He says "it's close," but Howard doesn't know if he'd say "it's as large a leap" simply because the tech gap between Morrowind and Oblivion "was greater."
Gameplay wise Skyrim is more than enough to give Oblivion a run for its accolades, but in terms of overall 'leap' in the long-running RPG franchise? "Hard to say... I have a hard time looking at it that way. I think it's close," said Bethesda's Todd Howard.
"I don't know that I would say it's as large a leap, just because the technology gap between Morrowind and Oblivion was greater," he told UK's PC Gamer in their latest issue.
In terms of mechanics, "I'd say it's about the same," he added. "The number of gameplay changes and things like that are probably on the same level." The studio debated whether or not to wait until the next generation of hardware launched before releasing Skyrim.
They wanted it "to be fresh. We don't want it to feel, visually or technically, 'Oh this is Fallout 3' or 'this is Oblivion' And if we couldn't do that we would have waited," said Howard. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim releases on Xbox 360, PS3 and PC November 11th.