It’s official – The Elder Scrolls VI won’t be in my hands until several years have passed. Bethesda has confirmed that not only is it scheduled to be released after two new IPs they’re producing, but also that the game is not even in development yet. We know it’s coming; Todd Howard said that “Of course they will be a new Elder Scrolls”, but it seems that The Elder Scrolls VI is coming in the same way that winter was coming in Game of Thrones for the first 6 seasons (is that a spoiler? If so… sorry?) – in that it’ll happen, oh yeah it’ll happen, and when it does you’ll know about it! However, it’s going to be so far in the future that you’ll have likely forgotten it was going to be a thing until Bethesda announces it, which will likely be about 20 minutes before official release, knowing Bethesda.

By the time The Elder Scrolls VI is in my hands I’ll have finished University and probably (hopefully) I’ll have a job and will (maybe) have moved out of my parents’ house. My life will be completely different from how it is now (probably), and what’s more shocking, is that by the Bethesda development schedule, The Elder Scrolls VI will be released over 10 years after The Elder Scrolls V, quite a wait for us Elder Scrolls fans. Consider it – the original Bioshock came out 9 years ago, and think how long ago that was – I was 8, and I’ll be over 25 by the time The Elder Scrolls VI is something I can play for hours and days and moths forever. It better be worth the wait – that’s all I’m saying.

There has been much speculation over The Elder Scrolls VI, mainly focusing around where it’ll be set. Will it be Valenwood? Black Marsh? Hammerfell? Or perhaps all of Tamriel? I don’t personally like the idea of just creating a game that covers all of Tamriel; I like the focus on a particular area that we’ve had in the previous games. In The Elder Scrolls V, you really get to know Skyrim as an area and it’s people (those racist, bigoted Nords. They’re almost as bad as UKIP supporters). It was interesting to learn about the people of Skyrim and how they felt about the empire, which leads to the civil war which every player loves so much – I’ve come to calling it #Skexit. Yeah, I love Skyrim, and I’m hoping the ‘special edition’ will tide me over for a while. Although I’m fairly sure my modding can beat the graphical improvements any day of the week, but whatever – it’s an excuse to start a new character.

All I really care about with the new Elder Scrolls is that Bethesda keeps it as open as every other Elder Scrolls before it. I spend about 40% of my time in Skyrim just sort of wandering about and doing, well, nothing. Doing nothing at all in Skyrim is more entertaining and fun to me than shooting people in Call of Duty or fighting through missions in GTA V; it’s indescribable – I don’t know why I enjoy it so much – I think it’s just relaxing. It’s like a sort of Zen. I also like how I can play nearly 200 hours of the game at the time of writing this and still be surprised at discovering new things in the world I hadn’t ever seen before and discovering new epic quest lines that I didn’t know about. There is so much to do in Skyrim, and if The Elder Scrolls VI has as much, then I’ll be satisfied with that.

I could go on about how great The Elder Scrolls is all day, and I might internally, but I’m sure you have other things to do. I’m not sure whether I should try to forget about The Elder Scrolls until the new one comes out, or just play Skyrim like crazy until then. I think the latter will do nicely.