Dungeons, Draugrs, and Dragons! Oh my!

Gating Mechanism Analysis 

Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim 

by Bethesda Game Studios

After a series of story quests, you are told by a respected Mage to explore this old temple ruin and fetch him an an ancient artifact, Golden Claw, for him to further his studies.

In which, you are then given a location on your map on where the temple is.

After running up a mountain, you finally arrive to your destination.

Alas, BLEAK FALLS BARROW 

The level itself is big and more of an exploration/walkthrough than anything else, it's straightforward. It was created to showcase the environment, story, and creatures. There is one main linear path but different encounters and different rooms to get immersed in. The first gating mechanism you encounter is a small and simple puzzle game. The goal is to match the images in accordance to the ones on top of the gate, if you decide to pull the lever beforehand, you will set off a trap of darts and get injured. I would say this would be a punishment system. Since its very common on your first playthrough. 

Wide view of the room. 

Pillars on the left need to be match with pillars above door.

After you successfully open the gate, you continue through the dungeon and eventually encounter a second Gating Mechanism. This type is more of Encounter Gating, where you have to defeat an enemy in order to get through.You are tasked to help this fellow; Arvel Swift whose entwined in webs, to kill the giant spider and in promise to hand over the Golden Claw. 

Before you cut him down, chase him for betraying you, and retrieving the Claw, you encounter this beauty. 

Every gating Mechanism has a chance to have a punishment system. In this case, its a trap door. As you can see in the first image of the spider; on what its standing on. 

But the game also rewards you with gratifying treasures! Not only do you get to kill, but the dungeon is filled with goodies you can indulge yourself with. Be wary though, even the goodies have Gating Mechanisms!

And the punishment system is far worse! 

You are supplied with a VERY low amount of lockpicks (2) in the early stages of the game. If you fail this obstacle, you break a lockpick and you don't get any rewards! Once you run out, you have to hope you loot it from somewhere else and they're not as common to come by. In other words, you need lockpicks to get into the chest to get more lockpicks. But fortunately for you, not all the chests are locked and you can loot lockpicks from dead bodies. 

You soon come across a third Gating Mechanism. This one was fairly simple. Unfortunately, it took me a while because the lighting and color blended the pull-chain. Making it harder to notice and find.

You find and pull the chain and the gate opens.

Lastly, as you go deeper into the level, you come across the last Gating Mechanism. Its a giant, armored door before encountering the boss. You notice you have to rotate the dials in a specific order but you are not aware in which order. Without any given clues, you are suppose to inspect the Golden Claw from your inventory. In which it displays the combination.

This prolonged my time with the dungeon, making my gameplay more immersive and time-consuming. It had me invest more into the game. My first playthrough of the level when the game released took me a little over an hour. After that, you encounter the boss.

Overall, the level was more about exploration and immersion but they added a lot of fun puzzles to their mechanisms that incorporated a lot of the story of the game and the overall ancient theme. They didn't give clues but left it to the player to figure it out for themselves. It was a good balance, in my opinion. It kept it interesting! Thank you, for reading my analysis and experiences with the level. I, personally, recommend playing the game!