The Elder Scrolls: Morrowind will be just the beginning. According to an open letter from Matt Firor – the head of The Elder Scrolls Online (ESO) – starting now, a similarly large addon is planned to be released every year – in addition to three smaller DLCs.
The Elder Scrolls Online is turning up the heat! As soon as the announcement of the first major addon The Elder Scrolls Online: Morrowind along with the new hero “Warden” and the structured PvP battlegrounds has subsided, ESO head Matt Firor announces the next expansions! According to him, ZeniMax plans to release a large addon and three smaller DLCs each year at the usual scale.
Chapters and DLCs – ESO is different!
The DLCs have so far been optimal for incorporating smaller additions to the game – for example, the assassination mechanics from Dark Brotherhood or the One Tamriel upgrade. With major innovations like the recently announced Morrowind, the DLC concept reaches its limits. Condensing the island of Vvardenfell to fit within a DLC would hardly do justice to the outstanding template.
Therefore, ZeniMax decided to introduce large expansions for such content. However, the term “expansion” is deemed inappropriate, as expansions typically refer to the endgame. In ESO, you have the endgame from the very beginning.
Thanks to One Tamriel, every player can go anywhere with their character. A newcomer can experience everything that highly developed max-level players can do. Furthermore, the stories and locations of the ESO addons are always self-contained. For this reason, Firor refers to the expansions for The Elder Scrolls Online as “Chapters” – after all, according to him, ESO is not a game like all the others.
What’s next?
But what else is coming alongside the Housing DLC Homestead in February and Morrowind in June?
Firor did not specify any concrete information, but he at least revealed that another dungeon DLC would be coming in the fall. Something similar was last seen in the fall of 2016 with “Shadows of the Hist,” where two instances were implemented in the swamps of the Argonians. It’s quite possible that the still-unknown dungeon pack will also consist of two dungeons tailored to a specific race and/or region. In the fourth quarter of 2017, there should be another content DLC. However, what it contains is still completely unclear.
Mein-MMO asks: What do you think about Matt Firor’s announcement? Do you think ZeniMax’s addon policy is good in this form or would you prefer larger addons and no DLCs? Or were the mini-expansions from the DLCs enough for you, and do large expansions not fit The Elder Scrolls Online? And what do you think the mysterious fourth DLC will contain? A new faction like the Thieves Guild or rather new features like the style parlor or housing? And where do you think the journey will lead in the new addon in 2018? I firmly believe in the Khajiit region of Elsweyr. So far, this has hardly been present in ESO and not at all in any of the other Elder Scrolls games.
Related to the topic: Our report on Morrowind from our visit to Zenimax
