Elder Scrolls Has there ever been any leaks of the early Morrowind builds or content? +Early Morrowind screenshots

[rusty_shackleford]

Here's some promo screenshots from Bethesda's site:

Following a guide and his guar, a beast of burden, to the village of Gnisis. Advanced AI allows NPCs to escort and follow. The guide is escorting you, and the guar is following him as well. An ash-storm is blowing through the area, affecting your visibility, movement, and even your guide's animation (notice him shielding his face). Morrowind, land of the Dark Elves, comes alive with weather that profoundly affects the gameplay.

A market square in the city of Vivec. The floating moonlet in the background is the "Ministry of Truth", a mythical comet frozen in its track by a god's gesture, refashioned by the Temple into a prison for dissidents.

Unparalleled character detail allows moving lips and eyelids, as well as full armor and clothing. The characters are actually wearing these items, and they can be removed, traded for, stolen, etc.

Riding a gondola in the canals of Vivec. Travel in Morrowind is often done by buying passage with a caravan or boat. In Vivec, the gondolas serve as a quick way of traveling around the sprawling city.

Like Venice, Vivec is an ancient city of canals, arching bridges, and weathered classic architecture.

Conversing with a merchant in Gnisis. The interface is elegant and customizable. Each menu can be placed and sized to your taste. In the new dialogue system, NPCs each have a Disposition value which tells how much the character likes you. Shulki's dialogue bar is green, indicating a very positive reaction. All dialogue and journal entries are hyper-linked so you can simply click on red topics to ask about them, or select from a complete topic list under the "information" button. You can also try to change his disposition through the "persuasion" button.

These are screenshots that were sent to RPGPlanet in 2000 that I believe(but am not certain for each one) would match the description text from Bethesda's website:

Wireframe mode for the Gnisis screenshot built in the Construction Set.

Looking over the village's strider port. Buying passage on the silt strider (a large creature used for overland travel and transport) is one of many methods of fast-travel in the game. Note the hefty Nordic War Axe you carry.

Village huts and a local in netch-leather armor. The huts are built in the common Redoran architectural style inspired by the organic forms of local megafauna exoskeletons.

Sun setting at west entrance to Gnisis. The round building is the residence of a powerful sorcerer.

View of the Script window and a dummy script that warps you across the world and plays music when you get there. The preview window shows the Guar. In this window you can preview the animation, define frames for different activities, add sounds, etc.

High shot of village of Gnisis. Shows the level of detail in a small village built in the Construction Set.

Here are screenshots from RPGPlanet that don't seem to match up to any of the descriptions:

Screenshots taken from Bethesda's modern site, no descriptions attached, I hope I matched them up correctly to the descriptions:

This Imperial fort guards the eastern approach to Gnisis. Imperial influence and settlements are commonplace throughout Morrowind since its incorporation into the Empire of Tamriel as a province.

A female Dark Elf waits to talk to you in front of the local tradehouse. In the sky you can just make out the floating jellyfish-like creature called a "netch" -- the source of netch-leather widely used for armor and durable goods in Morrowind.

Bonus old UI screenshot, no description:

Maybe it's because I haven't played Morrowind recently, but I don't remember this area at all.

 

[d1r]

My god, that fucking UI.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

My god, that fucking UI.

That was the main thing that made me interested. I don't recall those screenshots at all.

 

[KörangarTheMighty]

I used to love using that celtic font back in the day, on my ME machine.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Surprisingly enough, Bethesda's site still contains all those original screenshots: https://elderscrolls.bethesda.net/en/morrowind
Something devs rarely ever do is maintain media for old games -- especially pre-release material -- so... goodjob there?
They lack the description text though, so I still have to piece it together with the original descriptions. Think I picked the right ones.

+ Another screenshot with the old UI.

 

[Fowyr]

Yep, I remember these screenshots.
Always liked this one.

Reminded me of old fire resistant tanker's mask.

 

[Tihskael]

Maybe it's because I haven't played Morrowind recently, but I don't remember this area at all.

Ald'ruhn-under-Skar, also known as the Manor District or just Under-Skar, was the most distinctive architectural feature of Ald'ruhn, and was a manor and council district sheltered beneath the shell of an ancient, extinct giant dead emperor crab. The crab's large carapace enclosed a central dome, from which radiated the entrances to the Redoran Council chambers, the manors of the House Redoran councilors, and the shops of a few upscale merchants who offer their services to the House Redoran Councilors and their families and servants.
https://elderscrolls.fandom.com/wiki/Ald'ruhn_(Morrowind)

 

[Wunderbar]

Always loved those screenshots, especially the one with Vivec canals.

They were bullshots most likely. I doubt the actually sailing gondolas were real at any point in development.

My god, that fucking UI.

looks very SOVLFUL.

 

[Darth Roxor]

The interface is elegant and customizable. Each menu can be placed and sized to your taste.

This, btw, was one of Morrowind's major strengths, and it blows my mind that more games didn't pick this up. The only one I can think of at the moment must be Guild Wars.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

The interface is elegant and customizable. Each menu can be placed and sized to your taste.

This, btw, was one of Morrowind's major strengths, and it blows my mind that more games didn't pick this up. The only one I can think of at the moment must be Guild Wars.

Everquest has a better UI than most video games that exist. The entire thing is resizable/movable.

 

[kepler]

The interface is elegant and customizable. Each menu can be placed and sized to your taste.

This, btw, was one of Morrowind's major strengths, and it blows my mind that more games didn't pick this up. The only one I can think of at the moment must be Guild Wars.

This kind of UI doesn't quite work on consoles so this is probably what killed it.

 

[Jaedar]

They were bullshots most likely. I doubt the actually sailing gondolas were real at any point in development.

Gondalas probably were not, but afaik they had to reduce the scope of vivec a lot somewhat late in development because they didn't manage to figure out how to implement it to their vision (the tops of each canton were supposed to be open air as an example).

 

[lukaszek]

The interface is elegant and customizable. Each menu can be placed and sized to your taste.

This, btw, was one of Morrowind's major strengths, and it blows my mind that more games didn't pick this up. The only one I can think of at the moment must be Guild Wars.

This kind of UI doesn't quite work on consoles so this is probably what killed it.

play dragon dogma and it will be clear what happened

 

[kepler]

The interface is elegant and customizable. Each menu can be placed and sized to your taste.

This, btw, was one of Morrowind's major strengths, and it blows my mind that more games didn't pick this up. The only one I can think of at the moment must be Guild Wars.

This kind of UI doesn't quite work on consoles so this is probably what killed it.

play dragon dogma and it will be clear what happened

This is what I meant.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

And that makes me think of Bett Boop.

And those make me think giant birdo-shyguy hybrids were slain and now lived in.

 

[soulburner]

I love pre-release game stuff. It would be awesome if some early build of Morrowind was either leaked of officially released. I like to see how developers changed their initial visions (be it due to a change they wanted to do or something they had to cut for some reason, like not being as fun as initially thought or just too buggy to finish in time for release). Playing around with Quake Test, early builds of Unreal, Half-Life or more recently the leaked Duke Nukem Forever is so much fun and gives a huge insight to history of development.

I love the UI.

 

[agris]

"todd update.esp" & "todd test.esp"

 

[Palomides]

That's Windows 98, isn't it? It looks so crisp and neat...

 

[Nifft Batuff]

Resizable windows Is the equivalent of free camera in isometric games.

 

[Tacgnol]

I find it pretty interesting that they included UI shots of the construction kit as promotional materials.

You don't really see that done anymore, even with games that include hefty modding tools.

 

[jackofshadows]

Nice screenshots but they're so misleading - bunch of NPCs look as if they walk somewhere, creating an illusion of living and breathing environment, lmao.

They made resizeble UI almost as if they couldn't fucking decide regarding the final layout. Good thing that they've changed the elements for transparent ones at some point.

 

[JarlFrank]

This kind of UI doesn't quite work on consoles so this is probably what killed it.

Imagine what games could be like if consoles never existed.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

Ascii forever or binary.

 

[ADL]

This was back when Morrowind was going to be an MMO right?

 

[luj1]

Imagine what games could be like if consoles never existed.

Morrowind was their last PC game

and saved them from bankrupcy .. ironically