With Deadlands, the year around the Gates of Oblivion and the chapter Blackwood comes to an end in The Elder Scrolls Online. As usual, the developers are really ramping it up for the finale, but according to MeinMMO editor Jürgen Horn, they have outdone themselves with Deadlands. Read here his impressions report with the developers!
What is Deadlands anyway? Deadlands is the final DLC in 2021 and therefore marks the end of the current campaign “Gates of Oblivion,” which revolves around the new chapter Blackwood.
In Deadlands, you venture into the eponymous Deadlands, the domain of the feared Daedra lord Mehrunes Dagon, the lord of destruction, but also of new beginnings.
According to the developers, players are supposed to experience an “epic showdown with the Lord of Destruction” at the end. What exactly happens at the end, however, is not to be revealed here. But I still spent a good hour with the developers in the Deadlands and experienced a lot.
Who played it all? MyMMO editor Jürgen Horn was on the test server in the Deadlands accompanied by the two developers Jeremy Sera (Lead Content Designer) and Tom Murphy (Zone Lead). Together with the two devs, I explored the coolest areas of the DLC and peppered them with many questions.
Daedra in civilian life
Where does the journey start? Our journey in Deadlands does not begin in the Deadlands at all. Rather, we start in a curious city called “Ferngrave.” And the “grave” is to be taken literally, as the city was built around the skeletons of gigantic beings.
They actually look a bit like Mehrunes Dagon himself, and the developers leave open which beings the colossal bones actually come from. From Ferngrave, the advance into the Deadlands is supposed to begin, as the city wanders through the realms of oblivion and is currently synchronized with Dagon’s domain.
In Ferngrave, Daedra go shopping. 
Gigantic bones decorate Ferngrave. 
Ferngrave from a distance.
What is so great about the city? Ferngrave is simply great in its design. Already on the horizon, one can see the mighty bones towering over the towers of the city on the way there. Coupled with the unique architecture of the Daedra living there, it is a dark mix of somewhat oriental architectural styles, mixed with gothic-like spikes and the characteristic arches of doors and windows.
Above all, a strange sky stretches in bizarre colors, adorned with alien yet beautiful stars. “Oh yes, we are no longer in Tamriel!” remarks one developer dryly.
Besides the strange-fascinating appearance of the city, I also experience the feared Daedra here in a completely different way. Until now, these horned beings were mostly enemies and not friendly toward me.
But in Ferngrave, the inhabitants of Oblivion lead a regular, civil life. They go to the market, gossip with their neighbors, or enjoy the tricks of performers.
It is these small, loving details that make ESO so fascinating and endearing, and the Deadlands DLC offers plenty of such moments again.
Moreover, a wandering city like Ferngrave would be the ideal home base to stage further incursions into the realms of oblivion. “That is indeed a wonderful idea,” one of my companions comments, and I can’t shake the feeling that we will see more of Ferngrave in the future.
The Deadlands in another form
What do the Deadlands look like? Finally, we leave the city through a grim, red portal and now we are finally in the Deadlands. And they live up to their name, as hardly do we appear, we are greeted by a desolate desert. From an ominous sky shrouded in red clouds, lightning strikes down in seconds, and they are not just a spectacular backdrop!
Rather, these are dangerous area effects that can inflict significant damage on our hero if we don’t quickly jump out of the impact area.
“We didn’t want to just bring the typical fire landscape that you might know from other games,” one of the devs says. Instead, the domain of destruction has been divided into two aspects.
Fire and lava on one side and natural disasters like storms on the other. A creative design decision from which the new zone definitely benefits. After all, who wants to always trudge through the same burned wasteland?
These lightning strikes are not just decoration! 
A citadel of storms. 
A dark citadel. 
The Deadlands are a hauntingly beautiful place. 
This worm is a powerful boss.
What do we encounter there? The Deadlands are teeming with dangers. Among them are completely new creatures, such as freely roaming world bosses. They are supposed to be particularly tough to fight and represent a kind of executor of Dagon’s will. If you want to take them down, you first have to find them and then set a small raid group on them, the developers reveal to me.
What is particularly impressive? In the Deadlands, there are repeatedly powerful fortresses where Dagon’s minions are advancing sinister plans. Over the course of the campaign, we will experience many battles here.
Furthermore, we explore a particularly dark corner of the map. In the “Blood Pit,” Mehrunes Dagon keeps his worst enemies captive, for dead Daedra would eventually be reborn, but if they are imprisoned, they no longer disturb him.
The pit is to be taken literally, as we have to fight our way down several levels before we can clash with a nasty end boss and vicious Daedra panther creatures at the bottom of the pit.
At the end of our tour, we visit a huge world boss, a kind of worm that drowses in a cave and only occasionally comes out to accept offerings from cultists. To give our expedition a heroic ending, we approach the creature and are dead in a second. A truly epic ending!
Huge Update 32 for Everyone!
What else is there? The new DLC is extremely impressive, but also for players who just want to play ESO regularly, the developers have bundled a free Update number 32 that will benefit every player.
The update brings some powerful new features that we have already introduced elsewhere. Here are the most important contents of Update 32:
- The Arsenal, with which you can change your loadouts at any time
- Curation chance for item sets without annoying RNG
- New graphics options for Nvidia cards
- Changes to the combat system
Conclusion: I never thought that Elsweyr could be surpassed
My favorite chapter in ESO so far was the story of Elsweyr and I hardly thought it was possible that the developers at ZeniMax could surpass that.
But with the Deadlands, they have finally succeeded, because although the final DLCs have always been a spectacle, the devs have outdone themselves this time.
Only the alien atmosphere and the tense mood in the Deadlands and the city of Ferngrave are unparalleled, and one can practically feel how small and insignificant one is compared to primordial forces that Mehrunes Dagon can unleash at any time.
I, for one, am already looking forward to the release of Deadlands and the grand finale with Dagon, which certainly will not be the last encounter with the Lord of Destruction.
I just wonder how the developers plan to top this fireworks of creativity and atmosphere next year. But having seen the great work the developers have done so far, I have full confidence that ESO will continue to go grandly in the coming years.
Jürgen Horn
Editor at MeinMMO
Deadlands, the final ESO DLC for 2021, will be released on November 1, 2021, for PC, Stadia, and Mac. On PlayStation and Xbox, the DLC will only come out on November 16. According to our MeinMMO editor and MMORPG expert Alexander Leitsch, ESO belongs to the good MMORPGs, of which there are currently curiously “too many”.
