Why old lore Skyrim is the best Skyrim || Introducing "Skyrim: Home of the Nords" 

I'm still mad that Bethesda decided to reuse the imperial pantheon as Skyrims gods rather than the old Nord gods as "otherwise it might confuse players coming from Oblivion".. Always sounded like such a stupid excuse

I miss the Celtic influences on the older lore of the Nords. It gave them a really cool feel, when they made Skyrim they went all in on the Scandinavian influence and completely trashed the Celtic feel.

It's pretty fashionable for TES fans to shit on Kirkbride these days, and sure, the man could use a collaborating editor sometimes, but he's what made TES so unique and beautiful, and astonishingly weird. It was a D&D homebrew before, and without the bizarre wonder of Morrowind, that's all it would have ever been. Since he left, Howard has made the lore increasingly stale, while making occasional bits of Kirkbride's writing canon when it's convenient. I don't have high hopes for TES6, especially after the bland, dated nothing-burger that Starfield turned out to be, so thank fuck the community is still turning out gold like this.

I can't wait for the entire continent of Tamriel to be playable in the year 2111

Regarding the Minotaurs, PT intends to have 10 unique clans of the race, including one that views themselves as the true emperors of Cyrodiil. There are also going to be Minotaur priests, legionnaires and merchants

Nord Culture was more on the totemic side like the early germanic tribes with the whole idea of their gods being represented by animals instead of personified humans like imperial/elven religions. Tsun, Stuhn, Kyne, Shor, etc. we see them in TES:V Skyrim as the animal symbols of barrow ruins. They gave up all of that and started to adopt a more Imperial/Breton way of living which is part of why so many fled to the Stormcloaks in the game. They want to go back to that ancient Atmoran heritage that they lost after centuries of intermingling with the Empire. The Nords show in this mod seem to follow that original concept, of them being the Goths, Saxons, Franks, and other germanic tribes that lived up north of Rome and which reveled in that warrior culture. Skyrim nords are not supposed to be like medieval skandinavians, that was a fuck up with the timeline.

I completely agree! Home Of The Nords is what I wanted from Skyrim when it came out. It has what, to mean, makes Elder Scrolls what it is. The Kirkbridian approach of combining familiar elements with totally alien and focusing more on geopolitics with elements of the high magic inherent in The Elder Scrolls. a world where healing magic and potions are so common they appear to be the standard for healing for instance. Home Of The Nords makes the very familiar environment of skyrim--a very boreal setting, combined with elements of Russia and Canada, and throws in totally alien stuff it never treats anything less then normal. A spikeworm and snowray is just as normal to the world of TES old lore as a bear or a wolf is. The fact their focusing so much on the human provinces now is disappointing since they won't try to make it alien or weird in any impactful way. Bretons, Redguards, Nord and Imperials are just as unique as any of the elven races when you follow their lore. Also, I hope recovery is going well my friend!

As a small note - unliked dwemer direnni are not gone. They are still around as a high elf clan in summerset isles.

The reachmen seem to be based off Irish and Scottish celts imo, especially since they seem to mostly live in the Druadoch Highlands (like the Scottish Highlands) their names are very similar to tradional Irish and Scottish names, their magic is maybe like ancient Irish and British druids (and how it was viewed by ancient Romans or German invaders?) one reach man village is called Rauiri which is literally an Irish name more commonly spelt as Rory

kirkbride and george lucas are really similar in that they do their best work when paired with someone who can talk them down sometimes, making their ideas more refined. left unchecked they kinda go hog wild

Ah yes, the real Skyrim we never got...Such a shame, I love the old lore so much more. One of my biggest disappointments of Skyrim the game was the absence of original Nordic religion. Even the civil war was all about imperial god Talos, but also the landscape, the Reachmen, Nordic traditions, all of that was lacking in development. Glad that at least the community is making things much, much better.

old skyrim was fucking beautiful. as someone who got into the series from skyrim reading about the other regions blew my mind. i wish theyd leaned more into the norse aspects of their culture. when i played oblivion i never felt like i left skyrim. atleast in terms of how people acted

Thanks again for this wonderful overview! Some comments: - The next release is gradually moving into quest-development stage, while some bigger interiors still remain in making. The city of Markarth Side is filled with NPCs already, and there are some misc quests finished and reviewed even. But the main focus in PT right now is on releasing Anvil, since Province: Cyrodiil didn't have public releases for a very long time. - The next SHotN release after Markarth Side will most likely be Falkheim, which is a corner of land north of Markarth Side and west from Haafingar. It's capital is the town of Snowhawk, which is the last bit of exterior left in development for this area. The difficult part is, we need someone to model 3D assets for house interior set of this culture. Interior sets being one of the most difficult types of 3D assets. - The Reachmen being similar to Orcs has additional hidden sense in the fact that they use pitched down vanilla Orc voicelines. We're still looking for a voice actor to provide custom voice over for the race. - Kreathi minotaurs are named like that probably to distinguish them from Cyrodiil minotaurs. The latter are much more sentient and civilised. You will get to help one minotaur priest in the upcoming Anvil release as a part of a faction equivalent to the Imperial Cult. - The Bear Clan, just like the Nordic rulers of Dragonstar, are the remnants of warring parties left from the old border conflicts. They are struggling to fit into the relatively peaceful world of the modern Reach. The player will get to resolve the status quo in the upcoing release.

This makes me wish there was a mod project for Skyrim itself focused on recreating the world to fit more with old Bethesda lore. Sure, you can restore a lot with individual mods but different modders have very different styles and visions and it all feels a lot more disjointed than something that a team like the one behind this mod can make.

Seen any *e l v e s* ? HAHAHAHA!

Reachmen worship the Daedric Princes. They call them the Spirits. It also seems the Hagravens are the actual leaders of the Forsworn. They have a ritual where they replace a persons heart with a briarheart flower as a Lorkhanic Re-enactment. Lorkhan had his heart removed by Auriel (the Elven god)

That kobold is nightmare fuel. If I'd seen that as a kid, I'd have been creeped out to an unreasonable degree...then eventually gotten over it after countless hours of exposure and killing them.

This might be an unpopular opinion but I actually prefer Skyrim and nord areas in Morrowind rtaher than skyrim. There's a certain scale, colour, atmosphere and charm that Morrowind provides compared to skyrim.

Can I say how refreshing it is to watch a video where I'm not having a corporate sponsorship rammed into my ears and that has obviously been made by a fan of the material Excellent video, silky smooth footage, great job lad. Can't wait for any playthrough videos you might come out with! :)

I remember when the Thu’um was a Nordic wind magic that had no connection to Dragons.

Markarth is very unlikely to come in 2024, unless PT gets a large influx of developers. PT is putting its efforts towards getting Anvil done first before fully committing to getting Markarth done. Also, Shadowkey would be post-Morrowind, coming in 2004. Also most importantly, Hrnchamd has made a map expansion for the vanilla engine in the MWSE-lua mod UI Expansion.

The footage shown so far of the mod looks amazing and, yes, i think it does restore some of that "old lore" magic from Morrowind-era Bethesda.

I'm very excited for the upcoming update to Province: Cyrodiil

I love the square design of the buildings of Karthwasten. Reminds me of Daggerfall.

I wish the reason for more Imperial worship in Skyrim was that during Oblivion the gates did a large number on the homeland of man. So when Akatosh save the world from the force of Oblivion and beat up a prince. The nords thought the Imperial gods were more deserving. But thats just my headcanon.

I like the lack of Dwemer ruins. Seeing Dwemer ruins so abundant over all of Skyrim never seemed right to me. A few here and there, sure, with a much higher density in the eastern half (with the Blackreach subterranean highway network connecting major Dwemer cities in the east with the scattered few in the west), but far more appropriate would have been ancient Falmer (Snow Elf) ruins, showing how _they_ were once the dominant elven race of Skyrim.

I got into the franchise in Oblivion and thus enjoy much of the new aspects of Elder Scrolls, while also feeling some of the old remained in that game compared to Skyrim. However, the passion of Morrowind fans and how that has fueled their modding community has inspired me to pick the game up and finally personally dwell into the old lore of the Elder Scrolls rather than just reading about it in a in-game book or on a wiki article.

I dislike that there's almost no Nords in Skyrim that worship the traditional Nord gods. Only Froki does. Like wth is up with that? Bethesda could have made a village or at least one region that follows the traditional Nord culture and religion. That would have been cool

I have rarely looked into the old lore, but you told and showed it with such care, I cannot help being enthralled with it. Great video

This makes me feel homesick for what was never delivered. This is exactly what I've been trying to articulate for years now. I love Skyrim, but it could have been such a deeper, more primal place to explore. I feel like I should get involved with this project.

Reachfolk have always been my favourite culture in the elder scrolls, simply because as someone of Celtic heritage (Welsh) I feel like I get some representation in my favourite media. The rumours surrounding their culture and racial origins are very similar to the debates about the origins of the Celts in our world too.

That's pretty cool how they made morrowind have 2004 graphics. Reminded me of how og re4 looked.

I don't think that "Skyrim lacks political and history aspects cause you can join either Empire or Stormcloaks and it does not affect the storyline as it simply doesn't matter" is a valid statement to highlight a drawback. In all major TES games joining a faction does not affect storyline. In fact they actually made some improvements as in no other game there was a feature of capturing a settlement and changing the rulers there. As well as a battle for the settlement. I think the first game I have seen world letting you to fight and change the rulers in a town was Gothic 3.

I feel like the fact that Morrowind has very little voice acting (almost no voiced dialogue) is a huge and often understated advantage it has when it comes to fan made content. Groups like the Beyond Skyrim teams have to hire voice actors, and while Beyond Skyrim: Bruma has some pretty good voice acting, it's never going to reach the consistency of the main game. It's not feasible for a project that nobody gets paid for. When you add more content to Morrowind, as long as your writing is good the sky is essentially the only limit you have. I'm not saying this to shit on any voice actor out there, be they professional or amateur, but the fact is no matter how well made a mod project for Skyrim is, no matter how talented all the people working on it are, you can always tell when something isn't part of the main game. I played Morrowind after Oblivion, I found myself liking it a lot, and even though I never finished it I played it quite a lot, until eventually I just stopped, I had a lot of games to play. Coming back years later and installing TR and a bunch of other stuff straight away I just couldn't tell what was modded and what wasn't. Granted I probably lacked a proper frame of reference not having truly FULLY experienced every part of the game, but still. Nothing beats fan made content that FEELS like it belongs in the game, that feels like it was always there. The only other community that has in my mind achieved this feeling on the same level is Thief (First two and DarkMod). Morrowind is just good for this stuff in so many ways, from it's gameplay design, to the lore, to the fact that through these things it has gained a cult following WILLING to invest their time in infinity projects like PT. It shouldn't be surprising that there are few games like it, so many things have to go right for mods like Home of the Nords, Tamriel Rebuilt etc to exist. Even just having a msassive modding community built around a moddable game isn't necessarily enough. You quite literally need lightning in a bottle.

good to see you back. Here's to a healthy year for you!

Morrowinds Solsteim and home of the nords give off Bathory vibes. listen to Blood on Ice, Nordland 1&2 and youll know what i mean.

Home of the Nords and Tamriel Rebuilt and Province Cyrodiil are all amazing additions to Morrowind and are all must-have installs for me whenever I want to play it again.

I really admire your delivery and editing skills. You make Morrowind feel even more mysterious than the actual game and lore itself. Thanks for the video ^_^

your nord videos are my fav dude keep it up

Played this a few weeks ago and its actually amazing so far. ty for the vid

Your video is a godsend, SHotN deserves to have more recognition! Installed that mod a couple of months ago. Vorndgad forest was my first "real" exposure to what this Skyrim/Reach is in terms of aesthetics: cold, foggy, mysterious, with weird silhouettes of wormmouths and kobolds skulking about, and deranged spriggans. I was hooked immediately, it had this recognizable "hedge heathen" aesthetic to it, sometimes (only partially) reminding me of Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice. And the Karthgad village had set the tone for nords of this Skyrim perfectly. The Bear Claw clan carry similar themes of "falling from grace" like many nords in TES V, but in SHotN, the dialogue of the clansmen conveys so much more bitterness and misery over how no one remembers them as defenders of the Reach. Their clan tomb is barely tended to, having just a couple of draugr defenders inside, with many skeletons having been dropped haphazardly on the floor, no one caring enough to place their dead properly in their sargophagi. It's more than just "they used to be heroes but now they are bandits"; it's really heartbreaking to see this clan fallen so low, you can almost see a Bear clansman giving you the hard, bitter look and saying "Do we look sad to you?"

This old lore sounds much more interesting. Where can I read more about It?

Nice video. I think you managed to touch on what makes Morrowind unique from later elder scrolls games. Looking forward to how Morrowind will continue to develop over the next twenty years

You gave me a very nice template for my skyrim modding.

Recently started playing Morrowind for the first time and while I haven't installed any of the expansions since I don't want to get too distracted from the base game on a first playthrough, I did pick a Nord like you. But, my reason is a little reversed, I suppose. I really, really, like the ancient Nords. Like, First Era and earlier. So I miss thu'ums and the dragon cult stuff, even if the more "mundane" magicality of stuff like Woad etc. is nice, too. But so far I've been blown away by how grounded and real Morrowind is, even with all the slightly overdone mystique. While I enjoy some of Kirkbride's stuff, I find his quote ragging on how derivative and obviously referential early Elder Scrolls was (the forum post about, like how every place name is a reference to some other fantasy place, and how Vivec is so cool because he's a gay demi-god wearing bug armor... or something to that effect) a little jarring and distasteful. So it's not the exotic I find amazing in Morrowind, but rather the down-to-earth stuff played straight in high fidelity, so I think I'm going to enjoy Home of the Nords a lot, whenever I do get around to it.

Thanks for the video! You presented a great overview of what makes S:HOTN so special to so many people. And as you say, even though the playable land area isn't the biggest, there's a ton of stuff to do there. I also wanted to point out there actually are a few Orc encampments in the playable area. Quite small and easy to miss, but they are there. Also, this is just quibbling, but technically Black Marsh is also under the TR umbrella, because of Black Marsh's connection to Morrowind. The rest of the Tamrielic provinces are part of PT, however.

As someone who has been following both project tamriel and tamriel rebuilt for years now I can honestly say that I love both the scope and passion behind the projects and I see them being more fully realized so when I'm in my mid to late 40s im sure I can play Skyrim as described in the original kirkbride lore just like how im sure we will see lore accurate imperial City and its surrounding areas instead of The Lord of the rings inspired experience we got out of Oblivion because Todd was inspired by The fellowship of the ring but anyway man it's always a pleasure seeing you posting a video and I really enjoyed it.

Great video Alek. Happy new year to you and thanks for this fantastic analysis. I agree the story of Skyrim seemed to make the Nords concern about Talos bigger than what the lore should've been, like why were the Nords so obsessed with Talos when they have their own deities or at least versions of the Divines. You even in Skyrim have the NPC Froki who still worships the old pantheon like Kyne and so on. The mod looks awesome. Love that fans are making such quality content for this game like 20 years since it dropped.

I really like your morrowind videos! It made me install the game and mod it myself.

Dude idk how ive never seen your channel before but its awesome seeing all the huge mod stuff i dont have time to play anymore

My god, talk about an amazing mod! To think all this can still be done and show just how much this game's modding community still has to offer!

I adore the modern elder scrolls games but the mysticism of nords seen in Solstheim in TES3 is something special

Been following and playing this mod for a while now, thank you so much for making this video.

Honestly, even as someone not overly a fan of the Nordic race compared to some others, I most certainly agree that the Old Lore for Skyrim was a lot more interesting Sure, the Dragon Cult getting a lot of traction in the story was cool and all, I liked it but still, lost a lot of the cool history of Skyrim. They even dropped the ball when it cake to what they could've done for ths Snow Elves (albeit that's another story altogether). Overall, the Stormcloaks pushing for the worship of the Atmoran Gods over the Imperial ones would've made for a much better story. Ulfric's character on its own is one thing, but had he been given a similar role in-universe by being seen as "the next Hoag Merkiller", then we could've seen a more dynamic Civil War. Imagine Ulfric and the Stormcloaks end up mirroring/echoing the Nords of the First Era, who fought against the Allesian Order and their Imperial Cult's influence in Skyrim? Seeing them push forward the worship of the Atmoran Pantheon, their OG belief system, would've made for a much more interesting Civil War

I’ve been waiting to play this mod until it’s more complete. Gladly, I think I’ll be forgoing that wait.

Hype, this is along the lines of what my falkreath narrative overhaul will hopefully achieve eventually. Nowhere near this big I guess.

I was not expecting a mod review

damn, this looks interesting. Nords are my favorite, too. But in TES5 I really really miss the depth in their lore like give me more viking/germanic inspired lore and more shamanic sides

This is a great mod alongside Tamriel Rebuilt. Island of Stirk was a really good one too. For this mod I remember playing and finding that tomb with the head giving riddles. It was so cool. I can't wait for more of these areas to be released on both mods. Morrowind is my favorite game of all time so for me these mods are like getting new expansion packs for the best game ever. They feel like they are official that's how good they are imo. That's why I love them so much. This channel is also awesome. I've only found it for about a month but I really enjoy your videos as well.

Love the Warlockracy- adjacent style, this is an instant sub for me and likes on every tes video I watch. I am always needing more tes3 vision elder scrolls and your content really hits the spot!

I don’t know what amazes me more - the quality of the video, the choice of a topic that is very interesting to me, or the fact that the channel only has 2K subscribers. Спасибо!

Amazing work as always Alek! I've had S:HotN installed for months but there is just so much world to explore that I haven't made it out west yet, but it looks amazing and seems to be a major labor of love!

Great video again. Long and healty life.

Great video! The Markarth of version of Home of the Nords will be super interesting. A nordic city mixed with ancient elven architecture and with the College of the Voice in the center, which is an imperial institution teaching about the thu'um..... It will be quite the experience

I always thought that the Reachmen we like Celtic people perceived by roman conquestor and christian faith... So demonic worshipping pagan god enjoyer druidic led men. Anyway top tier video, top tier visual , top tier audio.

It looks alright, hope to see more updates in future.

Another banger of a vid! Can't wait for more Skyrim Home of the Nord vids from you. Maybe one about mini-bosses next? Or the most breathtaking dungeon of the Reach?

Very well made. thank you!

I have found my people. Let us enjoy the rich and wild old lore together.

Morrowind graphics in a temperate european setting really makes me think of Gothic.

I found this channel thanks to this video, checked the other videos and subscribed immediately. I'm leaving this comment here to slap the algorithm so that others can discover this channel too.

Playing Morrowind feels like being at sea, it even takes time to prepare (mod), and when I arrive its by boat. :) I know it influenced my career path.

Everything aside Atmosphere in this mod is phenomenal. I don't know how to describe it there is something in Atmosphere that you can't replicate in newer games The game is beautiful even without high res textures and volumetric lighting or real time shadow.

Morrowing is soo much deeper in lore content and intresting things that i figured out skyrim to quick as there is nothing there just some side quests .the way they devlope tge games now its gameplay first world building and lore last to fill in stuff before it was opposite

I look forward to playing this, I'm just so buried in all the TR content still. So much to do in modded morrowind these days its insane.

Excellent cinematography, really set the tone and ambience of the mod. Seems like a good vibe.

One of the very best Elder Scrolls videos I've ever watched.You've got a talent for video production/narration. Your voice is very nice to listen to as well. Just subscribed!

There is an oblivion project to make skyrim into oblivion called TWMP Skyrim alive witch is a part of the current biggest tes modding project called Wolf Tamriel.

You should cover province Cyrodiil too, if you haven’t yet! It’s Anvil release is coming up soon, and the lore they’re drafting blowing oblivion straight out of the water!

Lore beyond measure

Never heard of Tamriel rebuilt. I'll check out your other video but I thought I should leave this comment anyway for the algorithm

Sorry if this is an odd question, but where is your accent from? I've been trying to pinpoint it but I'm at a loss! Great videos btw. Very comfy.

Nice. I remember being estatic to explore skyrim lore and going up the thousand steps. Finding lore bits i recognized and my friends did not was cool. But a lot wasnt used. First of all they alluded to dragons returning for at least 2 games before Skyrim but they ddint even use the availavle lore. I was expecting Tosh Raka attempting to take over Tamriel.

Ok, I ended up re-installing morrowind because of this video. I shall not play it through open mw, as the map didn't work there the last time I tried. So, I will make a nord guy, call him Hayden Amundssen based on two epic real world "nords", I will ransack the redoran vaults, meet with my favorite creeper in Caldera, get the money, train my character to level 9 or something, and change the music to Conan the Barbarian soundtrack and Mortiis, a norwegian black ambient artist, and I'm sure it will be a blast. Thank you for the review! I'm super excited for this.

I have heard that the reachfolk are not actually “Breton”. Instead they are a the descendants of the Nedes who were the humans that inhabited (and were enslaved by) much of Tamriel before the Atmoran’s takeover of skyrim. There might me some Direnni (elf) blood in the Reachfolk, but it’s probably even less than the minimal amount you would find in a Breton.

20k views! yeah! dude you deserve as much views as possible!

Underrated channel

Great video!

Challenge: Todd and Emil don't destroying things created by better men

Is High Hrothgar possible in Morrowind's engine?

I had not considered this. As such, I must thank you for making an interesting episode about this

New subscriber here. Thanks for the steady stream of Morrowind content. All of the videos you've made on the subject have been great- I used your TR minibosses video to check out a few of the people. Love this game. There's nothing quite like it.

"Seen any elves?" x100 I actually would have loved Skyrim so much more if it had a Breton-style Medieval city in the Reach.

Wonderful video. Thank you so much for explaining the lore of 3rd era Skyrim!

Lovely mod

We need a Skyrim Overhaul mod

Yes! Morrowind lore & worldbuilding is the best from Elder scrolls for me. The work of all these modders is amazing! I respect and love their work more, then any of what the current Bugthesta can do. Fallout 4 & Starfield just proves that they are just high on skomma, and relies on work by more talented people.

Someone should make a mod for Skyrim to make it more like this.

Yeah, the old lore of skyrim seems a lot more interesting than what we got. Kinda like cyrodiil. Off topic, but do you maybe have a modlist for your morrowind?

Man, this version of Skyrim looks much cooler