Friction is Good for Games, Actually

When I think of the games that I hold closest, as my most cherished virtual experiences that make me the gamer I am today, Morrowind is, undoubtedly, exceptionally high on that list. But it's not the most approachable game in the series, and I think that's secretly one of its best features.
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[@TakRathen]

Did you use those blank pages for 'notes?' Tell me about it!

[@olaf.forkbeard]

I have more than one memory of writing down cheat codes in the note pages. Then.... it bothered me that I ruined the rulebook, and sought another copy by purchase or boon from friends, and stored it with the fouled copy. Today I have diagnosed OCD, and still don't have a good way to solve this problem. It bothers me innately that all the things I learned for TUNIC, are simply stored digitally, by camera picture of written notes, in a discord channel I made called "Sending myself shit."

[@TheFrench_Fry]

I never used them on my own, but, I inherited a small collection of NES games from my father and when I was young we would play them together. A handful of them had those blank pages (and extra, ink-fading lined paper besides) filled to brimming with passwords; back in that awkward period when games were getting too long to complete in one sitting but before battery backups became standard.

[@TakRathen]

@@olaf.forkbeard This is one of the most relatable things I've ever read lolol. You might want to look into 'personal wikis' or 'second brains.' I use Obsidian.md myself

[@GamblinLucario]

Absolutely have at some point or another, be it cheat codes from Nintendo Power (telling my age without really telling my age here), hard to find item locations I stumbled across ingame for later playthroughs, and even liked or loved items in the Harvest Moon games!

[@IVIaskerade]

This reminds me of how I played Far Cry 4. No HUD, no minimap, no flashing interactables, nothing. Just you and the world, and it's _so much better_

[@TakRathen]

That seems very difficult! The more a game was designed with waypoints and the like backed in from the start, the harder it is to play without using them because there's no alternative for knowing where locations are. Did you use any mods to do this?

[@IVIaskerade]

@@TakRathen No mods, it was on xbox. Honestly it really doesn't make it too hard - you still have all the information on the map if you pull it up, it just means you gotta stop whatever you're doing to consult it instead of running towards the dot on your screen. The hardest part was absolutely the stealth mechanics - removing the visibility indicator meant that I had to be a _lot_ more cagey about whether or not I thought I'd be spotted if I made a dash for cover.

[@BroodYouth]

morrowind is such an amazing game

[@TakRathen]

It can be hard to pick out what parts I love because of nostalgia, but it really is an incredible piece of media

[@nail712]

You're onto something with that bit about struggle building camaraderie. I've noticed whenever I talk to someone about a game I love, we mention one or two great "moments" and EVERY difficulty or tiny annoyance we ran into.

[@TakRathen]

There's something cathartic about complaining to someone that gets it

[@roachdoggjr3458]

Wealth beyond measure, outlander.

[@TakRathen]

You like to dance close to the fire, don't you?

[@igorthelight]

Google "Filthy rich by young scrolls". Thank me later ;-)

[@cykboy3254]

anyone wanting to get into morrowind should definitely use the development build of openmw, it has animation blending and many more features which make it feel so much better

[@TakRathen]

I totally forgot about the animation blending! Probably because I almost never go into third person

[@cykboy3254]

@@TakRathen it applies to NPCs aswell!

[@KusanajiKei]

9:40, LMAO good video sir, please make more.

[@TakRathen]

hah, yeah, I miss old Apple...

[@KusanajiKei]

@@TakRathen I found super funny also because i just saw this video of jobs talking about the lisa: kzbin.infovk3vo7xVkJc A game that get me the same feel you have with morro is the original dead rising. A lot of friction, but a ton of fun

[@TheDanc1nghawk]

Played morrowind when it came out. Have separate cases for bloodmoon and tribunal. I poured over that map.

[@TakRathen]

Did Bloodmoon and Tribunal's physical releases have maps as well? I've never seen them myself - I only ever played the base game on console before moving to PC, why which time box copies were already a long dead art form.

[@kaanozkuscu5079]

@@TakRathen yes they do.

[@donatodiniccolodibettobardi842]

Thanks It was an interesting video. Disagree on "graphics" though. Although it depends what you mean by that. It is well designed and the game has a unique visual identity. Even at the bloody low spec PC where everything was covered in this damn fog beyond 30 feet or so. And despite that Dunmer faces look like ash-baked potatoes not a single mod or a sequel have managed to rival Morrowind in the last 23 years.

[@TakRathen]

Honestly, I love how Morrowind looks, but it's hard to say that it looked "good" for the time. Character models were especially poor: The practice of separate body pieces was outdated years before Morrowind came out. But despite that, it manages to be captivating in a way few other games are.

[@PatchWorkExe]

I am all buckled in for the special interest.

[@TakRathen]

Then I've got a channel for you to sub to. (It's mine.)

[@HaturnAhheadns]

i Will consume any and all morrowind retrospective content like a rabid beast. ((Also your right the notes pages are an absolute joke))

[@TakRathen]

It's such an incredible game, and there's so much that can still be learned from it!

[@FrostbreakYT]

Great video! I was a little scared of spoilers but I watched the entire thing. It is unquestionably a new experience for me. The only games I can think of that I had growing up that were in anyway similar were the old Pokémon games on the DS. It wasn't necessarily an open world so that took some of the challenge off but there's a lot of puzzles and lack of hand-holding for a children's game. Anyway I'm glad I'm not alone as faced the same challenges you did back in the day. Makes me feel a little less incompetent :')

[@TakRathen]

It's definitely a very old-school game in a lot of ways, but it undoubtedly has its charms, and I'm looking forward to seeing your playthrough continue. (No pressure!) You're actually avoiding a lot of new-player pitfalls, like using weapons that you aren't skilled with, so don't feel like you're at all incompetent - the game merely takes a minute to click.

[@colbyboucher6391]

FYI if you look up "Morrowind Mechanics" here on YT, someone made a pretty great series of videos that explain how Morrowind characters work better than it's own manual. There's some pretty clever stuff going on that people don't generally pick up on, mainly how carry weight functioned a bit like how equip load does in the Souls games these days

[@DavidTheBrain_]

i enjoyed this alot

[@ZeltArruin]

I think it's important to have those rough moments in games, the meta difficulty. The struggle is to make it work for the game and not against the player. Something like Dark Souls 2's weapon durability was very annoying and didn't add much of anything but frustration. Morrowind requiring you the player to notice things and look for a dwemer puzzle box as opposed to having it marked adds to the game.

[@TakRathen]

Absolutely. It is a tool in the designer's toolbox, and not every use of a tool is good

[@colbyboucher6391]

On the other hand, the Shrine of Amana, also in DS2, is an example of the sort of assholery that I enjoy

[@TheBalthassar]

Notes pages aren't included to be used, they are included to get the page count to a multiple of 4 or a power of 2 for book-binding purposes.

[@TakRathen]

You are correct! But they're still there, so I assume some people did use them. Though marking up a manual like that seems almost sacreligious to me, personally.

[@TheBalthassar]

I too wouldn't on any booklet I cared about, I used to design catalogues for a living, and whenever I see notes I just assume the designers were unable or unwilling to shift things around to not need them.

[@MrTrollmyr]

I am your 41th subscriber and I think you will get a lot more in the upcoming year . Great video! 😁

[@kingdunlap741]

I’m your 42th I wonder who’s to be 43th and 44nd

[@TakRathen]

Thank you both for the encouragement! This video is blowing up by my standards, and I'm definitely excited to make more like it!

[@kingdunlap741]

@@TakRathen I was actually making fun of his grammar but this was a really good video.

[@raybrandt]

I'm the 58rd

[@yufi.]

Nice, good video.. Makes my leany legs sprinkle stardust of appreciation, Good Job

[@TakRathen]

I don't know what this means, but I think I'm safe in assuming it's a good thing, so thank you!

[@andrewroebuck9608]

The notes page was purely for cheat code notation!

[@TakRathen]

A valid use case! I just had a binder of printed pages from Cheat Code Central lol

[@raybrandt]

I see MW I hit like. No exceptions

[@m.siefert500]

Yooo just wanted to pop in and say I'm impressed! only thing I noticed was mic quality, but that's just a money problem. Otherwise, love the production style and quality!

[@TakRathen]

Hey, thank for the feedback! I actually have a pretty good mic and audio setup, so I'm willing to bet the problem is user error rather than hardware. What specific issues are you noticing?

[@Junk_Cat_0]

He's just too close to the mic, or the gain is too high, or both.

[@ajaakola2]

@@Junk_Cat_0this but it also brings some charm to it

[@userXKD669]

Yeah it's fine ​@@TakRathen

[@zoeygraverson6284]

I have to heavily disagree with you on the gameplay being bad. As you said, Its something that's very difficult to replicate, playing the game back in the day, when you couldn't just look up a guide on how to make a broken character, or how to abuse certain systems. They were things you learn, and the more you learn the quick you can make a character powerful, and learn different ways to make them powerful. Despite this, The low levels where you miss everything, constitute such an insanely small fraction of the game, even in a uninformed playthrough, that its totally insignificant. Ontop of that, missing and failing to cast spells is an important part of a good RPG, most games don't have it anymore, but it was common place in the era. The fact of the matter is, it was an RPG first, action game second, unlike the two entries that came after it. If your a true RPG lover, it has THE BEST gameplay of all the Elder Scrolls, period. Comparing Morrowind to Halo just seems extremely poor, its like apples to oranges. All of Bethesdas games are no longer meaningful RPGs. And as for your comment on the graphics, it looked good for the time, and it still holds up because its well stylized. Honestly it just kinda seems like you only enjoy the game because of Nostalgia, and none of the actual mechanics appeal to you. And your point about Gaming being the only medium to have friction, this is an absolute dip of a take. Imagine attempting to read some 17th-19th century German philosophy without any prior knowledge or grasp of the subject. It is so obtuse and complex, it challenges you to chew on the concepts these people are expressing, it provides more friction than any game you will play.

[@TakRathen]

Thank you for the thoughtful reply. I very much value this kind of respectful discussion and am happy to have it happen in the comment section. You bring up a lot of good points, and I agree with most of them. However, first impressions are important, and Morrowind's combat makes for a very rough first impression for the unwary. I think it's ultimately better for it, but it is a hurdle for new players to overcome and I unfortunately don't think enough people give it that chance.

[@adolfhipsteryolocaust3443]

​@@TakRathenfor players that never played an rpg I used to play d&d and morrowind combat system just made sense, after I started missing I realized that I just needed to stack one weapon skill in character creation and once you do taht you don't really miss that much even in the early game

[@heatherharrison264]

I feel the same way. The combat system of Daggerfall and Morrowind makes sense to me, but then, I was a veteran of turn-based CRPGs by the time I played Daggerfall. These games have an RNG, or dice roll, combat system like any turn-based RPG, but the system is masquerading as action combat. If people understand this going in, maybe they will have a better time of it. People who played Morrowind back in the day were more likely to be accustomed to this type of system. I have never liked action combat in its standard form. I want combat success to be based entirely on my character's stats, skills, and equipment, and not on whether I can click the mouse button rapidly or get my timing on a move just right. In Daggerfall and Morrowind, you begin as an underequipped, incompetent novice who can't hit the broad side of a barn, so you have to be careful where you go and have to be willing to run from a fight. In time, you learn the systems, level up your character, and acquire better equipment. Then, just as in any turn-based game, you get a lot better. And how good your reflexes are has little bearing on your success. Morrowind looks like an action game on the surface, but it doesn't really play like one. If Bethesda went back to this style of combat, I would be overjoyed, but I know I am in the minority.

[@zoeygraverson6284]

@@TakRathen You are absolutely correct. I actually tried showing morrowind to one of my ex's who was big into games like Baldurs Gate 2, a D&D ruleset game, and he could not get over the fact that he was missing attacks that appear as though they should connect, and he stopped playing and never gave it another shot. I lost a bit of respect for them that day, being so unwilling to even attempt to overcome the obstacles or learn more about the game.

[@zoeygraverson6284]

@@heatherharrison264 yes! This encapsulates the way I feel about it as well. Especially as I get older, I find it difficult to play reaction time based games like I was able to in my youth. I love the first 3 Dark souls games and Demon souls, but I struggle to even make it past the starter bosses in Elden Ring with a melee build. Its very unfortunate that my only option for true RPG gameplay is basically top down turn based games.

[@talonhatesnames7630]

rice

[@TakRathen]

You giant shitter. 💙