The Elder Scrolls 6 probably won’t be “drowned in stats”, but continue to focus on “real choices”, explains ex-Bethesda designer

The release of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered already has people thinking about the possibilities of The Elder Scrolls 6 whenever that releases. With fans now experiencing the more complex RPG mechanics of Oblivion compared to Skyrim, there’s a hope that the next mainline game in the series will be a return to form.

From ex-Bethesda developer Bruce Nesmith’s point-of-view, who spent decades at the company, this may not be the case. While the ex-Elder Scrolls and Fallout gameplay designer isn’t working on the next entry in the series, he imagines Bethesda will continue streamlining certain RPG elements while focusing on expanding player choice.

Elder Scrolls 6 may focus on expanded player choice

Speaking to VideoGamer after the release of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered, which the game designer was floored by, Nesmith explained that Todd Howard and Bethesda’s philosophy with Fallout, The Elder Scrolls and Starfield was always that they just wanted “the player to just play”.

“We don’t want the game to get in the way,” Nesmith explained. “And that’s a very modern take on RPGs. And that is actually at the heart of the ‘you do it to get better at it’ [levelling mechanic] philosophy of the Elder Scrolls. Because that means I’m not having to pick my skills, I just play. Don’t worry about all that crap if you don’t want to. If you want to, go ahead, but if you don’t want to, you don’t have to.”

“[Players] just want to get out there, the want to have fun. They don’t want to be drowned in stats and all this other stuff.”

EX-BETHESDA LEAD GAMEPLAY DESIGNER BRUCE NESMITH

Nesmith explained that he is a “firm believer” that Elder Scrolls’ way of increasing experience by simply performing an associated action is one of the best mechanics ever for an RPG, and it also helps Bethesda create more player-friendly, streamlined RPGs in comparison to other developers.

“As someone who works very deeply with it, I am a firm believer in that,” he explained. “I love, love, love, love that about the Elders Scrolls games.”

As for whether The Elder Scrolls 6 will revert back to the more complex, “fiddly character sheets” of older titles, Nesmith doesn’t truly know. With the massive success of Baldur’s Gate 3, the game design veteran admits that there is a willingness from audiences to have more complicated games, but only time will tell if Bethesda is willing to tweak its philosophy.

“I can’t tell you if that philosophy has changed inside the studio,” the game designer said. “There is a little bit of a movement to look back nostalgically at games that are more traditional RPGs. But I personally think that’s a much smaller core audience than the audience of people who just want to play fun games. [They] just want to get out there, the want to have fun. They don’t want to be drowned in stats and all this other stuff.”

At the end of the day, Nesmith believes the core of expanding The Elder Scrolls, Fallout and even a potential Starfield 2 isn’t so much about increasing the complexity of juggling stats, but in the choices given to players. Striking moral choices like Bethesda delivered in Fallout 3 were not only popular inside Bethesda, but took the gaming world by storm.

“I think the players appreciate having real choices in the game,” Nesmith said. “And you can see that in the reactions to the various Bethesda games. The decision-making in Fallout 3 that you could make in terms of how your character responded with karma and being able to finish quests in different ways compared to Fallout 4 [where] there’s really only one way to succeed, there was only one moral choice except for the grand main quest, players like that.”

As a collective, there’s still very little we actually know about The Elder Scrolls IV, we don’t even know its subtitle yet. However, with the game finally in full development after the release of Starfield, we may only be a few years away from actually playing the game. Let’s hope we live that long.

For more from our chat with Nesmith, read about his thoughts on what he would like to see from the rumoured Fallout 3 Remastered project. Just keep in mind, it’ll probably take “a while” until the game actually releases.