conference 2015 appeared first on Shane the Gamer.