Posted December 22, 2014
In games, do you never go back after leveling up to see how fun it can be just to slaughter masses of the wimpy goblins? With enemy scaling, the game feels flat.
Enemy scaling is the worst kind of immersion-destroying metagame mechanic.
Compare that to the Gothic series. There are enemies who you can almost one shot at the very beginning of the game but at the very same time there are enemies that can and will one shot you. Both are present in the game world at the same time, you don't have to level up to level 10 before "giant monster of doom" is allowed to spawn. By leveling up you gain Learning Points which allow you to learn new attacks, use new weapons, etc. Your character's skill grows as you level up, which allows you to see your character's growth when facing once feared foes but there are always other enemies out there who can give you a run for your money. No level scaling required.
Or even compare it to Two Worlds. No level scaling in enemies, in the beginning of the game even regular wolves are a challenge. It's a challenge to fight more than two at a time, and that's the weakest enemy around, there are dozens of other enemies in the game world at the same time that make wolves seem like a training dummy. You can still explore the world at level 1 but if you see Orcs you better run. Once you get into the higher levels there are still challenging enemies around, and those now merely pesky wolves do not mysteriously disappear from the game world.
In short, level scaling (as used at least by The Elder Scrolls) removes any challenge from the game unless you focus nearly entirely on non-combat skills and turn the difficulty up to the highest level. You're never too weak to take on any boss in Oblivion and Skyrim is more or less the same (the only real exceptions being Giants and Mammoths). You can finish the main quest of both under the level 10 with next to no problems. Not only that but it's not even worth dungeon diving for loot because you'll never find anything better than what you're supposed to have at your current level.
Non-level scaling adds the challenge of running into enemies that you CAN'T beat at your current level, which gives you incentive to go work on your skills, level up, etc and gives you reason to venture into places you have no business being (in hopes of finding excellent loot). It also gives a great sense of progression when you can measure yourself against once fearsome foes that have become just annoyances and those that are still above you. You never know what you're going to run into next when a game isn't level scaled and that's more exciting (to me) than always being more or less on the same level (or stronger) than everything I encounter in Oblivion/Skyrim.
Now that that wall of text is out of the way I think I'll go reinstall Morrowind and see if I can find a couple of decent graphics mods and whatever the Morrowind equivalent of the Unofficial Patches are.
