Why The Elder Scrolls V Skyrim: Is Still Played 9 Years Later 

Me when starting the game: "I'll try being a mage this time" Several hours later I'm a stealth archer again.

my dad has played Skyrim since it was released, went back home and my dad still plays it.

I remember dying over and over from that damn frost troll on the way up to the graybeards 😤😤

Skyrim was the first game to get me out of a serious depression. I genuinely believe it saved my life. I don't think I will ever not love Skyrim.

Skyrim was like a real life adventure for me, when I first played back in 2011. It still can be. Because modding can reignite one's passion for Skyrim even today. There are many many fantastic mods.

Its the mods that keep me coming back. Ive played over 1,500 hours and Im still able to do new quests and explore new places thanks to mods.

I just wanted to say that across these years I've had about 1000 - 1200 hours sunk into Skyrim, and I've NEVER stumbled across the plot twist in Windhelm after Wuulfberth gets imprisoned. I was shocked to know that the countless times I've done that quest in all these years I've, every single time, imprisoned the wrong guy

Man, this game came out my sophomore year of high school, and to this day I still play it. Every time I do play it, I always find something new. It's pretty crazy how much is packed in this game, and having a PC makes the experience so much greater with the use of mods! This video perfectly summed up how I feel about it!

19:50 btw, you don't actually need to "fail" the mistery. In my first playthrou I didnt talk with the stewart to arrest the mage. I went to the mage directly, because I didnt use the quest pointers. Confronting him, you can get all the information you need without the need to arrest him, or let another person get killed. So this quest actually has branching paths. I dind't know another murder would happen if I had him arrested.

Playing Skyrim is the purest expression of happiness.

“You know if you’ve got the aptitude you should join the Mage’s College Of Winterhold.”

You know the video’s good when I see that there’s over an hour left and am relieved that it’s not almost over

As someone who played this game in 2012 2013 I can say I am still playing skyrim to this day

Skyrim makes me think back to a specific time in my life when I first played it, so replaying it now gives me that nostalgic feeling. Plus all round it’s just a great game, and the soundtrack is something else

I love how Skyrim has different approaches for each new game you start. Choosing who to fight for in the civil war, choosing your class, completing quests you never knew about beforehand - all of these are factors that make Skyrim click in my opinion. Replayability is very important in any game ever and Skyrim perfected this aspect.

I started playing Skyrim last month so I bet you guys can Imagine the massive binge gaming I been doing especially since I’ve been quarantined.

Quite simply, because, and outside of its predecessors, they're is no other game that embodies be what you want, do what you want, how you want, and go wherever you want other than Skyrim. The Elder Scrolls is special

I remember getting this game for Christmas in 2011. Never played anything like it before as a kid, and it was truly an adventure. I remember not knowing how to read the map (to the point a friend and I tried playing with the real map that came packaged with the game) or figure out how the quests worked so I ended up going to Shimmermist cave instead of Bleak Falls Barrow after Dragonsreach. As you can imagine, not knowing what I was doing coupled with entering a cave full of Falmer and a Dwarven Centurion at like level 2 or 3 didn’t go well. Eventually I gave up and went looking for other stuff to do and basically learned how to play the game, but later came back and it was really interesting getting to the bottom of it. Still wasn’t easy for me at the time, and Lydia died on me there (which lead me to think any companion could die, which isn’t really true at all) so the stakes were pretty high, but when that machine dropped dead it felt like the whole game had opened up. Leaving the cave by looping around to the entrance was also a really cool way to finish it off, and while I was upset at first, it sort of became like a preview of what the proper Dwemer ruins would be like. Going to Blackreach later in the main quest made it all feel like the game really was building up to something epic, which given the ending I’d say it was. Played it a billion times since, and have a ton of memories of it, but that’s one of my earliest and most formative with Skyrim. Crazy to think it’s been 10 years.

Lets hope they dont take nine years to make the next game

Skyrim is just so large. If you want, every single play through can feel wildly different and ur almost never gets boring

Okay, straight up! This video is excellent and deserves to reach a larger audience. Good job my dude!

Hey Gingy. As someone who's been following you since your early days of For Honor content, I really appreciate the direction you're taking your channel and hope to see more videos like this one. I hope your channel continues to grow despite the discontinuation of the For Honor content.

No matter how much life changed, the characters and world of skyrim had always stayed there for the times i just needed a break. Since i was 9 years old and i have just now turned 20 and i still feel the same comfort just looking at the game as i did playing it those 11 years ago.

Jesus, just the soundtrack brings back a lot of memories. Not just the game but my whole life at the time when I was playing this game, how I was discussing this masterpiece with my friends or the hobbies that I used to do at the time, and being excited to go home and play skyrim. This is my favourite game of all time.

November 11, 2020: Today marks the 9th year anniversary of the greatest RPG of all time...From Orcs to Khajiits, no matter what race you play as, this game is truly special to me and to all the Elder Scrolls fans out there. I just wanted to say this, and to the many Skyrim players out there, happy 9th anniversary to The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, you truly are the bet game ever🤞🏾💎

Great video my man. I recently found your channel and have been listening to all the retrospectives on Skyrim and Fallout games. Even though I love these games. You have made me understand why there great games. I like how in depth you go into these videos, like with the different options you can pick in quests and playstyles to show how free the games can be. 😏 Keep it up. You have a noice voice as well. 😅

Why do these hour long documentary-esque breakdown's of Skyrim enthrall me so much? I swear I've watched them all.

This was an amazing video and deserves way more Recognition. Thank you for taking the time to make this. Have a great day.

Really liking the new videos! I played Skyrim a lot during middle school, and I still play it every once in a while

I love the video and loved the Thunderchild mod. Great video man! Loved the rush through style.

Mods have kept me playing this game literally til this day. I actually feel as if im living another life in another universe playing this game..no other game has made me feel like that.

The short answer? Ymfah still hasn't found all the ways to break it.

I am a fan of this form of video, lookin forward to more man.

I have a friend who has been playing skyrim on the day one patch of the xbox 360 for like 8 years now. Can't think of many other games you could do that with and not get bored

When I first got my more powerful pc system, I flooded the game with mods. It was awesome, and I had a ton of fun just adding things like ENB’s and parallax maps and brand new worlds to the game. At the end of December, as the ten year anniversary of me personally playing Skyrim came, I reinstalled the game with a handful of quality of life and graphical mods (improvements, not complete redesigns), and an alternate start. I’m loving it. Sneaking and archery are great, selling to rich merchants so I’m not over-encumbered with 9 dragon bones, and catching a stunning Vista as I turn a corner at the right time is still as amazing as it was in freshman year on my 360. Recently my fiancé has jumped into the game (she didn’t play it back in the day) and she’s also having tons of fun, so it’s not 100% nostalgia talking when I describe it as one of my favorite games, and absolutely my most played game.

Awh the peaceful ambient music playing in the background around the 3-4 minute mark took me back. Haven't played Skyrim since discovering TW3 in 2018, might be time to go back

Wait a minute....the court wizard wasn't the murderer!?! I literally never knew that holy shit. I've been playing this game for fucking years

Skyrim is great, one of the best games I’ve ever played. Always nice to see it get some love (despite some older fans hating on it). Do you plan on doing videos on other Elder Scrolls games too, or just Skyrim?

The main reason Skyrim is my favorite video game is because no matter how much I play it, there always seems to be something new I have not seen or done before. Even watching this video, there were a number of simple things you show that for some players, may have been a obvious thing, but for many others, was never even stumbled on or simply over-looked.

This game came out when I was 11 years old, I picked it up same week it was released but only got all the achievements for it last year and while I haven't played it since I still have nothing but love for it.

I had a great experience with combining Live Another Life and Frostfall. I chose to start the game at a shipwreck. What I didn't know beforehand was that the shipwreck spawned you far into the sea... What ensued was a desperate fight fore survival as my character had to use every resource she found in the wreckage to survive swiming through blood freezing waters and walking through blizzard riddled land until finally reaching Winterhold. Literally would have died if she stayed outside for even a minute longer She got a cruel frostbite, but survived and is now thriving. It was an unexpected but amazing introduction to my very first Skyrim survival playthrough. I had Campfire, Frostfall and disabled fast travels

Skyrim sparks my curiosity, and that snowballs into hours upon hours of playing. I also love feeling powerful, I made an orc blacksmith who now has armor higher level than their level, so it’s really awesome.

Thank you for this I depth analysis. Skyrim remains one of my favorite games of all time.

Skyrim is life. Lot of people are going thru something in their life, pressure, depression, boredom, etc. Escaping into the world of skyrim has helped millions of people.

Great video, Gingy!

Great Open World, great Atmosphere and Setting, Great story, Factions, Guilds..Good framerate even on older PCs, tons of Mods and its easy Moddable...

I've NEVER seen that Bow of the Hunt item before, ever, I had no idea it existed, that's so dope omg.

9 years? Nah. It'll still be played for eternity. It's the best offline rpg I've ever played. So far, no games can mimic Skyrim. While the developers keep updating it, modders keep supporting too. And I've been very happy playing it. Just my opinion tho.

I love that you mentioned Enderal. Skyrim ist absolutely amazing but Enderal is one of the best RPGs i ever played. Simply because the atmosphere is mindblowing. I felt so immersed and hooked by the World Design and Story. I will never forget that and play it several times

i definitely am about to play again with Mods!!! God Bless You Gingy!

👍🏾👍🏾🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥 I’ve played Skyrim since 11/11/2011. Thanks for this video!

Skyrim is a cult. Not just Skyrim but the whole Elder Scrolls series. And we LOVE to be a part of it.

I've always gone with battlemage/spellsword build - sword in one hand, spell in the other, or spells in both hands and heavy armor on the player. Essentially a tank spellcaster. it always turned out OP in the later half of the game. Personally I never really liked dodging and since there were no rewarding acrobatics animations I wasn't really incentivized to play as a rogue. As a battlemage though, I had the pleasure of enjoying great looking armor pieces and the awesome spell or shout visuals. Also, adding spell mods always helped - used to add midas spells mod which added more elements (water, earth, air) so you could play with elements other than fire, ice, lightning.

The level of immersion this game brought for us to be able to escape reality will possibly be remained unmatched

It's simple... The Elder Scrolls has the most awesome lore. Oh, and... Mods. Mods definitely help with the replayability. And you can make it your own game.

Because we keep trying to not play stealth archers only to play a stealth archer.

I will always be so happy to play this game and it has always been my favorite and every single time I boot up this game and hear the song and it’s chilling.

red water den is one of my favorite locations to go expescially early game. the best spell is in there too.

The modding community still alive in Skyrim, and also everyone are waiting for the huge expansion mod such as Skywin, Skyblivion, Beyond Skyrim, also bunch of waifu maker for Skyrim make this game got longer life before TES6 even release

BRO! When I initially finished the Blood on Ice quest I was like "that's it?" but I had no idea there was a part 2 to it! Going to go do that now!

i still dont understand how Gingy is so unknown and underrated..smh...... love you bro keep up the good work and thank you for all For Honor Videos you made

Hello from 2023 just did my 3rd punch only run….like and I STILL have so much builds I wanna try out. Been playing since day one don’t see myself stopping anytime soon! Hail Ulfric! The one true high king!

At 38:25 in the video he literally perfectly explained my first character I’d played as in Skyrim and it honesty shook me!

I was expecting some kind of analysis, but this guy just described the game. We know the game. It's 9 years old.

This is a great video of exactly why Skyrim is great then and now , thank you and well done 👍

I love the kill cam when using lightning spells…it makes me feel like Darth Sideous 🧙🏻

I finally got into this game after leaving it untouched for a year after I got it and I loved it

I am set up with my knitting and am so excited to watch this while I sit back vibe and do this. Freak yes.

I always wished there was kind of a gag option for A Night to Remember where you can actually go through the marriage to Moira, and it makes all Hagravens friendly to the player or something. Most people prob wouldn't pick that option but imagine if they just threw that in there for fun.

Jonah Lobe was the creature designer for Skyrim and Fallout 3 & 4 he also has a channel that details his process in design

Dude, I’ve played Skyrim ONCE when it came out. I’m now 23:23 in, and must say: you make fantastic videos.

You know what other game is still played and it was released seven days after Skyrim. Minecraft. Two great games.

Currently in my 6th-7th play through rn on switch. Don’t know why I always come back but it’s always nice no matter if I know the story lines.

Skyrim and Metal Gear solid are very important to me, thanks for such great games and the experience that comes with them

Skyrim is awesome. However, I grew up playing Morrowind so my opinions on Oblivion and Skyrim have always been tainted by my memories of Morrowind. I had a hard time with the modernization and simplification of the game systems when Oblivion came out. Also, Skyrim came out the same year as Dark Souls and for me, Dark Souls completely overshadowed Skyrim. I was obsessed with DS and did nothing but play it every day for about 3 whole months on my 360. After that I started college and moved on, never delving deep into Skyrim other than powering through the main quest and calling it a day. Looking back this is the absolute worst way to play Skyrim and in some ways I feel like I never really 'played' it the way it's meant to be played. Basically what I'm trying to say is I'm a boomer that loved Morrowind and therefore was lukewarm on Skyrim on release, but over the years realized while it's not Morrowind it's still a great game. Now that I'm done with college and more established in my career I have time for games again so I've been back to where I left off with Bethesda RPGs. I've been playing Skyrim again and I'm really enjoying it now more than I did when it came out. This video is a great reminder of why Skyrim is so special and still worth playing.

Whenever I played Skyrim I always did a mix of a one handed axe wielding warrior who wore heavy armor and was skilled in mostly destruction and restoration with some sneaking and archery on the side

I still remember my first play through im running towards rorikstead solo , I have a follower (Belrand) but I hadn’t seen him in days as I think we got separated somehow . He was the last thought on my mind when I first saw a dragon on too the hill the horror I had when I realized it was Alduin , as his dragon minion took off flying ready too attack me low and behold as if on Gandalf timing Belrand comes over the hill from the direction of Karthspire firing Ice and lightning helping me take down the dragon . We had a nice little reunion after . Belrands been one of my followers every play through since

i remember when this came out, i was hyped, like over hyped in school, its was the most glorius game i ever seen, and my entry to the world of elder scrolls, now? wow, looks so old.. like very old, just as old call of duty, battlefield and other games, have our standards improved so much since the past 10 years?

This is why Skyrim still gets played to this day. I’m only 14 minutes in, and you are talking about the red water den mission. And I usually run a sneak build. I always pick khajit for this with knight eye ability and immediately get aura whisper shout as soon as possible. Well because of that, I can see right through the deception of the den and I just sneak through the place and kill them all. If I took a different class, i would have had to drink the skooma and experience what you did. And that’s fascinating! Now 13 years later and I still find new things about the game. This game really shows how the little things matter most In a game. Because this game was extremely buggy and has stupid AI for the first 3 years of its life. However it’s these small details why people still play this game. I’m never not finding something new and exciting about this game.

I still love this game it never gets old for me I can always open the game and have fun and relax and all that this game is LEGENDARY

I got it running so good, I have had as many as 30 characters at once, 2/3 non-dragonborn. Some good or bad. I have a blend of music that doesn't replace the original, and still hear new songs for the first time since some are based on region. Magic is, expanded, more balanced and viable. Some of my characters can die in 2-3 hits if I don't block or evade...but mods build on an excellent base. Maybe not the smoothest or easiest to mod for...but I lose my self more than any other game. Weather, clothing, armor, food, water, sleep, camping, hunting, BOOKS...thousands of hours in this game...

First it was the game itself that kept me playing, then it was the dlc, then it was the ports, then it was the mods, and now it's the curated wabbajack modlists that keep me coming back for an easy to set up, fresh, (mostly) polished experience I can get going with in just a couple hours. But honestly at the end of the day none of that would make me want to play Skyrim again if I didn't love the core game Bethesda built.

It's been 9...9 seconds since this video was released

It's crazy i just started playing skyrim a few months ago and everyone in here played it so many years ago

Skyrims been a staple of my life ever since being a very young child due to my brothers, one of whom literally framed our original ps3 copy of Skyrim due to how much he loves it. Skyrims music filling my house at 6:30 in the morning as my brother played before school is seered into my brain

Skyrim will always be my favorite game of all time, but I don’t know, I just lost the love of playing it. I haven’t *actually* played it in maybe a year or two. I try to hop on every couple months & there’s just nothing there for me. It just feels empty. I mod it (Xbox) but I’ve played it so much that I just know what to expect with everything & nearly every quest, so I just walk around & appreciate the scenery & kill random shit for 10 minutes & then get off. I really miss playing it. I tried with Elder Scrolls Online but MMORPG’s just aren’t my cup of tea.

Day 3 of watching all your content And I have to say that this is skne really incredible work

For me its the Mods. I just finally put my 1660ti to work. it was a recent upgrade gifted to me from my 10603gb. and my God I never thought the game could look so beautiful. 8K-4K textures. using Skyrim 2020 parallax , and noble skyrim 2k. while using Rudy ENB for cathedral weathers. all this while holding 55+ fps. I can't even.

"everybody favorite, stealthy archer" me: stealthy heavy armored ebony knight with 2 handed axe that shoot magically enchanted crossbow

For the ebony warrior, I just used Mehrune’s Razor (which has a small chance of instant kill) and I was lucky enough to get instant kill on the first hit. I never knew he was that hard to beat lmfao.

Its still played cause is friken amazing I recently bought the anniversary edition that has the dlc plus alot of other stuff like extra quests armor spells and more

One of my favorite characters I ever played was Gor-Korbolg, a heavy armor-wearing, battle axe-wielding orc - I know, right? But about fifty hours or so into the game, I got tired of "run up to guy and slash him to death". Rather than scrap Korbolg and the dozens of hours spent playing with him, I decided to pivot and get him an education instead; He joined the college and became a conjuration wizard. Fun fact - conjured weapons scale with your conjuration skill, obviously... But they ALSO scale with the respective weapon skill. Meaning Korbolg, being a master of both two handed weapons and conjuration, wielded one of the most powerful axes in all of Tamriel. So he had his conjuration magic to summon an army of atronachs, and if the mood arose, he could summon an axe and relive the good ol days. I played him for another sixty hours after that.

The elder scrolls wouldn’t be what it is without Jeremy Soule! His music is what makes me go back. Oblivion had some of the most nostalgic music to me nowadays and it keeps me coming back plenty of times.

Wow! Lol i had no idea you would get captured if you drank the red water skooma. I always just murdered the guards and took the key and explored it myself.

I like most of this video but you had a few problems towards the end with guilds. I think you were too brief about the Thieves Guild when it came to the story of Karliah and the Nightingales, only mentioning the Nightingales after the quest line ended. You are also wrong about the Companions and the twins Farkas and Vilkas. They haven't been around since the guild started because the guild started during the days of Ysgromar

i just want to point out that archery, enchanting and Alchemy are not technically a part of those respective trees, but are between, which fits those skills thematically.

I started playing it in November of 2021 and I love it

Almost a two hour video on Skyrim you say? Like commented and subscribed 👍

I still play fallout 4 several times a month with a mod I made (the happy scraper) to rebuild cars by searching the city and badlands for components and raw materials to make sub systems that are used to make systems that are used to make parts to then assemble into complet cars. I do not still play Fallout 4 (for way more than 10 years) because my mod is so great, I still play because the world is so great. You just need to give the player a half decent excuse to return to the world to do stuff.

Lores,dungeons,potions,quests Serena and ..... are things that make me play skyrim again and again