Given that I have a tendency of getting a little too immersed in games, I thought I'd made a reasonable start to my Skyrim experience. A casual late night, four hour trek through the game's hair-raising prologue had me sated for the evening. The ugly turn came the next morning when I rolled out of bed, boiled the jug and set off for a magical day of fresh air and sunshine in Skyrim.

Fifteen hours and three skipped meals later, I was a tired and greasy wreck; and yet my journey had only just begun.

Another forty hours passed before I'd put the game's epic main quest line behind me. It truly is a wonderful fantasy tale that sees you, a hero of any given race or gender, try to realise your destiny as the last known Dragonborn, an ancient legion of warriors gifted with the 'voice'. Civil war divides the state of Skyrim following the assassination of the High King as allegiances are also put to the test – it's a gripping ride, even if the dialogue suffers at points.

Skyrim's whirlwind campaign – set two hundred years after the Oblivion crisis – kick-starts with your valiant hero en route to their own execution. Only seconds prior to having your head lopped off, a grim and jagged form swoops into view, interrupting proceedings. As the terrible dragon lays waste to the city, your only hope is to flee the bedlam and take refuge in the neighbouring village of Riverwood. What happens next is up to you.

While my determination to push on with the main quest was thwarted at every turn, I had no regrets in letting my unrelenting curiosity run the show for what would eventually be hours. With literally hundreds of unique locations scattered throughout this northernmost province of Tamriel, Skyrim is the most ambitious open world we've seen in our fair medium. Spelunking and exploration feels second nature to me now; I stood outside recently, gazing across the open meadows in rural Victoria and all I could think about was how badly I wanted to just walk – in hope of exciting discoveries.

I've been warped by Skyrim.

When not farming for Falmer blood in dank caves or ascending to the snow-capped mountains to take in the sight of some of the most stunning vistas I've ever laid eyes on, there are countless side-quests and miscellaneous favours to stumble upon. Bethesda has integrated a system, dubbed Radiant Story, which dynamically alters quests to fit with your in-game actions. Not only that but it actively encourages exploration as it can assign certain quests to undiscovered locales on-the-fly. It works well enough – plus it's subtle – so I guess you could consider it a job well done.

In terms of gameplay, it's similar to Oblivion in many respects. Swordplay feels a tad clunky, and hit detection can be troubling at times, but it's still accessible and isn't, at all, hard to grasp. Being able to dual-wield any combination of weaponry and magic – so long as the weapon itself is one-handed – is certainly as rewarding as it sounds.

Character progression is one of the biggest selling points when it comes to these western role-players that Bethesda specialises in, and I must say I love both the 'perk tree' and adaptable attribute-levelling, which bolsters the stocks of whichever attributes you use naturally during your time in Skyrim; this is a departure from the class system used in previous Elder Scrolls games. Being able to play naturally knowing that the engine is working behind-the-scenes to cater to your style is a relief to say the least. It keeps gamers in the thick of things, only pulling them out to advance their perks or peruse their inventory.

As a Dragonborn, you'll have your 'Thu'um' – or shouts – to use at your whim. Most will use them as their ace in the hole during overwhelming combat scenarios, but they also serve a narrative purpose throughout the game's plot. These shouts are learned by finding artefact dragon shrines that are inscribed with dragon jargon. Unlocking them requires a bit more mettle, as you'll first need to acquire a dragon's soul, which can only be obtained by slaying one.

While Skyrim is a wonderfully realised game with a wealth of things to keep us occupied for, no doubt, hundreds of hours, it's still a Bethesda game; meaning that (prior to the patch) there are bugs afoot. While I haven't personally experienced a heap of crashes or freezing – though I've heard from many who have – it was things like bizarre AI brain-melts and horrendous textures, which looked as though they were pulled straight from Tetris that had me flummoxed at times.

There's nothing quite like trying to follow an apparition of the Headless Horseman, only to have him succeed in leading his horse to water, then floating away downstream on it.

I did encounter one enraging bug that cropped up at the end of the game's second act. When trying to slog through a boss fight, I discovered that upon loading the auto-save preluding the fight, the boss had become invincible. Much to my chagrin, he'd pulled on his 'poker face' and enabled God mode. Boy was my face red. Oh, Bethesda.

There's no debating that with each province of Tamriel we're exposed to, the more we're in awe. Oblivion was an expansive, incredible sight to behold five years ago; Skyrim blows it out of the water. Snow falls dynamically atop the highest peaks, the engine's lighting and shadowing is flaunted when caving and the night sky is unfathomably beautiful – in fact, I'd be pickpocket bait for any keen thief with the amount of glassy-eyed stargazing I do.

I still couldn't recommend third-person view for anyone looking to be engrossed by Skyrim; character animation is still as poor as ever. NPCs walk robotically and don't fight much more fluidly; it's something I anticipated, but still found myself disappointed considering how great the new engine actually is. They've nailed the dragons though, from them circling like vultures to them crashing down to earth in battle, warping the terrain around them.

Skyrim has brilliant sound design – most Elder Scrolls games do.

Each of the dragon voice-actors can give themselves a pat on the back. Their delivery was superb, portraying the wisdom and power a being must have after centuries of existence. It's just a shame the dialogue is a bit iffy, seeming to force too much of the dragon-tongue into lines, rendering it somewhat hilarious. Odahving, voiced by Charles Dennis, was a standout amongst the dragon kind. Actors like Max von Sydow (as Esbern) and Michael Hogan (as General Tullius) give serviceable performances, though I can't help but feel Andy Morris stole the show at points. A mere bit-player, Cicero is one of the most bizarrely engaging characters I've seen in a sandbox game. His sheer peculiarity made me want to follow him to the ends of Tamriel but, of course, my spelunking lust remerged.

Jeremy Soule takes the reins as lead composer on Skyrim; just as he did on Morrowind and Oblivion. Once again he delivers a serenely wonderful collection of music that does nothing short of capturing the feeling of content one has when traversing a surreal land without aim. Evoking the urgency of a dragon battle, whilst keeping in tone with the game's epic vibe doesn't seem, to me, to be an easy task; Soule executes it with aplomb, even including the odd recurring theme from soundtracks of old – I'm sure I heard a bar of Oblivion's theme in there somewhere.