What are the chances of an Elder Scrolls MMO?

“We get asked that a lot,” admitted Pete Hines, Vice President-PR/Marketing for Bethesda, when Pro-G UK asked him if the company had any plans for an Elder Scrolls MMORPG. The interview is centered around the Shivering Isles expansion to Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (PC, Xbox 360, PS3), and the MMO bit came towards the end, but because they “get asked that a lot,” we’re going to clear that up first.

The answer is no, not really, Pete explained his opinion that they couldn’t do an Elder Scrolls MMO “unless it was with some fresh idea that no one has ever tried before.” This isn’t an unqualified “no,” though. “Certainly, there’s a chance, it’s something we’ve talked about, but it’s not anywhere in our immediate future.” The key is to come up with that “something new” that will work in an MMO environment, and as it stands with Oblivion on the one hand, and World of Warcraft on the other, it just won’t work.

The problem is that they are very different experiences. If you play Oblivion then everything you do in the world is about permanence – the world literally revolves around you. I finished that quest, it stays finished and if I kill someone he stays dead. With MMOs anything you do in World of Warcraft can be done by someone else two minutes later. That guy is going to respawn two minutes later and that other guy still needs a trinket even though you just gave it to him.

In Elder Scrolls stuff not related to MMOs, though, Hines said that Bethesda’s current aims are to wrap the Shivering Isles expansion and the PS3 Oblivion up, then move to Fallout 3. A future Elder Scrolls sequel isn’t being ruled out, not after Oblivion‘s success, but it’s not in the cards as of now.

“We get asked that a lot,” admitted Pete Hines, Vice President-PR/Marketing for Bethesda, when Pro-G UK asked him if the company had any plans for an Elder Scrolls MMORPG. The interview is centered around the Shivering Isles expansion to Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (PC, Xbox 360, PS3), and the MMO bit came towards the end, but because they “get asked that a lot,” we’re going to clear that up first.

The answer is no, not really, Pete explained his opinion that they couldn’t do an Elder Scrolls MMO “unless it was with some fresh idea that no one has ever tried before.” This isn’t an unqualified “no,” though. “Certainly, there’s a chance, it’s something we’ve talked about, but it’s not anywhere in our immediate future.” The key is to come up with that “something new” that will work in an MMO environment, and as it stands with Oblivion on the one hand, and World of Warcraft on the other, it just won’t work.

The problem is that they are very different experiences. If you play Oblivion then everything you do in the world is about permanence – the world literally revolves around you. I finished that quest, it stays finished and if I kill someone he stays dead. With MMOs anything you do in World of Warcraft can be done by someone else two minutes later. That guy is going to respawn two minutes later and that other guy still needs a trinket even though you just gave it to him.

In Elder Scrolls stuff not related to MMOs, though, Hines said that Bethesda’s current aims are to wrap the Shivering Isles expansion and the PS3 Oblivion up, then move to Fallout 3. A future Elder Scrolls sequel isn’t being ruled out, not after Oblivion‘s success, but it’s not in the cards as of now.