10 Video Games That Revolutionized Genres

161,500 square miles of explorable world, over 750,000 NPCs and great graphics? Yes, please! Bethesda's The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall was not the biggest hit in terms of sales but showed just how impressive open-world RPGs could be in full 3D. The game featured a lot of things we take for granted now but were new back in 1996, like an immersive open-world, the dynamic change from day to night, horse riding, procedurally generated locations and dungeons, and much more.

After the first entry in the Elder Scrolls series, Arena, found only moderate success, with a lot of players not even getting out of the first dungeon due to clanky controls and slow pace of the game even by the standards of the time, Bethesda Softworks decided to go bigger and better in every way possible. And bigger they went - Daggerfall is still the biggest game in the series in terms of scale with over 15,000 cities, towns, and villages to explore. And with hundreds of quests, both hand-crafted and procedurally generated, you could have literally spent over a thousand hours doing a 100% walkthrough.

Daggerfall wasn't flawless though; it was so ridden with bugs it was referred to as Buggerfall. However, that fact didn't hinder the game's success, as it received numerous awards and Game Of The Year titles in 1996 with sales way over the estimates. Bethesda cemented their reputation as a company that produces only the very best RPGs (oh, how the times have changed) with The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, but Daggerfall showcased Bethesda's true talent of crafting huge immersive games that didn't crumble under their own weight.