The land of Skyrim has been amazing in my experience. The beautiful scenery, the dynamic dragon fights, and I didn’t encounter any bugs till about 30 hours in. Even still, I’m having a great time with the game. So despite the critique I’m about to do on Skyrim’s Inventory System I still believe it is a fun and engaging game.
The most popular issue of Skyrim’s Inventory is the Overburdened state. This state occurs when a character is holding too many items. When this happens they receive a movement de-buff which slows players down below their walking speed. This rate of movement is painfully slow. And while this is an annoying feature of the system it is one I can understand. Implementing a carrying capacity and tying that limit to the Stamina Attribute affected the economy of the Level Up Perks. Dividing Perks between Health, Magic, and Stamina helps to balance the game’s leveling system. However this state becomes an issue when paired with these next two issues.
The two biggest issues, in my opinion, were the Inventory’s lack of category subdivisions and the absence of information on items.
The Inventory was divided up into several groups such as Weapons, Potions, Apparel, etc. This division of items made sense. However the individual items within each division are placed in alphabetical order. Players aren't given sorting options so the alphabetical system is all we have to work with. To clarify: Every item in a category is alphabetized with no other means of sorting through them. An Item’s details show its damage, gold value, and weight but neglects other important information. At a glance there is no way to know which items are quest items, stolen goods, or even which items are new to the inventory.
These two issues, sorting and presented information, made managing the Inventory a bit of a headache. Prioritizing items is more difficult when their true value isn't readily available. After all there’s no way to know that a 12 lb Battle Axe is a quest item until you try to drop it. Players cannot drop quest items so this makes juggling items to get under carrying capacity quite the chore.
These two issues, sorting and presented information, made managing the Inventory a bit of a headache. Prioritizing items is more difficult when their true value isn't readily available. After all there’s no way to know that a 12 lb Battle Axe is a quest item until you try to drop it. Players cannot drop quest items so this makes juggling items to get under carrying capacity quite the chore.
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| Inventory Screen Cap |
The items that suffer the most from these problems are Ingredients, potions, and poisons. Though Potions and Poisons serve many different functions they are all left in the same Item Category. This had the effect of breaking the tension of fierce battles while I was sifting through my ‘Poisons of BLANK Effect’ trying to find my last ‘Potion of Greater Healing.’
The reason I bring up Potions and Poisons specifically is because the crafting menus divide these items by which Stat they affect. This made brewing potions easier than using potions.
In conclusion the Inventory's organization is sound but it could function better with subcategories and alternate sorting methods. Readily available information on items is great but the little bits that aren't included are keenly felt. These issues show that the inventory wasn't quite as polished as the rest of Skyrim but all this said, its still an engaging game. The minor details I've pointed out here have been fixed by community mods available all over the net. I'd recommend the Steam Workshop for easy to use and functional mods.
The reason I bring up Potions and Poisons specifically is because the crafting menus divide these items by which Stat they affect. This made brewing potions easier than using potions.
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| Crafting Organization |
