Skyrim Editor Postmortem

What Went Right

Ease of Use

When I first heard about the editor, I was warned that it was one of the hardest to work with. A few people even warned me against it, saying the learning curve is far too steep and it is incredibly buggy. With this, I measured out my milestones very carefully, allotting a huge amount of time for learning.

As it turns out, none of that was true. There are the issues here and there found with any non-end-user-oriented editor, but otherwise it worked just fine. I had so much extra time because of this misconception that I was able to do a lot more with set design than I had originally planned. Objects snap together with ease, chests spawn with their own randomized loot, it's all incredibly convenient.

Enemy AI

Another thing that surprised me despite the warnings was how simple the AI is to use. Sure, you have to make the navmesh yourself, but that almost goes without saying in a 3D space. And even then, the editor makes a good 75% of it for you, you just have to clean it up. Afterward, popping enemies into the map is as easy as.. well.. popping enemies into the map! They follow the navmesh just fine, have easy enough controls you can tweak for your own needs, and they can be pseudo-scripted for patrolling and movements with almost no back-end work.

Aesthetic

I was blown away with how much great content there was to work with. A bit of it was overwhelming, given that you’d have 3 of any type of item and you had to know which one worked certain ways despite the naming not being any different, but this much to work with just meant that much to implement. Switching the entire lighting atmosphere was just a click of a button, as well as fog and certain types of lighting. My level went from good to great in just a single milestone with how many useful functions I found.

What Went Wrong

Camera Controls

One thing I found very difficult to work around was the camera controls for the editor. While this seems relatively mundane, it made putting almost anything down neatly to be a bit of a chore. Rather than a standard editor that rotates around the position you are at, the Skyrim Creator’s Kit has you rotate around the object you’re selecting. This means that if you want to generally pan around the room, you need to consistently grab new objects to lasso between like spiderman. Bit of a nuisance when putting down finer details like items on a plate or bigger objects like the walls.

Limited Pirate Objects

Long before I started using the editor, I knew what I wanted the level to be. Regardless of assets available, I would make it work. Turns out there weren’t many assets available and it was hard to make work. Whoops. The overall level needed to focus around a grand, multi-tiered vessel with masts and sails, anchors and chains, the whole nine yards. Instead, I had flat wooden boards to work with. It’s my fault for not researching ahead of time, but it definitely hurt the final product. Still, I’m happy with how it turned out anyway, and my vision came to life.

Cave Design

The awkward part about making a cave is that none of the edges quite line up. From what I understand, this is deliberate, but to make a truly immersive cavern I needed to more or less invent the entire insides. The entire room was just made up of repeated giant walls and ceilings in order to form the shape it was meant to be, which meant that seams were open everywhere. Pillars had to be placed everywhere, as well as rocks and dirt mounds to fill in the gaps and make it look like a natural cave. It got what I was hoping for across, but it was a much bigger chore than I anticipated.

Lessons Learned

Make Your Own Assumptions

While it is good to get advice from the crowd, it would be much better if I had ignored the negativity and just went straight into the editor with the same style of milestones that I always do. A few levels I’ve made did take a bit longer than expected because of how hard they were to use or random mechanics I couldn’t quite master, but I think that added to the experience rather than took away. Dedicating so much time in my milestones to learning meant significantly less time to developing, which is never good.

Collaborate

This was one of the few times I worked on a project that someone else had a similar idea in mind. As such, I was able to ask questions and find great tutorials just by talking with them about it. In turn, they would ask me if I knew how to solve certain issues, which forced us both to do more research and learn how to improve our levels. I hear there are dozens of great forums and Discords dedicated to each type of editor, and I think I could greatly improve my experience if I learn to use them.

Be Flexible

Midway through one of my milestones, I realized there was no way I could practically complete it without adding dozens of hours of extra work later on. This was because I was creating the navmesh to test combat before completing the set design. It all makes sense, sure. Get the play down before you make it pretty. However, the navmesh is dependent on what the map looks like. If I got that all set up nice and pretty but started dumping tables and crates on top of it, I’ve rendered it useless and would have to do it again. Instead, I’ve learned that it's better to accept a change of plans than to waste time.

Overall

I consider the project yet another success. I'm happy with how it turned out, and I'm glad it became what I originally envisioned. The map is meant to not be outstanding, but rather look like it could fit into Skyrim naturally. This is why there isn't excessive dialogue or thousands of enemies. Just a simple map for the player to explore, with a few boogiemen to face. The intention was to make a forsaken cove, and I believe I've done just that!