Adventuring in the Elder Scrolls games has never really been about the game's storyline or characters. Rather, most of its engagement comes from the freedom it offers the player, which allows the player to craft, or experience his or her own personal narrative.
Thanks to a newly introduced system in Skyrim called the Radiant Quest System, players can now enjoy infinite quests, procedurally generated by the system. The system enables the game to create new quests on the fly, like assigning fetch quests to NPCs.
"The vibe of the game is that it's something you can play forever," said Bethesda's Todd Howard in an interview with Wired.
Through the system, quest givers from the game's various factions will provide the player with tasks relating to their professions. For instance, the Theives' Guild might task the player to rob a merchant, while the Dark Brotherhood may put hits on certain, also procedurally generated characters hidden in dungeons and forts.
Likewise, these locations will be generated on the fly, providing players with a wealth of opportunities to explore the game world.
Howard says that the world will be filled with minor narrative pieces allowing players to piece together the lore of Skyrim and other interesting subjects in their explorations.
Like the developers, we are equally excited about all the emergent storytelling opportunities the game will offer.
Skyrim is out on the 11th for the PC, Xbox 360 and Playstation 3.
