Xi
Arcane
Francis knows all
What a load of hooey. Games like Skyrim aren't "screw ups", they are designed to be shallow and simplistic because that's what their fans/players want. TES has only gotten more popular while every iteration post-Morrowind has continually removed skills, spells and other character options, up to Skyrim which only has three real builds - warrior, rogue and mage. You don't get to that point by "screwing up", but by specific design goals.
You make some pretty big assumptions, none of which are backed up by more than speculation. Skyrim sold a lot of copies, for sure, but simplification of it's character progression systems was hardly the reason it sold as it did. See, I'm speculating too. Also, Skyrim's character progression system was more advanced than Morrowinds and Oblivions. However, some of it's other systems were more degenerated. (Hand placed loot, Less scaling, Etc)