9 Reasons Skyrim Is Still One Of The Best Video Games Of All Time

2. It Knows It's A Video Game

From the now-legendary "arrow in the knee" jokes to the fact you can awkwardly mantle up any cliff-face by angling your body or horse just right, Bethesda have always had that level of "We know you know what this is, so let's have fun with it."

Their sprawling, open-ended worlds are teeming with A.I. scripts and routines for every last NPC - ones that when they start overlapping, produce genuinely magical moments. Completely dynamically and in a tongue-in-cheek kinda way, you've probably got your own stories to tell in regards to seeing things like a giant battling a dragon because the latter flew too close to its camp, or for a hit to be placed on you because you accidentally stole a potion from a shop.

Bethesda care not for overblown, 'on rails' segments that otherwise dominate the triple-A market. They want you to make your own spectacles, and provide some volatile A.I. interactions to do so. Skyrim is at its best when it feels like the world is operating independently of your input (or as a consequence of it), and therein lies one of the most refreshing feelings when revisiting it:

Skyrim knows you're the player, it's a video game (not an interactive movie) and how to best play those elements off of one another.