There are two options for playing The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim on current-gen consoles if you played it the last time around: You can either take your PS4 or Xbox One version of the game and update it for free, or you spend $20 to upgrade to the Anniversary Edition.
When I learned this, I told myself I would simply take the free update and call it a day. But, of course, upon rousing this old gray mare, I was sucked back into the game world, and I found myself plopping down that $20 upgrade fee. I’m now about a dozen or so hours deep. To quote John Wick, “Yeah, I’m thinking I’m back.”
Now, I can’t really blame anyone but myself for being a fan of what might be the greatest RPG I have ever had the pleasure of playing. And, love it or hate it, it’s hard to argue that Skyrim isn’t stuffed to the gills with content, an insane amount of which I still have yet to engage with. Even though I invariably end up with yet another one-handed, light-armored, bow-and-arrow-savvy stealthy assassin, I keep coming back for more. I always tell myself that maybe this time I will go double-handed, or try to be a mage or necromancer, all of which themselves offer rich skill paths, but I always return to my main archetype.
But hear me out: The fact that I am willing to spend dozens of hours duplicating builds I have previously already spent dozens of hours toying around with… well, that speaks to the longevity and quality of Skyrim. It’s why Bethesda is able to effectively pimp it out time after time, like it’s freakin’ GTA V or something.
So even though it’s hip to get on the “not another version of Skyrim” bandwagon, I would be a hypocrite if I did that. Here I am, yet again, paying more money for a slightly different version of a game that I’ve already been playing for a decade.
For all of the creation club features and content that the Anniversary Edition has to offer for $20 (on top of the original $60 I spent when it came out on the PS4, on top of the $60 I spent to originally play it on my Xbox 360), it’s hard to justify the upgrade when there is still so much content in the base game itself that I have yet to even skim the surface of. And yet, I continue to play and love this friggin’ game, so what’s another $20 in the grand scheme of things?
Even though I told myself I wasn’t going to pay for what is effectively a slightly bigger version of a game I already own… well, I guess I will be pairing this latest playthrough of Skyrim with a side dish of crow.
