The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall

About The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall

The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall (1996) is Bethesda's vast open-world RPG, a world "the size of Great Britain" with 15,000 settlements, in which an imperial agent untangles the politics of the Iliac Bay and a buried brass golem.

The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall in Depth

Sent by the Emperor to the Iliac Bay, between High Rock and Hammerfell, the player must free the ghost of King Lysandus and find out what happened to a letter from the Emperor to the former queen of Daggerfall. The letter reveals that Lysandus's mother Nulfaga knows the whereabouts of the Mantella, the key to reviving the Numidium, a powerful brass golem built by the vanished dwarves and once used by Tiber Septim to found the Empire. Through mishaps, the letter has fallen into the hands of the orc Gortworg, who consults the necromancer Mannimarco, while the Underking, who destroyed the Numidium long ago, recovers in a tomb. The player eventually chooses whom to give the Mantella, with endings in which the Underking finds rest, Gortworg founds Orsinium, the Blades reunite Tamriel, a Bay King briefly triumphs or Mannimarco becomes a god.

As in all Elder Scrolls games, players need not follow questlines or fill set roles. Over 15,000 cities, towns, villages and dungeons can be explored, houses bought, and guilds, orders and religions joined for their own quests and ranks, which shape reputation. Joining the Mages Guild unlocks custom spell creation, with the magicka cost calculated automatically, and equipment can be enchanted. Players can become vampires, werewolves or wereboars, and melee swings follow the direction of mouse movement.

Making The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall

Work began right after Arena's release in March 1994, with Ted Peterson as lead designer, and Arena's experience points gave way to a system rewarding role-playing. Bethesda dropped an updated 2.5D raycast engine in favour of XnGine, one of the first truly 3D engines, and Julian LeFay said the idea was that, like a pen-and-paper game, "you could play for years". Peterson said contemporary games "weren't very interesting" as influences. MediaTech West, acquired by Bethesda in 1995, helped develop it. Completed on 31 August 1996, it was released on 20 September, and more than 100,000 of the 120,000 copies shipped sold within two days, emptying many shelves; it debuted fourth in PC Data's US chart for September. It was a critical and commercial success, selling about 700,000 copies by 2000, though its bugs upset players, and LeFay's dislike of "all the stupid patches we had for Daggerfall" made Bethesda more cautious later. Fans built mods and engine remakes, most fully Daggerfall Unity, completed in 2023. Morrowind followed in 2002.