In the fantasy MMORPG The Elder Scrolls Online, starting today, April 9th, there is a 30-day period in which PC players can switch to the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One consoles. With this, Zenimax is fulfilling a debt from the summer of 2014. The “immoral offer” was an attempt to smooth things over.
Update 15:15: We have now updated the article with the latest information. It is literally not a “transfer” or “switch”, but an additional purchase.
@MeinMMO The console transfer includes a copy of your #ESO account. Your PC account will remain active with all of your characters intact.
— Elder Scrolls Online (@TESOnline) April 10, 2015
In these hours, many players are being informed that they can switch from PC to Xbox One or PlayStation 4 with all their belongings within 30 days. The requirement for this is that they purchased and activated The Elder Scrolls Online by June 30, 2014. Players who were later cannot take advantage of the offer.
And even qualifying players must act quickly. The offer is valid for only 30 days, after which it expires. The offer consists of purchasing a special digital version of The Elder Scrolls Online for PS4 or Xbox One at a discounted price of €14.99.
According to Zenimax’s letter, the characters will not be copied at the moment when the switch is requested; rather, a later email with further instructions will be sent, indicating that characters will be copied later. When the offer is taken within the 30 days does not matter for the timing of the copy. No one would probably want an immediate transfer anyway. The Elder Scrolls Online will be released for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on June 9. The “left behind” PC characters can still be played. They will develop independently from their console twins from the moment of copying.
The uniqueness of the switch is that players can take their entire account to the pristine Xbox One and PlayStation 4 servers: They will then be fully involved with their veteran characters among all the beginners. This switch offer was made by Zenimax back then, when they suddenly pushed the console version back significantly to take some steam off the excited and disappointed players. Back then, players were still reassured that it would be at the end of 2014; today we know that it would actually take a little longer, almost a full year from the planned time to the actual release on Xbox One and PlayStation 4. Assuming nothing goes wrong again.
We have summarized more details about the switch in this article.
