How accurate ESO's lore is, compared to Bethesda games?

Lord_Ejl

I mean with all the lore books on history, characters etc. I've heard two different sides of this being an accurate, and not being. My Elder Scrolls playing goes only back to Morrowind, so i have no idea of the first two ones at all.

Jimboo84

Many parts are correct. My history in The Elder Scrolls go back to the very first game, Arena, back in DOS :-)

DovresMalven

Let's just say this: there are books in the game that haven't been written yet in Bethesda's timeline. Also ESO's Tamriel seems like a much more magic-heavy and playful world. Many people who were really really into lore, like many folks at r/teslore were disappointed in ESO's treatment of it. Personally, I wasn't a fan either, but there is still some great storytelling and bits of lore that ESO has brought to the series- if you choose to think of it as cannon.

BabeestorGor

There is also an in-game explanation for why those books are in the game.
Bethesda have rewritten lore themselves when it suited them. I remember huge storms over aspects of the lore and how they were treated over at Bethesda's forums after Oblivion and Skyrim were released.
I'd say ZOS have been as faithful to the lore as Bethesda ever were.

JD2013

The books that don't exist were placed around by Hermaeus Mora, who absolutely would have knowledge and ability to do such things.

It actually seems to be more the folks at r/ElderScrolls who are less accepting of the lore than those in r/teslore.

The thing about setting it during the second era is that there is more room for the devs to do things, as it is set before any of the main series games. Of course, things like the Planemeld won't have been put into books in games like Skyrim because ESO didn't exist yet. It's like how if you made a prequel to a film series, the later series won't mention it because that prequel had not been made yet. So it is impossible to put things into games and films that had not been made yet.

Bethesda may or may not put references to what happens in ESO in lore books in future ES titles, and they may not. Who knows? But there's a big story coming up that will add a lot of possible material for lore books in future games if handled well.

I actually quite like a lot of the lore in ESO. And this is from someone who has played every ES game since Arena. There's nothing that I would describe as massively "Lore Breaking" and Tamriel does seem a little bit more playful and Magical, that is true. But then, it is earlier in the timeline of Nirn than we have ever seen before, so it stands to reason that things are a little more primitive.

ShadowDisciple

you have to keep in mind that lore is there to serve the game and not the other way around...

that said, eso was preety logically placed just in the time Vanus Galerion made mages guild, so that it will make sense when 10000 ppl going around using magic, which is not something many ppl did...and fighters guild was established about 100 years later, so you can fit it in there...and it fits the lore from before eso was even in the works

also TES Arena - Skyrim is all in 3th age, with exception of skyrim which is in 4th age.

so we dont really know MUCH what happened in ESO cuz its the 2nd age...and that part is being currently written with eso.

Rune_Relic

What is Lore ? What is History ?
Its word of mouth or books.
Words get twisted and books get rewritten to suit the cultural bias of the time.
In the end, the only people that really know the historical truth is those that were there.
The further back in time you go the shakier the historical truth becomes.
The only thing we can ever know accurately is the present as we experience it.

History is as accurate as fortune telling.
The further away it is timewise... the less accurate it is.

kirk_lewis_ESO

If you try to follow the lore of any long running franchise, you'll go nuts. Wow is the biggest example i can find. Don't get me started about time travel introduced into games.

UrQuan

"Accurate" is not a word that should ever be associated with TES lore. The lore is built up from many different sources, none of which are completely reliable, and some of which contradict each other. The only way you can ever be completely sure about how an event happened is if you were there and experienced it (and even then you might still be wrong about what really happened). It has always been much like the real world that way.

When you start throwing all kinds of crazy magic, dragon breaks, and manipulations by daedric princes into the mix, nothing is certain.

nordsavage

One could also say that the players first hand account and experiences from ESO's era would take precedent over written or oral "history" found in any other game. Since you saw it happen or were closer to ground zero in the timeline there would logically be less variation and variables subject to (mis)interpretation. As it would be in real life details are lost, changed or embellished over time and history is written by the victorious.

ShadowDisciple

UrQuan wrote: »

"Accurate" is not a word that should ever be associated with TES lore. The lore is built up from many different sources, none of which are completely reliable, and some of which contradict each other. The only way you can ever be completely sure about how an event happened is if you were there and experienced it (and even then you might still be wrong about what really happened). It has always been much like the real world that way.

When you start throwing all kinds of crazy magic, dragon breaks, and manipulations by daedric princes into the mix, nothing is certain.

You went too far with your quasi philosophy lol

ofc its certain..every single bethesda published media is considered canon...and everything in them is as good as set in stone..plotholes happen but theyy are ussually minor and secondary to the main story...

whether you like it or not thats up to you.. ESO is mixed feeling for me...
i like the general story but i dislike reason for putting the 3 alliances together...

Shogunami

ShadowDisciple wrote: »

UrQuan wrote: »

"Accurate" is not a word that should ever be associated with TES lore. The lore is built up from many different sources, none of which are completely reliable, and some of which contradict each other. The only way you can ever be completely sure about how an event happened is if you were there and experienced it (and even then you might still be wrong about what really happened). It has always been much like the real world that way.

When you start throwing all kinds of crazy magic, dragon breaks, and manipulations by daedric princes into the mix, nothing is certain.

You went too far with your quasi philosophy lol

ofc its certain..every single bethesda published media is considered canon...and everything in them is as good as set in stone..plotholes happen but theyy are ussually minor and secondary to the main story...

whether you like it or not thats up to you.. ESO is mixed feeling for me...
i like the general story but i dislike reason for putting the 3 alliances together...

You fail, lol. There was nothing "quasi" about what UrQuan stated.

UrQuan is objectively correct, what he describes is what is actually true in when it comes knowledge (epistemology or whatever).
The only thing that is really real is what you experience, the experiential evidence.

"every single bethesda published media is considered canon". True, the experiences you can have in those games are canon, but there are books, rumors, sayings and all kinds of things in the games that are incorrect and contradictory in the games. Not (only) because of developer mistakes, but also intentionally.
Canon can also retroactively change somewhat, as seen in some previous TES games.

Forestd16b14_ESO

Well hard to say cause in the other TES games their isn't many books dateing all the way back to the 2nd era unless it was tied to Talos of Atmora and he didn't show up till the end of the 2nd era while ESO takes place right in the middle.

Some book refreance how in the 2nd era before Talos that Cyrodiil were like the jungles of Elswyer but the special ESO lore book you received for getting the Imperial edition of the game states that those books of the 3rd and 4th era were "mis-translated" and the Cyrodiil never was a vast jungle.

Plus by the time Skyrim happens more books were probably destroyed cause only other source of info I can think of that would have lore on the 2nd era would have been the mages and fighters guild and the mages guild is disbanded in the 4th era cause of the Oblivion invasion and the fighters guild has no more presents in Skyrim.

So hard to tell but many theorizes that ESO will use the Dragon-Break to make multiple out comes happen while still maintaining lore.

Rosveen

ESO lore is about as "accurate" as any previous single player game. Some parts are new and brilliant, some expand on what we've heard about before, some are at odds with it, some are borderline ***. A few of the *** things are actually discussed in the game as an attempt to explain and validate them (quite successfully, I'd say). This includes books from the future and Cyrodiil's temperate climate, two favorite complaints of lore fanboys who didn't bother to actually play the game they so love to criticize.

ShadowDisciple wrote: »

UrQuan wrote: »

"Accurate" is not a word that should ever be associated with TES lore. The lore is built up from many different sources, none of which are completely reliable, and some of which contradict each other. The only way you can ever be completely sure about how an event happened is if you were there and experienced it (and even then you might still be wrong about what really happened). It has always been much like the real world that way.

When you start throwing all kinds of crazy magic, dragon breaks, and manipulations by daedric princes into the mix, nothing is certain.

You went too far with your quasi philosophy lol

ofc its certain..every single bethesda published media is considered canon...and everything in them is as good as set in stone..plotholes happen but theyy are ussually minor and secondary to the main story...

whether you like it or not thats up to you.. ESO is mixed feeling for me...
i like the general story but i dislike reason for putting the 3 alliances together...

Secondary to the main story? Have you even played the main stories? All possible Daggerfall's endings are canon because of nonsensical time shenanigans a Dragon Break. Morrowind revolves around the results of an event we won't even begin to understand until we're halfway through the story and then we realize all we have are a bunch of conflicting accounts and a lying scoundrel's living god's words.

Aeladiir

ESO is 100% lore-friendly. Everything that happened during the period in which ESO is taking place, is what actually happened. You experience it. You see it.

People have claimed it is not (Cyrodiil dilemma and some other stuff), but I am kind of surprised that not many of them thought that the books they have read in the past games might be biased, overreacted and simply false.

Also, if there is a book that doesn't exist in Skyrim, but exists in ESO, why would that be a big deal. It would simply mean that the Dragonborn has never been able to read that book. Basically, he never found it. And you see a lot of them Deadra worshippers destroying book for a reason.

UrQuan

ShadowDisciple wrote: »

UrQuan wrote: »

"Accurate" is not a word that should ever be associated with TES lore. The lore is built up from many different sources, none of which are completely reliable, and some of which contradict each other. The only way you can ever be completely sure about how an event happened is if you were there and experienced it (and even then you might still be wrong about what really happened). It has always been much like the real world that way.

When you start throwing all kinds of crazy magic, dragon breaks, and manipulations by daedric princes into the mix, nothing is certain.

You went too far with your quasi philosophy lol

ofc its certain..every single bethesda published media is considered canon...and everything in them is as good as set in stone..plotholes happen but theyy are ussually minor and secondary to the main story...

whether you like it or not thats up to you.. ESO is mixed feeling for me...
i like the general story but i dislike reason for putting the 3 alliances together...

To put it simply, you're objectively wrong.

Aside from events which were actually witnessed by the player in a game, not a single thing in TES lore is set in stone (and even the events which were actually witnessed in-game aren't always completely certain). This is exactly the same as in the real world. Because every source is written by an in-universe source (rather than an out-of-universe sourcebook style written by an omniscient narrator) each and every one of them suffers from having an unreliable narrator to one degree or another. None of it can be taken at face value as being true. There is absolutely nothing "quasi philosophy" about this: it's the most basic research methodology.

The way sources from TES should be treated will be familiar to anyone who has done any history research above the middle-school level. First you determine if it's a primary or secondary source (ie. is the author writing about something he was actually a witness to, or is he writing based on the accounts of others), and then you judge what you know about the author's conscious or subconscious biases. Based on that, and based on whether other sources (which you also judge by the same criteria) agree or disagree with the source, you decide how much weight to give to it.

Regardless of the result of your analysis, it's never black and white. At best you can only ever say "these sources agree that _____" with the knowledge that those sources may not be accurate.

ShadowDisciple

UrQuan wrote: »

ShadowDisciple wrote: »

UrQuan wrote: »

"Accurate" is not a word that should ever be associated with TES lore. The lore is built up from many different sources, none of which are completely reliable, and some of which contradict each other. The only way you can ever be completely sure about how an event happened is if you were there and experienced it (and even then you might still be wrong about what really happened). It has always been much like the real world that way.

When you start throwing all kinds of crazy magic, dragon breaks, and manipulations by daedric princes into the mix, nothing is certain.

You went too far with your quasi philosophy lol

ofc its certain..every single bethesda published media is considered canon...and everything in them is as good as set in stone..plotholes happen but theyy are ussually minor and secondary to the main story...

whether you like it or not thats up to you.. ESO is mixed feeling for me...
i like the general story but i dislike reason for putting the 3 alliances together...

To put it simply, you're objectively wrong.

Aside from events which were actually witnessed by the player in a game, not a single thing in TES lore is set in stone (and even the events which were actually witnessed in-game aren't always completely certain). This is exactly the same as in the real world. Because every source is written by an in-universe source (rather than an out-of-universe sourcebook style written by an omniscient narrator) each and every one of them suffers from having an unreliable narrator to one degree or another. None of it can be taken at face value as being true. There is absolutely nothing "quasi philosophy" about this: it's the most basic research methodology.

The way sources from TES should be treated will be familiar to anyone who has done any history research above the middle-school level. First you determine if it's a primary or secondary source (ie. is the author writing about something he was actually a witness to, or is he writing based on the accounts of others), and then you judge what you know about the author's conscious or subconscious biases. Based on that, and based on whether other sources (which you also judge by the same criteria) agree or disagree with the source, you decide how much weight to give to it.

Regardless of the result of your analysis, it's never black and white. At best you can only ever say "these sources agree that _____" with the knowledge that those sources may not be accurate.

this is something called retconning, and/or plotholes... every major lore-worlds have it.

UrQuan

ShadowDisciple wrote: »

UrQuan wrote: »

ShadowDisciple wrote: »

UrQuan wrote: »

"Accurate" is not a word that should ever be associated with TES lore. The lore is built up from many different sources, none of which are completely reliable, and some of which contradict each other. The only way you can ever be completely sure about how an event happened is if you were there and experienced it (and even then you might still be wrong about what really happened). It has always been much like the real world that way.

When you start throwing all kinds of crazy magic, dragon breaks, and manipulations by daedric princes into the mix, nothing is certain.

You went too far with your quasi philosophy lol

ofc its certain..every single bethesda published media is considered canon...and everything in them is as good as set in stone..plotholes happen but theyy are ussually minor and secondary to the main story...

whether you like it or not thats up to you.. ESO is mixed feeling for me...
i like the general story but i dislike reason for putting the 3 alliances together...

To put it simply, you're objectively wrong.

Aside from events which were actually witnessed by the player in a game, not a single thing in TES lore is set in stone (and even the events which were actually witnessed in-game aren't always completely certain). This is exactly the same as in the real world. Because every source is written by an in-universe source (rather than an out-of-universe sourcebook style written by an omniscient narrator) each and every one of them suffers from having an unreliable narrator to one degree or another. None of it can be taken at face value as being true. There is absolutely nothing "quasi philosophy" about this: it's the most basic research methodology.

The way sources from TES should be treated will be familiar to anyone who has done any history research above the middle-school level. First you determine if it's a primary or secondary source (ie. is the author writing about something he was actually a witness to, or is he writing based on the accounts of others), and then you judge what you know about the author's conscious or subconscious biases. Based on that, and based on whether other sources (which you also judge by the same criteria) agree or disagree with the source, you decide how much weight to give to it.

Regardless of the result of your analysis, it's never black and white. At best you can only ever say "these sources agree that _____" with the knowledge that those sources may not be accurate.

this is something called retconning, and/or plotholes... every major lore-worlds have it.

No, it isn't that at all. None of what I've mentioned has anything at all to do with retconning (which is intentionally changing a part of the continuity - the Warp in the West would be an example of retconning), or plotholes (which would be where there's something that doesn't make sense).

It's unreliable narrators, and every single lore source in every TES game uses that technique. It's an integral part of the setting that nothing is spelled out with certainty. It's part of what makes the setting feel real. There are even intentionally different sources describing the same historical events in different terms, and it's up to the readers to decide which they think is more likely to be true.

Anhedonie

Lord_Ejl wrote: »

I mean with all the lore books on history, characters etc. I've heard two different sides of this being an accurate, and not being. My Elder Scrolls playing goes only back to Morrowind, so i have no idea of the first two ones at all.

*** up mostly.

Tdroid

Given that Bethesda has done major retcons in the lore for every game, I say it does things fairly uncontroverially. And, overall, I like it, though more controversy might be better :P