User blog:Zippertrain85/The Elder Scrolls Online, does it really NEED to be online?

Hi, so even though I've left this Wiki, I still decided to give you guys some blogs from time to time, since I'm just nice that way, and think this Wiki deserves some quality blogs! So without further adieau, let it begin. So, the Elder Scrolls Online has recently come out, some people like it some people not so much. But that's the not the point I'm trying to make here, I have recently come to the conclusion that maybe Online doesn't really need it's Online feature at all. That the game could've simply made it without anything Online, or even done better.

Single Player
Okay, so let's consider what the game has outside of the Online capabilities. It's basically an Oblivion or Skyrim styled game that takes place all over Tamriel. I'm serious. That could've easily been enough to make it's own game, think abour how much players have been asking for Tamriel to be in one Elder Scrolls game (Arena doesn't count to most for reasons, I assume you can probably figure out). A lot of Elder Scrolls fans really like Oblivion and Skyrim, and their style for gameplay is what really defined the Elder Scrolls, so that is a solid foundation for a game, even better, now players have all of the content of Tamriel to explore and enjoy. This idea alone could've been so exiciting for Elder Scrolls players, but even with that, there's more in the offline game that couldve made it. The Factions. People could've joined factions and whatnot while fighting against NPCs, like in Skyrim or something. That doesn't need to be online, that could've easily been implemented in the game, probably with a lot less problems (which I'll explain in the next part of this blog). It could've been like the Civil War, just as exiciting, just as much deep information, political stuff, etc. So Obviously, Elder Scrolls Online isn't lacking in the offline gameplay department. But, now let's look at other part of this game the Online aspect.

Online Player
Online in The Elder Scrolls Online has been reported (thank you Draevan) for having multiple problems, rather it be from poorly placing the Faction members in servers, or players just donwright cheating to get ahead. Needless to explain, the Online part of the game is currently broken and no fun. Which is kind of odd, since the game was being marketed by Zenimax (and game websites too) as being an MMO of the Elder Scrolls, so why does the online part suck so much? Here's why: Because Zenimax had consistantly marketed the game (atleast from what I have heard) as not wanting to limit the player like things such as WoW or something. Which is all well and good, but could've they have tested it more to see if something like that could even be done completely? When they saw it couldn't, they could have tried to make atleast so limitations to prevent this. It's clear they didn't test it hard enough, because as was reported, people are already exploting this and the game is barely a couple weeks old! So in idea, this game has the set up to be actually a good single player game, but a bad MMO. Zenimax, 'mind explaining to me why this was called The Elder Scrolls Online?

Fees
But, there's even another reason why Zenimax shouldn't have made this an MMO. Because it has caused a lot of money issues for multiple people, trying to pay for their annoying fees. You see, Zenimax is making every player pay a verying fee (depending where you live) in order to play Online (since you need to be Online to play it, you need to pay extra money to play it at all), which would not be the case if it wasn't online. A lot of different gamers have rejected the game simply because of this, either it be because they cannot afford it, or simply don't want to spend that much money on a game. Honestly, who could blame them, people shouldn't have to pay for a game they already bought. So, in the long run, the lack of Online for the game would've probably bought more costumers and players into the Elder Scrolls series, now, mostly the big fans are going to be it's only real players (as they're the most likely ones to spend all that money).

Last, But Not Least
When you think about all of this, why would Zenimax make this an MMO? It's online portion is poorly made, the fact that it is online has caused gamers to not buy the game, and the actual single player seems to be good. I honestly cannot think of a single reason for this. But, if you can, tell me in the comments :)