Tamriel Infinium: Elder Scrolls Online celebrates its 10th anniversary in Orc-land

I have to give some serious credit to ZeniMax: This studio isn’t letting Elder Scrolls Online’s 10th anniversary go by with nothing more than a token nod and a box of fireworks. March has been a full month of activity on behalf of the studio, with the release of the Scions of Ithelia DLC and Update 41 along with the giveaway of the Orsinium DLC pack through daily rewards.

We have a saying around these parts: “Free is free, and you don’t pass up free.” Not only was the DLC itself free, but by downing four world bosses in Wrothgar and wrapping up the main storyline this month, players could earn three costumes and a bear mount. That means for me and many others, we’ve been spending all of March in Orc-land — and kind of having a blast.

The Orsinium DLC came to the game in November 2015, making this one one of the earlier post-launch expansions for ESO. As ZeniMax described it, “Orsinium, ESO’s largest DLC game pack to date, features a colossal new zone with over 20 hours of story content, a new single-player monster arena, new public dungeons, and much more!”

Previously, Orsinium cost 3,000 crowns for non-subscribers, which bumped it down on my priority list for purchases. So getting this as a free gift put Wrothgar in front of me much sooner than I had anticipated. I’m not complaining, though!

As a casual visitor to the Elder Scrolls universe, I found myself somewhat curious how this game handled the Orc race. In other MMOs, Orcs are either green barbarians out for your blood or a tribal nation full of muscles and pride. Here… well, I found that it’s pretty much the same, minus quite as much green. Yet I also discovered a lot more depth than I had anticipated.

Even though Orsinium took players through this savage land and its fierce inhabitants, these aren’t just grunting Klingons who are looking to get into fights at the drop of a helmet. Sure, there is that, but many of these characters demonstrated a shrewdness, intellect, and passion that I wasn’t expecting. By the end of the main storyline, there were one or two of these Orcs for whom I grew to have a grudging respect.

The full zone itself is above-average in design but pretty loaded with content. The capital city of Orsinium itself is not the best with a monotone grey everywhere and a somewhat annoying layout, but the rest of Wrothgar is more colorful and photogenic. I liked how there’s a transition halfway through the zone between snowy and non-snowy areas, as this gave me a best-of-both-worlds experience zipping around the map.

As usual with ESO, the main quest arc is OK with a few standout moments, but it’s the side quests where the real storytelling shines. I actually cheered out loud when I bumped into Stibbons, because I knew I was in for a hilarious quest with this sad sack of a human being. And I was not disappointed.

It was kind of a stroke of genius to hand out free DLC like this and incentivize players to go do it during the same month. Wrothgar felt packed with people running around you and zone chat filling the screen. It also made doing the world bosses — necessary for the costume unlocks — pretty easy as there was almost always others around to do it too.

I both can and can’t believe that Elder Scrolls Online is 10 years old already. When I look back, 2014 seems so far away and also just a couple years ago in my head. One thing’s for certain: It’s been a highly productive 10 years of live operation with dozens of new zones, expansion packs, classes, dungeons, and features added along the way. I’m still nowhere near my first full clear of the game’s story content, and that makes me excited to see what else is out there.

So happy birthday, Elder Scrolls Online! Thanks for sharing the fun with us.