In general, Western RPGs are different from JRPGs in several areas. They are less shiny, have less robots & are more.... hairy.
Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is no different - AND it is awesome! I'm no connoisseur of Western RPGs (having only played top-down stuff like Baldur's Gate & Champions of Norrath) but Skyrim is really addicting & I'm playing it to the neglect of homework & FYP research. It's a good thing I only get to play it for short 2 hour sessions before my motion sickness kicks in and I crawl to the bathroom to dry retch. I cannot for the life of me endure a 1st-person screen. But I loath to switch my game to 3rd-person view because archery & combat becomes more difficult this way.
Oh~ 1st world problems.
I've never suffered so much while playing a game. Resi 4 was the last game that gave me a throbbing headache - Skyrim is worse. I believe this is how drug addicts feel; taking enormous pleasure from their own misery.
But here are some shots from the game.
Beautiful right? I don't think I've ever seen more realistic foliage in any other RPG. Too bad I don't experience this pixel perfect eye-candy, because I'm playing on a macbook with an ancient XP installed on it; so even with the texture setting cranked all the way to nothing, my frame rate still barely coughs along. Ho hum.
Well, I'm off to harvesting everything in sight.
