Even though essentially nothing has been revealed about it,The Elder Scrolls 6is still top-of-mind for many gaming fans, especially those who experienced the historical significance ofSkyrim. Fans havespeculated endlessly aboutThe Elder Scrolls 6’s central elements, like its setting and story, but more important than these big-ticket details is how the game will actually play, and whether it will be able to provide an RPG experience worthy of its pedigree.
The RPG genre isn’t what it was back in 2011 whenSkyrimfirst sauntered onto the scene and was proclaimed a masterpiece. While vital elements like real-time combat mechanics weren’t typically prized in Western RPGs during that time, subsequent releases likeThe Witcher 3andElden Ringhave shown audiences that games can have vast open worlds, deep storytelling, and mechanical depth all at once—they didn’t need to choose between these strengths. So, whenThe Elder Scrolls 6eventually comes around, it may have to provide gameplay that stacks up against its competition, fleshing out its build-crafting, strategic elements, and execution. There are countless ways to achieve these goals, but one fundamental change could tackle them all at once.
The Elder Scrolls 6 Could Get a Lot of Mileage From a Higher Companion Limit
The Elder Scrolls 6: More Companions, More Gameplay Opportunities
Typically, Bethesda RPGs only allow players to travel with a single companion at a time. So, if aSkyrimplayer were traveling with Lydia, the companion that most players will encounter before all others, they wouldn’t be able to join forces with, say, Serana, without parting ways with Lydia first. And while swapping these companions out for one another isn’t exactly difficult, it’s far from the most interesting way to do things, as there’s no real room for growth or experimentation: the game simply forces the player to choose one. And since these followers' stats are only vaguely defined, it’s hard to determine the material benefits of switching one out for the other.
Most of these issues also apply to thecompanion systems of theFalloutgames, as well asStarfield.
But ifThe Elder Scrolls 6were to amend the traditional system, allowing players to travel with more than one companion at once, there would be a lot more to chew on. Combat would be easier with more companions, certainly, but there could also be ways to interact with companion NPCs on a deeper mechanical level, with the game rewarding players who put thought into party composition. Of course, this would require Bethesda Game Studios to essentially rework its age-old companion system, but this might be necessary regardless. Plus, there are plenty of great examples to follow.
How The Elder Scrolls 6 Could Make a Broader Companion System Work
There are a number of routes that Bethesda Game Studios could take with respect to fleshing out andmodernizing its follower system inThe Elder Scrolls 6, but in essence, the developer should strive to inject the game with dynamism through party composition. It could provide quantifiable information about each companion, perhaps having them adhere to a traditional class system (tank, healer, etc.), which would thus inform the player’s decisions about whom to take with them. If the game were to allow players to have two or three companions at once rather than just one, then this loose class system would be all the more rewarding, as players could mix and match different character archetypes, following the rubric of games likeBaldur’s Gate 3andMass Effect.
Of course, BGS games are all about setting out on a vast, unfamiliar world on one’s own, so this kind of feature would need to be totally optional, but it’s hard to imagine how it would do any harm.The Elder Scrolls 6shouldn’t lose its identity, but borrowing from other party-based RPGs in this way could definitely kick its overall gameplay scheme up a notch.
