I've grown up with the Elder Scrolls games, and I think they do something unique and beautiful among all the role-playing games I've experienced: rather than just a vessel to tell a pre-defined story, they allow you, the player, to tell your own stories. But, could this be improved upon? If we weren't bound by reaching a wide audience, hitting a certain timeline, or making a profit at the end of the day, how much more could we do with these game worlds?
This is the idea that inspired our first project, Librum, and eventually Scenic Route Games itself. I (Apoapse) started Librum out of exactly this desire, to remake Skyrim in a way that, while it certainly wouldn't appeal to all Skyrim players, would be the perfect version of Skyrim in my own eyes: low-fantasy elements, magic that has to be discovered rather than unlocked, no levels or other typical RPG fare, harsh survival mechanics and a deep (and deeply corrupt) crime and justice system, and a unique (but punishing) respawn system. As the project grew, so did the team around it -- my small team started to fill out with programmers, artists, and other developers, and what was once a small modlist evolved into much more than I could ever accomplish alone.
Eventually, as we started in on our second project, our small band of volunteers grew into a real, respectable development team, and we decided on "Scenic Route Games" to reflect what we do: we won't develop the games you expect to see, or maybe even the ones you want to see, but we'll certainly come up with something interesting along the way.
