Gothic i think

Thanks!

It's not that great so see you soon!

Good luck with studies though!

Best of luck to you, I know how hard it can be to not let Skyrim devour all your time when you need to do some studying.

You just like to disagree with the world, doncha?

-.-

Khajiit has no words for you.

I found it a bit bland. Admittedly I haven't really played that much so my judgment might be a bit unfair. I suppose I just find fantasy themes uninteresting.

I'll keep seeing stuff like that and always wonder: if Skyrim isn't that great, what other games qualify in your opinion?

Yes, that's also usually the point where almost everyone is ducking out, as they're full aware, there's only a handful even standing a chance in a comparison. :p

Are you serious? Skyrim was average at best. It mostly involved follow the arrow, click attack at the right time, hear poorly acted dialogue.

Contenders:

Assassins creed series (except for AC1): was very good at doing what it did. Making you a stealthy assassin, and having some really cool missions, and good music. They didn't overload it with a free world, they just made a game that had one purpose.

The Thief Series: If you can find anything in Skyrim to rival the Shalebridge Cradle, I missed it, and missed out big time.

I'm bored now, I'll just say: Grand Theft Auto, Final Fantasy, in fact most jRPGs, and The Witcher.

Skyrim is good. Not great, but good. I'd give it a solid 7/10 based on my experience thus far.
Which RPGs compete? Gothic 1-3, Risen, Fallout 1-2, Morrowind, BG 1-2, VTM:B, etc. The list goes on.

Yeah the controls in the first one put me off still. I didn't mind them when it was first released, but I do mind them ever since Gothic 2 came out. Gothic 2 is the best in the series really, it does everything that G1 does and better.
Gothic 3 is a bit of a different game, but it's still absolutely fantastic.

First things first: don't want to follow a marker and be on you're own? Don't activate the quest in the questmenu and you don't get a marker on your map. D'oh.

AC series: can't compare, still didn't had the time to play them anywhere near to a point of forming an opinion.

Thief series, Shalebridge Cradle. Without a doubt we're talking about not just great games, but classics here. Still, you're pointing out a specific part of the game that was grand, be it from an atmospheric point of view / leveldesign / gameplay / whatever.
Measuring other games to just that, they all fall short in 99,999% of all cases, which leaves about 0,001% of all games to be great. And yes, Skyrim (heck, all TES games even the very first one) offers so much more to do / possibilities / options / even choices (though not really a strong part) then any of the Thief series.

Witcher and GTAs I would agree, with 4 being the exception. Final Fantasy I would disagree largely and "most jRPGs" is just flat out [self censored].

Gothic 2 yes, Gothic 1 with it's controls and it's "kill all and everything that moves until you wander through a empty gameworld, reach point X and we'll fill it up again with more / harder enemies"? Really? Well, let's talk about a believable gameworld, shall we?
Risen suffers from the same gamedesign as well as Gothic 3, which still doesn't belong in the great category even with all it's community fixes.

Everything else on your list: all not just great games, but still classics even 10 years later. If only those are to be considered great, you didn't had much to play with (except the classics) in the last 5 years.
Oh and about feeling a bit bland - on my way I just encountered 2 neutral hunters in a fight against a spriggan and a bear. Yes, I'm fully aware that most of these are scripted random encounters, but the feeling that this is a living world with other NPCs going their own way / running into trouble, you won't find in any of your listed games - not even Morrowind.

... and yes, with all games brought up here together, be it back to Thief (1999) or Fallout (1997) - that's still just a handful.

Two counts of blasphemy right there. :)

good luck with your studies and enjoy skyrim its a great game although a big time sink.