Venture further into the Dark Heart of Skyrim as The Elder Scrolls Online prepares for the arrival of the Greymoor content update with an upcoming free play event. The long-running action MMORPG started a full year of Skyrim-adjacent content at the start of March with Harrowstorm and now continues the story in western Skyrim with a mystical plot to take down the home of the Nords by the foul Icereach Coven. The Greymoor prologue event begins today with a quest for all players called The Coven Conspiracy. To celebrate the prologue, an Elder Scrolls Online free play event takes place beginning Wednesday, April 1 at 10AM EDT and runs through April 13, allowing full access to all of the game’s content.
Give credit to Bethesda for showing the restraint in jumping to the land of Skyrim so late in the game’s lifespan. The icy lands of northern Tamriel were the focus of 2011’s The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, which has sold over 30 million copies across myriad hardware iterations. While the Elder Scrolls Online fanbase is arguably smaller than the mass audience of Skyrim, it wouldn’t be the first MMORPG to get by on pluck and a handful of dedicated fans who will scream in delight at the name of their game being uttered out loud.
That dedication is warranted, as Bethesda supports Elder Scrolls Online with more fervor than most MMORPG developers. Four expansion packs in a year–even if it is part of one single, year-long story arc–is out of the ordinary in a genre space that usually asks its players to wring every drop of playability out of an expansion before moving on to the next big thing. The overarching story of a vampire lord looking to enslave all of Tamriel is a huge undertaking and one that plans on taking its time as Dark Heart of Skyrim rolls on through all of 2020.
The PlayStation 4 contingent of Elder Scrolls Online players will be waiting a bit longer for the full Greymoor expansion than their PC counterparts. The second Dark Heart of Skyrim expansion hits PC on May 18 while the PS4 party won’t start until June of this year.
