Skyrim on iOS

Discussion in 'General Game Discussion and Questions' started by cdbaksu, Jul 28, 2014.

  1. cdbaksu

    cdbaksu Well-Known Member

    Jul 25, 2013
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    I've been wondering this for quite a while now. I'm not a programmer so I don't know the implications so if anyone has more knowledge than me on this front, I'd love to start a discussion. I'm not talking about a port here, per sé, but more abot a redesign of the game specifically for touch, supporting both the iPad and the iPhone.

    Obviously the graphics wouldn't be so high quality even as the vanilla console versions, never mind all the graphical mods available on PC. But even with this, a lower poly count on the characters would suffice - think Monster Hunter. Speaking of Monster Hunter, the draw distance on that game was pretty spectacular, but you wouldn't even need that.

    Now the controls could be a little iffy but I believe forcing, or maybe having the default option set to third person view would solve a lot of the aiming/camera panning and shooting. As far as the shouts, Bethesda could really employ some kind of gesture based/ drawing on the screen of the shout's characters.

    The only thing I would be a little afraid of would be the app's size when all this is done and dusted. Obviously with the lower overall quality of the visuals, the file sizes would be smaller, but it would still eat a pretty hefty chunk of your iDevice's capacity.

    Personally, I'd pay $60 for an iPhone remake of Skyrim. With iOS 8 and Metal coming out, the platform is really starting to shine and a lot of classic benchmark games, like Skyrim, could be adapted for it.

    What are your thoughts?
     
  2. kmacleod

    kmacleod Well-Known Member
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    I think a port of Skyrim, Oblivion, or the new Fallout games would absolutely be possible, with visual tweaks and potential texture / viewing distance reductions.

    As you mentioned, the biggest difficulty here would likely be file size. The expansive textures and models used by those games aren't exactly small - Skyrim could easily fill up a device.


    Bethhesda has been reluctant to port their games to mobile. Their only move in that direction was announcing a mobile Oblivion spinoff back when th PSP was new. It was never released, and they never announced anything mobile related again.
     
  3. Greyskull

    Greyskull Well-Known Member

    Dec 13, 2009
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    NO. I would elaborate but I havent slept-in simolest terms, without access to more memory and a disc cache...NO
     
  4. kmacleod

    kmacleod Well-Known Member
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    I do wonder how big of a problem RAM would be. These games were all available on the PS3, which had a mere 256 megabytes each of RAM and VRAM. The iPhones and iPads are up to a gigabyte now - I wonder how much of that is addressable by developers...
     
  5. Exact-Psience

    Exact-Psience Well-Known Member

    Jan 12, 2012
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    Dont the benchmark scores say iPad4 is better then the PS3? I think i remember that from a tech news site before.
     
  6. Mene

    Mene <b>ACCOUNT CLOSED</b>: <em>Officially</em> Quit iO

    Mar 18, 2012
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    I've been a huge ES fan since Daggerfall but Skyrim on ios?

    Oh god no.. Just the thought of moving around and the camera control would be a nightmare.


    Coupled with the fact I'm burnt out on it after spending 300+ hrs on the 360 version and 600++ hrs on the modded PC version ;)
     
  7. kmacleod

    kmacleod Well-Known Member
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    There was some hype about it a while, but general consensus is that no, the iPad 4 (and iPad Air / Mini) are not quite as powerful for gaming as the Xbox 360 or PS3. But they might not need to be. Scale the games back a bit, tweak graphics down, reduce view distance a bit, and they should be more than capable of running at least 30fps on iOS.

    In general, one of the biggest knocks against iOS was that graphics was all done at too high a level. On consoles, it's generally possible to dig really deep into the graphics stack and address the GPU more fully, whereas that wasn't really possible on iOS before. However, Apple's new Metal API allows just that. It's entirely possible that with Metal and their next A8, whatever iPad comes next will be able to noticeably outperform the 360 and PS3

    Well there are always MFi controllers now ;)
     
  8. Edmilan

    Edmilan Well-Known Member

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    Maybe they can start with Morrowind
     
  9. Mene

    Mene <b>ACCOUNT CLOSED</b>: <em>Officially</em> Quit iO

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    Yeah, just need to win the lottery to be able to afford one ;)
     
  10. Primoz

    Primoz Well-Known Member

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    Errrm... I don't think you are looking in the right direction for why there is no mobile version of Skyrim. Performance is not an issue, if the game's graphics were optimized to fit the platform, along with the controls.

    The problem is the profit. Do you really think Skyrim would be profitable and would repay for all the time spent on an optimised version of it? What would their target group be? Die-hard Skyrim fans? Casual mobile gamers? I don't think so... Who and for what amount would buy a worse (in terms of graphics and controls) 4 year old Skyrim?

    The mobile market is another issue. It is very unpredictable. And it seems that a freemium Skyrim-themed-flappy-bird could bring in more money than the real game.

    You are forgetting about the TES Travels franchise (Stormhold, Dawnstar, Oblivion mobile, Shadowkey). The first three were "simple" java games (though still quality RPGs). Shadowkey however... Magnificent game in all aspects. I spent 60+ hours on it this summer (I'm about 3/4 through the game now) and I'm confident when I say that this is one of the best mobile RPGs up to date, and consider that its a 10 year old game. Yes, let that sink in for a bit. You can only imagine what games big companies could release these days, but unfortunately it wouldn't be profitable to them. So, instead of investing their time and funds in the development process, they spend it for marketing the game and market research.

    Yes, the market. Therein lies our problem and not in the performance of the devices.
     
  11. cdbaksu

    cdbaksu Well-Known Member

    Jul 25, 2013
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    All very valid points Primoz!

    I do think, however, that the mobile market would just eat up Skyrim. Just look at XCom or Monster Hunter.

    I still want to believe someday I'm going to play the masterpiece that Skyrim is while commuting on the bus! :)
     
  12. kmacleod

    kmacleod Well-Known Member
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    I'd wager a lot that someday you will. There is just way too much money in this ecosystem for Bethesda not to come around someday. But it might take a few years for them to even start - I'm sure the A11 will be one heck of a chip :rolleyes:
     
  13. Jorlen

    Jorlen Well-Known Member

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    The xbox full install of skyrim is only 4gb. From a technical standpoint, given the CPU power of mobile devices, it's perfectly viable. Cut down texture resolution and compress music / audio and I'm sure skyrim can be done under 2gb.

    The question is only this: Will Bethesda do it?
     

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