Seriously, I've been doing this for eight years! What the hell have I been doing with my life?! I'VE LOST COMPLETE CONTROL OF MY LIFE! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!
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| "GOIN' CRAZEEEE! (GOIN' CRAZEEEEE!!!) FROM THE HEAT!" |
...okay, I took my happy pills. I'm better now.
But no, seriously. Eight years! Eight years of reviewing games, films, TV shows, and more! The mind absolutely boggles at the prospect...well, mine does, anyway. So, given that my first review was Dragon Age II waaaaay back in 2011, I figured it was only appropriate to go back to high fantasy with this review. Hence, we're looking at one of the Creation Club's offerings of a player home - Myrwatch.
One thing that I don't particularly care for (and this is the problem with several of the Creation Club creations I've looked at) is that your journal is automatically updated with the quest instead of having to look for it or get starter elsewhere. I'm of two minds on this - firstly, it does save time and effort, but also goes out of its way to not encourage exploration, something which I think the Elder Scrolls has been moving away from and it's a real shame.
However, that is one minor complaint atop a very fantastic mod - which this most definitely is. A short quest to find it which involves all of shooting a Flames spell at a Mages' Guild sigil will unlock the tower of Myrwatch to you. A grand tower sitting outside of Morthal, it is a thing of utter beauty from top to bottom. Literally!
It's an Elianora creation, and anyone who has even a passing interest in the Skyrim modding community has at least heard of her if not downloaded and played around in some of her creations. Her mods are a high water mark for modding in general, and I'm happy to say that Myrwatch is no exception in spite of the limitations of Bethesda. I'm also admittedly a big stickler for Mage-oriented player homes (being that I gravitate toward playing magic-heavy characters), so this was right up my alley.
There's some lore in the background of the mod to explain the tower - a pair of mages who split off from the College of Winterhold with the intention of pushing the boundaries of magic and, eventually, collecting artifacts of power to store them away safely. This apparently continued right up until the Oblivion Crisis, given that the last journal entry of one of the tower's former residents concludes just as they get the news about the assassination of the Emperor in the beginning of Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.
What happened to them? No idea. But the entire storeroom - called the "Myrwatch Gallery" - a magical artifacts is completely empty, ready to be filled by trophies of the Dragonborn's travels, and there are many a place for all sorts of treasures you can find across Skyrim and Solstheim, everything from Daedric artifacts to the various things you can acquire from the DLCs such as the Dawnguard Rune Weapons and the Dwarven Black Bow of Fate. There's even slots for all of the Dragon Priest Masks and even the Insects in Jars!
This technically should count as a spoiler. Actually, it should count as a lot of spoilers given that it reveals items that won't be known to the player until way later in the game. That being said, Skyrim has been out for eight years at the time of this writing, and I'm not gonna lie, having an entire wall filled in that room is absolutely fantastic, to say nothing of what it'll look like with every slot filled on every wall (yeah, I have a bad history of game restarting, so even I haven't done it yet. Sue me).
And if that were all that the mod gave, that would be enough, but when Elianora makes a home mod, she makes a home mod. Upon entry into Myrwatch, you'll find a foyer complete with chairs and bookshelves. Beyond that, a kitchen with a working oven and beds circling the entire room along with storage spaces and shelves galore. Complete with a roaring fire at the (near) center, it has a very lively, homely feel to it all. Why exactly all the food here is still edible after two hundred years is a question the mod skillfully avoids. Also why there are books in Myrwatch that had clearly been written in the 200 years since the end of the Oblivion Crisis is also likewise unanswered. My explanations? Magic and random number generator, respectively.
Myrwatch also has you covered for all your crafting needs. As stated above, there's an oven for the budding chef in your Dragonborn, but also a forge and smelter, an arcane enchanter, a tanning rack, an alchemy lab (complete with a garden you can plant your own ingredients in for a steady supply), and even a staff enchanter with a few Stones ready for use. Elianora really did think of everything and made maximum use of the space really well.
Oh, and your spouse and adopted kids can move into Myrwatch, just in case you were wondering.
Even if you aren't playing a mage character, I'd definitely recommend picking this one up. It is at a decent price at 400 credits, and you get quite a bit for it. The only real disadvantage to its placement is its location...namely in the wilderness near Morthal and not really near anything else without a bit of a walk. Of course, this problem is negligible if you use fast travel mercilessly. Pick it up, stock the walls of the Gallery, and admire your hard work. You've earned it, Dragonborn!
Myrwatch is now available to download from the Bethesda Creation Club for 400 Credits.
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