But I don’t think lore is the main strength of TES. I think it’s the absolute freedom to play how you want. Do you want to be a dread necromancer bringing terror to the land? Sure. Do you want to be a virtuous Paladin on a mission to complete the main quest? Go ahead. Do you want to be a thief who breaks into every dwelling and steals all of the spoons in the game world? Have at it..
I wouldn't say that Skyrim has "absolute freedom", merely a good illusion of it. There are no roleplaying choises since every quests bare the civil war and in a lesser extend dawnguard offer the same path for everybody. The gameplay is also very polarized, you are basically pushed by the game into two categories : sneaky rogue archer or two hands heavy armor tank. Spells are a joke so don't even count them as a play style.
When I’m talking about absolute freedom to play how you want I’m referring to player agency to approach the game as a sandbox. Nothing to do with storytelling and role playing, which are very bare bones.
I played as neither a sneaky archer nor a heavy tank. I played most of the game as an enchanter / illusionist thief with no direct damage spells or weapons before eventually becoming a necromancer who sat back and watched my minions take care of everything for me. It was awesome and completely valid as a play style.
Approach the game as a sandbox? Even in 2011, previous TES games were miles ahead on that front. Dungeons are extremely linear so you can't use any of your tools for anything else that doing damage or controlling enemies. Access to said dungeons is always straightforward, and you always access those by the front door and leave it by the back door. Random encounters aren't interesting at all, 90% of the time it is just some wolves that you just have to one shot. Spells are interesting in the same way playing blindfolded is interesting. They are so clunky and sub optimal compared to W + left click since their scaling is terrible. Playing with invocations is only good because Skyrim IA is a broken mess and make you invincible as long as you have a friendly unit aside of you. Modern Zelda games are what Skyrim could only dream to achieve, where every situation has dozens of varied answers.
I don’t disagree with anything you are saying there so I don’t know what point you are trying to make.
