About ten years ago, I played the Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion for the first time. For the first time, I saw what I really really wanted from a game. A game where you could do anything, literally anything. Where travel between cities was fun, filled with odd little quests and travellers and bandits. Where the towns and cities were filled with characters, who had their own little backstories and even the world itself had its own lore, brought to life through the books found on shelves, in chests, and lying around on tables around the world.

It was what I wanted from a role-playing game, having faced scripted, leaden storylines most of my life. It was a world in which to give birth to a character, and have that character make decisions, join groups, become alive in so many ways.

And then, in 2011, came Skyrim. Greater complexity, more things to do, more life, more lore, and entirely new sections of roleplay. In Skyrim, the relationships you made with characters could have deeply lasting effects on your characters – you could get married, own property, run a shop. There were even two main questlines right to start with – two different focuses to choose between. And the decisions were real. Once you were in the Stormcloak, you couldn’t change sides. Perhaps not ideal while roleplaying, but a good semblance of loyalty among factions.

Now, we have ESO. Elder Scrolls Online. It’s taken me a while to take the plunge and actually play it. But it hasn’t disappointed. Not in the least. The world is what I expected – large, complex, full of life. The lore is all there, and lore books are scattered about the world. The characters, with their shifting alliances are there. The complex moral choices – Arresting an ex-general, wanted for killing a number of civilians, it gave me the chance to explore his history since those war crimes. He has lain low, and fed all his time and money into making life better off for the orphans and survivors. That’s the sort of moral decision I want from a game. How do we deal with the aftermath of genocide? Is man ever redeemable for that sort of crime?

And I’m creating a complex character, with decisions based about his motivations. An unlikely Orcish paladin, who seems to end up in the most unusual situations. I’ve only been playing for a couple of hours, and I’ve already faced up to the man who is a monster, and the monster who is reformed. And I’ve walked, all the way from Daggerfall to the Alik’r Desert, across farmlands, swamps, forests, mountains, hills, and desert itself. I’ve fought cultists of a variety of flavours, and met characters to the extent that last night I was told that my quest log was full, and I couldn’t take any more. Which was probably wise advice.

And the scenery. In Oblivion, and in Skyrim, there were high places, where you could go up and just look down at the valleys below you. ESO is the same, but more so. There are so many valleys, so many views, so many different types of biome. It’s gloriously complex.

There is, however, one thing amiss. So many quests, and not one single fetch quest anywhere. What I want is a quest that will send me to the other side of the world. Someone to give me a package that just happens to need to get to Skyrim, or Cyrrodil. No such luck, at least not yet. Oh, well. There’s enough to explore here already. Anyway, I need to go. I have to go back and help a witch who’s lost her sister.