The Elder Scrolls: Chapter II - Daggerfall (DOS)

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Description

Daggerfall is a sequel to The Elder Scrolls: Arena; it is set in the same medieval fantasy world Tamriel - more specifically, in the homeland of the Breton race, known as High Rock, and the province Hammerfell, home of the Redguards. The game's title is derived from the name of High Rock's capital city.

The main protagonist travels to Daggerfall at the request of the emperor Uriel Septim. His mission involves freeing the ghost of the late King Lysandus. Apparently, a letter concerning the king and sent by the emperor to the court in Daggerfall contains information about a dangerous ancient power. It is now up to the hero to retrieve the letter, reveal the dark secret that has been preserved in the king's family, and eventually discover the key to the resurrection of an iron golem who wields immense power.

Like its predecessor, Daggerfall is an open-ended role-playing game, in which the main quest is but a small fraction of the various missions and assignments the player is able to undertake. The game is notable for breaking records concerning the size of its world (though much of it has been generated randomly). Interaction with hundreds of thousands of non-playable characters is possible. The player is free to join one of the many political and social organizations of Tamriel, as well as pursue a personal quest for power. The player is able to buy houses, ships, and horses, as well as become a werewolf, a vampire, or a wereboar.

Combat in Daggerfall is action-based: the player uses the mouse to determine the direction and the power of sword swings and shots from a ranged weapon. Character growth is handled somewhat similarly to that of Quest for Glory games: the more the player performs an action, the better the protagonist becomes at it. For example, swinging the sword will eventually increase the player character's attack power and skill with that weapon, etc. This extends to non-combat activities such as jumping, bartering, speaking foreign languages, etc. Leveling up occurs when several main and secondary skills have been raised sufficiently. During character generation the player is given the option to create and name his or her custom classes by combining attributes and skills.

Screenshots

Promo Images

Trailer

Alternate Titles

• "Daggerfall: The Elder Scrolls - Chapter 2" -- French title
• "Daggerfall: Die Schriften der Weisen" -- German title

Part of the Following Groups

• 3D Engine: XnGine
• Elder Scrolls series
• Fantasy Creatures: Elves
• Fantasy Creatures: Orcs
• Game feature: In-game screenshot capture
• Gameplay feature: Alchemy
• Gameplay feature: Character development - Repetition
• Gameplay feature: Day / Night cycle
• Gameplay feature: Paper doll inventory
• Gameplay feature: Pickpocketing
• Games with randomly generated environments
• Live action cut-scenes

User Reviews

Where wereboars visit endless cities on sleepless nights	Unicorn Lynx (181614)
A massive, ambitious masterpiece that just missed 'perfect'.	ShadowShrike (303)
A complete world in a box, and the freedom to do what you want.	Steve Hall (352)
If open ended gameplay is your thing, look no further	Mattias Kreku (439)
Daggerfall, in the humble opinion of this simple reviewer, is quite simply THE greatest CRPG in existence...	Omniscia (37)	unrated
Is that a pixel in your pocket or are you just glad to see me?	Jacques Guy (55)	unrated
Deep...Very Deep.	Alexandre Reis (4)	unrated
A classic that brings together the first person with RPG elements!	Perfil Falso (3314)

Critic Reviews

Quandary	Nov 05, 1996		90
Retro Archives	Jan 28, 2019	18 out of 20	90
Computer Gaming World (CGW)	Dec, 1996		90
Jeuxvideo.com	Dec 09, 2011	18 out of 20	90
Computer Games Magazine	1996		90
GameSpot	Sep 26, 1996	8.4 out of 10	84
Legendra	Jun 15, 2009		80
Online Gaming Review (OGR)	Oct 26, 1996	8 out of 10	80
Pelit	Oct, 1996	70 out of 100	70
High Score	Jan, 1997	3 out of 5	60

Forums

Topic	# Posts	Last Post
Do these (DOSBox-ed) as a free bonus count as a Windows release?	4	Pseudo_Intellectual (62519) Dec 25, 2015
Daggerfall Soundtrack Remake	1	Pieces of 8-bit Dec 03, 2015
It's FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE	24	Mobygamesisreanimated (11177) Jul 18, 2009

Trivia

Freeware release

The game was offered as freeware on July 9, 2009 in celebration of fifteen years of Elder Scrolls.

Graphics

Daggerfall's creature art is an interesting mix of hand-drawn work and rendered material. All of the creatures, in fact, originally had 6 frames to every animation, but this had to be chopped down considerably to compress the size of the game which was already monstrously large for the time it was released.

The only remaining trace of these original detailed animations is in a "bestiary" video describing several of the creatures of Daggerfall.

Awards

• Computer Gaming World
  • November 1996 (15th anniversary issue) – #8 Top Vaporware Title in Computer Game History
  • May 1997 (Issue #154) – Role-Playing Game of the Year

Information also contributed by PolloDiablo.

Related Web Sites

• Daggerfall at Wikipedia (Information about The Elder Scrolls: Daggerfall at Wikipedia)
• Doug's Daggerfall Page (A Fansite dedicated to Daggerfall.)
• TES: The Essential Site (THE site for Daggerfall, featuring one of the largest surviving conclaves of fans.)
• The Tamriel Compendium (The Tamriel Compendium has lots of info about Daggerfall (and a few files), including a bestiary with creature sounds.)
• The UESP (The Unofficial Elder Scrolls Pages is one of the oldest sites about the Elder Scrolls series. It has huge amounts of information about Daggerfall.)