Here’s a couple new mods I wanted to share that are over at Planet Elder Scrolls.
Yesterday the site honored their September Hall of Fame inductees. From Morrowind, the Tamriel Rebuilt Team’s TR Morrowind Map1: Telvannis was the lone addition to the Hall. This massive mod adds over tons of new exterior and interior cells, over 2000 new dialogue responses, as well as new NPCs, creatures and equipment. Above is a screen of of Tel Ouada, the home of Mistress Rathra that is included within the mod.
A couple of weeks ago I received an e-mail from Stephane Wuttunee (aka Veritas_Secreto) regarding his mod project, Tamriel NPCs Revamped. For this mod, the 39-year-old Canadian recreated nearly every NPC within Oblivion (leaving only guards in the game untouched). I had a chance to ask Stephane a few questions and here’s what he had to say.
This blog post is sponsored by the Daedric letter for “O.”
In my inbox, I received a question not too long ago about learning the Daedric Alphabet. When I spoke with Pete, I was pleasantly surprised to see that The Imperial Library is sharing the alphabet on their site. If you’re dying to write your buddies, Unofficial Elder Scrolls Wiki has a great guide for studying the language.
Here’s an interesting tidbit: speaking with Todd, he wanted to emphasize that officially there is no X or Y in the Daedric Alpabet, although a a few may have accidentally shown up in Morrowind. Now if I could only get a Cracker Jack-like decoder ring so I could start deciphering Todd’s e-mails.
On YouTube today, I noticed that a there’s several videos that help instruct folks with playing the music from The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind. I found the above video by user fabiandevries particularly impressive, because of his skills of taping with one hand and filming with the other.
Looks like I’ll have another song to play when I come across a piano. You should see my rendition of the Jurassic Park theme…it’s glorious.
Today’s Q&A is with programmer, Mike Lipari. How important is Mike? Whenever we have a day that Mike has to leave early, we all get nervous that something will go horribly wrong while he is away. Nothing we ship leaves this building without going through Mike’s hands.
Thought I’d share some interesting mods for Morrowind and Oblivion while surfing Planet Elder Scrolls today.
Above is an image from Rougetet’s Lore Friendly Libations mod. This mod is intended to help modders looking to fill up “shelves, bars, etc. within the tavern/bar mods that have been created by other modders with some more colorful and lore-friendly beverages.” S0unds like a great mod to come home to after a tough day at the office.
Also new, here’s a couple cool “cosmetic mods” to check out. Oblivion brings dark times to Cyrodiil, so it makes sense that characters should look like they’ve had a hellish day. Using Djangos Unique Features mod, you can add details like, “scars, stubble, tattoos – even acne” to the NPCs in the game. If scars and acne aren’t bleak enough for you, maybe PrinceofNothing’s Amputations Mod for Morrowind will be. With this mod, you’ll easily be able to “equip” amputations to your character. Let’s start seeing some reenactments of Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
Last but not least, here’s a shout out to Galuf’s Imperial Texture replacer for Morrowind. With this mod, you can make Imperial structures look a little more homely by giving the textures a more wooden look. Check out the screens here…pretty cool!
Back in 1996, we released Daggerfall, the second game in The Elder Scrolls series. In just a few months of working here at Bethesda, I’ve come to learn that it is a beloved title for many fans because of its depth and ambitious gameplay.
As a result, I often hear suggestions that the game should be remade. While that’s not something we’re really looking into (we’d rather focus on making new games), last week I had a chance to ask a few questions to Deathless Aphrodite (Daniele Brunengo) about his Oblivion mod, Daggerfall Memories: The Liberation of Cybiades — a mod that adds plenty of new content inspired by Daggerfall. Here’s what the Brunengo, a 36-year-old math and physics teacher from Albenga, Italy had to say:
When did you first get into the Elder Scrolls, and when did you first get involved with modding the games?
I’ve played all Elder Scrolls games except for Arena. Daggerfall got me involved as no other game before it. I’ve been hooked ever since. As far as modding goes, I took my first steps with the Morrowind Construction Set and released a couple of mods, but I didn’t really get into it before Oblivion.
For this edition of Inside the Vault, meet artist, Josh Jones. He is the Lead Character Artist on Fallout 3. Josh is also our resident motion capture specialist — he also spends much of his time fine tuning our animation system.
What’s your job at Bethesda?
Lead Character Artist. I split my time between meetings and animation work. I also work a great deal with character rigging and other technical aspects of character art production.
So Monday morning when I got to the office, I immediately went into the blog’s mailbox to see who would become the winner of our contest. When I left on Friday, we had a couple guys with game times around 600 hours, but it turned out our winner would best these impressive efforts. There were also a few folks sending in multiple screen shots showing total game time across different players, but as the rules noted, this contest was for one game save.
Without further ado, I’d like to congratulate Krisztián Kovács of Hungary as becoming the “Oblivion Iron Man.” With a gameplay time of 700:48:55, he was the official winner by nearly 50 hours. If you think about that, that’s like playing for the entire month of February — even if it’s leap year! To quote Pete on the accomplishment, “Da-yum!”
This week I’m pleased to share a Q&A I gave with modder Ashton Mills, better known to some as Martigen. He recently released the utterly massive Martigen’s Monster Mod 3.0, which we’ve already discussed here at Bethblog. Being an active modder, Mills has already released version 3.1 of the mod.
Before jumping into the interview, remember you can always shoot us an e-mail if you have a mod project that you think the world should know more about.
What makes the newest iteration of your Monster Mod stand out from your earlier mods?
MMM 3.1 includes a new Wounding and Wounding Effects system. The former allows NPCs and creatures to get weaker the more wounded they become, while the latter displays this visually through blood textures, bleeding, and staggering effects that appear the more wounded an enemy becomes. It’s a lot of fun to play with as it adds a new dynamic to combat.