I feel like the gritty aesthetic was also a sign of what was popular in 2011. If I remember correctly, this was when shows like the Walking Dead and History Channel’s Vikings and Game of Thrones were all very popular, which all have a really dirty gritty aesthetic.
This isn't really a 2011 trend, the "grey and brown" era of video games was actually earlier - it started with stuff like Resident Evil 4, which was notorious for going a much more bland and "realistic" route eith aesthetics. Many games that came our from 2005 all the way to the early 2010. Actually Borderlands 2 was one of the first games to BREAK the "gritty realism" trope, by being colorful, on the nose, and blatantly engaging in self-mockery, breaking the 4th wall on occasion. The thing with Skyrim is, Bethesda has always been one generation behind. Oblivion came out in 2006, yet looked aesthetically more similarly to early 2000s games. Skyrim came out in the same year Portal 2 and Batman Arkham City did, yet the latter two look crisp, colorful, and bold in their aesthetics, while Skyrim is bland and faded. And Bethesda knew they were late for the trend, which is why they cranked up the colors for the Skyrim gameplay trailer. Compare it to the actual game, and you'll notice how much more bland and grey the world looks. So no, this isn't a sign of what was popular in 2011. This is a sign of what was popular in 2007-2008, when they started developing Skyrim.
It's definitely just another case of Bethesda devs being primally fearful of the color green, and trees. They're scared to touch grass and don't want to force players to go through such trauma.
@@brunoactis1104 I'm surprised you never noticed. It's been quite a controversy in gaming. Not with just RE4, but in general games of that era. And it's objectively true, and there's a reason for the brown plague of mid to late 2000s games. LCD monitors. It was the late 2000s when LCD monitors became affordable enough for peopel to replace their CRT monitors. Problem is, LCD monitors have linear, rather than exponential light intensity due to the nature of the lighting, so the colors are generally more faded and flat compared to CRT. This is why some people preferred plasma, and later OLED, before LCD - because LCD just doesn't look as colorful, especially with monitor lighting, which was significantly weaker than LCD TV lighting. The videogame industry hasn't adjusted yet to the new color standards, so they effectively developed games on CRT monitors, and then when the consumer opened up the game on their LCD monitor, it looked like a brown mess. It wasn't until the market fully adjusted to the new color schemes that this problem stopped. See for example Wolfenstein 2009. The game looks awesome on scrreenshots, but then you load it up, and it looks like a flat, brown mess.
The use of sandals for a wedding is funny. XD Although, now you've got me thinking... Historically, what defined something as being a luxury was scarcity, so maybe the fact that no one in Skyrim wears sandals because of the climate would mean that sandals are kind of a luxury garment. Completely impractical and something you'd probably struggle to even find. Special occasions only...such as weddings!
My guess? It's because she has close ties to the Emperor, and Cyrodill has a lot of Roman inspiration, and sandals are associated with them. I also liked the videos (I've seen the Oblivion one as well). I'm hoping that, with more time to actually lay the groundwork, TES VI will be just better across the board (magic and combat system, but also the clothing/armour).
I was honestly somewhat flabbergasted by the sandals comment because, like, what's inelegant about sandals?! The Empire takes heavy cues from Rome, as has been said here already, Roman nobles most definitely wore sandals on most occasions and they had some goddamn drip on them! Or are you gonna disrespect togas as well now, huh?! No taste, I say! None!
Weddings in every culture are steeped in tradition, usually centuries of tradition. I'm assuming the sandals are part of it, similar to the flowery wedding wreath.
I feel like Bethesda could have dipped more into some of their other Nord inspirations for the outfits. Variations of plaid could have added some nice splashes of colour to the world, and possibly built up more unique identities around the map depending on the region, faction or family. Similar to the Scottish clans
some outfit not included in the vid that i think are worth noting: - cicero's jester outfit that includes the funky hat & boots - the archmage robes - nocturnal's robes - executioner's robes - fur trimmed cloak, as worn by a bunch of jarls (ulfric for example)
If there's one thing Skyrim was super dedicated to, it was its aesthetic. No saturated colours (even the most startling colours are reserved for magic and still pretty desaturated) and every single thing in the entire game is worn down, beaten up, scratched, and dirty, except for magical effects and some organics. Even the rocks lying around on the ground look like they got in a fight down at the tavern with an axe-wielding Nord. Morrowind's aesthetic is pretty consistent too, though with its alien nature and varied cultures it doesn't stick so closely to a specific style, while Oblivion tended to flip-flop between some sort of medieval European blend and the then-new Lord of the Rings trilogy. The Imperial Legion as soldiers of Gondor were a neat choice, as was revamping the Imperial City to be dry, white, and circular like Minas Tirith. In terms of what I'd want to wear, it'd always be the robes from Morrowind and the other clothing types from Oblivion. Oblivion's robes were such a miss compared to its other clothing and to Morrowind's. It had, what, two models for robes (three if you count the emperor's) with the only difference being the textures? Even Mannimarco couldn't get his own robe model.
Entirely agree. While realistically there would definitely be characters wearing clean elaborate clothing like some nobles in solitude, it'd simply be jarring to me at least seeing such a stark difference to the rest of the game. Visual cohesion is something i find extremely important in games and while skyrim isn't well aged or particularly eye pleasing, it has it's own vibe that's there from weapons and armor to clothing and landscapes etc.
One thing that annoys me about the depiction of bleak clothes is it goes against human nature to me. Like some of the most outlandish colours are by used by people in relatively bad environments. The medieval world was awash with colour while in the modern day we prefer simple plain and often dull colours. When we are faced with adversity and misery we seek hope and joy in almost anything even if its just jokes and pretty colours. so why aren't the people doing that
Money. In medieval ages dyed clothes and fabric to make clothes were more expensive especially the more vibrant. Those who didn't have the knowledge and skills to make that themselves, would pay a premium for bright colors. The jarls and wealthy do wear more vibrant clothes compared to the lower class in the game. Skyrim has been in the midst of the civil war for the past twenty years roughly as of the start of the game. Trade and commerce has been disrupted to the point of just getting food traded in has become fairly dangerous and the roads fallen in disrepair, constantly being attacked by various threats by bandits, animals, magical beings and by the time we play dragons too. So, all that taken in consideration, it makes sense the clothes are the way they are. If it were a province located in a tropical peaceful area, I would imagine more bring colors. However a cold war-torn province would have dark clothing that retains more heat from what sunlight they get and as previously mentioned would be common and ragged. Clothing in Skyrim from other places would look different but I've never paid much attention to all that.
IRL people are trying these days to copy the wealthy minimalist lifestyle of muted colors because it looks rich and lots of colors looks like the items are mass produced which is seen as poor on social media. "Beige moms" are a great example of this. Tiktok has them and so does instagram. There are many RUclips videos talking about the developmental risks that come with raising a kid in a colorless muted home because the mother (sometimes the father too) wants a wealthy looking aesthetic. Companies have started to play into these trends as well by selling products for the "beige mons" and "crunchy moms"
@@MethuselahWinter skyrims civil war has only been going on for months or a year at most not 20. While most dyes in irl were made domestically and people still had bright colours. Sure the rich had greater variety and even brighter colours but the poor still had access to local dyes that produce bright greens and yellows. In fact the best evidence we have evidence of nordic clothes dyed bright yellow clothing from local plants
@@MethuselahWinter People USED colors even during those times and that also goes for the commoner; white and grey were the more common followed by red, green, yellow, orange, brown, even blue were colors used in medieval clothing, the things about medieval people only wearing brown colors it's just false. And the war is not an excuse, people had clothes before the war, you know?
@@MethuselahWinter beige moms are a great example, but i think in general our society is continually heading towards the drab, muted colors unfortunately. just look at how many brands/restaurants/etc. have rebranded to a more "minimalistic" and "modern" style over the past few years. same with cars, too. you're lucky to see a car that's not black, white, or grey these days. it's really sad tbh, the world could be so much brighter and more colorful :(
One thing that stands out to me about clothing in Skyrim is that other than that one clothes shop in Solutide (which is for the wealthy) you can hardly buy any clothes in Skyrim. There are no other clothes shops, and general stores have very few clothes. The player probably gets most of their clothes by looting (let's try not to think about the implications of stabbng filthy necromancers in a cave and then wearing the clothes taken off their corpses). Put that fact together with the hand-made look of regular clothing and it looks like people make their own clothes (or at least, a family all have their clothes made by the one person who can sew/stitch). I think there's implied storyline there about life in a harsh land in the middle of a civil war. Compare to ES 2, 3 and 4 where life was fairly stable until Oblivion gates or whatever started opening. Life in Skyrim was brutal and short before the dragons.
I like this idea. Particularly seeing as it can be claimed the Empire is no longer importing cloth (I think it's mentioned in Whiterun how the civil war has made the trade routes dangerous,) which has caused the Nords to fall back on more traditional clothing.
Bethesda went for the movie/show trope of commoners wear brown. There's very little evidence that this was the case in history, particularly in towns. Various dyes were available and people went out of their way to not look drab. Wool, linen and cotton weren't even brown in their natural state, so who's dyeing all the clothes brown? You only have to look at the traditional garb worn by people all over Europe when they're having traditional garb days to see that there was a lot of color. Skyrim's clothing is rather disappointing, and I'm not a great fan of the armor either except for Steel and Daedric.
Do you mean steel plate? Because the base steel armor is an absolute mess. It looks like someone has sawn 4 different outfits together, ans then stitched steel parts to it.
Maybe it was white but nobody does their laundry in Skyrim so it turned brown from all the dirt since they wear the same thing everyday and I don't ever see any clothing lines with clothes hanging off of them idk
Cheaper clothes weren’t dyed as deeply. The lower class also spent more time out doors so their clothes would be bleached by the sun. The higher classes would have more vibrant colors or just more wealthy people in general. It probably depends on the exact time and culture but I do agree moves do have the underclass more drab than accurate.
IRL white was one of the most common colours worn by peasants, because cloth is naturally white (or at least a shade of it) and bleaching was the most effective way of deep cleaning clothes (which would strip out dyes and the whole process took weeks before the development of chlorine bleaches in the late 1700s). Dyes were still quite expensive, but there are cheap natural dyes that can be made with "domestic" reagents (usually natural pigments from flowers that have been saturated with urine), so the most common patterns (which you see in a lot of traditional dress) are whites accented with bold primary colours. Nobody wore rough brown sack cloth, because that was very expensive! Sack cloth is jute (native to Asia), hemp (North Africa and the Middle East), and hessian (AKA burlap, from India), or really, really tough wool (but the imported sack cloths were preferred because they were easier to work and naturally resistant to pests, chiefly moths). It's scratchy and unpleasant to wear, so nobody wore it, but they used it for commercial sacks because it was strong and up to the job of carrying cargo and being reusable. If a naked peasant found a sack, he'd probably sell it to buy clothes. Or just go to a church and ask for alms.
Scandinavians seem to really like bright colors. Like, really colorful. I've always attribute this to the land being covered in snow with really long nights in winter and they just need those bright colors to break it up. Skyrim dropped the ball
Oh really? Would you mind giving some examples? I've never thought of this myself, and seem to recall more muted colors when thinking of typical clothing :)
@@vildastensson1189 in reality, nords didn't dry a lot their clothe. Actually skyrim use good clothes for the medieval nord era. Nobles often dress more or less like they do in it, with lot of colors, middle or poor community has those type of clothe they have in the game, and warrior usually use what they did in the game, excluding obviously fantasy armor like orc, daedric ect one. They do can make more on the leather tho, it was often dry in this era, especially in red or blue. The clothes people often complain cuz they want it in it are often from their imagination only, and never existed in the way they want it in it. Plus it was really divided in this era, and they all, especially warrior, had different type of clothes. People dont complain and love the fantasy only clothe, like thalmor one which never existed as it's from more fictional country that Cyrodiil and Skyrim (which are the only one inspired from the real world with Hammerfell (Alik'r land) and High Rock (Breton land)).
first off, your outfit in the video - y e s. amazing. secondly, great overview and I totally agree with you, what a lift Skyrim fashion would've gotten with some more clothing influences from earlier games - but I guess the plain/simple vibe tells its own story too ✨
I understand its been over 200 years since the Oblivion crisis, and a few more since the events in Morrowind; but I agree that there should have been more fashion that survived from Skyrim's neighbors to influence the culture of those affiliated with those provinces.
I really like the black head wrap you can get for male characters. It's basically just a bandana but I love those. For female characters though it sucks that it's made super long and doesn't look right instead of being tied at the top. It looks more like scrooge night cap lol. The miner outfit is good too. It doesn't seem too bulky like a lot of the clothes do.
i really love that you talk about these aspects of the games. i’m a woman who looooooves jewelry and a world that has that available to play with makes me so excited. i even went out of my way to make replicas of my favorite pieces. nothing professional, but i had fun regardless.
You forgot to include the best gloves in the game, the ones you get in the mages guild quest to stabilize energy around the college. Sure, you can only get them for the duration of that quest, but if you never finish the quest...
You’re right, I love those! For the most part I tried to focus on stuff that people around the world wear as opposed to the more unique pieces, even though I did end up making a few exceptions 😅
7:58 Not to mention she's getting married outside in one of the more northern cities of this famously cold province. No, it's not Winterhold but I can't imagine it's sandal weather.
It's interesting to see a feminine takeaway from games who's targeted demographic is more a masculine audience. I think she makes valid points here that would make the art more immersive and more aesthetically appealing. Good work :)
In regards to wedding sandals, it could be that the designers were trying to say something like, "It's her special day, she's part of the high upper class, wearing impractical and unprotected sandals in the cold and harsh climate of Skyrim would be a statement of her ability to live a trouble-free life. It's the opposite of what everyone else wears, just because she can, just because she's noble." That doesn't mean they couldn't have made them a little more elegant, though. Like gold threading, flowers, pearls or something along that nature. And to be fair to the people of Raven Rock, they're probably wearing dull, unremarkable garb because the settlement was taking a nosedive by the time the Dragonborn gets there. The mine has been closed for decades, shopkeepers can barely sell anything, and they've been cut off from assistance from House Redoran. There could've been more outfits, but the dunmeri clothes I think represent the state of Raven Rock very well.
It seems like the dirty clothing is a holdover from that era of games and movies, wherein medieval meant "dirty faces and soiled clothing." Still, I love the game in spite of this gripe. Still playing all these years later.
When you play a stealth archer, you don't need armor because your enemy never gets the opportunity to fight back. Enchant some clothing and get a bound bow and you can walk around inconspicuous looking like a harmless citizen.
@@mostbeautifulsinner224 it's called media (i.e. art) analysis ¿don't you like to dive deeper into the things that make you feel specially with a username like Most Beautiful Sinner
@@Andythecreature Skyrim Clothings are making me feel some type of way. And its bad. But I get it. Not the part about my username though that confused me.
I love that you're making these videos focusing on these aspects of games. I'm making a small RPG myself, and really want to get these parts right. Armour usually gets the most focus in games like this, but clothing is so important in fleshing out the world and people within it. Love your analysis.
Absolutely loooooved the video, so glad you showed up on my recommended ❤ I like to think that just like the US did that campaign during WWII to convince rich women to donate their jewelry to the war effort, Skyrim at some point in their semi-recent history convinced its people to donate their fine/less practical clothes (silks, velvets, brocades), making the jarls lead by example, and adopted a strictly utilitarian style to display the strength and endurance of the nords, which would also explain why the best dressed people are the ones not ideologically linked to the nords. (but again, this is just me trying to make sense of why they wouldn't have at least ONE superbly dressed character)
You are our Skyrim Official Clothing Expert. Great outfit you were wearing too. Thanks for the info and your knowledge of Skyrim Threads. More cosplay outfits please, they are always great to see. 🏆
My favorite jewelry are the Nordic circlet, amulet, and ring, it also goes well with the Nordic Carved Armor which is one of my favorite armors and weapons
DAMN youtube recommended killed it today, what a great video, never seen your channel before but its clear you are someone who puts in a lot of effort, much respect!
0:24 *laughs in Dagoth Ur* xD Skyrim clothing is very limited it was one of the first things I noticed amd didn't like. The clothing in Morrowind and Oblivion is much better not just the aesthetic and variety of selection but the main issue is the fact that without mods a clothing item in Skyrim is a single item and cannot be customizable with different clothing items besides hats, gloves and shoes which is a major disappointment smh :/ in Morrowind you can even wear clothes under Armour, even mage robes with pauldrons which is awesome for Battlemages
I use the Creation Kit, it's a modding tool Bethesda offers (for free on Steam!), and the game files give a little more detail into the clothes. So the more basic clothes are considered "Farm clothes", Haelga's outfit is called "Merchants Clothes", etc. Some mods like the Unofficial patch implement this into the game. A little bit of extra info, Frea of the Skaal wears a unobtainable "Skaal Amulet", which is very pretty. I was doing some digging into the game files, and there is a model for a Gold and Sapphire amulet, that for some reason was never added to the game. The Tavern Clothes was supposed to come with a matching hat/headdress, there is a texture set made for it, but no model unfortunately. But yeah, I like the clothes in Skyrim but they are lacking when compared to previous games. Anyway, awesome video Angelika!
For the unobtainable items, if you smack an NPC with the Mora's Grasp greater power and then paralyze them after it wears off, you can pickpocket their gear as they're getting up. Great video!
Thanks for the unique content! There is so much that goes into such large art projects (like video games) that goes unnoticed but that clearly people put a lot of work into! Discussing things like just the clothing of a fictional world gives credit to the awesome work those who made the clothes!
if you look at accurate recreations of viking age clothing, the wealthy would be covered in elaborate embroidery and bright colors. even the average person would probably have one nice green tunic.
Clothing options is games is one of the most important aspects to me especially in an RPG. Bonus points if the NPCs react differently based on how your dressed, even if it's just slight dialogue changes.
Something that really strikes me as perfectly immersive actually IS that dirty grimy quality of not only the clothing, but the character’s faces. I adore those dark circles and straight up dirt that seems caked on everyone. The weird part is that the higher classes also have this quality about them, but none of the Elder Scrolls’s characters have a particularly “radiant” quality. I agree in that if we can have the facial construction down to the tiniest customizable minutiae that we could maybe ask for a tiny morsel of clothing selection too 👉👈
4:35 that outfit would be cool for a “traveling merchant” character using mods. There is a mod where you can set up your wares and sell them to customers. The outside layer looks a little like a gambeson/padded armor so it could be modded to have a small light armor value. It would give some protection against the dangers of Skyrim, along with a steel dagger (IMO that fits best) just in case, while not being too cumbersome and also looking decent. You’re just trying to sell your goods from place to place, not get into big fights. You might want to get an armored follower to serve as your bodyguard, like Uthgerd (IIRC all you have to do to get her is beat her up in the fistfight, which is easy). If bandits attack, you’d try to let your follower brawl with them as much as possible. You could roleplay that the merchant wears this outfit because it’s lower profile than other fancy clothes so he’s less of a target for thieves and bandits (of course no one tries to rob you except bandits and they’ll try to do that even if you’re max level in daedric armor lol, but again just for roleplaying purposes)
As for the robes, there are also green, brown and red ones in the game-files,. Although unobtainable, your children can find them and gift them to you. (I got the red-hooded one once)
Regarding rings, I really love the bone hawk ring, which you did not mention. The bone hawk amulet is similarly cool, and both are only found in Harkon's quarters in the Daunguard dlc. Very fitting as Volkihar castle is surrounded by hawks.
My current game through is with some 'restrictions'. The only items allowed in my inventory are: food, clothing, jewelry, gems and ores. Also I can read spell tomes. Quest items are allowed (you can't get rid of them) but they are not used. Legendary difficulty. Two handed warrior, but I use stealth in Thief Guild and Dark Brotherhood quest lines.
I am a historical dress fanatic and a world building nerd, and to this day there are exactly three pieces of clothing I think were genuinely good in design (good, not just okay), and which I think the whole game should have followed in design language. The merchant's clothes, being the only piece of clothing that has obvious nordic design elements. The apron of the women's dress in particular reminded me of many traditional nordic women's outfits. Then the gamberson style fine clothes. Because it's a gamberson. Video games oh so often ignore that incredibly prominent form of armour. Comfortable, warm, stylish, versatile (layer mail or plate over it! Go ham!) Ironically in the game this piece of armour is categorised as clothing.... And finally there's Elisif's dresses. They also have good nordic design language. I just wish that same level of detail had been applied to tge rest of the clothing. In general I think skyrim could have created more variety for the clothing quite easily, by simply expanding the color variations for the pieces.
Speaking of fashion, can we also just take a minute to appreciate the fit you have on in the video?! You want to know who the Daedric prince of drip is? I'd argue it's you! Thanks for the video!
Excellent video! I just started playing Skyrim a few days ago and then I found this video. I'm roleplaying a female Nord miner who when not mining likes to collect all clothes and chest armor styles in the game.
13:25 That is very similar in style to a Morrowind common robe. That one has the same asymmetric jewel thingy, but the robe itself is more of a reddish-brown instead of the gray.
You can have lootable greybeards robes by using the mod High Hrothgar alternate cave route. Imperial cyrodlic clothes can sadly be obtained ONLY with Beyond Skyrim Bruma ( one day maybe they'll be available by Endarie and Taarie in Solitude tailor shop or in East Empire offices ? ) Would be nice too to find UNenchanted robes of the Thalmor
RPG's today seem to shy away from multi-slot/layered apparel& armors, often they get reduced to a full one-piece with gloves or shies and hats on the side. Recently since Dragon's Dogma 2 was released I was bummed out quite a bit to find out that a 7-slot system from the first game was reduced to 4 slot. Also apparently the upcoming [God willing] Skyblivion is following in Skyrim's footsteps regarding armor and apparel, while the Skywind project is sticking to an apparent Morrowind identical system
If it hasn't been done already, I would recommend the Modular Clothing mod, it introduces the clothing system from the Fallout series to Skyrim. Only gripe with it is that the mod does not update npc clothing.
You know what I wish we saw in Skyrim? Some traditional Argonian clothing. Considering they're heavily based on cultures like the Aztec or the Maya, I think they'd have some really beautiful designs. But I guess, given Skyrim's climate, that wouldn't exactly be functional!
There are actually two versions of the ragged trousers. one has the default rough-spun outfit appearance for females, the other is just the trousers and just the bra. it's a little harder to find. I think you can find it in fort greymoor. But yes, the fashion is pretty meh in Skyrim. Very function over form. Radiant Raiment though does occasionally load the outfit Elisif wears, butt it's very rare. just check with the shopkeep.. if she don't have it, give her a friendly slug in the shoulder....with a mace. then reload, and she'll have a new list of items. you may have to do this a hundred times, but, eventually it'll show up. I've seen it maybe twice.
Everyone dogs on the massive, visible stitch working in a lot of more normal person clothing that both has exactly zero precedent for any irl history and are wildly impractical, but I don't mind it. If you've ever looked into making clothing, even just a glance at it, you'd have to realize that this would have to be actively decided on. This was a choice. This was deliberate. The regular people of Skyrim really went "this is fashion," and they're right.
Skyrim’s art style is generally not trying to be as realistic as people sometimes think it is. Every texture has this is very exaggerated roughness to it that tries to tell the story of Skyrim’s environment. I mean look at the hair. They didn’t need to make it look like straw, but they did. The really exaggeratedly awful stitching is just part of that, and I appreciate it even if it doesn’t make any practical sense at all.
There's the technical reason too. If you were playing the game on a then 6-year-old Xbox 360 (2005 console hardware was pretty old in 2011), unless the stitches were goofily oversized they're not even going to be visible in normal gameplay as anything more than a smudge. The texture resolutions you'd get from running Skyrim on 512MB of RAM were horrendous and that's *shared* memory between system and graphics. Easy to forget that Skyrim was intentionally designed around half-a-decade old consoles with the same amount of memory that the smartphones of 2011 had. (iPhone 4s, October 2011, 512MB RAM.) It also ran at 720p if you had the later revisions with HDMI ports, though was often run through composite video for a much less crisp image.
I agree that most outfits in Skyrim are rather boring, I can never find a cool not armor item to enchant and always end up using the red variety of miner clothes which look fine and comfortable for my female character to go on adventures. One of the best items I think you didn't mention is Cicero's/jester clothes, as extravagant it is supposed to be, it actually has a dark and sober feeling to it that's very fitting for its nature. That's one of my favorites.
I really feel the dunmer outfits deserve less shade, I enjoy the feel of raven rock being a faraway sliver of a once much greater culture and the concept of having the temple robes relay theyre an important part of their culture via them being more high end. As a whole I enjoy that Skyrim doesnt integrate clothes as a major part of the province, the most fancy garbs belong to the rich, royal and and some of the most complex adorned clothing belongs to either foreign culture or old tradition, I think that armor being valued in terms of aesthetic and efficacy mirrors the constant state of battle the province finds itself in.
Skyrim is more aligned with Viking culture with everyone dressing like they belong in the 800s. The Kingdom of Skyrim itself also has a Jarl or Thane system in where each lord rules over a certain district in Skyrim. The game is also very similar to that of the Western Roman Empire with how the Imperials dress, mainly in centurion or legionarie armor. The game also has some medieval Arabic clothing with what the Redguards were wearing in Skyrim, which is a bit similar to how people dressed during the reign of the Abbasid Caliphate. Also, do you think that Elder Scrolls 6 will take place in the Kingdom of Hammerfell?
Uh in answer to the question it is hands down Sheo. But also wanted to say: I love these videos. Analyzing different aspects of these games like their fashion or flags is like... I don't know but it's working with my tism. It's a different type of TES content that I never thought about and also never realized it would go so hard.
"Immersive Armors" & "Immersive Weapons" are a must-have mods for any Skyrim playthrough, they just add so much more visual variety without going over the top.
I would also add "Armor and Clothing Extension." Better textures for vanilla clothes as well as making so many of the items pop and even add new variant for a more varied look. One thing I will say about "Immersive Weapons" though is that many of the weapons included has really aged poorly in terms of graphics. That is really one of the only reasons I no longer download it but "Immersive Armors" have gotten a graphics boost by another modder so that one stays.
From what i gathered Todd was in a odd place because a load of creatures and animals are named from Irish folklore, he continued this into fallout 4, the weather and climate does resemble Ireland from snow capped mountains to harsh barron landscapes, what i think was going on is the Witcher 3 dlc has a island modeled after the city of cork which realised before skyrim and it was prasied so todd had to step it up a notch so unless you look into it you wouldn't notice it unless you have learnt a bit of irish folklore
great video!! i apreciate the adressing of such an overlooked topic in the elder scrolls and in gaming in general, i personally didn't pay much attention to clothes in games but you changed that, thank you. you also made me wanna play oblivion again and idk wether to like you or to hate you for that lol. a video about potential mods to fix the shortcomings of skyrim without sacrificing much of the tone of the game would be astonishing and i'd hope to see it!
One of the biggest letdowns with Skyrim were the lack of separate clothing pieces like pants and shirts. Mixing and matching different apparel in Morrowind, while rudimentary considering the models, were great fun and rocking in to Balmora with the freshest and tastiest drip just to impress my man Caius felt amazing.
I am pretty sure the vampire robes were introduced with Dawnguard. Iirc, vampires didn’t have specific clothing to them before it, just wore black robes, occasionally hooded variants
As much as I hate the thalmor and they deserve some serious shade for how they caused all the instability in skyrim, I must admit - they got that shit on them. Dominion drippin.
It's funny, but as a long time Skyrim player, the clothes / armors have always been more for role play. There is a mod that was added to the "Anniversary Edition" that added "survival mode" - players need to sleep, eat, and can actually freeze to death. The fancy, noble hats have the most warmth rating for headwear. I'm guessing many players wear those on survival mode.
I prefer multiple options to create looks with layers, great to do in Morrowind and to extent in Oblivion but in Skyrim, very hard to do. I ended up mixing heavy armour boots with light armour gloves and a robe.
5:36 I've never stopped and appreciated the wedding dress. It does look a lot fancier than the rest of the clothes in Skyrim, which is great. In Oblivion it would have just been regular rich people clothes.
I really appreciate the amount of color they put into the clothes of Skyrim, even the working people's garments. They could have easily put everybody but the rich in drab, monotonous clothing, but historically people love color. Medieval Scandinavians themselves were well known to pride themselves on cleanliness and grooming, and it wouldn't have been uncommon to see your average man anywhere in Europe wearing greens, yellows, sometimes even blues and reds. Hell, go way up north and look at traditional Sami clothing, full of vibrant reds and blues. You can criticize Skyrim for loads of things, but they did clothing pretty well overall.
One thing I guess we should think of is that when we are in Skyrim it’s in the midst of a civil war, and while the game doesn’t show it having a drastic toll on the world and people, it could explain the “dirty” nature of the games clothes, nonetheless I wish there was more options and variety
Install Frostfall mod - touch water near winterhold - insta death Lol. Fur armour provides good warmth. Also Daedric and Dragonbone. Mage robes are so-so. But this mod is harsh as heck. I like to explore and I always die of hypothermia like by accident. Campfire mod is a must have along with Frosfall. And maybe ever Hunterborn... venison stew warms you up and keeps you full. Eat Drink Sleep Bathe is another immersive mod. Man, I love Skyrim's modding community. :)
The fine cloths and noble clothes definitely could have been better. Historically nobles and wealthy people would have worn brightly colored clothes as a way to show off their wealth. Nobles especially should have worn super rare colors that were hard to make such as purple. There even could have been exotic patterns and trimmings lines with gems and precious metals. The clothes on average npc’s makes sense but the wealthy and nobility should have had clothes that properly matched their wealth.
In the Elder Scrolls Online you have lots and i mean lots of clothes NPC's as well as players can wear fromarmours in details as in beautiful shiny silk fabric dresses, to pieces of jewellery people can wear. Especially to an extend like you can literally travel throughout all the provinces in Tamriel (Cyrodiil, Morrowind, Skyrim, Elseweyr, Black Marsh, Summerset, Valenwood, High Rock and dfferent Daedric planemelds) Each and every regions has their citizens with their clothes, outfits and armour designs....
There's actually a guy who's channel is him seeing if different characters can do the quests they send you on. What would they need you for? Not a lot in most cases.
Who is the Daedric prince of drip?
Sheogorath, hands down
Sheogorath (Immaculate drip game goes dummy hard)
I think you are :)
Sheogorath, because I don't want a Mad God to skip rope with my entrails.
Ithelia, they had to lock her away for a reason 🔥🔥🔥
I feel like the gritty aesthetic was also a sign of what was popular in 2011. If I remember correctly, this was when shows like the Walking Dead and History Channel’s Vikings and Game of Thrones were all very popular, which all have a really dirty gritty aesthetic.
Borderlands series comes to mind
This isn't really a 2011 trend, the "grey and brown" era of video games was actually earlier - it started with stuff like Resident Evil 4, which was notorious for going a much more bland and "realistic" route eith aesthetics. Many games that came our from 2005 all the way to the early 2010. Actually Borderlands 2 was one of the first games to BREAK the "gritty realism" trope, by being colorful, on the nose, and blatantly engaging in self-mockery, breaking the 4th wall on occasion.
The thing with Skyrim is, Bethesda has always been one generation behind. Oblivion came out in 2006, yet looked aesthetically more similarly to early 2000s games. Skyrim came out in the same year Portal 2 and Batman Arkham City did, yet the latter two look crisp, colorful, and bold in their aesthetics, while Skyrim is bland and faded. And Bethesda knew they were late for the trend, which is why they cranked up the colors for the Skyrim gameplay trailer. Compare it to the actual game, and you'll notice how much more bland and grey the world looks.
So no, this isn't a sign of what was popular in 2011. This is a sign of what was popular in 2007-2008, when they started developing Skyrim.
True! Think of the intricacy of the costumes of LOTR which dominated the 2000s fantasy landscape compared to 2010's direction of pure realism
It's definitely just another case of Bethesda devs being primally fearful of the color green, and trees. They're scared to touch grass and don't want to force players to go through such trauma.
@@brunoactis1104 I'm surprised you never noticed. It's been quite a controversy in gaming. Not with just RE4, but in general games of that era.
And it's objectively true, and there's a reason for the brown plague of mid to late 2000s games.
LCD monitors.
It was the late 2000s when LCD monitors became affordable enough for peopel to replace their CRT monitors. Problem is, LCD monitors have linear, rather than exponential light intensity due to the nature of the lighting, so the colors are generally more faded and flat compared to CRT. This is why some people preferred plasma, and later OLED, before LCD - because LCD just doesn't look as colorful, especially with monitor lighting, which was significantly weaker than LCD TV lighting.
The videogame industry hasn't adjusted yet to the new color standards, so they effectively developed games on CRT monitors, and then when the consumer opened up the game on their LCD monitor, it looked like a brown mess. It wasn't until the market fully adjusted to the new color schemes that this problem stopped.
See for example Wolfenstein 2009. The game looks awesome on scrreenshots, but then you load it up, and it looks like a flat, brown mess.
The use of sandals for a wedding is funny. XD Although, now you've got me thinking... Historically, what defined something as being a luxury was scarcity, so maybe the fact that no one in Skyrim wears sandals because of the climate would mean that sandals are kind of a luxury garment. Completely impractical and something you'd probably struggle to even find. Special occasions only...such as weddings!
And because I forgot to mention it in my comment, I really enjoy these fashion videos. Good work!
My guess? It's because she has close ties to the Emperor, and Cyrodill has a lot of Roman inspiration, and sandals are associated with them.
I also liked the videos (I've seen the Oblivion one as well). I'm hoping that, with more time to actually lay the groundwork, TES VI will be just better across the board (magic and combat system, but also the clothing/armour).
I don't know about other games but high heels don't exist in Skyrim - it's either boots or shoes, and neither of those work for the wedding 'fit.
I was honestly somewhat flabbergasted by the sandals comment because, like, what's inelegant about sandals?! The Empire takes heavy cues from Rome, as has been said here already, Roman nobles most definitely wore sandals on most occasions and they had some goddamn drip on them! Or are you gonna disrespect togas as well now, huh?!
No taste, I say! None!
Weddings in every culture are steeped in tradition, usually centuries of tradition. I'm assuming the sandals are part of it, similar to the flowery wedding wreath.
I feel like Bethesda could have dipped more into some of their other Nord inspirations for the outfits. Variations of plaid could have added some nice splashes of colour to the world, and possibly built up more unique identities around the map depending on the region, faction or family. Similar to the Scottish clans
skyrim hates color so bad its crazy
Yeah but it was made in 2011, when colour was a long-lost myth known only to a few.
I could see the Reachmen especially having Scottish influences
This is why the dunmer outfits added in dragonborn are probably my favorite clothing piece, the style and the colors are sweet imo
Not sure how graphics work but wouldn't plaid be more taxing on graphics cards?
some outfit not included in the vid that i think are worth noting:
- cicero's jester outfit that includes the funky hat & boots
- the archmage robes
- nocturnal's robes
- executioner's robes
- fur trimmed cloak, as worn by a bunch of jarls (ulfric for example)
I thought about the archange robes when I say the Solstheim priest robe one of the best looking pieces of clothing in the game fs
I thought about Cicero's clothes too but I think those count as armor. That's probably why she left them out.
@@Version0111 no, it's clothing, but it comes with enchantments ig
What about the skaal outfit? I really like it
If there's one thing Skyrim was super dedicated to, it was its aesthetic. No saturated colours (even the most startling colours are reserved for magic and still pretty desaturated) and every single thing in the entire game is worn down, beaten up, scratched, and dirty, except for magical effects and some organics. Even the rocks lying around on the ground look like they got in a fight down at the tavern with an axe-wielding Nord.
Morrowind's aesthetic is pretty consistent too, though with its alien nature and varied cultures it doesn't stick so closely to a specific style, while Oblivion tended to flip-flop between some sort of medieval European blend and the then-new Lord of the Rings trilogy. The Imperial Legion as soldiers of Gondor were a neat choice, as was revamping the Imperial City to be dry, white, and circular like Minas Tirith.
In terms of what I'd want to wear, it'd always be the robes from Morrowind and the other clothing types from Oblivion. Oblivion's robes were such a miss compared to its other clothing and to Morrowind's. It had, what, two models for robes (three if you count the emperor's) with the only difference being the textures? Even Mannimarco couldn't get his own robe model.
Ripping off Lotr was the worst decision they could've taken.
Entirely agree.
While realistically there would definitely be characters wearing clean elaborate clothing like some nobles in solitude, it'd simply be jarring to me at least seeing such a stark difference to the rest of the game.
Visual cohesion is something i find extremely important in games and while skyrim isn't well aged or particularly eye pleasing, it has it's own vibe that's there from weapons and armor to clothing and landscapes etc.
These ppl bashing Skyrim for its muted tone when it’s what gives the game its personality smh
@@versace6609 tbf you apply the same logic to all the piss filter games of late 2000s and yk. Ugliness sure is an aesthetic
One thing that annoys me about the depiction of bleak clothes is it goes against human nature to me. Like some of the most outlandish colours are by used by people in relatively bad environments. The medieval world was awash with colour while in the modern day we prefer simple plain and often dull colours. When we are faced with adversity and misery we seek hope and joy in almost anything even if its just jokes and pretty colours. so why aren't the people doing that
Money. In medieval ages dyed clothes and fabric to make clothes were more expensive especially the more vibrant. Those who didn't have the knowledge and skills to make that themselves, would pay a premium for bright colors. The jarls and wealthy do wear more vibrant clothes compared to the lower class in the game.
Skyrim has been in the midst of the civil war for the past twenty years roughly as of the start of the game. Trade and commerce has been disrupted to the point of just getting food traded in has become fairly dangerous and the roads fallen in disrepair, constantly being attacked by various threats by bandits, animals, magical beings and by the time we play dragons too.
So, all that taken in consideration, it makes sense the clothes are the way they are. If it were a province located in a tropical peaceful area, I would imagine more bring colors. However a cold war-torn province would have dark clothing that retains more heat from what sunlight they get and as previously mentioned would be common and ragged.
Clothing in Skyrim from other places would look different but I've never paid much attention to all that.
IRL people are trying these days to copy the wealthy minimalist lifestyle of muted colors because it looks rich and lots of colors looks like the items are mass produced which is seen as poor on social media. "Beige moms" are a great example of this. Tiktok has them and so does instagram. There are many RUclips videos talking about the developmental risks that come with raising a kid in a colorless muted home because the mother (sometimes the father too) wants a wealthy looking aesthetic.
Companies have started to play into these trends as well by selling products for the "beige mons" and "crunchy moms"
@@MethuselahWinter skyrims civil war has only been going on for months or a year at most not 20. While most dyes in irl were made domestically and people still had bright colours. Sure the rich had greater variety and even brighter colours but the poor still had access to local dyes that produce bright greens and yellows. In fact the best evidence we have evidence of nordic clothes dyed bright yellow clothing from local plants
@@MethuselahWinter People USED colors even during those times and that also goes for the commoner; white and grey were the more common followed by red, green, yellow, orange, brown, even blue were colors used in medieval clothing, the things about medieval people only wearing brown colors it's just false.
And the war is not an excuse, people had clothes before the war, you know?
@@MethuselahWinter beige moms are a great example, but i think in general our society is continually heading towards the drab, muted colors unfortunately. just look at how many brands/restaurants/etc. have rebranded to a more "minimalistic" and "modern" style over the past few years. same with cars, too. you're lucky to see a car that's not black, white, or grey these days. it's really sad tbh, the world could be so much brighter and more colorful :(
One thing that stands out to me about clothing in Skyrim is that other than that one clothes shop in Solutide (which is for the wealthy) you can hardly buy any clothes in Skyrim. There are no other clothes shops, and general stores have very few clothes. The player probably gets most of their clothes by looting (let's try not to think about the implications of stabbng filthy necromancers in a cave and then wearing the clothes taken off their corpses).
Put that fact together with the hand-made look of regular clothing and it looks like people make their own clothes (or at least, a family all have their clothes made by the one person who can sew/stitch). I think there's implied storyline there about life in a harsh land in the middle of a civil war. Compare to ES 2, 3 and 4 where life was fairly stable until Oblivion gates or whatever started opening. Life in Skyrim was brutal and short before the dragons.
I like this idea. Particularly seeing as it can be claimed the Empire is no longer importing cloth (I think it's mentioned in Whiterun how the civil war has made the trade routes dangerous,) which has caused the Nords to fall back on more traditional clothing.
Bethesda went for the movie/show trope of commoners wear brown. There's very little evidence that this was the case in history, particularly in towns. Various dyes were available and people went out of their way to not look drab. Wool, linen and cotton weren't even brown in their natural state, so who's dyeing all the clothes brown? You only have to look at the traditional garb worn by people all over Europe when they're having traditional garb days to see that there was a lot of color. Skyrim's clothing is rather disappointing, and I'm not a great fan of the armor either except for Steel and Daedric.
Do you mean steel plate?
Because the base steel armor is an absolute mess. It looks like someone has sawn 4 different outfits together, ans then stitched steel parts to it.
Yeah, and the clothing that survived are only brown bc of age. They were white when they were made.
Maybe it was white but nobody does their laundry in Skyrim so it turned brown from all the dirt since they wear the same thing everyday and I don't ever see any clothing lines with clothes hanging off of them idk
Cheaper clothes weren’t dyed as deeply. The lower class also spent more time out doors so their clothes would be bleached by the sun.
The higher classes would have more vibrant colors or just more wealthy people in general.
It probably depends on the exact time and culture but I do agree moves do have the underclass more drab than accurate.
IRL white was one of the most common colours worn by peasants, because cloth is naturally white (or at least a shade of it) and bleaching was the most effective way of deep cleaning clothes (which would strip out dyes and the whole process took weeks before the development of chlorine bleaches in the late 1700s). Dyes were still quite expensive, but there are cheap natural dyes that can be made with "domestic" reagents (usually natural pigments from flowers that have been saturated with urine), so the most common patterns (which you see in a lot of traditional dress) are whites accented with bold primary colours. Nobody wore rough brown sack cloth, because that was very expensive! Sack cloth is jute (native to Asia), hemp (North Africa and the Middle East), and hessian (AKA burlap, from India), or really, really tough wool (but the imported sack cloths were preferred because they were easier to work and naturally resistant to pests, chiefly moths). It's scratchy and unpleasant to wear, so nobody wore it, but they used it for commercial sacks because it was strong and up to the job of carrying cargo and being reusable. If a naked peasant found a sack, he'd probably sell it to buy clothes. Or just go to a church and ask for alms.
You make a gorgeous Bandit Chief in that scaled armor (or that's the closest armor set I can think of from Skyrim).
That’s what I was going for!! Thanks 🫶
I agree, she has great taste
Scandinavians seem to really like bright colors. Like, really colorful. I've always attribute this to the land being covered in snow with really long nights in winter and they just need those bright colors to break it up. Skyrim dropped the ball
Oh really? Would you mind giving some examples? I've never thought of this myself, and seem to recall more muted colors when thinking of typical clothing :)
@@vildastensson1189 in reality, nords didn't dry a lot their clothe. Actually skyrim use good clothes for the medieval nord era. Nobles often dress more or less like they do in it, with lot of colors, middle or poor community has those type of clothe they have in the game, and warrior usually use what they did in the game, excluding obviously fantasy armor like orc, daedric ect one. They do can make more on the leather tho, it was often dry in this era, especially in red or blue.
The clothes people often complain cuz they want it in it are often from their imagination only, and never existed in the way they want it in it. Plus it was really divided in this era, and they all, especially warrior, had different type of clothes. People dont complain and love the fantasy only clothe, like thalmor one which never existed as it's from more fictional country that Cyrodiil and Skyrim (which are the only one inspired from the real world with Hammerfell (Alik'r land) and High Rock (Breton land)).
Gotta say, my favourite clothing in Skyrim is that worn by the "Tavern Girls". Preferably maxed out with health and magica regeneration enchantment.
Chef’s Tunic is S-Tier (I am biased because it’s the easiest cosplay to do for green screen videos)
first off, your outfit in the video - y e s. amazing. secondly, great overview and I totally agree with you, what a lift Skyrim fashion would've gotten with some more clothing influences from earlier games - but I guess the plain/simple vibe tells its own story too ✨
Thank you so much!!❤❤ as a fellow cozy game enjoyer, the clothes is non negotiable. 🎉
You look like you get to the Cloud District very often
You forgot the Aetherium crown and nocturnal's robes!
The Solstheim Priest Robes are obtainable by pickpocketing it off the priests, but yeah, you can't kill them.
I understand its been over 200 years since the Oblivion crisis, and a few more since the events in Morrowind; but I agree that there should have been more fashion that survived from Skyrim's neighbors to influence the culture of those affiliated with those provinces.
Simple black robes isn't good enough for you?
@@user-tk8gi5cl6j not every character is in mourning, what is this Hot Topic?
@@kylethomas9130 If your character wears some black, that means style, not mourning.
Anyway, simple blue robes isn't stylish enough for you?
@@user-tk8gi5cl6j what even is this bit
@@user-tk8gi5cl6jyeah some black, you have to be pretty pretty to wear all black and don’t look like s***
"Not everything can be flashy and over the top"
And then there's my character, walking around Skyrim in her wedding dress every day
I have always been partial to the Mourner's Clothes. Look really cool on a female character!
I really like the black head wrap you can get for male characters. It's basically just a bandana but I love those. For female characters though it sucks that it's made super long and doesn't look right instead of being tied at the top. It looks more like scrooge night cap lol. The miner outfit is good too. It doesn't seem too bulky like a lot of the clothes do.
i really love that you talk about these aspects of the games. i’m a woman who looooooves jewelry and a world that has that available to play with makes me so excited. i even went out of my way to make replicas of my favorite pieces. nothing professional, but i had fun regardless.
I wish I had the skills to make them! There’s something so therapeutic about dressing up in RPG clothes 🤣
The vampire robes are my favorite thing in Skyrim 🦇
You forgot to include the best gloves in the game, the ones you get in the mages guild quest to stabilize energy around the college. Sure, you can only get them for the duration of that quest, but if you never finish the quest...
You’re right, I love those! For the most part I tried to focus on stuff that people around the world wear as opposed to the more unique pieces, even though I did end up making a few exceptions 😅
You can pickpocket them
7:58 Not to mention she's getting married outside in one of the more northern cities of this famously cold province.
No, it's not Winterhold but I can't imagine it's sandal weather.
Suffering through impractical clothing options on special occasions is very human & realistic, actually.
you forgot the most modded unatainable outfit nocturnal's robe
It's interesting to see a feminine takeaway from games who's targeted demographic is more a masculine audience.
I think she makes valid points here that would make the art more immersive and more aesthetically appealing.
Good work :)
In regards to wedding sandals, it could be that the designers were trying to say something like, "It's her special day, she's part of the high upper class, wearing impractical and unprotected sandals in the cold and harsh climate of Skyrim would be a statement of her ability to live a trouble-free life. It's the opposite of what everyone else wears, just because she can, just because she's noble."
That doesn't mean they couldn't have made them a little more elegant, though. Like gold threading, flowers, pearls or something along that nature.
And to be fair to the people of Raven Rock, they're probably wearing dull, unremarkable garb because the settlement was taking a nosedive by the time the Dragonborn gets there. The mine has been closed for decades, shopkeepers can barely sell anything, and they've been cut off from assistance from House Redoran. There could've been more outfits, but the dunmeri clothes I think represent the state of Raven Rock very well.
It seems like the dirty clothing is a holdover from that era of games and movies, wherein medieval meant "dirty faces and soiled clothing." Still, I love the game in spite of this gripe. Still playing all these years later.
When you play a stealth archer, you don't need armor because your enemy never gets the opportunity to fight back. Enchant some clothing and get a bound bow and you can walk around inconspicuous looking like a harmless citizen.
The College robes (the outfit Tolfdir wears) honestly give Assassin's Creed, with the open coat that ends in points.
Yet another outstanding video! Thank you for consistently delivering such high-quality content!
It’s a pleasure to make these:) thank you again for the support, you’re too kind! ❤
She talks about imaginary clothing lmao
@@mostbeautifulsinner224
it's called media (i.e. art) analysis
¿don't you like to dive deeper into
the things that make you feel
specially with a username like
Most Beautiful Sinner
@@Andythecreature Skyrim Clothings are making me feel some type of way. And its bad. But I get it. Not the part about my username though that confused me.
I love that you're making these videos focusing on these aspects of games. I'm making a small RPG myself, and really want to get these parts right.
Armour usually gets the most focus in games like this, but clothing is so important in fleshing out the world and people within it. Love your analysis.
Absolutely loooooved the video, so glad you showed up on my recommended ❤
I like to think that just like the US did that campaign during WWII to convince rich women to donate their jewelry to the war effort, Skyrim at some point in their semi-recent history convinced its people to donate their fine/less practical clothes (silks, velvets, brocades), making the jarls lead by example, and adopted a strictly utilitarian style to display the strength and endurance of the nords, which would also explain why the best dressed people are the ones not ideologically linked to the nords.
(but again, this is just me trying to make sense of why they wouldn't have at least ONE superbly dressed character)
You are our Skyrim Official Clothing Expert. Great outfit you were wearing too. Thanks for the info and your knowledge of Skyrim Threads. More cosplay outfits please, they are always great to see. 🏆
My favorite jewelry are the Nordic circlet, amulet, and ring, it also goes well with the Nordic Carved Armor which is one of my favorite armors and weapons
DAMN youtube recommended killed it today, what a great video, never seen your channel before but its clear you are someone who puts in a lot of effort, much respect!
I’m so glad you liked it! Welcome to the channel 🫶🥳
0:24 *laughs in Dagoth Ur* xD Skyrim clothing is very limited it was one of the first things I noticed amd didn't like. The clothing in Morrowind and Oblivion is much better not just the aesthetic and variety of selection but the main issue is the fact that without mods a clothing item in Skyrim is a single item and cannot be customizable with different clothing items besides hats, gloves and shoes which is a major disappointment smh :/ in Morrowind you can even wear clothes under Armour, even mage robes with pauldrons which is awesome for Battlemages
I use the Creation Kit, it's a modding tool Bethesda offers (for free on Steam!), and the game files give a little more detail into the clothes. So the more basic clothes are considered "Farm clothes", Haelga's outfit is called "Merchants Clothes", etc. Some mods like the Unofficial patch implement this into the game.
A little bit of extra info, Frea of the Skaal wears a unobtainable "Skaal Amulet", which is very pretty. I was doing some digging into the game files, and there is a model for a Gold and Sapphire amulet, that for some reason was never added to the game. The Tavern Clothes was supposed to come with a matching hat/headdress, there is a texture set made for it, but no model unfortunately.
But yeah, I like the clothes in Skyrim but they are lacking when compared to previous games. Anyway, awesome video Angelika!
For the unobtainable items, if you smack an NPC with the Mora's Grasp greater power and then paralyze them after it wears off, you can pickpocket their gear as they're getting up. Great video!
Skyrim with style
Honestly i think skyrim has the least amount of options though the clothes looks good wish there were more outfits
Thanks for the unique content! There is so much that goes into such large art projects (like video games) that goes unnoticed but that clearly people put a lot of work into! Discussing things like just the clothing of a fictional world gives credit to the awesome work those who made the clothes!
I used to be an adventurer like you. Then I took an Angelikatosh upload in the feed.
(sorry, couldn't resist)
if you look at accurate recreations of viking age clothing, the wealthy would be covered in elaborate embroidery and bright colors. even the average person would probably have one nice green tunic.
really appreciate your specific niche of elder scrools content. its really well done and fascinating
I’ve been patiently anticipating this video. Thank you so much for making these.
Kind of surprised that you didn't make any mention of the gloves, because there are few but FABULOUS options.
Clothing options is games is one of the most important aspects to me especially in an RPG. Bonus points if the NPCs react differently based on how your dressed, even if it's just slight dialogue changes.
Something that really strikes me as perfectly immersive actually IS that dirty grimy quality of not only the clothing, but the character’s faces. I adore those dark circles and straight up dirt that seems caked on everyone. The weird part is that the higher classes also have this quality about them, but none of the Elder Scrolls’s characters have a particularly “radiant” quality.
I agree in that if we can have the facial construction down to the tiniest customizable minutiae that we could maybe ask for a tiny morsel of clothing selection too 👉👈
4:35 that outfit would be cool for a “traveling merchant” character using mods. There is a mod where you can set up your wares and sell them to customers. The outside layer looks a little like a gambeson/padded armor so it could be modded to have a small light armor value. It would give some protection against the dangers of Skyrim, along with a steel dagger (IMO that fits best) just in case, while not being too cumbersome and also looking decent. You’re just trying to sell your goods from place to place, not get into big fights. You might want to get an armored follower to serve as your bodyguard, like Uthgerd (IIRC all you have to do to get her is beat her up in the fistfight, which is easy). If bandits attack, you’d try to let your follower brawl with them as much as possible. You could roleplay that the merchant wears this outfit because it’s lower profile than other fancy clothes so he’s less of a target for thieves and bandits (of course no one tries to rob you except bandits and they’ll try to do that even if you’re max level in daedric armor lol, but again just for roleplaying purposes)
Wait tapping into the fashion of rpg’s is great I love this channel
I love the jewelry in the game. It adds a little to it.
As for the robes, there are also green, brown and red ones in the game-files,. Although unobtainable, your children can find them and gift them to you. (I got the red-hooded one once)
Regarding rings, I really love the bone hawk ring, which you did not mention. The bone hawk amulet is similarly cool, and both are only found in Harkon's quarters in the Daunguard dlc. Very fitting as Volkihar castle is surrounded by hawks.
My current game through is with some 'restrictions'. The only items allowed in my inventory are: food, clothing, jewelry, gems and ores. Also I can read spell tomes. Quest items are allowed (you can't get rid of them) but they are not used. Legendary difficulty. Two handed warrior, but I use stealth in Thief Guild and Dark Brotherhood quest lines.
I am a historical dress fanatic and a world building nerd, and to this day there are exactly three pieces of clothing I think were genuinely good in design (good, not just okay), and which I think the whole game should have followed in design language.
The merchant's clothes, being the only piece of clothing that has obvious nordic design elements. The apron of the women's dress in particular reminded me of many traditional nordic women's outfits.
Then the gamberson style fine clothes. Because it's a gamberson. Video games oh so often ignore that incredibly prominent form of armour. Comfortable, warm, stylish, versatile (layer mail or plate over it! Go ham!) Ironically in the game this piece of armour is categorised as clothing....
And finally there's Elisif's dresses. They also have good nordic design language. I just wish that same level of detail had been applied to tge rest of the clothing.
In general I think skyrim could have created more variety for the clothing quite easily, by simply expanding the color variations for the pieces.
Speaking of fashion, can we also just take a minute to appreciate the fit you have on in the video?! You want to know who the Daedric prince of drip is? I'd argue it's you!
Thanks for the video!
So kind, thank you! 😌♥️✨
Cool thank you for doing this. I enjoyed your overview of the Oblivion outfits so this will be great.🙏
Excellent video! I just started playing Skyrim a few days ago and then I found this video. I'm roleplaying a female Nord miner who when not mining likes to collect all clothes and chest armor styles in the game.
That's why the 'rustic clothing' mod is a must have for me, imagine wearing clean clothes
13:25 That is very similar in style to a Morrowind common robe. That one has the same asymmetric jewel thingy, but the robe itself is more of a reddish-brown instead of the gray.
You can have lootable greybeards robes by using the mod High Hrothgar alternate cave route.
Imperial cyrodlic clothes can sadly be obtained ONLY with Beyond Skyrim Bruma ( one day maybe they'll be available by Endarie and Taarie in Solitude tailor shop or in East Empire offices ? )
Would be nice too to find UNenchanted robes of the Thalmor
RPG's today seem to shy away from multi-slot/layered apparel& armors, often they get reduced to a full one-piece with gloves or shies and hats on the side. Recently since Dragon's Dogma 2 was released I was bummed out quite a bit to find out that a 7-slot system from the first game was reduced to 4 slot. Also apparently the upcoming [God willing] Skyblivion is following in Skyrim's footsteps regarding armor and apparel, while the Skywind project is sticking to an apparent Morrowind identical system
What an amazing costume :3
If it hasn't been done already, I would recommend the Modular Clothing mod, it introduces the clothing system from the Fallout series to Skyrim. Only gripe with it is that the mod does not update npc clothing.
You know what I wish we saw in Skyrim? Some traditional Argonian clothing. Considering they're heavily based on cultures like the Aztec or the Maya, I think they'd have some really beautiful designs. But I guess, given Skyrim's climate, that wouldn't exactly be functional!
There are actually two versions of the ragged trousers. one has the default rough-spun outfit appearance for females, the other is just the trousers and just the bra. it's a little harder to find. I think you can find it in fort greymoor.
But yes, the fashion is pretty meh in Skyrim. Very function over form. Radiant Raiment though does occasionally load the outfit Elisif wears, butt it's very rare. just check with the shopkeep.. if she don't have it, give her a friendly slug in the shoulder....with a mace. then reload, and she'll have a new list of items. you may have to do this a hundred times, but, eventually it'll show up. I've seen it maybe twice.
Thats a good topic. I always wanted to talk about the fashion of skyrim.
Everyone dogs on the massive, visible stitch working in a lot of more normal person clothing that both has exactly zero precedent for any irl history and are wildly impractical, but I don't mind it. If you've ever looked into making clothing, even just a glance at it, you'd have to realize that this would have to be actively decided on. This was a choice. This was deliberate. The regular people of Skyrim really went "this is fashion," and they're right.
Skyrim’s art style is generally not trying to be as realistic as people sometimes think it is. Every texture has this is very exaggerated roughness to it that tries to tell the story of Skyrim’s environment. I mean look at the hair. They didn’t need to make it look like straw, but they did. The really exaggeratedly awful stitching is just part of that, and I appreciate it even if it doesn’t make any practical sense at all.
There's the technical reason too. If you were playing the game on a then 6-year-old Xbox 360 (2005 console hardware was pretty old in 2011), unless the stitches were goofily oversized they're not even going to be visible in normal gameplay as anything more than a smudge. The texture resolutions you'd get from running Skyrim on 512MB of RAM were horrendous and that's *shared* memory between system and graphics.
Easy to forget that Skyrim was intentionally designed around half-a-decade old consoles with the same amount of memory that the smartphones of 2011 had. (iPhone 4s, October 2011, 512MB RAM.) It also ran at 720p if you had the later revisions with HDMI ports, though was often run through composite video for a much less crisp image.
I agree that most outfits in Skyrim are rather boring, I can never find a cool not armor item to enchant and always end up using the red variety of miner clothes which look fine and comfortable for my female character to go on adventures. One of the best items I think you didn't mention is Cicero's/jester clothes, as extravagant it is supposed to be, it actually has a dark and sober feeling to it that's very fitting for its nature. That's one of my favorites.
I really feel the dunmer outfits deserve less shade, I enjoy the feel of raven rock being a faraway sliver of a once much greater culture and the concept of having the temple robes relay theyre an important part of their culture via them being more high end. As a whole I enjoy that Skyrim doesnt integrate clothes as a major part of the province, the most fancy garbs belong to the rich, royal and and some of the most complex adorned clothing belongs to either foreign culture or old tradition, I think that armor being valued in terms of aesthetic and efficacy mirrors the constant state of battle the province finds itself in.
Dunmer clothing is my favorite, in all of Elder Scrolls lore
Skyrim is more aligned with Viking culture with everyone dressing like they belong in the 800s. The Kingdom of Skyrim itself also has a Jarl or Thane system in where each lord rules over a certain district in Skyrim. The game is also very similar to that of the Western Roman Empire with how the Imperials dress, mainly in centurion or legionarie armor. The game also has some medieval Arabic clothing with what the Redguards were wearing in Skyrim, which is a bit similar to how people dressed during the reign of the Abbasid Caliphate. Also, do you think that Elder Scrolls 6 will take place in the Kingdom of Hammerfell?
Uh in answer to the question it is hands down Sheo. But also wanted to say: I love these videos. Analyzing different aspects of these games like their fashion or flags is like... I don't know but it's working with my tism. It's a different type of TES content that I never thought about and also never realized it would go so hard.
"Immersive Armors" & "Immersive Weapons" are a must-have mods for any Skyrim playthrough, they just add so much more visual variety without going over the top.
I would also add "Armor and Clothing Extension." Better textures for vanilla clothes as well as making so many of the items pop and even add new variant for a more varied look.
One thing I will say about "Immersive Weapons" though is that many of the weapons included has really aged poorly in terms of graphics. That is really one of the only reasons I no longer download it but "Immersive Armors" have gotten a graphics boost by another modder so that one stays.
I love to add my own special magic to my clothes and hooded robes and armor in the game with the boots and work garments added
Just found your channel and I rather liked it. You were charismatic and the cosplay looked great. You had some nice fashion insights too.
Real life vikings: AW HELL YEAH BRIGHT COLORS!
Skyrim: BWOWN.
Yesssssss, the perfect vid to come home to.
From what i gathered Todd was in a odd place because a load of creatures and animals are named from Irish folklore, he continued this into fallout 4, the weather and climate does resemble Ireland from snow capped mountains to harsh barron landscapes, what i think was going on is the Witcher 3 dlc has a island modeled after the city of cork which realised before skyrim and it was prasied so todd had to step it up a notch so unless you look into it you wouldn't notice it unless you have learnt a bit of irish folklore
great video!! i apreciate the adressing of such an overlooked topic in the elder scrolls and in gaming in general, i personally didn't pay much attention to clothes in games but you changed that, thank you. you also made me wanna play oblivion again and idk wether to like you or to hate you for that lol. a video about potential mods to fix the shortcomings of skyrim without sacrificing much of the tone of the game would be astonishing and i'd hope to see it!
I recently started playing Skyrim again after taking a 2 year break. I decided to use mods this time, and it makes the game so much more fun.
One of the biggest letdowns with Skyrim were the lack of separate clothing pieces like pants and shirts. Mixing and matching different apparel in Morrowind, while rudimentary considering the models, were great fun and rocking in to Balmora with the freshest and tastiest drip just to impress my man Caius felt amazing.
My fav garb is the Skaal Fur Garb, +5 Drip and cold res
Another amazing breakdown. 🤩
I am pretty sure the vampire robes were introduced with Dawnguard. Iirc, vampires didn’t have specific clothing to them before it, just wore black robes, occasionally hooded variants
Yeah Dawnguard added a lot of unique outfits
As much as I hate the thalmor and they deserve some serious shade for how they caused all the instability in skyrim, I must admit - they got that shit on them. Dominion drippin.
Your outfit is amazing. I know why I trust you with virtual fashion!
If you're interested in more deep dives into Elder Scrolls fashion then it's worth checking out ESO's outfit station and style motifs.
It's funny, but as a long time Skyrim player, the clothes / armors have always been more for role play. There is a mod that was added to the "Anniversary Edition" that added "survival mode" - players need to sleep, eat, and can actually freeze to death. The fancy, noble hats have the most warmth rating for headwear. I'm guessing many players wear those on survival mode.
I prefer multiple options to create looks with layers, great to do in Morrowind and to extent in Oblivion but in Skyrim, very hard to do. I ended up mixing heavy armour boots with light armour gloves and a robe.
Great video! Love the enthusiasm and the longcat in the back 😄 And great (Cosplay?) outfit! O_O The jingling noises 😭 Lovely
5:36
I've never stopped and appreciated the wedding dress. It does look a lot fancier than the rest of the clothes in Skyrim, which is great. In Oblivion it would have just been regular rich people clothes.
I love you, thank you for existing
I really appreciate the amount of color they put into the clothes of Skyrim, even the working people's garments. They could have easily put everybody but the rich in drab, monotonous clothing, but historically people love color. Medieval Scandinavians themselves were well known to pride themselves on cleanliness and grooming, and it wouldn't have been uncommon to see your average man anywhere in Europe wearing greens, yellows, sometimes even blues and reds. Hell, go way up north and look at traditional Sami clothing, full of vibrant reds and blues. You can criticize Skyrim for loads of things, but they did clothing pretty well overall.
One thing I guess we should think of is that when we are in Skyrim it’s in the midst of a civil war, and while the game doesn’t show it having a drastic toll on the world and people, it could explain the “dirty” nature of the games clothes, nonetheless I wish there was more options and variety
Install Frostfall mod - touch water near winterhold - insta death Lol. Fur armour provides good warmth. Also Daedric and Dragonbone. Mage robes are so-so. But this mod is harsh as heck. I like to explore and I always die of hypothermia like by accident. Campfire mod is a must have along with Frosfall. And maybe ever Hunterborn... venison stew warms you up and keeps you full. Eat Drink Sleep Bathe is another immersive mod. Man, I love Skyrim's modding community. :)
The fine cloths and noble clothes definitely could have been better. Historically nobles and wealthy people would have worn brightly colored clothes as a way to show off their wealth. Nobles especially should have worn super rare colors that were hard to make such as purple. There even could have been exotic patterns and trimmings lines with gems and precious metals.
The clothes on average npc’s makes sense but the wealthy and nobility should have had clothes that properly matched their wealth.
In the Elder Scrolls Online you have lots and i mean lots of clothes NPC's as well as players can wear fromarmours in details as in beautiful shiny silk fabric dresses, to pieces of jewellery people can wear. Especially to an extend like you can literally travel throughout all the provinces in Tamriel (Cyrodiil, Morrowind, Skyrim, Elseweyr, Black Marsh, Summerset, Valenwood, High Rock and dfferent Daedric planemelds)
Each and every regions has their citizens with their clothes, outfits and armour designs....
Skyrim/Morrowind : S tier
Oblivion/Daggerfall : A tier
Never played Arena
There's actually a guy who's channel is him seeing if different characters can do the quests they send you on. What would they need you for? Not a lot in most cases.