The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall
Encyclopedia
The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall is a first-person, traditional role-playing video game
for MS-DOS
developed by Bethesda Softworks
and released in 1996. It is a sequel to the RPG The Elder Scrolls: Arena
and the second installment in The Elder Scrolls
series. On July 9, 2009, it was made available as a free download on the Elder Scrolls website. It is the first game in the series to be rated M.
games, players are not required to follow questlines or fill specific character archetypes.
Daggerfall features a spell-creation system where, through the Mages Guild, players can create custom spells with several different effects. The game will then automatically generate the mana
cost of the spell based on the power of the effects chosen.
Other features include an equipment enchantment system (similar in concept to the spell creation system); the ability to buy houses and ships; a variety of clothing and equipment; dynamic political relationships between kingdoms; the ability to become a vampire
, werewolf
, or wereboar; and the combat system, which uses mouse movement to determine the direction and effect of weapon swings in melee combat.
The political system is supported by a net of guilds, orders, and religions, all with unique tasks and quests. Joining and contributing to these organizations allow the player to raise ranks and gain a reputation in the game world, which affects how NPCs and other factions view the player.
Daggerfall has genre-typical gore elements and some sexual topics. It displays cartoonish nudity (showing breasts but no genitals) both on NPCs
and on the character's paper doll
when all equipment is removed. The game installer includes a password-protected childgard feature that hides blood and corpses (instead showing just the skeleton of the corpse), disables sexual topics (though not removing all nudity), and ensures the character portrait is wearing underwear at all times.
Daggerfall, like the other games in the Elder Scrolls
series, takes place on the fictional continent of Tamriel. In Daggerfall, the player may travel within the High Rock and Hammerfell provinces of Tamriel. A wide range of formidable enemies, the strongest of which are the Daedra, make the journey through these realms difficult.
Bethesda claims that the scale of the game is equal to twice the size of Great Britain: around 487,000 square kilometers. The game world features over 15,000 towns, cities, villages, and dungeons for the player's character to explore. According to Todd Howard
, Game Director and Executive Producer for Bethesda Game Studios, the game's sequel, The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
, is 0.01% the size of Daggerfall, but it should be noted most of Daggerfalls terrain was randomly generated. Vvardenfell, the explorable part of Morrowind in the third game has 10 square miles (25.9 square kilometers). The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
has approximately 16 square miles (41.4 square kilometers) to explore. In Daggerfall, there are 750,000+ non-player character
s (NPCs) for the player to interact with, compared to the count of around 1,000 NPCs found in Morrowind and Oblivion. However, the geography and the characters in these later games are much more detailed.
An automap was implemented to help players navigate through the lengthy tombs and ancient underground fortresses. Players have to visit approximately 6-8 areas in order to finish the game, although a total of 47 areas are present. A limited array of building blocks were used to construct the towns and dungeons, causing some reviewers to complain about the game's monotony. In 2002, Morrowind, the third game in the series, responded to this issue with a smaller, more detailed world containing unique-looking cities and NPCs with greater individuality.
' s release in March 1994. The new project saw Ted Peterson assigned the role of Lead Game Designer. Originally titled Mournhold and set in Morrowind
, the game was eventually relocated to the provinces of High Rock
and Hammerfell, in Tamriel's northwest. Daggerfall saw the replacement of Arena' s experience-point-based system with one that rewarded the player for actually role-playing their character and revolved around skills. Alongside skill-set tweaking, Daggerfall came equipped with an improved character generation engine, which included not only Arena' s basic class choices but also a class
creation system. The system, which was designed primarily by Peterson with influences from GURPS
, allowed players to create their own classes, assigning their own skills. Peterson notes that he's always enjoyed character-creation systems and that, although he doesn't "like playing Gamma World
", even now he'll sometimes "roll the dice and see what kind of mutations my character would develop if I actually wanted to play the game". "I know", he says, "I'm weird." Daggerfall was initially developed with an updated 2.5D
Raycast engine, like Doom' s, but it was eventually dropped in favor of the XnGine
engine. Daggerfall realized an immense game world, filled with 15,000 towns and a population of 750,000.
Daggerfall saw little influence from other video games of the time. "Computer role-playing games weren't very interesting while we were working on Daggerfall. I can remember playing the latest King's Quest
, Doom, and Sam and Max Hit the Road
while working on it, but I can't say they had any profound impact on the story or design." The game's most profound influences came from whatever games and literature Julian LeFay or Ted Peterson happened to be playing or reading at the time, such as Dumas
's The Man in the Iron Mask
, which influenced "the quest where the player had to find the missing Prince of Sentinel", and Vampire: The Masquerade
, which influenced "the idea of vampire tribes throughout the region". Daggerfall' s plot was opened up beyond Arena' s cliché
d and linear "find the eight missing pieces of the Staff of Chaos and use it to rescue the Emperor from a dimensional prison", and "that most cliched of all role-playing conventions, slaying the wicked wizard", to a "complex series of adventures leading to multiple resolutions". Daggerfall was released on August 31, 1996, within the game's intended release window. Similar to Arena
, the original release suffered from buggy code. Although Daggerfall' s code was, in contrast to Arena' s, patchable
, the yearning to avoid, in LeFay's words, "all the stupid patches we had for Daggerfall" led to a more cautious release schedule in the future. Ted Peterson left Bethesda following Daggerfall' s release and went to work for a series of companies in Los Angeles
and San Francisco: Film Roman
, AnyRiver Entertainment, Activision
, and Savage Entertainment.
On July 9, 2009, Bethesda made Daggerfall available as a free, legal download on their website, commemorating the 15th anniversary of the Elder Scrolls franchise .
tools like later Elder Scrolls series releases, enthusiasts for the game developed tools on their own to access the game's content soon after its release. As a result, a number of additional quests, graphical enhancements, and gameplay features were developed by third parties. Notable works include AndyFall and DaedraFall. In addition, some mod makers have devoted time to repairing some of the remaining bugs in the latest official release of Daggerfall, the DFQFIX quest-fix pack and HackFall being the most recent attempts at this.
of many different classic game engines, including Daggerfall. It has been in development since June 2009. It was initially called DaggerXL, and was being developed alongside another game engine rewrite project until 2011, when DaggerXL and the other project were merged together, creating the XL Engine in the process.
The eventual goal of the project is to create an updated playing environment for classic 3D games, capable of being run on modern operating systems (as opposed to being run in DOS or through DOSBox). Past this, additional goals - for Daggerfall specifically - include the implementation of features that were initially promised for the game, but were not included or only partially coded in for the final release of the game.
As of June 2011, DaggerXL supports character creation, the rendering of all provinces and dungeons, user-definable display resolution (including smoothed terrain and Bloom
), and basic gameplay. Additional gameplay features and bug-fixes are currently being coded for future releases of DaggerXL.
is used to run the game.
Role-playing video game
Role-playing video games are a video game genre with origins in pen-and-paper role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons, using much of the same terminology, settings and game mechanics. The player in RPGs controls one character, or several adventuring party members, fulfilling one or many quests...
for MS-DOS
MS-DOS
MS-DOS is an operating system for x86-based personal computers. It was the most commonly used member of the DOS family of operating systems, and was the main operating system for IBM PC compatible personal computers during the 1980s to the mid 1990s, until it was gradually superseded by operating...
developed by Bethesda Softworks
Bethesda Softworks
Bethesda Softworks, LLC, is an American video game company. A subsidiary of ZeniMax Media, the company was originally based in Bethesda, Maryland and eventually moved to their current location in Rockville, Maryland...
and released in 1996. It is a sequel to the RPG The Elder Scrolls: Arena
The Elder Scrolls: Arena
The Elder Scrolls: Arena is the first game in the Elder Scrolls series. It is a first-person computer role-playing game for MS-DOS, developed by Bethesda Softworks and released in 1994...
and the second installment in The Elder Scrolls
The Elder Scrolls
The Elder Scrolls is a role-playing video game series developed by Bethesda Game Studios and published by Bethesda Softworks.-History:...
series. On July 9, 2009, it was made available as a free download on the Elder Scrolls website. It is the first game in the series to be rated M.
Gameplay
In Daggerfall, as in all The Elder ScrollsThe Elder Scrolls
The Elder Scrolls is a role-playing video game series developed by Bethesda Game Studios and published by Bethesda Softworks.-History:...
games, players are not required to follow questlines or fill specific character archetypes.
Daggerfall features a spell-creation system where, through the Mages Guild, players can create custom spells with several different effects. The game will then automatically generate the mana
Magic point
Magic points are units of magical power that are used in many role-playing, computer role-playing and similar games as an expendable resource that is needed to pay for magic spells and other abilities, such as special attacks...
cost of the spell based on the power of the effects chosen.
Other features include an equipment enchantment system (similar in concept to the spell creation system); the ability to buy houses and ships; a variety of clothing and equipment; dynamic political relationships between kingdoms; the ability to become a vampire
Vampire
Vampires are mythological or folkloric beings who subsist by feeding on the life essence of living creatures, regardless of whether they are undead or a living person...
, werewolf
Werewolf
A werewolf, also known as a lycanthrope , is a mythological or folkloric human with the ability to shapeshift into a wolf or an anthropomorphic wolf-like creature, either purposely or after being placed under a curse...
, or wereboar; and the combat system, which uses mouse movement to determine the direction and effect of weapon swings in melee combat.
The political system is supported by a net of guilds, orders, and religions, all with unique tasks and quests. Joining and contributing to these organizations allow the player to raise ranks and gain a reputation in the game world, which affects how NPCs and other factions view the player.
Daggerfall has genre-typical gore elements and some sexual topics. It displays cartoonish nudity (showing breasts but no genitals) both on NPCs
Non-player character
A non-player character , sometimes known as a non-person character or non-playable character, in a game is any fictional character not controlled by a player. In electronic games, this usually means a character controlled by the computer through artificial intelligence...
and on the character's paper doll
Paper doll (video games)
In computer and console role-playing games, a paper doll is a way of representing a character's inventory and currently used equipment.In games that use a paper doll inventory management, the different player characters are usually shown posing the same way...
when all equipment is removed. The game installer includes a password-protected childgard feature that hides blood and corpses (instead showing just the skeleton of the corpse), disables sexual topics (though not removing all nudity), and ensures the character portrait is wearing underwear at all times.
Game world
The Elder Scrolls
The Elder Scrolls is a role-playing video game series developed by Bethesda Game Studios and published by Bethesda Softworks.-History:...
series, takes place on the fictional continent of Tamriel. In Daggerfall, the player may travel within the High Rock and Hammerfell provinces of Tamriel. A wide range of formidable enemies, the strongest of which are the Daedra, make the journey through these realms difficult.
Bethesda claims that the scale of the game is equal to twice the size of Great Britain: around 487,000 square kilometers. The game world features over 15,000 towns, cities, villages, and dungeons for the player's character to explore. According to Todd Howard
Todd Howard
Todd Howard is an American designer, director, and producer. He is currently Game Director and Executive Producer for Bethesda Game Studios, where he has led the creation of Fallout 3 and The Elder Scrolls video game series. GamePro magazine named him to the Top 20 Most Influential People in Gaming...
, Game Director and Executive Producer for Bethesda Game Studios, the game's sequel, The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, often simply referred to as Morrowind, is a single-player computer role-playing game developed by Bethesda Game Studios, and published by Bethesda Softworks and Ubisoft. It is the third installment in The Elder Scrolls series of games, following The Elder Scrolls...
, is 0.01% the size of Daggerfall, but it should be noted most of Daggerfalls terrain was randomly generated. Vvardenfell, the explorable part of Morrowind in the third game has 10 square miles (25.9 square kilometers). The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is a single-player action role-playing video game developed by Bethesda Game Studios and published by Bethesda Softworks and the Take-Two Interactive subsidiary 2K Games...
has approximately 16 square miles (41.4 square kilometers) to explore. In Daggerfall, there are 750,000+ non-player character
Non-player character
A non-player character , sometimes known as a non-person character or non-playable character, in a game is any fictional character not controlled by a player. In electronic games, this usually means a character controlled by the computer through artificial intelligence...
s (NPCs) for the player to interact with, compared to the count of around 1,000 NPCs found in Morrowind and Oblivion. However, the geography and the characters in these later games are much more detailed.
An automap was implemented to help players navigate through the lengthy tombs and ancient underground fortresses. Players have to visit approximately 6-8 areas in order to finish the game, although a total of 47 areas are present. A limited array of building blocks were used to construct the towns and dungeons, causing some reviewers to complain about the game's monotony. In 2002, Morrowind, the third game in the series, responded to this issue with a smaller, more detailed world containing unique-looking cities and NPCs with greater individuality.
Story
Daggerfall is a city in the Breton homeland of High Rock. The player is sent here at the personal request of the emperor. He wants the player to do two things. First, the player must free the ghost of the late King Lysandus from his earthly shackles. Second, the player must discover what happened to a letter from the emperor to a Blades spy in the court of Daggerfall. The letter reveals that Lysandus's mother, Nulfaga, knows the location of the Mantella, the key to resurrecting the first Numidium, a powerful iron golem. The emperor wants his spy to force Nulfaga into revealing the location of the Mantella so that the Blades can finish the reconstruction of the Numidium. Through a series of mishaps and confusions the letter fell into the hands of an orc by the name of Gortworg. Not knowing what the Mantella is, Gortworg consults Mannimarco, the King of Worms (the leader of the Necromancers). During this time the Underking, who originally destroyed the first Numidium because of its misuse by Tiber Septim, is recuperating deep within a tomb of High Rock after expending so much energy destroying it the first time. In order for the player to give the Mantella to anyone, the player must kill King Lysandus's murderer and put his ghost to rest. After accomplishing this, stealing the totem of Tiber Septim from King Gothryd of Daggerfall, and freeing the Mantella from its prison in Aetherius. Following this the player has six choices of how to deal with the Mantella.Endings
Daggerfall has six endings:- If the player activates the Mantella himself while in possession of the totemTotemA totem is a stipulated ancestor of a group of people, such as a family, clan, group, lineage, or tribe.Totems support larger groups than the individual person. In kinship and descent, if the apical ancestor of a clan is nonhuman, it is called a totem...
(the controlling device of the Numidium), the Numidium will slay the player, go out of control, and be destroyed by Imperial forces. It should be noted that although this was listed as a possible ending on the Elder Scroll's official website during the 10th anniversary of the series, there doesn't appear to be any possible way to achieve this ending because the player cannot retrieve the Mantella without giving the totem to one of the major powers first. This ending is possibly just a rumor which even staff of Bethesda that didn't work on the development of Daggerfall were led to believe was true. It is possible to acheive this ending through hacking of game files however the end result is a glitchy mess. - If the player gives the Mantella to the Underking, he absorbs its power, passes into eternal rest, and creates a large "magicka free" area around himself.
- If Gortworg is victorious, he uses the Numidium to destroy the Imperial forces and the "Bay Kings", the rulers of the several provinces of the Iliac Bay. The Underking arrives shortly thereafter to destroy the first Numidium once and for all, losing his own life in the process. Gortworg then succeeds in creating Orsinium, a kingdom of Orcs.
- If the Blades are victorious, they succeed in recreating the first Numidium and use it to defeat the Bay Kings and the Orcs as well as unite all the provinces of Tamriel under the empire once again.
- If any of the Bay Kings win, that king will use the first Numidium to defeat all the other kings just before the Underking destroys him and itself.
- If Mannimarco receives the Mantella, he uses it to make himself a god.
Development
Work on The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall began immediately after ArenaThe Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, often simply referred to as Morrowind, is a single-player computer role-playing game developed by Bethesda Game Studios, and published by Bethesda Softworks and Ubisoft. It is the third installment in The Elder Scrolls series of games, following The Elder Scrolls...
, the game was eventually relocated to the provinces of High Rock
High Rock
High Rock is a former district of the Bahamas. It corresponds roughly to the current district of East Grand Bahama....
and Hammerfell, in Tamriel's northwest. Daggerfall saw the replacement of Arena
Character class
In role-playing games, a common method of arbitrating the capabilities of different game characters is to assign each one to a character class. A character class aggregates several abilities and aptitudes, and may also sometimes detail aspects of background and social standing or impose behaviour...
creation system. The system, which was designed primarily by Peterson with influences from GURPS
GURPS
The Generic Universal RolePlaying System, or GURPS, is a tabletop role-playing game system designed to allow for play in any game setting...
, allowed players to create their own classes, assigning their own skills. Peterson notes that he's always enjoyed character-creation systems and that, although he doesn't "like playing Gamma World
Gamma World
Gamma World is a science fantasy role-playing game, originally designed by James M. Ward and Gary Jaquet, and first published by TSR in 1978. It borrowed heavily from James M. Ward's earlier product, Metamorphosis Alpha.-Setting:...
", even now he'll sometimes "roll the dice and see what kind of mutations my character would develop if I actually wanted to play the game". "I know", he says, "I'm weird." Daggerfall was initially developed with an updated 2.5D
2.5D
2.5D , 3/4 perspective and pseudo-3D are terms used to describe either:* 2D graphical projections and techniques which cause a series of images or scenes to fake or appear to be three-dimensional when in fact they are not, or* gameplay in an otherwise three-dimensional video game that is...
Raycast engine, like Doom
XnGine
XnGine was a 3D engine developed by Bethesda Softworks.In 1997 support for higher resolutions was added and in 1998 it was made compatible with 3dfx graphics cards....
engine. Daggerfall realized an immense game world, filled with 15,000 towns and a population of 750,000.
Daggerfall saw little influence from other video games of the time. "Computer role-playing games weren't very interesting while we were working on Daggerfall. I can remember playing the latest King's Quest
King's Quest
King's Quest is an adventure game series created by the American software company Sierra Entertainment. It is widely considered a classic series from the golden era of adventure games. Following the success of its first installment, the series was primarily responsible for building the reputation...
, Doom, and Sam and Max Hit the Road
Sam & Max Hit the Road
Sam & Max Hit the Road is a graphic adventure computer game released by LucasArts during the company's adventure games era. The game was originally released for DOS in 1993 and for Mac OS in 1995. A 2002 re-release included compatibility with Windows and Amiga...
while working on it, but I can't say they had any profound impact on the story or design." The game's most profound influences came from whatever games and literature Julian LeFay or Ted Peterson happened to be playing or reading at the time, such as Dumas
Alexandre Dumas, père
Alexandre Dumas, , born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie was a French writer, best known for his historical novels of high adventure which have made him one of the most widely read French authors in the world...
's The Man in the Iron Mask
The Vicomte de Bragelonne
The Vicomte of Bragelonne: Ten Years Later is a novel by Alexandre Dumas. It is the third and last of the d'Artagnan Romances, following The Three Musketeers and Twenty Years After. It appeared first in serial form between 1847 and 1850...
, which influenced "the quest where the player had to find the missing Prince of Sentinel", and Vampire: The Masquerade
Vampire: The Masquerade
Vampire: The Masquerade is a role-playing game. Created by Mark Rein·Hagen, it was the first of White Wolf Game Studio's World of Darkness role-playing games, based on the Storyteller System and centered around vampires in a modern gothic-punk world....
, which influenced "the idea of vampire tribes throughout the region". Daggerfall
Cliché
A cliché or cliche is an expression, idea, or element of an artistic work which has been overused to the point of losing its original meaning or effect, especially when at some earlier time it was considered meaningful or novel. In phraseology, the term has taken on a more technical meaning,...
d and linear "find the eight missing pieces of the Staff of Chaos and use it to rescue the Emperor from a dimensional prison", and "that most cliched of all role-playing conventions, slaying the wicked wizard", to a "complex series of adventures leading to multiple resolutions". Daggerfall was released on August 31, 1996, within the game's intended release window. Similar to Arena
Arena
An arena is an enclosed area, often circular or oval-shaped, designed to showcase theater, musical performances, or sporting events. It is composed of a large open space surrounded on most or all sides by tiered seating for spectators. The key feature of an arena is that the event space is the...
, the original release suffered from buggy code. Although Daggerfall
Patch (computing)
A patch is a piece of software designed to fix problems with, or update a computer program or its supporting data. This includes fixing security vulnerabilities and other bugs, and improving the usability or performance...
, the yearning to avoid, in LeFay's words, "all the stupid patches we had for Daggerfall" led to a more cautious release schedule in the future. Ted Peterson left Bethesda following Daggerfall
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
and San Francisco: Film Roman
Film Roman
Film Roman is an animation studio founded by Phil Roman, best known for producing the animation for The Simpsons, King of the Hill for 20th Century Fox, as well as the Garfield and Peanuts animated TV specials....
, AnyRiver Entertainment, Activision
Activision
Activision is an American publisher, majority owned by French conglomerate Vivendi SA. Its current CEO is Robert Kotick. It was founded on October 1, 1979 and was the world's first independent developer and distributor of video games for gaming consoles...
, and Savage Entertainment.
On July 9, 2009, Bethesda made Daggerfall available as a free, legal download on their website, commemorating the 15th anniversary of the Elder Scrolls franchise .
Modding
Although Daggerfall did not come with official moddingMod (computer gaming)
Mod or modification is a term generally applied to personal computer games , especially first-person shooters, role-playing games and real-time strategy games. Mods are made by the general public or a developer, and can be entirely new games in themselves, but mods are not standalone software and...
tools like later Elder Scrolls series releases, enthusiasts for the game developed tools on their own to access the game's content soon after its release. As a result, a number of additional quests, graphical enhancements, and gameplay features were developed by third parties. Notable works include AndyFall and DaedraFall. In addition, some mod makers have devoted time to repairing some of the remaining bugs in the latest official release of Daggerfall, the DFQFIX quest-fix pack and HackFall being the most recent attempts at this.
XL Engine
The XL Engine is a rewriteRewrite (programming)
A rewrite in computer programming is the act or result of re-implementing a large portion of existing functionality without re-use of its source code. When the rewrite is not using existing code at all, it is common to speak of a rewrite from scratch...
of many different classic game engines, including Daggerfall. It has been in development since June 2009. It was initially called DaggerXL, and was being developed alongside another game engine rewrite project until 2011, when DaggerXL and the other project were merged together, creating the XL Engine in the process.
The eventual goal of the project is to create an updated playing environment for classic 3D games, capable of being run on modern operating systems (as opposed to being run in DOS or through DOSBox). Past this, additional goals - for Daggerfall specifically - include the implementation of features that were initially promised for the game, but were not included or only partially coded in for the final release of the game.
As of June 2011, DaggerXL supports character creation, the rendering of all provinces and dungeons, user-definable display resolution (including smoothed terrain and Bloom
Bloom (shader effect)
Bloom is a computer graphics effect used in computer games, demos and high dynamic range rendering to reproduce an imaging artifact of real-world cameras. The effect produces fringes of light around very bright objects in an image, obscuring fine details...
), and basic gameplay. Additional gameplay features and bug-fixes are currently being coded for future releases of DaggerXL.
DaggerfallSetup
DaggerfallSetup is a Daggerfall installer for modern Windows. The aim of this project is to install and easily run a fully patched Daggerfall on a modern Windows operating system. The setup contains many official and unofficial patches and translations for the game. DOSBoxDOSBox
DOSBox is emulator software that emulates an IBM PC compatible computer running MS-DOS. It is intended especially for use with old PC games. DOSBox is free software....
is used to run the game.
External links
- Official The Elder Scrolls site
- UESP Daggerfall Wiki
- The Daggerfall Embassy
- Daggerfall Tool Repository Unofficial patches, and game editing tools and information.
- Daggerfall Resources