The Elder Scrolls Online: High Isle preview: New lore, new locations and NPCs

Bretons, the “Man-Mer” race of The Elder Scrolls lore, have long been a favorite choice among role players looking for a capable magic-user who isn’t an’t elf. But, of the standard races in Bethesda Softworks’ fantasy universe, the Bretons’ homeland of High Rock has been overdue for a closeup. You get one. The Elder Scrolls Online’s next major expansion, High Isle Launched June 6.

“This is probably the most accessible piece of content that we have added to The Elder Scrolls Online in terms of people that are familiar with the franchise,” said Rich Lambert, the MMO’s creative director for Zenimax Online Studios. “Morrowind [which got a huge expansion in 2017]Blackwood is very strange and has weird mushrooms. Blackwood can be seen in this way: [last June’s big expansion] like, this is a big, giant demon that’s coming in, and if you don’t know who Mehrunes Dagon is, you don’t necessarily know or care.

“But with this, this is kind of your traditional medieval fantasy storytelling,” Lambert added. “It’s focused on the noble houses and the politics that intermingle with all of that, and knights. So it’s super accessible and super easy for anybody to get into.”

High Rock is the provincial name; High Isle refers to a specific area in High Rock. It was once a space that could be used for recreation. The Elder Scrolls Online since the MMO debuted in 2014, but it hasn’t been given the full chapter treatment until now. This is the In TESODaggerfall Covenant, which includes Redguards, Bretons and Orcs is the faction that controls High Rock. Thus, mission there advances the lore and history of the entire alliance, as opposed to the Bretons.

High Isle Lambert stated that Lambert pivots around the Three Banners War which, according to Lambert, is the factional conflict underneathpinning TESO; in the expansion, a peace summit at High Isle brings the noble Society of the Steadfast and the chaotic Ascendant Order to the table, and players must uncover the true motives of both sides as they wind through the expansion’s main story arc.

Lambert admitted that Arthurian legends and how they were traditionally presented inform a lot about the set design. High Isle. Bretons can be used as an analogue to Britons, even though the are half-elf. (In Elder Scrolls lore, “Breton” comes from a dead language and means “half.”)

“We wanted [the setting] to feel more like a resort than anything else,” Lambert said. “To the team, when I was going through [the backstory] I said, ‘This is where nobility goes, this is where money goes, this is Las Vegas meets the Roman times.’ How can we make this as pristine and as beautiful as possible? And the team just jumped in on that and started digging into it.”

Asked for his favorite, can’t-miss location that Elder Scrolls fans should be sure to visit in High Isle, Lambert mentioned one of the expansion’s two new NPC followers, Ember, a Khajit street-survivor with a talent for magic. “She is such a cool character, and the story, and her objective to unlock her, they’re just so well done,” Lambert said. “I think players are going to enjoy the heck out of her and that objective.”

Grid View

Isobel Vellois, a Breton Knight knight, is another unlockable companion. She’s not a straight lift of Brienne of Tarth from Game of Thrones, but if that’s how players relate to her role within High IsleLambert seemed to be fine with this. “She could be one such take,” Lambert said. “She and her family are knights. Her objective is to see right and wrong, and do the right thing for everyone. She’s not, kind of, your stuffy, pompous, ‘I’m a knight, therefore, you know, worship the ground I walk on.’ She’s got her own traits and flaws and whatnot.”

Tales of Tribute is a new gameplay feature that allows players to build decks against both NPCs or human opponents. Tales of Tribute will allow players to unlock decks and cards as well as chart advancement with the help of leaderboards.

Image: Zenimax Order Online Studios/Bethesda Softworks

Considering that High Rock and High Isle are so much undiscovered country for an Elder Scrolls video game — other than Online, its last appearance as an explorable video game world was 1996’s The Elder Scrolls 2 Daggerfall — Lambert agreed that this expansion effectively put him in charge of a huge chunk of canon for the series, which turned 28 on March 25.

“But one of the things that we have established over the years is this sense of trust; [Bethesda Game Studios] trusts us with the IP — we’ve been working on this game since, you know, for me it’s been 2007, but it’s been live since 2014,” Lambert said. “And we treat the IP with respect. They are very close to us, whenever we do anything. And they’ve given us carte blanche to do whatever we want with High Isle. It’s great.”