Even after being commercially available for over a decade, The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim still possesses a dedicated following of players. With new fan content for Skyrim being consistently posted online, it's impressive that fans are still managing to find new things to accomplish in-game. Though, one player in particular found a way to progress through most of Skyrim while missing an integral gameplay mechanic.
Unlike previous iterations of The Elder Scrolls, Skyrim was the first game to introduce dragons into the game's wildlife. The inclusion of dragons came with it a wide variety of new abilities called shouts. As part of the lead character's title of Dragonborn, they have the ability to use shouts that can be unlocked by collecting words of power all throughout the in-game world, and subsequently purchasing shouts using Dragon Souls. Now, one player has managed to play through a significant portion of Skyrim without the use of shouts.
Over on Reddit, a user named ajhw13 posted an image of Skyrim's map with numerous locations already visited and unlocked. According to the user, this was the result of a detour they made while on their way to retrieve the Dragonstone, which is not only essential for progressing the main questline, but also for unlocking the ability to shout and absorb Dragon Souls.
Dragons can only start appearing in Skyrim after the player retrieves the Dragonstone, so this means that for an indeterminate amount of time, this player has been exploring the world of Skyrim without the presence of dragons. While this might make exploration through the open world a bit easier, since the player won't have to contend with dragons randomly appearing, it's also quite detrimental in some ways.
Without dragons appearing, there's no way for players to absorb Dragon Souls, which means that they can't unlock shouts or learn any words of power. Players don't technically need to have shouts unlocked in order to progress through the various questlines Skyrim has to offer, but it also seems like a rather odd thing to neglect.
Then again, players have managed to pull off a surprising amount of bizarre occurrences within the confines of Skyrim that the developers clearly didn't intend for. Take for instance, one player who successfully managed to escape Helgen while still having their hands bound. Therefore, the idea of another player progressing through most of Skyrim without having shouts or Dragon Souls unlocked isn't too far-fetched.
The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim is available now for PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.