[Bethesda] Daggerfall: Now available for free! - Page 2 - Overclock.net

*VulcanDragon* · 07-09-09

I bought Arena, and it was horrible, horrible, horrible. After slogging through a few dungeons that all looked the same, and geeting pissed off at repeatedly entering empty rooms only to have monsters spawn behind me when I turned around (and you always knew it was coming because the 5.25" disc would start spinning when it was about to happen), I just said the F with this crap game. Needless to say, I never tried Daggerfall as because Arena left such a bad taste in my mouth. I remember it was a bug-riddled mess at launch though, hopefully it's a cleaned up version they offer now.

All that nasty talk aside, it's always ubercool for a company to release their really old games for free like this. So kudos to Bethesda for the gesture, even if I am unlikely to participate.

(Although I have to admit, I enjoy Oblivion just enough that I wonder if I didn't "get" Arena back in the day. I probably should give it a second chance...but that's unlikely, there are just too many new games to play.)

Paradox me · 07-09-09

Quote:

Originally Posted by VulcanDragon

I bought Arena, and it was horrible, horrible, horrible. After slogging through a few dungeons that all looked the same, and geeting pissed off at repeatedly entering empty rooms only to have monsters spawn behind me when I turned around (and you always knew it was coming because the 5.25" disc would start spinning when it was about to happen), I just said the F with this crap game. Needless to say, I never tried Daggerfall as because Arena left such a bad taste in my mouth. I remember it was a bug-riddled mess at launch though, hopefully it's a cleaned up version they offer now.

All that nasty talk aside, it's always ubercool for a company to release their really old games for free like this. So kudos to Bethesda for the gesture, even if I am unlikely to participate.

(Although I have to admit, I enjoy Oblivion just enough that I wonder if I didn't "get" Arena back in the day. I probably should give it a second chance...but that's unlikely, there are just too many new games to play.)

I have a similar feeling for Morrowind. It's regarded as the best in TES series, and I haven't played it in years, but I just don't see what was so amazing about it. Maybe I didn't give it enough of a chance, though I did spend several hours each time I attempted to play, but it was just boring.

lowkickqop · 07-10-09

Anyone have any idea how to install this?

T3h_Ch33z_Muncha · 07-10-09

IIRC daggerfall had some ridiculous amount of playing area - multiples more than morrowind and oblivion! Will be sure to give this a go...

Blameless · 07-10-09

Daggerfall is over 63,000 square miles. That's 6,000 times the size of Morrowind and 4,000 times the size of Oblivion.

I remember playing Daggerfall for the first time, back in 1996, and I didn't realize there was a fast travel...I played for 12 hours before finding a town, and I was damn lucky that I managed to stumble upon one.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Playapplepie

For some reason the Daggerfall install wont let me instal using the "Huge" setting because it thinks I dont have enough space

What OS are you installing it in?

Quote:

Originally Posted by lowkickqop

Anyone have any idea how to install this?

It's a DOS game. Install it on a computer with DOS, or in something like DOSBox.

Windows95/98 will also play it.

Windows XP might work with quite a bit of fiddling.

lowkickqop · 07-10-09

Got it thanks.

JadedFloridian · 07-10-09

Great game, I'm playing it now. For those asking how to get it to run, check out this guide to get it working on DOSbox:
http://static.bethsoft.com/downloads...stallation.pdf

Playapplepie, the setting to change your free space should fix your problem, check out the above pdf.

*VulcanDragon* · 07-10-09

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blameless

Daggerfall is over 63,000 square miles. That's 6,000 times the size of Morrowind and 4,000 times the size of Oblivion.

Yes, this was back from the days when developers thought that bigger meant better. I remember RPGs, especially NES RPGs, that advertised how many hours it would take you to finish on the back of the box, as if it were a feature of the game (100 hours of gameplay!)

Fortunately, we and developers have grown since then. 63,000 square miles of pointless and/or random "content" does not equal quality. Arena non-main dungeons were 100% random...ugh. Daggerfall dungeons were modularized, which is better than randomized but still not exactly "fresh content".

Quote:

I remember playing Daggerfall for the first time, back in 1996, and I didn't realize there was a fast travel...I played for 12 hours before finding a town, and I was damn lucky that I managed to stumble upon one.

Same thing for me with Arena. Or I should say, I knew it was there but did not realize how integral to actually getting anywhere in the game it would be. I was born and bred on Ultima and Wizardry, and skipping over huge portions of the map was just anathema to me. Heck, I even started Oblivion that way...I only recently started using fast travel as an everyday tool, I'm still in old-school "walk everywhere" mode by default.

Blameless · 07-10-09

it's true that a lot of Arena and Daggerfall were more or less meaningless expanses. However, I think the current trend of scaling whole nations to fit within 10-20 square miles is just as bad, if not worse.

It really lessens my immersion and ability to suspend belief when I leave Valut 101 for the first time and can see almost to the edge of the game world (Tenpenny Tower and the Washington Monument clearly visible), and can walk anywhere on the map in 5-10 minutes, without fast travel. Also, when the largest City in Tamriel is a few hundred yards across and has a population on the order of 150, something just does not feel right.

Yeah, they packed a lot of content and many destinations into that area. I still like a good journey, and being able to get lost.

If Morrowind, Oblivion, and Fallout 3 had maps that were more like 20-50 miles on a side, instead of 3-4, I would have enjoyed them more.