Top 20 Images

As promised over recent days, I have coded the Top Images section of the Image Share feature on the site. The listings are limited to the top 20 images based on the same bayesian formula used in the Top 150 Files in the file database. As and when more ratings come in on images the listing will increase from 20, so head on over to the Image Share section now and start rating your favourite pictures!...

Current Interesting Mod Projects

In this news post I'll mention certain mod projects which are either released and still being worked on, or are unreleased and being worked on. For those not familiar with Bethesda's official forums, 'WIP' means Work In Progress, and 'RELZ' means release. 'REQ(Z)' means request but that's not really relevant. Also, 'OBSE' means Oblivion Script Extender, and for those who have been living under a rock for the last 10 years: 'mod' is modification. Enhanced Daedric Invasion BETA It would seem t...

Site Layout Changes

As you may have noticed I have been busy changing the layout of the site (both the main site and file database) today. Changes include a switch to a variable width design (using up 100% of the screen), a change to the right nav, a darker background colour, switching the right nav to the left in the file database and a few other tweaks here and there. Hopefully there will be some more changes and tweaks coming soon as well as an uplift to the content of the site. In other news; I'm trying t...

RSS feeds now available

RSS feeds are now available on TESSource for the current day's uploaded files and the current day's updated mods. People with RSS programs should been able to add these feeds no problem. For people who do not know what RSS is I believe the Google techie said it best when he said "when you want to check your email you don't contact Bill, Jenny or Ben to ask them; it's all centralised in your email inbox". RSS is basically a way to consolidate the resources you access regularly in one place so ...

'Tamriel: Total War', a Rome: Total War Modification

A team of modders is making a modification for the game Rome: Total War, using the world of The Elder Scrolls. Tamriel: Total War (TTW). The purpose of this mod is to bring the world from The Elder Scrolls game series into good, old RTW. Our aim is to create different, realistic and fun experience. We believe that balance, fun game play and realism can be matched together very well and we will do everything that we can to satisfy our fans. We will focus on Tamriel (the continent actually k...

Oblivion Expanded Weapon-Drawing Contest

Septim741 is holding a weapon-drawing contest for his mod Oblivion Expanded. You can read the interview about Oblivion Expanded we had earlier here. Septim741: To get ideas for new weapons to be used in Oblivion Expanded, we are having an art contest. We are challenging everybody to create a new bow, mace, axe, or sword. Your weapon can be hand-drawn or made in a graphics program. The weapons cannot be taken from a movie or other source. We want you to use your imagination and talent for th...

New Community Manager

A couple of days ago Bethesda hired a new Community Manager. What does that mean you ask? My name is Matt Grandstaff. Yesterday I started as the community manager for Bethesda Softworks. Basically I'm going to be working with you guys and help communicate your thoughts, ideas, criticisms, etc with the folks at the office, while becoming an active member of this community. You'll see me in these boards, as well as other fan communities for Bethesda games. I really look forward to talkin...

We're Back!

TESSource has returned after being offline for the past 12 hours. I want to thank everyone who waited patiently and posted comments of support on the forums. The site is now on a new, much faster server and I'm going to have to do some exploring to see what I can now do to improve the site's quality (remove the caching system, perhaps?). Ooo, exciting....

Interview with Le Driver, owner of The Elder Scrolls Traveler

Le Driver over at The Elder Scrolls Traveler recently contacted me in regards to answering a few questions for the weekly blogspot he writes. Naturally instead of just answering the questions normally I went off on a huge 3,000 word tangent about plenty of things. If you're really bored or enjoy reading my dull ramblins then go check out the interview, otherwise go check out the rest of Le Driver's blog! Here's a snippet so you can see how boring I am. TESSource was created under it's init...

PS3 vs XBox360 Comparison

Game Trailers have a number of videos with split-screen comparisons of Oblivion on the XBox 360 and the PS3. Unfortunately they're a bit small and, ergo, it's a bit hard to point out major differences (or I just have rubbish eye sight). You can view these comparisons in the Game Trailers video archive for Oblivion....

Current Interesting Mod Projects

In this news post I'll mention certain mod projects which are either released and still being worked on, or are unreleased and being worked on. For those not familiar with Bethesda's official forums, 'WIP' means Work In Progress, and 'RELZ' means release. 'REQ(Z)' means request but that's not really relevant. Also, 'OBSE' means Oblivion Script Extender, and for those who have been living under a rock for the last 10 years: 'mod' is modification. Deadly Reflex 3.3 (OBSE) NEW Deadly Reflex 3...

Oblivion Construction Set update

V1.2.404 of the Oblivion Construction Set has been released. It requires the V1.2 patch of Oblivion or higher. Bugfixes: 'Fixed error with preview window not displaying art properly.' This was the largest bug in the V1.2 Construction Set. Unfortunately, there were more bugs that weren't fixed in that version: Some issues with the Height Map Editor. The lip-synch generator (using .wav files option) is broken. There's probably more. And from what I've heard this new version also cr...

New Poll

Now that Shivering Isles is out I think a slight change in Poll question is warranted! As always here are the results of the last poll: Are you going to buy the Shivering Isles expansion? Yes. 77% (2283 votes) No. 9%. (270 votes) I don't know yet. 14% (412 votes) So that would be a resounding yes then. Sometimes I wonder what all the pesimists on the forums are going on about when they say Oblivion was rubbish; I loved the game and it seems a lot of other players did too (oh I'm gonna g...

Shivering Isles Beta Patch Released

Update! Read these two posts: 1,2 ---------------- Bethesda has released the Shivering Isles Beta Patch 1.2. It will work for all language versions worldwide, except those downloaded from Direct2Drive. The patch fixes (well, to summarize it) a bug which appears after +- 150 hours of playing with Shivering Isles, which made items disappear when you dropped them. If you want details take a look at this page. You should only use this patch if you have the Shivering Isles expansion of cour...

Project Serpent (TC) Q&A

I had an interview about the TC (Total Conversion) Project Serpent with its leader, Serpent of Shadow. Their official site can be found here and the forums here. A snippet: Pov: Could you give us a general outline of this project? SoS: Project Serpent is a total conversion for Oblivion that takes its basis from the Heretic/Hexen game series by Ravensoft. We have created our own world that takes key aspects from the Heretic/Hexengames, allowing us to both satisfying fans of the series ...

1000 Kudos Points and Counting!

Relatively inconsequential but good to know none-the-less, the new kudos system has taken off quite well with over 1,000 kudos points being awarded to people since it's launch around a month ago. I reckon once that number reaches 4,000 - 5,000 I'll work on a little ranking system to see the people with the most kudos points. Fun fun....

BBCode Functionality Added

Here's yet another feature addition to TESSource that I've been working on recently. While the BBCode functionality has always been there (but never visually available to writers) certain aspects of the site are now BBCode enabled. These areas include: File descriptions (written by file uploaders) File comments News comments The easy way to tell whether an area is BBCode enabled is to look for the BBCode menu. If it's there it's enabled! For more information on using BBCode on ...

Oblivion Expanded (unofficial expansion) Q&A

Yesterday, I had a Q&A interview with Septim741 about his unofficial expansion: Oblivion Expanded. A snippet: Povuholo: Could you give me a summary of what this mod is about? Septim741: Sure. Oblivion Expanded, which is an unofficial expansion for Oblivion, adds a ton of new content for the player to experience. The following has been announced already: five new sets of armor and weapons, three new races, two new locations, a creature, a companion, at least a dozen miscellaneous quests...

Bethesda's New Customer Care Strategy (April Fool's day)

2 April edit: This, of course, was an April Fool's day prank. Still, it was a funny article. From now on I'll post serious news! Original message below. An interesting article popped up at Planet Elder Scrolls, about Bethesda's 'Enhanced Consumer Interaction'. Apparently they are visiting people (and modders) who are having problems with getting the official mods to work on their computer. And then they... Er... Give them a hug. Some snippets: "I spent months perfecting my mod," said di...

London Eye in Oblivion

While doing a Google Image search for Oblivion piccies today I came across an interesting picture: The London Eye in Oblivion. Now, I've never seen this before but then again I don't keep very up-to-date with some of the crazy things the Oblivion community tries to do. This picture is compliments of a satanic blogger (see: all bloggers are satanic, which includes myself, due to their ability to warp my mind into reading the entire blog and wasting my entire afternoon on non-sensical informati...