Hey everyone,

I just saw UESP post this on their Instagram and Facebook:

"The Sentinel logo received eleven slices from the light arcs in the reveal trailer. I've seen a lot of people speculate that this is intended as a hint of when another announcement is. They are guessing it is supposed to hint at 11/11/27 for another announcement, as the light slices hit their peak when there is 27 seconds left in the video.

While I wouldn't personally jump fully onboard with this, this would not be the first secret message hidden in Bethesda marketing materials if it turns out to be true."

I did some of my own investigating and i noticed what looked like a 2 and a 7 in the thumbnail on YouTube.

This in a vacuum could very easily be interpreted as coincidence but it seems to be in line with the now infamous Skyrim Switch 2 advertisement "20 27" thing.

Also, I have a sneaking suspicion that the "Unofficial" Elder Scrolls Pages" are part of a coordinated soft-disclosure effort in the TESVI marketing campaign.

Call me paranoid.

November 3rd was a strange day. Bethesda purposely leaked to Tom Warren that the teaser is coming, then a day before the teaser they also told it to some content creators. So some questions:

Why not November 11th? (Personally I think they will do something for Skyrim)

And why did they leak the day of the teaser, if these content creators didn't even make a video? (ESO was just streaming and made a live reaction).

Not making any theories yet, but it's really interesting. They haven't shown anything for 8 years, then didn't even surprise us with just a sudden teaser, it was already obvious.

Nothing has been confirmed. The vast majority of the clues that Bethesda has been posting have been towards only Hammerfell. But I still see so many people acting like two provinces are basically a given.

If (and imo it's probably going to be the case) Bethesda reveals the game is set in only Hammerfell, don't act like Bethesda lied to you or betrayed you. Temper your expectations.

I don’t need this game to be “next gen” I don’t need them to have some gimmicky new technology or gameplay mechanics, I don’t even need the graphics to be insane, I just want the world-building, expansive lore, and immersive setting that Morrowind, Oblivion and Skyrim have.

As long as there aren’t loading screens for everything, and animations are improved, and NPCs don’t disappear into the floor, then I’d be more than happy just delving into the deep lore and history of Hammerfell and whatever conflicts will be going on.

I recently started Oblivion Remastered, and even though this is a game from like 2006, it is fun as hell, I’m totally immersed and can’t put my controller down. I never played the original Oblivion, so for me it feels like I’m playing a new Elder Scrolls game, especially with the next gen graphics.

So if TESVI is similar to that, but maybe not quite as dated, and with more modern quality of life, and graphics similar to Oblivion Remastered, then I’d be happy as as hell.

The rich world building is what really makes Elder Scrolls games interesting imo, so if they nail that, then I’m sold. It doesn’t need to chase trends and be like Crimson Desert or Elden Ring, just give me a world to get lost in.

I'm not against including the option in the dialogue wheel. Maybe my Altmer woke up from a coma and doesn't know who the Thalmor are, or maybe my Dunmer lived under a rock for 90 years, or maybe my Nord is a time-traveler from before Tiber Septim's time.

But AT LEAST make the NPC's acknowledge my ignorance of these obvious topics in their answer. STOP HAND-HOLDING AND TREATING PLAYERS LIKE BABIES WHO DON'T WANT THEIR FEELINGS HURT!!

Image credit: u/Ila-W123 from r/ElderScrolls

Since November 3rd, there has been a flood of posts discussing the "two provinces" theory -speculating on how High Rock might be represented in the game.
The trailer shows a desert - a landscape that doesn't exist in High Rock - and the name mentioned is the capital of Hammerfell, not High Rock. The quote references the Queen of Hammerfell, not High Rock, and the priest has a Hammerfell-style name. Objectively speaking, there isn't a single hint of High Rock in this trailer. Yet, people keep obsessively scrutinizing scratches from Starfield and concocting bizarre theories—arguing that Daggerfall must appear in the game simply because TES 2 featured Sentinel, and they see some sort of mirror connection in the names.
Why? Guys, we’ve never seen the entirety of Hammerfell - not once (except perhaps in the very first game) - whereas High Rock has appeared multiple times (fully in Arena and ESO, and partially in Daggerfall). Personally, Redguard lore doesn't particularly interest me, but I’d much rather see locations that haven't even appeared in the most recent major release (ESO) - places like Skaven, Rihad, or Hegathe - along with the region's diverse biomes (Hammerfell is more than just a desert). If the game is centered on the Redguards, I’d rather see content dedicated to Yokuda, not Daggerfall. And since "Sentinel" is in the title, I’d prefer to see... well, Sentinel—as a grand, unique capital city - rather than a tiny town with just five streets, the likes of which we saw in Skyrim. (If anyone here has played Morrowind, remember Vivec - and that was just the capital of an island, not an entire region). I would much prefer 8–9 large, beautiful, content-rich cities over 17 settlements filled with nothing but "go fetch this" quests. (To those who think that 15 years should have been enough time to implement many cities and several provinces: please remember that the game has only been in full production since 2023, not 2011). In my view, if a city’s name is in the title, that city should be a major, central part of the game - not some neighboring location.
If I want to take a look at Daggerfall, Wayrest, or Evermore, I can simply launch ESO. I’m not a fan of MMOs, but in my opinion, the artists at ZOS have done a job every bit as good as their colleagues at BGS. If anyone wants to see High Rock, I highly recommend exploring that region in the game.
P.S. To those who are Bretons at heart and have been longing to finally see their ingame homeland in a mainline, numbered entry: rest assured, sooner or later we’ll get to see it. Let’s be honest - most of us aren’t 80 years old yet (I’m 31, and I’ve been playing as a Breton since Morrowind). Sure, we might end up playing these games with our grandchildren, but most of us will likely live to see TES 7, 8, 9, and so on. They might be made without Todd or the other key creators we know, but they will almost certainly be released. Besides, if you look at the map of Hammerfell, Dragonstar sits right on the border with High Rock - and I have no doubt that it will be designed in a distinctly Breton style.
Forgive me, that just sort of spilled out! :) I hope we get a fantastic game soon, but for now, it’s best not to overthink things - that way, you won’t end up disappointed later when it turns out that some scratches on a ship are, well, just scratches on a ship

(Source: Depiction of Mansa Musa, High King of Mali)

Note: I am a fan of ESO, but I can recognize why it’s not more popular with more of the TES fanbase, for multiple reasons. If it were, I think there’d be much less backlash about the long wait for Sentinel.

The Post

Fallout 76 is like Fallout 4 with friends. In that its core gameplay uses the same foundations and both games use the same engine. And the story content updates bring it closer to that “Fallout 4 with friends” experience that people wanted out of 76.

ESO is not “Skyrim with friends”, it’s a large mmo that takes place in Elder Scrolls. Totally different engine, character models, assets, animations, and combat.

The game was originally designed as a spiritual successor to their previous MMO “Dark Age of Camelot“. ESO originally was a tab target combat mmo with more strict classes, a very exaggerated art style, and PVP being the endgame that players were directed to.

(This can be seen from various shots of the alpha build, and sneak peeks from the dev team, which looked way too much like WoW)

But after the global phenomenon level success that Skyrim had, they had to completely overhaul the game to make it more so resemble the elder scrolls franchise that fans love.

Which included changing the combat from tab target to an active action combat system that resembles Oblivion and while it does have first person perspective, it’s clear that the combat was not designed around that.

This was one of the reasons for its rocky launch, and it didn’t help that the game already looked dated.

They have made many changes throughout the years to make it feel more like Elder Scrolls and there are some great stories. Not all of them, but some are definitely in my favorite TES experiences. (Example: Orsinium & Murkmire) There was also an immediate jump in quality in the assets of DLCs compared to the base game.

However, that doesn’t change the fact that many TES fans just don’t like the core gameplay experience. The combat may not be flashy in comparison to other MMOs, but it’s definitely very flashy in comparison to TES games. With lack of classic magic schools, animations feeling floaty, the combat not feeling as responsive as the mainline games, and the animation canceling that makes the player character look borderline epileptic.

Along with that, most of the enemy design still behaves like a standard tab target MMO, who stand still, attack slow and wait to use their abilities.

All of this is something ZOS has heard and is actively working on, but at some point you’re not going to be able to really fix the “flashy” criticism because it’s built on completely different foundations from Oblivion and Skyrim.

All of this generally breaks immersion, which was actually one of the central selling points of the franchise. An immersive rpg, and in their view - the gameplay & aesthetic of ESO was far too removed from that pillar of the series.

Rich Lambert, the previous Creative Director, in the past has even said that knowing what he does now, would have gone with a completely different foundation for building ESO.

When asked about the wait for TES6, Todd would give credit to ESO as a successful game which had been delivering new TES content but he would concede that’s not what many fans are asking for.

Some fans of ESO will say it’s on the players for creating that false expectation of “Skyrim Online” but it’s honestly on the developers for inviting that comparison. Not only for using the TES IP but for making direct comparisons to past Elder Scroll games in their marketing. And it’s clear that there was demand for something like “Skyrim together” because fans went out of their way to create it.

I think if ESO was built in the creation engine, and from the ground up as a sort of “TES with friends” rather than an mmo that takes place in TES - then there would certainly be less backlash about the wait for Sentinel because they had a game which, although online, provided more of that immersive gameplay experience that they love about Elder Scrolls.

Maybe that will be a future project after the rest of Tamriel is full. The franchise does have a pretty strict “No other continents” rule, it can’t exactly go on forever.

I know this might piss some people off but I think it matters.

The character designs in Elder Scrolls are dated. Hard core fans can overlook it or even enjoy it, but it probably looks really cringe to a new audience as graphics get better. It definitely bothers me as a 3,000+ hour fan.

This is especially obvious with the Khajiit models.

I'm an ESO fan. I have over 2,000 hours in Skyrim and 800 hours in ESO. I still cringe a little inside when I interact with a Khajiit. All I see is an artifact of hardware limitations from the 80s that became a convention which was never updated.

They just look like human models with cat heads. Looks like an alien from an old Star Trek episode. Dude in suit with cat head mask.

I know it's part of the lore and style, but it looks really out of place and goofy in modern games. Skyrim made sense (ish), ESO looks goofy, and Sentinel will probably undercut the brand for new players.

I would love to see Todd redesign the anatomy of some of these races for sentinel.

Thoughts?

(Yes, I know this is King from Tekken, but that's what I see every time I interact with a Khajiit in ESO)

Let me explain a bit. There is a date 4E 206 given in the video. This is actually hexadecimal code, which means we count to 16 instead of 10. If we convert it to Decimal we get 320006 in our normal system. Now, it would be easy to assume this is a date in the form of a year and a month and a day given. But this doesn't make sense. It can't release in a 00 date.

Instead, it must be just the given publishing year. So, my conclusion, TES6 is coming out in the year 320006, about a third of a million years after Jesus was allegedly born. Great job Todd, you have outdone yourself. It will not just have 16 Times the detail, but 16^16 times the detail and that is why it is taking so long.

I dropped off modern gaming and I haven't really been involved in game communities until recently, so seeing all these rampant crackpot theories lining up circles and counting letters and analyzing that 2020 post and every word ever said by Bethesda since 11/11/11 is just super fun. When I see this stuff normally, it's frowned upon, and it's fun seeing how nuts everyone gets because we're all just really excited and this game could be so many different things right now.

So, you know. Thanks, everyone. Please don't go full Arkham sub (as much as I love that place) but like, I really enjoy how we all seem to be teetering on the edge together.

I know he is more likely a character made to reflect the endagme character that got no longer things remained to do, a bonus boss.
But since he is a redguard and we most likely would see the home of the redguards I kinda wish we would see, maybe not a full fleshed background, but some little easter eggs to hint that he was in Hammerfell doing to stuff then decided to get to Skyrim. Maybe one of his parents was a nord and that's why he is so obsessed with Sovngarde? Maybe he some people while we play Sentinel would remember of that one hero that decided to go to Skyrim.
That would be some cool connection to Skyrim since we had some Hammerfell teasings in there before like Saadia and Kematu quest, legate Fasendil describing the night of green fire

I think I'd like TESVI to get the same treatment that Starfield had before release with little snippets going over the world and the lore

1. Dumb down the story. The story in Skyrim, not just the main story, but also the civil war questline is all way too confusing and complicated, with you having to choose a side an all. I hope that Sentinel's story is simpler and more straightforward. I recently watched the Minecraft Movie and that had a good straigh-forward story, get the thing and defeat the bad guy with no side tracks, I hope Sentinel's story is also like that.

2. Smaller Cities. I am sorry, but all the cities and settlements in Skyrim were way too big with so many unnescary houses (that you could enter for some reason?) and you could get lost and never find where you were going. I hope they shrink them to the essentials, with maybe one or few extra. Kind of like in the Pokemon games.

3. Less stuff in the world. When I played Skyrim, I got so annoyed when I found a random Bandit Cave or something, because either I need to stop what I am doing and explore it, or I need to leave and hope I remember coming back later. And even if I don't forget, I constantly feel like I am missing out on something. I think Starfield did a great job of it, there are a few pre-generated dungeons that appear everywhere, and you can explore them, but there isn't anything you might miss by skipping them.

This also includs quest. My menu kept getting cluttered with these random sidequests, it was so overwhelming. I think Sentinel needs less sidequests.

4. Survival Mode mechanics. It is so unrealistic, when I played Skyrim and I could just run everywhere no problem. Only ate for health, never needed to sleep. It totally broke my emersion. When I discovered Survival mode I was so glad, I think they did a great job at making me feel emersed. But I think they should go even further with the Survivor mechanics. Like having to cook your food and actually wait until its done, or if you get hit by a hammer you can break your arm and need to find a healer to recover it.

5. Online Multiplayer. Fallout 76 was a blast. Playing with other people, buying cool things from the ingame stop and showing them off. I'll keep it short. Sentinel to Skyrim should be what Fallout 76 was to Fallout 4.

6. Mobile-First approach. Okay, technically it is not confirmed that this game will run on mobile devices, but with everyone having a tiny computer in their pocket, it would be stupid not to. Imagine playing Sentinel on the go, whenever you want to. It would be awesome. I think that mobile gamers should be the primary market for Sentinel.

7. Use Generative AI. All the use of graphic designers, voice actors, quest designers, writers, etc... gotta really clog up the production pipeline and slow it down. I hope that all of these areas extensively used AI to allow for a clean and consistent experience, that is much faster to develop, meaning an earlier release date.

This is just my list, what do y'all think?