Facebook page

So I've created a page on facebook for this website - Needless to say, I suck at it.
Please, to all my readers, if you have any decency or fanlove left in you, got to facebook and search for Skyrim Coverage and you'll see it pop up. I'd appreciate it if you would go there and "like" it.

If this works out, I'll be able to update people on facebook, as well as this blog - I figured that a lot of people would wanna have their news delivered to them in neat little blocks of text, on the page which sucks in people like a vacuum cleaner sucks in dust.

I've also added facebook "like" buttons on the site, which from my point of view, is quite the feat.
So, guys and chicks, get to facebook, like the page and make the world a better place for all of us! Huzzah!

- McBraas

Time flies when you are having fun (Fast travel)

Oh god, a lot of people on the internet has a problem with the fast travel of Oblivion and so do I. Not saying that it sucks, but... Okay, yeah it does!

Apart from the cities, you had to find the place first, but as soon as you had, you could feel free to magically zap your way over there screaming "BaZiNg!"
Not to say that Morrowind didn't have flaws, 'cause you could practically find yourself spending an hour or more getting to wherever you needed to go.

Many, many folks who actually do like the way they handled it in Oblivion, often argue with the fact that if we don't like the fast travel, then we shouldn't use it. Now, as NextMasterMind neatly enough pointed out, there is one problem with that statement: It's stupid. (I'll link his video in the bottom of this post.)

I will use his example, 'cause it is good: Asking us to not use fast travel, is like asking the fat kid to choose between a carrot and a cake. Our other options are walking and riding by horse, which isn't much of an improvement - That only leaves the unsatisfying fast travel option.

I did like Morrowind better - they had boats, striders and Astral Recall.
But how is it being handled in El Skyrimo?!

I shall tell you! It is a mixture of the two, huzzah! There will be boats for travelling between coastal cities, which is just great. Mind that we won't be able to enjoy our voyage across the sea - it is fast travel after all. Of course this isn't Morrowind, so we need to be able to say goodbye to the Striders, as they are ugly and don't really fit in. However, there are other options. You can jump aboard a travelling merchants carriage and either choose to sightsee the entire trip, or you can skip that and go straight to your destination.

Now we reach the point where I am not entirely sure how it works, but the way that I've understood it, we also have the option we had in Oblivion: If you've been a place before, you can return there by clicking it on your map. I do know that we can't do that with cities, until we've been there, like we could in Oblivion.

But what about the astral recall? Sorry to inform the fans, but no. After consideration they decided not to include it, due to the bad touch they felt it gave Morrowind. There were some situations where you could just use it, when you just weren't supposed to. So no. Sorry.

All in all, it looks to be good - should I have the Oblivion option, I will mod it out, I think. Still, I am sure that those who want are more than happy to hear that it is back.

Oh, and here is the link I was talking about: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2nXO4gLxfgQ
Enjoy

Makeover Princess

I know next to nothing about any sort of coding or website managing / creation. I once fooled around with Ruby, but that's it. Even here, where google practically comes up and smacks me in the face with pre-made layouts I stare and drool more than a young teenager looking at a girls boobs for the first time.

You'll noticed that I've changed the site a bit. I've but the poll in the top, I've added a Picasa web album on the right, so I can share all of my Skyrim photos with you. I've also added a little A&Q box, so if you have any questions or something that you'd like to discuss, feel free to use it. All for you.

I've changed the clock in the bottom. Strangely enough I became dissatisfied with the large orange field, with small-ass letters and numbers. This one is prettier, easier for the eye and has a better setup.

Apart from that, I've put the archive under the clock and added a facebook "like" button at each post (biggest challenge of my life.) The tags / keywords are still on the right, I figured it would be best not to move them.

There are still videos at the bottom, as well as follow options.

Now, back to me being retarded on the subject - If anyone has any suggestions to make the website more... smooth, then go ahead and contact me on my mail: madsbraas@gmail.com

Now let us move away from the world of Skyrim and move on to other projects - I also lead a coverage site on Saints Row the Third (solely because I was asked to,) and if you've been to it, you'll notice that it is quite empty. Why is that? Because I know less about Saints Row than Blizzard knows about holding their release dates. I will gladly recruit anyone who is willing to help on that project, 'cause I have never felt more handicapped.

For anyone interested in Naruto, I am also handling the coverage of Ultimate Ninja Storm Generations - That I can do, so I don't need any co-writers there (not that you aren't welcome, if you want.) Links are in the bottom left as always.

Thank you
- McBraas

Why and where you should preorder Skyrim (PAL)

I wouldn't wait around for some sot of special pre-order edition, 'cause that probably won't happen. Just preorder now!!

Why should you? First of all, Skyrim is awesome and there'll be a brutal battle for being the first to play it and post crap about it on the internet. You could be that douchebag! Huzzah!

Should you preorder, you will get an authentic map of Skyrim in a nice, woven material. If you don't, you'll get it on stupid paper.

If you decide to buy it, and you can completely ignore what I write now if your region code is not PAL, you should preorder it from shopto.net
If you preorder it from shopto before November 9th, you'll receive it on the release date, not to mention that it is cheap - both the game and the delivery.

Personally I save more than 50% by preordering it from Shopto. So that was just a neat little webstore that I'd like to inform you of. Take it or leave it.

You did the crime (of course,) now how do you do the time?

A little follow-up to my crime article.

Amidst my adventure through life, I realized that I had not explained what happened if you are a fool and get caught. You assume jail time? Correct. Although there is more to it than in Oblivion.

As I explained previously, there are 9 regions in Skyrim, each with their own, individual bounty for your luscious head. If you do a bad thing in region A, there won't be a bounty on your head in region B. Simple as that.

Should you wreak havoc across each and every region and fail to make sure that the witnesses are sleeping with the fishes, then you might find yourself in a situation where escape isn't an option.

You eventually get caught and need to serve some time, given that you can't pay up. Now here is the difference: Each region have different jails. We don't exactly know what types of jails yet, but there are at least 9 different, so I kinda want to set fire to crops and rob merchants just to find out what they look like on the inside. You can of course serve your time as intended, or you can try and make a daring escape (probably via lockpick.)

So who is excited to enter the world of Skyrim to assassinate Nobles and take their money to give it to the poor? I know I am, 'cause I can't wait to see the poor peoples faces when I kill one of them and take it back, as well as set everything on fire as a follow-up.

I kid, I kid. Of course I won't do that. Would you?

Horker!

If any of ya'll played Bloodmoon, you'll know what this is all about! There'll be Horkers in Skyrim! HORKERS! WONDERFUL! Okay, I may be overreacting a bit, but I love horkers! So cute!

They are like little seals :')
Of course they have a tentacle-like mouth and will probably  try to eat ya, but you still wanna get in there and get a good hug before it sucks out your brains. Okay, I don't know if they actually do that, but they look like they might. Still cute though. You know... Brain-eating cute.

How did I, among approximately 3-10.000 others, notice this little detail? It's plain and simple. Watching a bit of the E3 demo, we saw a glimpse of the inventory menu, which I'll write about later on. Anyway, there was meat, but most importantly X in there, but that I have already written about. There was Horker meat in ze Inventory!
Yae!

Will the Horkers once again be the peaceful creatures that's actually way to easy to piss off, or will they be lovely critters with anime eyes? Or maybe strong, masculine seals of death, still maintaining an air of cuteness about them?

Tune in on 11.11.11 to find out!

Ze Blade!

I'll consider this an "equipment topic finisher."

It'll shortly be about the swords. As I mentioned about armor, it'll only be Heavy and Light, without a medium option.

But people also ask whether we'll see short swords, medium sized swords and long swords. The answer is the exact same: No.
There'll be one-handed swords and two-handed swords. Expect the one-handed to be shorter than the two-handed. That it is, folksies.

By god, let the lord almighty smite me if there is anything left out now. Of course I mean Alduin, not God.

A dedicated Rubrics cube

I have solved my newly acquired Rubrics cube and I dedicate this lovely occasion to the already legendary game of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. Huzzah!

Skyrim will be out in 122 days and I suggest to you all that you do as I and make this your browsers home page: http://skyrim2011.info/

Simply because of the awesomeness.




- McBraas

Look over yonder!

Just another short one.
I'd like to comment on the brilliant landscape of Skyrim.

In the previous installment: Oblivion and even the Fallout games, we could draw a line on our map and say "I want to go there!" And then just start walking in a straight line until you got there.

In Skyrim we'll not only be able to see further over yonder, but we can go anywhere we want - Not in a straight line though! There are mountains blocking your way, which you'll have to scale in order to move on. And get this: Every mountain in Skyrim is completely scaleable. You CAN reach the top on everyone of them!

This is mainly the reason that Skyrim will feel bigger than Oblivion, in spite of having approximately the same map size.

This idea is a genius worthy and I fully endorse it. Whomever made that decision should have chocolate and flowers placed as a surprise on their beds - Along with a naked Mr. T of course.

Pad my shoulders

This'll be very short and work as a finisher for my armor articles, which the last couple of articles have been about.

There a couple of fine gentlemen on the internet whom believes that there are an additional piece of armor to equip, other than what I've already mentioned here (Body armor, Boots, Gloves, Helmet.) That piece of equipment is shoulder pads.

The reason for this is that they've no doubt spotted the shoulder pad, covering the left shoulder of our friendly neighbourhood Dovahkiin.

It is, however, wrong. This isn't World of Warcraft, where we can all enjoy the luxury of fourteen hundred equipment slots. The shoulder pad is part of the Body Armor (the combined greaves and cuirass.)

Now I think I've covered all armor-related questions, so hopefully I'll be able to move on with new articles... And solving my rubrics cube.

The Viking Helmet

Believe you me, I am a huge fan when it comes to helmets with horns. They are intimidating and they look brutally awesome. Wicked cool. It looks fresh. Will Smith wouldn't be the prince of Bel-Air without one. I'm totally sure that he does have one!

Anyway, when I was a kid, growing up, as kids do, I went to elementary school. Of course, since I am Danish, we had to learn a bit about our history and heritage. Hint: Vikings. In the books there were illustrations of big, brawly men, wearing helmets with horns.

Also the latest games that had been focusing on Norse culture, as Skyrim does and as World of Warcraft did, have illustrated people wearing horned helmets.

Notice the two pictures in this article. The Draugr overlord and the Dovahkiin, both wearing them. See?

A lot of people have also come to learn about Norse culture and the fact that there is a little spot on the map called Denmark, which isn't just the capital of Sweden.

I think it is great that it'll be part of the game. It makes players feel epic. Just a little notion --> Vikings didn't wear horned helmets, just regular ol' leather helmets.

That is all, Thank you.
-McBraas

Overtopic!!

Seriously, it's the same things being asked over and over on the forums. Oh, this is not news, it's just me talking BTW. Or writing... Actually.

I check in regularly on the forums and there are a lot of the same topics being created CONSTANTLY!
The most common ones I see are:

• Can my computer run this? (Often replied to with a load of crap)
• What is the first thing you will do in Skyrim?
• Are there spears?
• What races will we be able to choose from?

That last one blows my mind completely. I figured that THAT would be the thing that everybody knew. I found out what races there would be in Skyrim before I found out the true meaning of foreplay (stalling.)

Worst thing is that all of these questions has already been answered a lot of times! A lot, a lot! More times than Phoebe Buffay has asked out guys!

I wrote an article, here on this very site, about the so called "estimated" Pc requirements, which should be our best base ATM.

Anyone worth his salt will of course put on a dark robe and fire off a poisoned arrowed, right in the kisser of a mean looking guard, in an attempt to impress the Dark Brotherhood, whom we will naturally assume will be watching.

And no there will most definitely not be spears. I do request that people stop blabbering over how much that sucks. It has been clarified many a time why there aren't in the game - Besides, it's just a stick with a knife at the end. How awesome is that? Not a lot. Know what an awesome weapon is? A spoon blade! Here, have a look: http://dontevenreply.com/view.php?post=84

And what races will there be? Hmm... The 10 that we saw in Oblivion:

• Imperial
• Redgaurd
• Khajit
• Argonian
• Nord
• Altmer
• Dunmer
• Bosmer
• Orsimer
• Breton

If you really wanna know all'o this and you don't know any sites, you can use the magical tool named "google." To all of you who don't know "google" - It is a search engine, the best there is. You only have to type in words and then it'll search ze wholz Intawebz. Here is a link: http://www.google.com/

I am not saying that I have a problem with it being asked over and over again. It doesn't affect me, in person. I think it is unnecessary, but by all means go ahead. There are no silly questions, just silly answers - that I provide.

- McBraas

Armor is the new Black

So I've written about armor and weapons in a previous article.

A quick summary on the armor:
We have 4 pieces of armor. Helmet, Boots, Gloves and then the now combined Cuirass/Greaves, which we'll just call "Body Armor."

Allow me to briefly expand upon the whole armor thing.

The devs have promised us more varied armor. This means that we won't have a definite look attuned to our level and neither will the mobs. (Like all the Marauders in Oblivion wearing Glass Armor in the end.)

Now here is where I answer a question: Will there be medium armor again?
As much as I love playing classic D&D 3.5 I am not to sorry to reply: No, there won't.
There will be Heavy and Light Armor only.

Of course there is nothing wrong with heavy armor, for the big brutal Warrior. That is just cool! The light armor for the swift, sneaky assassin is the pinnacle of awesomeness.

Why the medium armor? No reason!
I say that we will survive with the other two, don't you!