Why I wanted Morrowind for my 13th birthday

There were two main reasons I wanted Morrowind for my birthday eight years ago:

1) My best friend said it was good, and his taste in games has always been excellent. He introduced me to the Oddworld series and Little Big Adventure, after all.

2) My school friends and I were hyped about a game called Fable, which had not come out yet. It was going to be the greatest game ever. I assumed Morrowind would be the next best thing to play while I waited. Over time though, I’d realise Morrowind is many times more ambitious, memorable, and plain better than Fable.

Days before my 13^th birthday, I sneaked into my mother’s room, stole the bag containing Morrowind from the top of her wardrobe, and snuck* back to my room to play it. It wasn’t pure excitement that made me do this. I was also scared of being disappointed by my birthday present, because it was only a ‘placeholder’ while waiting for Fable.

As it turned out, I didn’t like Morrowind that first afternoon.

At the beginning of the game (as in all Elder Scrolls titles) you are a prisoner; this time on a ship. When the ship docks at Morrowind, you are released there for mysterious reasons. When your character moves up the ladder from the dark cabin onto the deck, it is meant to be a moment where you say wow. But I thought the characters looked silly, like cardboard cut-outs scattered over the sludgy landscape. Some people say it looked amazing at release, but I was playing two years later.

I took the disc out of my Xbox and put the game back on top of my mother’s wardrobe with guilty disappointment. I had made her waste £15 on a birthday present I no longer wanted.

However, back at school, I began talking about the game with the friend who had recommended it. By that time I’d found Balmora, the game’s first proper town. My character trudged there through swamps and a mountain pass; I hadn’t yet discovered the silt striders, giant flea-like insects which shuttle your character between locations.

As my friend and I discussed the game more, he helped me overcome the confusing beginning. My initial bad impression turned into an obsession with the game and its world.

Below are some of the reasons I became so taken with Morrowind.

1) It’s not very pretty. I began to see the game’s ugliness, which put me off when I first played it, as a kind of rough beauty. The game world feels as if it has existed hundreds of years before you ever set foot there.

I can see why some people like to download modifications to change the way Morrowind looks. They want higher resolution textures, for example, or prettier faces for the characters you encounter. I have tried these mods; after a few minutes of play, I want my old Morrowind back. Bethesda created a world with a very unique look. The starting area is called the ‘Bitter Coast’ for a reason.

2) The weather cycles. It’s late evening. As you walk through the wilderness, the setting sun turns the landscape yellow. You’re headed towards a fort in the distance for some shelter. As you run over a bridge and past twisted trees, the screen lights up with a flash of lightning. There’s a clap of thunder. The sound rolls around the landscape, and rain pours down as you enter the fort’s courtyard.

This game actually made me pay more attention to the weather in real life. That sounds silly. But in the same way a well-written description of food can make you crave, for example, a cooked breakfast, Morrowind’s thunderstorms made me savour their real-life occurrences. You can almost smell the damp earth.

3) It doesn’t go out of its way to help you. I’m sure many have been put off Morrowind because it doesn’t make much of an attempt to settle you in.  Other players argue that the game does, in fact, tell you where to go. The guard at the Census and Excise office sends you to Balmora, to give the mysterious package to Caius Cosades.

But that isn’t the point. There is a difference between being told where to go and knowing how to get there. The mysterious town of ‘Balmora’ seems very far away when you’re new to the game. You’ve just been dumped in the tiny seaport village of Seyda Neen, and no one is in a hurry to tell you where to go next.

Admittedly, this feeling of being lost and isolated seems like a minus. The reason I like this aspect of the game is probably more to do with the fact I first played it when I was 13. Back then, I excitedly discussed its intricacies with a friend. If I played it for the first time now, the lack of clear directions would probably put me off.

Despite this, there is a lot to be said for Morrowind’s atmospheric experience, the feeling that you are a ‘stranger in a strange land’. Instead, most modern games point the way to go with floating arrows and dialogue boxes.

There is a fine line between creating atmosphere and making players feel bored and frustrated, and Morrowind comes close to crossing that line at times. Still, the experience is worth it if you have the patience.

4) Again, the atmosphere.

There are hundreds of unique books to read. Hidden stashes of moon sugar to stumble across. Scary tentacled monsters on the loading screens to be terrified of running into in-game. A number of funny secrets and unnecessary things to discover, such as a hermit lizardman who collects forks.

If you haven’t already tried the game, I can’t say whether it will hold up for you. If you feel lost, there isn’t too much shame in consulting the internet for directions, especially when the in-game ‘journal’ doesn’t properly record where to go next.

I feel very nostalgic about Morrowind, but I’m not sure I’ll ever play the game again seriously. It’s a big time investment, and I’ve already put a few hundred hours into it over the years.

*apparently both 'sneaked' and 'snuck' are correct English, so I used both!