spartaxoxo wrote: »

The more complex stories are mostly moreso in smaller stuff from smaller games. Elder Scrolls massive success has been both a blessing and a curse for its writing. On the one hand, they can make grander games than they could before. On the other hand, since they're no longer niche, there are more obvious attempts to make the writing appeal to a broader audience. Stuff like the cannibalism of the wood elves is downplayed for more broadly relatable stories, and those stories are being executed with varying quality.

AScarlato wrote: »

twisttop138 wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

I'm an American and was taught that stuff in public school. The Odyssey, Beywolf, Gilgamesh, Shakespeare, etc. Dating myself a bit but I remember reading Romeo and Juliet and then watching the movie in class. Education level varies greatly by state.

Very good point. I grew up in Southern California, and went to a very large high school. Shakespeare was taught, yes, I guess I spaced on that. It's been awhile. But many of the things mentioned were absent from my curriculum. I know our teachers work very hard, and I look forward to seeing what my sons highschool curriculum is.

Where I grew up, I was fortunate to have been tested into our district's very small "gifted" program, where a small group of 5 of us were removed from the rest of the school a few hours a day to learn things from Aesop's Fables as first graders to more advanced ancient readings and Shakespeare by graduation.

For the hundreds of other students, our school had more emphasis on basic life skills and there was a huge disparity in what was being learned in both literature and mathematics.

I live in California now, and my friends who are parents are outraged at the quality of some public school systems here and it is known that some students leave the system barely literate at all.

https://californiapolicycenter.org/the-reading-crisis-why-illiteracy-threatens-californias-future-and-what-we-can-do-now/ - here is an organization claiming a shocking 35% of students are leaving schools proficient in reading.

Syldras wrote: »

Tariq9898 wrote: »

It doesn’t seem common based on recent writing not just in games, but in other media as well. If anything, it’s starting to feel the opposite. But that could just be me. As for your first paragraph, much of that depends heavily on the country, current climate, both political and societal as well as personal (not just agenda, but what kind of writer they are/aspire to be as well as their personal life experiences). There’s also huge influence from other works too.

What I meant was that people were generally aware of the value that classical literature has for education and personal development - as a way to broaden the horizon, to learn about human nature, etc. It might depend on the country, of course, but where I live, it's a normal part of the school curriculum from elementary school on. Perhaps the focus was even bigger a few generations ago; at least I knew several elderly people who grew up very rurally and only received minimum education since they were supposed to inherit their family's farm anyway, but even they had read classical works at school and knew the Odyssey, the Iliad, the Song of the Nibelungs, and so on. It's also still very common to learn Latin or Ancient Greek here. It's basically impossible here to finish school without having read literature from all eras.

Which is also the reason the banality of the current ESO writing leaves me a little perplexed - surely these people must have read narrations beyond mass entertainment novels from the past decade, fanfiction and memes before, especially if they chose to become writers for a living (which, I'd assume, people do out of love for literature - it's not a job typically chosen out of financial interest alone, after all)? So why do the stories feel so uninspired then?

Tariq9898 wrote: »

But why? I think much of it is an attempt to make characters, especially villains relatable.

But to be relatable, they don't need to exact copies of the current modern world. People can read the Epic of Gilgamesh, the Metamorphoses of Ovid, or Tristan and Iseult today and still relate with many of the characters, despite these stories having a completely different setting compared to whichever 21st century western society.

Tariq9898 wrote: »

But anyways, with this nuanced writing often comes with adding in personal life experiences and views. Mainly because it’s a gateway to making a character relatable. Statistically speaking, one person’s struggle-whether it’s environmental, political, gender, health-is something many (maybe millions?) can relate to, given there are billions of us. This in turn, can lead to modern day sentiments in storytelling. Which I agree isn’t best for Elder Scrolls.

But why aren't they aware that their personal struggles as a 20/30-something 21st century western human citydweller might just not fit into a story about feudal-Asia-inspired elves living under the rule of three powerful godkings (or tree-venerating tribal lizard people living in swamps, or cannibalistic forest-dwelling miniature elves,...) in a pseudo-medieval, magic world threatened by dragons, demonic forces, pestilence and war?

Sometimes it almost feels like some people today revolve around their own personal issues so much they can't barely comprehend that other people might live (or have lived) a completely different life (especially in other cultures and eras) where none of that matters.