When presented with a truly open world RPG type game throughout the years I have had an interesting affliction. I wouldnt say it is a problem - but that is what people who have my particular situation do - they never admit there is a problem...
I am a thief.
There I said it - I am a thief. I want all of the things in the world to be mine. The idea that characters in the game have possessions which they "own" is abhorrent to me and the only solution is to steal all of these things and deal with the in-game systems setup to attempt to thwart my efforts. I possessed EVERY bottlecap I ever came into contact with @ the end of Fallout3. In the first city that Oblivion dumps you into I had literally taken every key and emptied every home of everything that was not bolted to the floor. I had the hut that they gave to me to sleep in because I was a beggar when I crawled out of the sewer and scattered all over the floor was the finest in silver and wooden goblets, cutlery, vases, weapons, and armor. I had no idea that they created a methodology for selling stolen goods in the early days of Oblivion - and hence I just took things back to my place.
So what about Skyrim then? Well I will start off by saying that my wife was not interested in my posession and fencing of peoples flatware. So that was a change - lol - however I thoroughly enjoyed the pickpocket system and the utilization of the lockpicking system from Fallout3 was awesome because I had already mastered it.
That is not the end of the story though - Skyrim is an amazing game - a world where you can truly do whatever it is you want to do. Before I ever really had more than two points in any combat skill I was already 30 points into Sneak, Pickpocketing, and Lockpicking - but when I decided it was time to leave town the missions were readily available. Moving into the questing arena was seamless - none of the work that Oblivion required to prepare yourself. Simply head out in whatever you managed to steal and test your mettle.
When I got there I found that leveling magic skills and Archery skills was NOT counter intuitive. I found that healing myself was exceedingly rewarding not only because of the time saved loading my last save - but also because simply doing it made me better at it and gave me experience to get more levels which in turn got me more perks for the things I WANTED to improve.
Healing powered my way through at least three or four perks in Stealth which greatly enhanced my ability to play the game I wanted to play around enemy combatants.
The highest praise I can levy on Skyrim is this: No other RPG I have ever played enabled me to play the way I wanted to play by simply doing what I wanted to do. I got better and better at playing in a way that made me happy and every.single.thing I did brought me closer to that ideal. Whether it was crafting armor, potions, healing myself, or wearing armor and getting hit. I could use the points to enhance the skill most interesting to me.
Skyrim is the game of the year from this bloggers perspective. Uncharted 3 was exactly what you want from Uncharted 3 but no more and no less. It was also too short - I have not played Arkham City - but it is going to have to work pretty hard to eclipse the amazing experience I had with Skyrim.
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