Selv her næsten femten år efter udgivelsen er The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim stadig et af de mest populære spil nogensinde. En, der stadig undrer sig over spillets vedvarende succes, er Bruce Nesmith - chefdesigner på det ikoniske RPG.
"By all rights, a year later, some other game should have eclipsed it. And then two years later, three years later, five, ten. It's like 'what the hell is going on here?'" fortalte Nesmith i en nylig podcast med FRVR. "Todd [Howard] would even go to these meetings and show us information, which I can't give you the details of, about how many people are playing it. It's like, 'You've got to be kidding me?' Seriously, still, ten years later."
Ifølge Nesmith skyldes Skyrims evige liv især dets åbne verden. "We didn't put anything off limits. We didn't try to manage the experience," sagde han. "We let it be your experience, it was a player-driven experience. And very, very few games have mastered that because open world is now almost a cliché statement. 'Oh yeah, we have open world.'"
Der er dog også noget mere udefinerbart, der gør Skyrim tidløst. Det er langt fra fejlfrit, men som Nesmith påpeger, formår det at skabe illusionen af, at hver spiller får sin helt egen oplevelse - og det er en sjældenhed i dag.
Vi kan kun håbe, at The Elder Scrolls VI formår at indfange den samme magi, når det endelig udkommer.
