Category Archives: Uncategorized

Mod of the Year Contest

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Since it’s the end of the year, everyone’s talking about their picks for Game of the Year (right now I’m torn between Super Mario Galaxy, Bioshock, Halo 3, and Everyday Shooter). In similar fashion, over at Mod DB, they’ve already kicked off the nomination process Annual Mod of the Year Awards. Looks like there are some great prizes for the winners: Gaming Rigs, Logitech prizes, cold hard cash, and more.

You can nominate a mod from one of our games (Oblivion, Morrowind, or Star Trek: Legacy) or one of the other games listed…it’s all good (Fallout 2 is even a choice). To give an example of how to nominate a mod, first head to this link. You’ll see that you can select a game from the drop list that says “Any Game.” For example, if you select “Oblivion,” you’ll get a list of choices. For example with Oblivion, if you click on the first choice, NPCs with Jobs, you’ll then go to a page that has a “Vote for Mod” link at the bottom…it’s that easy.

Good luck to all the modders out there.

What we’re NOT playing: Let the Party Begin!

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So tonight is our office holiday party….it’ll be my first here at Bethesda and it sounds like a great time: good eats, open bar, and a “Casino Night” to follow. It’s nice that it’s on Friday too because folks don’t have to worry about sludging through work the next day. Given that we’ll all be sleeping in tomorrow morning, we thought we tell folks what games we’re NOT playing and the reasons why. Continue reading full article ›

Oblivion (PS3) on sale for the holidays

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Just noticed that Amazon is once again selling Oblivion for $19.99, so if you know someone that hasn’t had a chance to play the game yet, it might make the perfect stocking stuffer for a friend or family member. And with Shivering Isles now available on PSN ($29.99), this deal would save you $10 if you were considering the Game of the Year edition of the game.

Click here to view the deal. Offer is valid while supplies last.

New Hall of Fame Members at Planet Elder Scrolls

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It’s coming a little late, but we thought we’d give a shout out of “congrats” to the following modders that achieved “Hall of Fame” status over at Planet Elder Scrolls for the month of December.

For more details about each of the mods, check out the links below.

For Morrowind:

Harlequin sword and bow resource by Phijama: Adds 4 katanas, 2 bows and 1 two-handed sword to the game.

Kirel’s Interior Weather by Kirel: Allows you hear the exterior weather from inside buildings.

For Oblivion

Loading Screens Themed Replacer by Trollf: Adds new, unique loading screens for the game.

Qarl’s Harvest by Qarl: Adds new harvesting options and brings apple and orange trees (see above) to Cyrodiil.

Book Placement by Erik Peter: Improves the way you can place books on a shelf.

Congrats!

Mod Interview: AlienSlof

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For this week’s mod interview, we’re talking with AlienSlof, who is known for her numerous contributions to the Elder Scrolls community — whether it be her Goth Shop mods or her tendancy to help other modders in the community.

A resident of Leeds, when Slof isn’t modding Morrowind or Oblivion, she works as a freelance professional artist. In her spare time (away from modding), she’s also an avid fan and collector of anything related to Giger’s Aliens (yes, those nasty creatures that battled with Sigourney Weaver). Hmm, I suppose that explains why her online name has “Alien” in it.

On to the questions…

Continue reading full article ›

Top Xbox Live Downloads: November 2007

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Fighter’s Stronghold stays at #1 for November, selling more than twice as much as #2, Spell Tomes. I’m still amazed that tens of thousands of people still play Oblivion, to date.

Fun Fact: The average length of a typical Oblivion play session is around 1 1/2 hours**.

Top Five Oblivion Xbox Live downloads for November 2007*

1. The Fighter’s Stronghold
2. Spell Tomes
3. The Wizard’s Tower
4. Mehrunes’ Razor
5. Thieves Den

*ranked by number of times downloaded

**per unique user playing Oblivion while logged onto Xbox Live, worldwide

In case you’ve missed it…

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…our Fan Art section on the blog is continuing to grow. We’re continuing to get some pretty cool contributions from folks — for both The Elder Scrolls and Fallout (c’mon Trekkies…pick it up). The image above comes from Ali Tunç, who has contributed a few of his Fallout drawings.

If you’ve got some art to share, send us an email.

Shivering Isles now available on Playstation Network

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We’re happy to announce that The Elder Scrolls IV: Shivering Isles is available as downloadable content on Playstation Network for $30. This is the English version for North America.

Please note Shivering Isles requires the Oblivion PS3 disc to play. In fact, you can even use the Oblivion Game of the Year PS3 disc too – though, if you own Oblivion Game of the Year (GOTY), you already have Shivering Isles, so don’t purchase Shivering Isles off PSN if you have GOTY. The version of Shivering Isles on PSN is exactly the same as the version in GOTY. I promise.

Getting Shivering Isles to work as downloadable content on the PS3 via PSN (and as a standalone disc!) was a challenging task. Thanks to our technical director, Guy Carver, who did the bulk of the implementation himself. Also thanks for Chris Krietz, our QA Lead, and his group of terrific testers – those guys have been playing the same game in all its iterations for close to two years now.

First Conquest Review

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This morning Losi let me know that Sam Bishop at IGN has posted the first review for Star Trek: Conquest. Reviewing the PS2 release of the game, IGN seemed pleasantly surprised by the game. The review’s standfirst states: “First sign of the apocalypse: a $15 Star Trek game ends up being the best in years.”

Here’s a sample from Bishop’s review:

Conquest does one thing, and does it well. Freed from all the TV actors and even the characters themselves, the game instead just rests comfortably in providing a tried-and-true game of strategy with enough variety and differences in play style to make every race feel like they can tackle the game differently.”

In addition to the PS2 release of the game, Conquest is also available on the Nintendo Wii ($29.99). If you’re looking for more impressions of the game, head over to our Star Trek boards, where a number of folks are sharing their impressions of the game.