Elder Scrolls Online is a job using the mantle of The Elder Scrolls universe to pass itself as playable. There's no challenge in combat, progression is filled with incredibly repetitive and menial tasks, there's an absurd amount of backtracking and running around during questing and inventory management... It's just boring.
Every game mechanic feels like it was engineered to be as boring and repetitive as possible. And what are the rewards for your job done? scraps. Scraps of currencies, of materials, cosmetics, drab dyes... the only slightly interesting group of rewards that you can find is in the convoluted 3-layered microtransaction shop with an included unfriendly lootbox system added on top.
But what if you don't care about cosmetics, and still want to play an RPG adventure game? You'll find the most meaningless exploration combat experience in the market. The combat is not shallow, surprisingly, there are some nuances that can be interesting, but if not even the bosses can deal 1% of damage to your health, none of it matters. you can never upgrade your health, use the first skill and still probably complete most, if not all, questlines in the game.
The only redeeming factor ESO has is its story, which not even sometimes is. Some stories are deep, meticulous and genuinely interesting, but the other half simply brings powerful or famous in-universe characters out of nowhere with piss-poor explanation, saying to the player about the 50th world ending event the player is destined to stop. Even then, there's poorly any motive of playing the good stories if the combat is meaningless and the rewards are shallow.
Maybe this isn't the game for me, as I tend to dislike MMOs and their gameplay, but the way Elder Scrolls Online treats the player feels like a genuine offense of my time and will. But hey, if you don't mind a game having zero gameplay, the most grinding-engineered progression systems and hunting for scraps, 1 currency at a day for a reward costing 1000 currencies, and solely focusing on upgrading your character's appearance, this might be the game for you. Otherwise, stay away from this mess.
