Grow beard; Kill dragons

Skyrim is a foreign country: they do things differently there. I’ve been trekking its sunny snow-packed hills and alpine meadows for seven days now, but apart from an incredible beard I’ve little to show for it. I know I ought to be more dependable; I know there’s a lot at stake. I know that dragons have suddenly returned to the world, and I know that, as one of the Dragonborn, it’ll probably turn out to be my problem. But with so many rabbits to chase, flowers to pick and butterflies to eat I’m finding it hard to concentrate on any of the many tasks at hand.

It went wrong from the start. I emerged into the vast open world with a companion who bid me join him in the next town – there was a main quest to be played. But this is an Elder Scrolls game, and there’s side-quest gold to be found in them hills. I waited until my companion turned a corner in the road and then I ran in the opposite direction.

I’ve found adventure and moderate riches, but no glory – not yet anyway. I came upon an abandoned fort in the mountains and rid it of skeletons. But its current owner turned out to be a vampire master who refused to fall over even after a dozen reloads – I ran away. I made friends with a werewolf, delivered a love letter, stole vegetables from the shelves of a shop and sold them back to the shopkeeper. I bought a fat horse who occasionally disappears when I’m riding it, killed twenty bandits and ran away from a bandit thug.

I met a bard crossing a plain one night and paid him twenty-five gold pieces to stand and sing for me; he was still singing when he went out of earshot. I walked alongside a mute giant for a mile or more, but I’m not sure he knew I was there. I’ve become pretty good at picking locks but not at sneaking, which has left me in several embarrassing situations in other people’s houses late at night. I’ve seen mammoths and sabre-toothed tigers and bears and run away from all of them.

I don’t know what came over me when I finally arrived at my original companion’s village. I saw a chicken scratching in the street in front of me, took out my bow and shot it. As it flopped over sideways, a woman ran at me, shouting, “That’s a valuable animal!” She was followed by the entire village, who came at me with axes and sticks. When I reloaded I gave that chicken a wide berth.

After a while I acquired a servant of sorts – a house carl, though I’m a long way from having a house – who diligently carries my heavier items and picks off mudcrabs I can’t be bothered with. She’s obedient but violent: she’ll pick up anything I tell her to and sit where I point, but when it comes to my horse the only thing she’s willing to do is attack it.

But you probably want to know about the dragons. Bethesda’s announcement a year ago that The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim would feature dragons set the tone for the marketing hype that followed. We’re not talking some dragons, either, but unlimited dragons, randomly encountered, flapping out of the sky with a scream and a shadow. However, other than during a couple of scripted introductory encounters, I’ve so far seen only one. It was a long way off, minding its own business, majestically circling a cold grey peak; I turned and ran back the way I’d come.

Running is such a simple joy in this game. The world in Oblivion, Skyrim’s predecessor, was undoubtedly beautiful, but ultimately bland and soulless. The astonishing detail is there again – maybe you’ll only notice that daytime shadows move with the sun or that the stars edge across the night sky if you put the controller aside and let the game idle for a bit – but Skyrim feels more fully realised, more varied – you get the impression that each vignette of water-splashed rocks or shade-dappled spinney have been shaped by artists’ hands and not procedural generation alone. And it’s not just the landscape: this time the people have more than three voices to share between them and background conversations are less inane. Everyone’s also a lot less ugly – except for elves, who for some reason now all look like angry aliens.

There’s also a lot more to your interactions with the world: crafting now encompasses tanning, smithing and cooking, as well as enchanting and alchemy. Fighting has been made more strategic with the option to wield what you like in either hand, be it weapon, shield or spell. And you can shout at things. Shouts are learned from defeated dragons – I’ve just learnt my first one and it seems most effective at mildly stunning my horse. A piece of loading-screen lore, however, has informed me that a king of Skyrim was once “shouted to pieces”. Levelling up appears to work in much the same way as it did in Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas, with each level giving you a point to spend on perks. But it’s easy to forget about the levelling – none of these Bethesda games are RPGs in the traditional sense, like Baldur’s Gate, say, or even Dragon Age. Let’s instead call them action RPGs, or choose-your-own FPSs, or FPSs-with-conversations.