Official Xbox Magazine UK has a cover story of Skyrim. There are 10 pages about Skyrim with an additional interview with Todd Howard, Bruce Nesmith
Info
- There is a perk that will lower the sound of your footsteps.
- Perk for Axe that enables deeper cuts, which means prolonged bleeding. You can hit someone once and they will eventually bleed out.
- Eventual perk upgrade for Maces that will allow you to hit for full damage, ignoring armor stats.
- The article mentions placing runes on the floor (that we know already) but in particular talks about 'lob a frost rune down and if an enemy wanders over it, shards of ice will be launched through its body'
- Telekinesis is an available spell.
- 'No more agility to build up so don't have to keep jumping around to level up' (I assume they mean no longer skills like acrobatics and athletes but they use the word agility)
- When you kill a dragon you're able to absorb its soul which will make you learn a new dragon shout.
- There is a dragon shout called 'Unrelenting Force' which pushes anything standing directly in front of you backwards.
- Dragon shouts have cooldown periods after each shout performed. Individual shouts will have their own cooldown time.
- In the northern parts of Solitude is the Bard's College. The city is a busy port and there's event similar to bonfire night that has the burning of an effigy of King Olaf.
- Windhelm is the largest city. It has a palace that should look spectacular. This is also apparently the hangout for the Imperial Guards who monitor the path to Morrowind.
- Bleak Falls Barrows is a dungeon, with ancient Nord catacombs which features rivers, tree roots coming through the ceiling and light coming through odd cracks.
- 120 Dungeons and they claim that 'no two areas will be alike'.
- Just to re-confirm this fact straight from Todd Howard. Oblivion had 1 dungeon designer with artists doing the rest. Skyrim has 8 dungeon designers.
- Whole world is hand-crafted. Oblivion had some generated landscapes and there is NONE of that anymore used in Skyrim.
- The Shivering isles expansion inspired the team that unique, hand-crafted cities, where no two buildings look the same, was the way to go.
- Example of a 'Radiant Story'. OXM UK recieved a quest to go to Bleak Falls Barrow and retrieve a golden dragon claw antique and take it back to shopkeeper Lucan. If you killed Lucan, the quest would change to his friend Camilla instead.
- The Snow. Has been a lot of confusion about this. OXM UK says that snowfall is dynamic. Instead of a texture with a bit of white added, landscapes realistically get dusted with snow landing in appropiate nooks and crannies.
- There are one-off puzzles in certain dungeons.
- Example of new AI: 'Wolves have a den. Few times a day they go out and do a patrol and hunt in a pack. If they kill something then they'll hang out there. If you go outside and they're on patrol they will come after you. If they've killed something they will guard that and not chase you down as they want to look after it.
Dragon Shouts
The fact about the 'absorb soul of dragons to learn new shouts' has caused a little bit of confusion.
The dragon shout phases, of up to three words, can be found inscribed on the walls of ancient Nord dungeons. When uttered by the Dragonborn (the player) the words invoke powerful magic powers. For many of the shouts you can learn more phases which in turn will allow you to unleash a lengthier or more powerful version of the shout by holding the shout button down.
This appears to be the main way of learning shouts, by finding the word inscriptions. However the OXM article also mentions that you can learn new shouts in the process of absorbing dragon souls. The article doesn't mention anything else about this, maybe not all dragons give shouts, we don't know yet.
Key Map Locations visible on page 34
- Solitude
- Markarth
- Dawnstar
- Winter Hold
- Windhelm
- Whiterun
- Riften
- Falkreath
edit - These map locations may very well be outdated as OXM have used the old skyrim map with a new colour scheme.
Confirmed Skills
- Alchemy
- Illusion
- Conjuration
- Destruction
- Restoration
- Alteration
- Enchanting
New Screenshots
- Page 31 - We see a dragon on top of snow covered ruins. There is a huge backdrop behind it showing off mountains, new clouds and fog. Draw distance looks great.
- Page 34 - There is a picture of the skyrim worldmap which lists the locations listed above. On 2nd look they've used the same map as the one on the UESP wiki, so it may be outdated.
- Page 38 - A player appears to be wearing Elven armor and dualwielding a sword and staff. The staff is able to cast light along a corrider. (Was in gameinformer but bigger shot here and addition info)
- Page 39 - 2 new screenshots here, we see a hooded stealth character performing a stealth execution (Assassin's Creed style, blade to the chest up close). We see a new dungeon called the 'Hall of Stories' which features a locked door and a puzzle to open it. Stonework looks fantastic with spider webbing across the walls.