Is Morrowind Worth Playing in 2022? (2024)

It has been a little over 20 years since The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind released, but it is still easily worth playing in 2022. Morrowind is Bethesda's direct sequel to The Elder Scrolls 2: Daggerfall, but compared to later games like The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim, Morrowind was more of a niche cult classic in 2002. Still, The Elder Scrolls 3 success stems from Morrowind's renowned depth and complexity as a role-playing environment.

Skyrim is the prime example of peak Elder Scrolls saturation, as it marked the time The Elder Scrolls series went mainstream and became popular with millions of players.Its predecessor Oblivion was a fraction as popular because Oblivion still had a good deal of mechanical complexity that Skyrim abandoned in favor of streamlined role-playing systems. On the other hand, Morrowind stood out among RPG enthusiasts thanks in-part to its profoundly obtuse, yet equally rewarding gameplay features that are still important to experience.

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Morrowind's World Helped Make It a Cult-Classic

Morrowind was the first Elder Scrolls game not to rely entirely on a randomly generated world, unlike its more niche predecessors Daggerfall and Arena. Instead of being hundreds of miles in size, Morrowind's island of Vvardenfell (home of Dark Elves called the Dunmer) was a fairly small landmass by today's open-world standards. Morrowind was also more of a free-form RPG than what came before, reflected by the way players explore the world and progresses through mostly silent quest. The default graphics of Morrowind were impressive and detailed for the time, especially as a key seller on the original Xbox.

Still, in 2022 Morrowind's replayability lies in its gameplay. Creating a character still has incredible depth due to the amount of skill and attribute specialization from level one. Starting as a proficient thief, spell caster, or warrior is more than possible when choosing between 10 races, 13 star signs, and 22 classes - even more if the player makes a custom class. Morrowind is the kind of role-playing game that lets players jump over buildings if their Acrobat skill is high enough, or even levitate themselves using Alteration. These robust, unfettered systems largely did not carry over to newer Elder Scrolls titles.

Mods Allow Morrowind To Feel More Modern

Nostalgia is a powerful influence, and players will find a strong sense of that when they arrive in Seyda Neen - the first explorable town in Morrowind. The old-school 3D graphics don't hold up nearly as well as the gameplay systems that make Morrowind fun, but the voice acting and original musical score by Jeremy Soule help cover the game's aging visuals. Alternatively, graphical mods like the "Morrowind Graphics Extender" significantly extend draw distance on top of overhauling the lighting and reflections. Couple that graphics mod with flora and texture overhaul mods, and Morrowind can become a game that looks better than vanilla Skyrim on account of its environmental design.

Graphical and audio mods are just the tip of the iceberg, as players can install thousands of gameplay mods enhancing the world and mechanics of Morrowind. For players who don't like how Morrowind's combat feels, mods exist to make it feel closer to that of Oblivion or Skyrim. Likewise, new hand-crafted landmasses can be installed to greatly extend any Morrowind playthrough with new NPCs, items, magic, towns, and even built-in quests. With the help of mods covering the aging aspects of the game, Morrowind is still worth playing in 2022 due to its strengths in the role-playing genre and place in gaming history.

The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind is available for PC.

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