As Bethesda continues development on The Elder Scrolls 6, players have begun debating about where they would like to see the series go next, and where they believe the developer is planning on going. Seeing that every game in the series has made its setting the core of the experience, there is a lot of pressure for choosing an exotic setting for the next Elder Scrolls title that can give a unique view on the world of Tamriel.
While many fans have their theories about where Bethesda plans to take Elder Scrolls 6, there’s one area that has only been explored before through The Elder Scrolls and could use a deeper exploration. This would be the Summerset Ilse, which stands widely separate from many of the other regions that other titles have explored, thanks to its placement outside of the Third Empire as the homeland of the Aldmeri Dominion.
There are a number of quests and side quests in the Elder Scrolls series that involves the mysterious Aldmeri Dominion as a foreign power that is actively in conflict with the Third Empire. Deeper lore, especially from the stories explored in Elder Scrolls Online, suggests that the First and Second Empires have also been fighting this foreign power throughout history. However, the Aldmeri Dominion has often either been a red herring for a larger twist, like the Thalmor in Skyrim, or just a reference in some other titles.
Taking The Elder Scrolls 6 to Summerset Isles can give this phantom enemy the chance to shine, while also possibly giving the developer a chance to expand on the overall culture. So far, the Almderi Dominion has essentially been shown to be villains, similar to the slavers and fascists that make up Fallout: New Vegas‘ Caesar’s Legion. Putting the player in their lands, or even giving the option to be native to the area could make for a much more well-defined villain than how they have been shown so far.
One of the weaker parts of the previous game in the series is Skyrim‘s Civil War, which acts as the opening to the experience, but falls short by the end of the side mission. For every impressive moment, like storming Whiterun, there are a dozen copy/paste forts for the player to capture, sometimes with little effort if either army has been properly prepared. However, Elder Scrolls 6 could take this somewhat anti-climactic side mission and turn it into an all-out war between the Aldmeri Dominion and the Third Empire, right on the shores of the Summerset Isles.
This could give Bethesda another chance at a similar story, with the Third Empire attempting to annex a foreign land and the natives of that area resisting against being brought into the fold. The difference with this situation is that the ending of Elder Scrolls 6‘s war can help shape the way that the series moves forward with the ongoing conflict between the Empire and the Aldmeri Dominion. It could additionally give players a moral choice to make that could have a lasting effect on the game world, even if the canonicity of the choice doesn’t extend into future titles.
There are a few reasons why fans still consider Fallout: New Vegas to be one of the best titles in Bethesda’s open world style, even though it was developed by Obsidian. One of the major features of the game is the ability to take moral decisions to their extremes, by either siding with the NCR, Mr. House, or Caesar’s Legion. Putting the player in Aldmeri territory like the Summerset Isles could offer that kind of choice in a much more natural setting, with logical reasons to pick either side, instead of the obviously good one.
Bethesda has proven to be able to handle these complex layers of nuance with Fallout 4‘s Institute, by making the cold, calculating people come off as sincere, though their methods are immoral. The Aldmeri Dominion can prove to have the same utility in Elder Scrolls 6, using the previous interpretations of the foreign power from the series to better muddy the waters of the moral choice. This was explored before with the Stormcloaks during Skyrim‘s Civil War, but the execution slightly misses the mark based on how the game first presents the conflict between the warring factions.
Not many enemies appear or chase players through the limited water sources in Skyrim, though this was treated fairly differently in its predecessor Oblivion. In earlier games, players could not only swim underwater, but fight against slaughterfish and other creatures that swim under the surface. It was a whole extra layer that added to how players could try attacking enemies from the water, or added a level of ease to hunting down swimming monsters for their specific drops.
Sending players to the Summerset Isles could be the exact opportunity that Elder Scrolls 6 needs to bring the underwater mechanics from previous games back into the series. The presence of an expansive ocean on all sides, with a secondary island split by water, means that players will need to be able to travel over the open water to explore the world. This extra layer that being able to attack underwater adds could really be expanded on an island setting, and might even be able to make choices like which race the player wants to play as have larger implications in gameplay.
Looking at some of Bethesda’s competition in this realm, BioWare seems to already be ready to touch on many of the above concepts with Dragon Age 4‘s Tevinter setting. Between the two franchises, Tevinter and the Aldmeri Dominion hold similar positions as shadowy antagonists to the local governments of various titles. So, with Dragon Age stepping into the “evil” area, or at least the opposing nation, BioWare will be diving into the ongoing warring of nations before Elder Scrolls gets the chance to.
The pretty picture Dragon Age 4 paints of Tevinter makes it look like BioWare is preparing a nuanced look at what is often treated as a scary enemy whispered about in the rest of the series. Considering how long Bethesda has been developing the Elder Scrolls series, the developer has been avoiding the political overtones of the franchise for a long time. This has led to epic moments fighting against dragons and Daedric Princes, but the overall world doesn’t really seem to be evolving as a result.
The Elder Scrolls 6 is in development by Bethesda.
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