Category: Industry News

Double Fine Wants to Change the Game

I love when you see something so simple yet so brilliant that it kind of blows your mind. Tim Schafer has been in the spotlight quite a bit this week, what with his Psychonauts 2 shenanigans with Notch and all. But this actually goes a step further:

Tim Schafer is letting you (meaning us) finance Double Fine’s next game, a classic point-and-click adventure. Normally, a game like this would have little chance of being put into production by a publisher, so he’s taking the game straight to fans on Kickstarter. Rather than blather on about it, I’ll let Tim tell you about it himself.

And there you have it. For $400,000, Double Fine will make an old school adventure game, and the fans get to be a part of the process. Meanwhile, all of it will be documented by 2 Player Productions, the dudes behind the Minecraft/Mojang documentary.

It’s hard for me to express just how excited I am about this. While I don’t think it’ll necessarily change gaming as we know it, it certainly opens the door to start developers down that path. They would answer to fans and cut out the middle man completely. At the same time, what we’re seeing of the game isn’t being dictated by marketing, but rather an in-depth documentary crew. It’s just a little bit rad.

So what do you guys think of this? I’ve already donated some money. The numbers are already past 100k in the first day of the campaign, so I don’t think they’ll have any problems hitting it. Do any of you think you’ll join?

Edit: At the time I published this, the Kickstarter was at 122k, up from 90k when I started writing/donating.

Source – Kickstarter

Miyamoto: Searching for Nintendo’s Next Big Hit

Miyamoto

Nintendo has been in a bit of a bind lately, compared to the massive successes they’ve seen in the last few years. Wii sales are dropping off, the Wii U hasn’t generated the buzz that they wanted (they’re even considering a re-brand of the whole system), the 3DS was a certifiable flop in its early months and they are sustaining significant losses with each new quarter. There are a number of theories circulating about how Nintendo can right their massive misguided ship, but Nintendo has its own: Shigeru Miyamoto.

Several months back, there was a bit of miscommunication that made the Internet rounds about the famed developer retiring. However, it turned out that Miyamoto was actually going to be taking a step back from overseeing development teams to train younger staff. His other job? Idea-ating Nintendo’s next big hit. Here’s what he had to say on the matter in a recent Q and A session:

“I am acting with the understanding that one big hit title can change multiple phases of a situation in the entertainment business, and I feel that finding such one big hit is my basic job.”

It’s interesting to think that Nintendo is putting so much stock in finding that one big idea. It smacks of the way Hollywood thinks in a lot of ways, where studios will sink all their energy into finding that one box office smash year in and year out. The problem is, lightning doesn’t always strike like that, especially in a time where Nintendo might be finding themselves at a disadvantage when relating to core gamers.

We talked about this very topic for the upcoming podcast release, but I wanted to hear your thoughts on it, too. What do you think it means for Nintendo to use Miyamoto in such a way? Will it make a difference? Do you think the man that built Mario, Zelda, Nintendogs and Pikmin has one final swan song left within him? Go!

Source – SiliconEra

The GamerSushi Show, Ep 39: Ameri-Cast

Episode 39 of the GamerSushi Show happens to be Canadian-less, so I’m sure that’s going to make it a lot better for you guys to listen to. I kid, I kid. Mitch had a fancy radio show to take care of, so the rest of us tackled the week in gaming all by our lonesome selves. I will suggest that it’s merely coincidence that it’s one of the more fluid casts we’ve ever recorded.

As always, we cover a variety of topics. One of these happened accidentally and might become a regular feature that is sure to make you guys rage quit our site and go find your gaming entertainment elsewhere – Six Minutes with RE 6. It’s just what it sounds like. And it’s awesome by association with the greatest gaming franchise of all time.

Beyond that, we tackle Uncharted 3 and Arkham City. And then we play a game of Percentages, where we rank the chances of a number of pending news items and if they’re likely to go down. I’m pretty sure you all know the drill by this point: Eddy wins and makes some fantastic points while the others talk nonsense.

Listen up, rate the podcast and enjoy, everyone. Continue reading The GamerSushi Show, Ep 39: Ameri-Cast

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Skyrim Creation Kit Trailer Is Good News for Mod Community

I think this is what Skyrim players have been waiting for. Or at least, the PC Skyrim players have been waiting for this. That’s right, it seems the mod community has a huge reason to celebrate with the release of a new video from Bethesda which details the Skyrim Creation Kit. Like the tool set from Fallout and Oblivion before it, the Creation Kit gives modders all the same features that the developers had at their own disposal, which will allow them to create anything from crazy swords to whole campaigns.

What’s really interesting is the integration with Steam, with the ability to subscribe or follow projects that you’re interested in, along with some easy ways to browse and find new content. I could be ignorant of some other games that make good use of this, but I’m a huge fan of the way Valve is making that accessible.

No word on an official release date, although Bethesda says the Creation Kit will be out soon.

Personally, even though I don’t own Skyrim on the PC (although I imagine I’ll grab it at some point just to have it), I’m super excited about this. Even without this kind of huge tool kit, we’ve already seen a number of creative things from the community. Part of that comes because the game just has so much content, but also because the community itself has such a great passion for the game and everything about it.

Any modders out there? Any of you excited about this?

The Problem with Trailers

Bioware

I’ve got a bit of a thing against video game trailers. Do I get hyped over them? Sure. Do I love watching announcements of titles that I’ve been dying to see just a glimpse of? Totally guilty. But all the same, I sometimes find it hard to forgive the game industry for the way it treats trailers, the video game press for how it feeds into the mania and all of us gamers for how we do the same.

The fact of the matter is, trailers are mostly the product of PR and marketing departments. Often time, they’re created by people in the company that had little to do with the game itself, or worse yet, by an outside firm altogether. Yes, we’re all looking at you now, Bioware. The goal of these trailer makers isn’t necessarily making the most accurate representation of the game – it’s generating hype and moving copies.

This is why we see all kinds of game trailers that really don’t reflect the game that we see while holding our controllers, and it really bugs me these days. But I know I’m not the only person that notices that kind of thing. Over at Ars Technica, writer Kyle Orland breaks down the number of ways that game trailers make for terrible gameplay experiences. It’s a really nice look at the ways that game trailers differ from the games we play, and should hopefully point readers to measuring their responses a bit more in the future.

Personally, this is why I try to refrain as much as possible from posting every single trailer that comes out, especially pre-rendered ones. What do you guys think of this topic? Let’s talk about trailers.

Source – Ars Technica

Rumor: Anti-Used Game Component in Next XBox

Used GamesWell, this is quite a whale of a rumor. It seems that Kotaku recently heard some supposed details of the next generation XBox (we refuse to call it the 720) from an inside source. While these things tend to happen quite a bit and only have a small chance of actually being true, this rumor goes beyond traditional hardware specs.

On top of a rumored Blu-ray disc drive in the next XBox, DVR capabilities and the launch of Kinect 2, Microsoft is supposedly including some sort of anti-used game component into its next system. Yes, you read that correctly. According to this source, there will be some kind of system in place to keep the next XBox from playing used games.

If this is true, it would make a pretty big splash on nearly every side of the gaming industry. Continue reading Rumor: Anti-Used Game Component in Next XBox

Mass Effect 3: Special Forces Trailer

One of the biggest pieces of news to come out in the last few months has been that of the inclusion of a multiplayer mode in Mass Effect 3. Specifically, a co-op horde mode of sorts that has an actual bearing on the single player game. As is typically the case with the Internet, this news was met with all kinds of hyperbolic reactions – from those complaining that it was going to ruin the main game to others celebrating it without even seeing anything.

Well, now we can expect even more outrageous reactions: Bioware’s released a trailer for Special Forces mode in all its glory, teasing the game’s final release in March and the demo that’s scheduled to drop next month. I have to say, the footage looks a bit more fun than I anticipated – I definitely think the different races/classes are going to mix up the gameplay.

Thoughts, Sushians?

Blizzard Cans BlizzCon 2012, Citing “Jam-Packed Schedule”

no blizzcon 2012

In a move that’s sure to incense Jay Mohr fans the world over, PC gaming giant Blizzard announced today that it will not be holding its annual celebration of its franchises down in Anaheim, California. The convention, which has not missed a year since 2006, is usually the platform Blizzard uses to announce its upcoming projects. With a next-gen MMO rumored to be waiting in the wings, many people had hoped that 2012 would be the year that we would first see “Titan”, but it appears that this isn’t going to be the case.

With a game from each of the company’s major properties hitting this year, Blizzard has said that they’re a little too busy to make BlizzCon 2012 a reality. While this certainly is disappointing, the prospect of seeing not only Diablo 3, but also StarCraft 2: Heart of the Swarm this year is more than enough to make up for it (there’s some Kung Fu Panda based WoW expansion too, I guess).

Blizzard will still be putting on the Battle.Net World Championship for StarCraft 2, which will take place in Asia closer to the end of the year, so we’re not even going to miss watching StarCraft pros beat the stuffing out of each other.

So what do you guys think of BlizzCon’s 2012 absence? Do you just want to see the games finally be released? Should Blizzard have held their convention, schedule be damned?

Source – Battle.Net

The GamerSushi Show, Ep 38: Managing Your Assassins in Space

I think we’re going to spoil you guys. Yes, that is now 3 podcasts in a row. And this one is more meme-tastic than most, if you can believe it.

That’s right, much of the beginning of this podcast is about the release of our game of games here at GamerSushi, Resident Evil 6. This is the celebration of all things good and proper, and the end of our time of mourning now that Resident Evil 5 has passed into the annals of gaming yesteryear. So yes, there is much rejoicing. And hopefully you’ll join us as we pave the way for the Game of Our Time.

Besides us going fanboy-tastic on RE6, we also talk about RPGs and choices, Bioshock Infinite and Modern Warfare 3. After all of that, we play a game of Over/Under, where project review scores for the next few months of releases, including Mass Effect 3, Twisted Metal and Final Fantasy XIII-2. As always, I’m right again and win at everything. This should be no surprise by now. Continue reading The GamerSushi Show, Ep 38: Managing Your Assassins in Space

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BioShock Infinite Steps Up the Difficulty with 1999 Mode

BioShock Infinite 1999 1

Some of the other writers here at GamerSushi may fall into the category of gamers who would agree that developers “just don’t make ‘em like they used to.” With plenty of respectably aging gamers out there who grew up on games that made today’s “Veteran” difficulty look like child’s play, it’s no wonder a change was bound to happen. The crew over at Irrational Games, makers of the BioShock series, is introducing a new level of difficulty in BioShock Infinite with “1999 Mode.” This mode is designed to “challenge players in a variety of ways – each requiring substantial commitment and skill development.” But what does this mean exactly?

I’m an old school gamer. We wanted to make sure we were taking into account the play styles of gamers like me. So we went straight to the horse’s mouth by asking them, on our website, a series of questions about how they play our games. 94.6 percent of respondents indicated that upgrade choices enhanced their BioShock gameplay experience; however, 56.8 percent indicated that being required to make permanent decisions about their character would have made the game even better.” – Kevin Levine, Creative Director

The idea behind 1999 Mode is to make players think much harder about the decisions they make while playing the game. Gone will be the day of rushing in like Rambo without thinking. Players will have to deal with each and every one of their choices – sometimes permanently. This new game mode will also force the player to pick specializations and focus on them. The new mode will also have “demanding” stat requirements including health, power and your weaponry. Respawning will also be much tougher, with players experiencing the old school “Game Over” screen if they don’t have sufficient resources to get back into the action.

So what do you guys think of this new game mode? With games like Call of Duty, where players can charge through recklessly, will BioShock Infinite’s new approach change the way we approach single player campaigns? I can certainly see this sticking with certain types of games. How about you guys? Will we see more of this in games, or can today’s youth not handle the challenge?

Source – Business Wire

Mass Effect 3 Demo Coming February 14, Contains Multiplayer

mass effect 3 demo

The final chapter in BioWare’s sci-fi trilogy Mass Effect will be releasing on March 6, but fans will have an opportunity to try out the various features of the game on February 14 when the demo launches.

In a post on BioWare’s social site, Chris Priestly laid out the details of the newly announced Mass Effect 3 demo and what we can expect from it come release day. The demo will feature both single and multiplayer content and will be launched simultaneously on all three platforms.

The single-player portion of the demo will contain a couple snippets from Mass Effect 3, one taking place early in the game during the initial Reaper assault on Earth and the second will occur on an unspecified alien homeworld where Shepard travels to gain the support of the populace. All three of Mass Effect’s different single-player modifiers, Story, Action and Role-Playing, will be available and Xbox 360 users will be able to take advantage of the Kinect integration. The demo will have all classes available and you can customize and level up Shepard. Progress in the demo does not carry over to the main game, however.

The multiplayer component of the demo will be available to all on February 17, but owners of Battlefield 3 (with an activated Online Pass) will put their boots on the ground day one. A microsite will be up on February 7 where you can check and see if your EA account is eligible for early access, but as long as your account contains an active Battlefield 3 Online Pass, you’ll be good to go. There will also be an early access program for people who have not purchased BF3 or activated a Pass, so no worries there.

The multiplayer demo will contain two levels, Slum and Noveria, but beyond that BioWare isn’t saying. I’m happy for an opportunity to try out the multiplayer, even if I’ve already pre-ordered the Collector’s Edition (although it should be Reaper’s Edition in my opinion).

Are you guys excited for the Mass Effect 3 demo? What are your thoughts on the early access for multiplayer? Oh, one more thing: PC players will need to get the demo through Origin, EA’s much-maligned digital store.

Source – BioWare Social Network

The GamerSushi Show, Ep 37: Don’t Call it a Come Back

After the long-awaited arrival of last week’s video podcast, many of you expressed your wishes that we not wait so long before the release of the next one. Well, for the first time in my life, I’m afraid I won’t be disappointing all of you – here’s a brand new podcast, fully of shiny gaming stories, GamerSushi memes and all kinds of other wonders.

This podcast brought us the monumental task of trying to recap an entire season’s worth of games, ranging from Bastion all the way to Skyrim. We used this as an excuse to try out a new game, Lightning Round, and I think all of you are going to be happy with the results. It was a nice way to run down a staggering list of games in a way that didn’t take 87 podcasts and two years of our blabbering to cover.

In addition, we played a game of Buy or Sell with a number of industry topics. Like we do. Listen up and enjoy, friends. Continue reading The GamerSushi Show, Ep 37: Don’t Call it a Come Back

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Demo Madness with Kingdoms of Amalur and The Darkness 2

kingdoms of amalur reckoning

It might just be me, but 2012 seems a little light on big tent-pole titles. 2011 would be a tough year to beat, true, but this far out the only notable games I can think of are Mass Effect 3 and Halo 4. I’m sure I’m missing some, but beyond that I’m not too sure if there’s anything to look forward to.

Demos dropped today for a couple relatively unknown games hitting early this year, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning and The Darkness 2. Kingdoms of Amalur is a new one for me, but it’s got some well known names behind it like Big Huge Games, Todd McFarlane, Curt Schilling and R.A. Salvatore. Big Huge Games made one of my favorite RTS games of all time, Rise of Nations, then kind of dropped off the map for a while.

Reckoning, which I’m going to be calling it for brevity’s sake, is a Western-style RPG that’s very reminiscent of Fable and Dragon Age 2. It controls more like a brawler, but you have all the RPG trappings you’ve come to expect from games of this flavor. You can pick one of three archetypes (warrior, rogue or mage) and min-max from there, but thankfully the game doesn’t lock you into one specific class. I actually really enjoyed my time with Reckoning, which has fun combat, a beautiful world, and an engaging story (despite all the obtuse fantasy terms). I can already tell it’s one of those games that sucks you in very quickly and doesn’t let go. I just love the art style in this game, which is stylized and helps differentiate it from similar games in the genre. Even the most basic weapons and armor look bulky and bad-ass and the spell effects are flashy and powerful looking.

I have a couple of minor nitpicks, mostly concerning the inventory and the conversation systems. Reckoning straight up lifts Mass Effect’s dialogue wheel, but doesn’t give your character a voice. Maybe I’m too used to that, but if you’re going to copy someone’s ideas, at least go all the way with it. That’s a minor annoyance compared to the inventory, however. Like most RPGs, you get a huge stash of loot to manage, and the screens to do so are big and clunky and move kind of slow. You can put consumables like potions on a wheel to use in combat, but you can’t put various types of weapons on there, meaning that during the tutorial I had to constantly hop in and out of the menu to use the various gadgets the game was trying to show me. Once you nail down your class I expect that this smooths out, but it was kind of annoying.

That said I’m really looking forward to Reckoning after playing this demo. Like I mentioned above, it’s a game that just grabs you and pulls you in without any difficulty, something that only BioWare and Bethesda games have managed to do. Hit the jump for the other demo I tried. Continue reading Demo Madness with Kingdoms of Amalur and The Darkness 2

Mass Effect 3: Does Choice Allow for Character Depth?

Mass Effect 3 Shepard

Whenever people talk about JRPGs being obsolete in relation to the success of the modern Western RPG, the one thing I can never escape is that the Western RPG’s freedom tends to work against its story. As great a game as Skyrim happens to be, its narrative takes a backseat to whatever impulse it is that drives us to pick locks or hunt foxes outside of Whiterun. I think this is one of the reasons that the Mass Effect series appeals to me – it still manages to have a tight, exciting narrative while allowing the player a certain amount of freedom. Somehow, the series has straddled a pretty nice sweet spot that brings the best of both of those worlds.

In the latest release of Bioware Pulse, the company’s video series highlighting its projects, lead writer Marc Walters discusses their desire for Shepard to be a much deeper character this time around than ever before:

“One of the things we wanted to do in Mass Effect 3 was deepen Shepard as a character, so you really get to express what your Shepard is feeling and going through, throughout the war… We wanted to take that next step with the story telling. Yeah, it’s a war, yeah it’s got giant robots we get to shoot in the face, but there is a human side to the story. You are role-playing, and you are role-playing as a human. Why shouldn’t that human have an emotional component throughout the game?”

Here’s my question, and one I think the Western RPG is going to keep running into as long as it does business this way: can a lead character in a game based on player choice ever really have depth? Sure, Bioware has come up with some memorable, incredibly well-written characters in the past – but all of these completely outshine the main characters, who are just conduits for your own one-dimensional choices. I’m not sure if those things can ever co-exist, and I think developers could be kidding themselves if they think they can.

How do you guys feel about this issue? Can lead characters in games based on player choice actually have depth? Is it OK for them not to?

Source – VG247

Penny-Arcade Starts Gaming News Initiative with Ben Kuchera

penny arcade ben kucheraPenny-Arcade has traditionally stood up for the “little guy” in the gaming industry which is us, the paying customers, the gamers. In the past, this has involved being pretty vocal about the way the big gaming news sites handle their content and PA has attacked everyone from IGN to GameSpy and beyond.

In a pretty surprising turn this morning, Penny-Arcade announced that they are moving into new territory by finally breaching into the realm of gaming news by picking up famed Ars Technica editor Ben Kuchera. While no specific format has been announced yet, Ben’s Q&A on the Penny-Arcade forums has revealed that the site will most likely consist of hefty pieces of content released Monday, Wednesday and Friday, much like the PA comics proper.

Ben Kuchera is no stranger to the video game industry, having worked at Ars Technica for just over a decade. If you follow Ben Kuchera on Twitter, then you know that he’s not afraid to get down and dirty when he needs to, so the new Penny-Arcade site will benefit from his unique stance on the various happenings in video game-dom.

Penny-Arcade expanding into gaming news is a monumentous occasion, but perhaps it isn’t so surprising considering they’re a company that’s tried their hands at everything from web TV series to conventions that draw crowds in the thousands. What do you guys think about this move? Are you excited to see what’s going to come out of PA’s new site? What kind of content are you hoping for?

Source – Penny-Arcade

Valve Keeps Wrecking Shop with Steam

Valve

Valve, you wily devils. Not only do you make critically acclaimed video games, you also happened to pioneer iTunes for video games on the PC. Over the holidays, you wow-ed everyone with some ridiculous giveaways, absurd gaming deals and hit the whole Steam community with a shot of adrenaline that gave college kids the world over something to do during the Winter break.

But it doesn’t stop there. Valve recently reported its 2011 end-of-year statistics, and they’re staggering. Here’s a brief rundown of some of the highlights:

  • Steam offers over 1800 games to 40 million account holders
  • Year-over-year sales have doubled from 2010 to 2011, marking 100 percent growth for the 7th straight year
  • 14.5 million copies of Steam registered in 2011, a 67 percent increase over 2010
  • Steam doubled the amount of content it served in 2011 – over 780 Petabytes

Firstly, I didn’t even know a Petabyte was a thing. It just sounds made up. Literally, my brain can not fathom the numbers that go into that, even though I looked it up. This might just be because I’m a stupid person, though. The other shocking statistic is the fact that Steam’s sales have doubled each year for the last 7 years. I knew that they had a corner on the market, but it’s nuts to me that keeps soaring upward. And when you think about it, there’s really no other place for those sales numbers to go, considering that more content keeps coming out and there are so few legitimate competitors.

So what do you guys think of these Steam statistics? Come sing Steam’s praises if you wish.

CVG

The GamerSushi Show, Ep 36: PAX South

This post was actually written by Eddy, posted by Nick. Just to clear up any confusion.

Wow. Uh, hi dudes. I know it hasn’t been a long time since we’ve chatted, but it’s certainly been a long time since we’ve chatted in this format – you know, the format where I’m bringing you a brand new podcast. So that’s pretty cool, right? Especially considering the fact that this isn’t a normal podcast, but a special video podcast!

Yes, this is the long-rumored video podcast from GamerSushi Weekend, AKA PAX South, where the GamerSushi dudes convened for a weekend of hanging out, video gaming, drinking and yes, podcasting. I know it’s pretty ridiculous that it’s just now coming out almost six months later, but sometimes life happens and bearded dudes have to go to California to work. And yeah, that gets in the way every now and then. Continue reading The GamerSushi Show, Ep 36: PAX South

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GamerSushi Asks: Favorite Gaming News of 2011?

Penny Arcade

Kind of hard to believe that it’s the last stinking day of 2011. It’s a year that we all couldn’t wait to see at the end of 2010, particularly because we knew that there were tons of games and even more surprises waiting for us in the wings. We knew that it could stand to be one of the best years of gaming we’ve ever seen, and in hindsight, it truly might have been.

But in addition to the games, 2011 brought with it a variety of other gaming news items. We saw the announcement of the Nintendo WiiU and the 3DS. It also brought us word of the Playstation Vita, the calamitous PSN hack and the Modern Warfare 3 leak. More recently, it even brought us the dramatic Penny-Arcade/Ocean Marketing snafu. And finally, the release of Star Wars: The Old Republic and Duke Nukem Forever.

So, in a year full of twists, turns, announcements, debacles, wild successes and major fails, what would you rank as your favorite bit of news that you heard in 2011? It doesn’t have to be something we posted here on the ol’ Sushi, but if you love us that much, feel free to tell us. Go!

Holiday Steam Sale 2011 Is all kinds of Ridiculous

Steam SaleLeave it to Valve to organize a holiday sale that puts Black Fridays, Cyber Mondays, Koala Tuesdays and ever other kind of wacky sale days to shame. I’m not sure if someone pumped some kind of happy gas all throughout the Valve offices, or if Gabe Newell finally cracked under all the Half-Life 3 pressure, but nonetheless, things are looking good for the rest of us.

So what’s on sale? The better question is: what isn’t on sale? Here is a glimpse of just a few of the daily deals going on:

  • Fable series: 75% off
  • Entire 2K games pack: 86% off. This comes out to $75 for everything 2K has on Steam, including Borderlands, Civ V plus expansions, DNF, the Mafia series, NBA 2K series and MLB 2k series
  • Entire Id games pack: 83% off. That’s 24 items for $45
  • Portal 2: 75% off
  • Just Cause 2: 75% off

And that’s just for starters. On top of that, for every challenge you complete between now and the New Year, you will receive either a gift (to be used however you want) or a lump of coal. Don’t worry, though, lumps of coal can be horded like Pokemon and used for gifts as well. Better yet? You can trade all of these things with friends on Steam. Best yet? If you save all of your lumps of coal, each one earns you one entry into the big sweepstakes at the beginning of 2012 – where the grand prize is every game on Steam.

So, yeah. I don’t even know what to do with all of this information. Valve seriously just threw a wrench in all my Christmas gaming plans. I’ve always wanted to play games like Just Cause 2, and taking a stab at them for just $5 isn’t a bad entry point.

Are any of you guys buying stuff on Steam? Who else thinks this is madness? Go!

Source – Steam

Skyrim is Full of Undiscovered Secrets

Skyrim Horse

It goes without saying that The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is tremendous. And I don’t even mean that in terms of quality. I’m talking about sheer size. The game is enormous in every sense of the word. From the amount of quests to the cities to the NPCs and the depths of dungeons, it could take one years to mine all of the game’s secrets on their own. You can ignore the main quest and spend hundreds of hours doing nothing but dungeon-diving or picking pockets. That doesn’t even take into account all of the mods available for the PC version.

That’s one of the reasons I love the Internet: we don’t have to do this kind of stuff all by ourselves. The kind folks over at the Official Playstation Magazine have put together a list of 9 Things You Didn’t Know You Could Do in Skyrim. While I’ve made good use of a few of the items on the list, such as free archery training and the re-fillable soul gem, a few things certainly surprised me. Lists like this are usually a bad thing for me, as now I want to go get the dog that never dies, the staff that turns enemies into bunnies and the legendary horse as well.

As it stands, I’ve had some strange occurrences in Skyrim myself. Why, just a couple of weeks ago, I had to square off against an invisible dragon. On another night of exploring, I came across a lying character that tells you meta secrets about Bethesda and its development of the game.

So what about you guys? Have you stumbled across any of these undiscovered secrets? What are some of the strangest things you’ve seen for yourself in the game? Go!

Source – Official Playstation Magazine

More Skyrim Content

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