Skyrim: How to Unlock All Locations? & Toggle Map Markers

All Map Markers and Locations in Skyrim discovered
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Skyrim is a pretty big place. The game features a large map filled with over a hundred locations you can discover and explore. The map is bigger than the one featured in Fallout 4, and naturally, it takes a long time to explore it fully. Due to this, some players prefer to use shortcuts when it comes to discovering all map markers in the game, but how do you do it? To answer this question, we’ve decided to put together this guide. Let’s see how to toggle map markers in Skyrim and how to unlock all locations. 

You can unlock all locations in Skyrim by using the command “tmm 1.” By using this command, you will unlock all locations marked on the map, and you will be able to fast travel to them. If you want to hide all map markers in the game, you need to use the “tmm 0” command. 

Now that we’ve covered that toggling map markers on and off in Skyrim is easy, it’s time to analyze it in a bit more detail. If you’re interested in more, as well as how to modify the command in question, stay with us! 

Skyrim map features over 100 locations that are marked on your map

Once you leave Helgen Keep and brave Skyrim, you will notice that there are places of interest scattered all around Skyrim. Those locations come in the form of mines, Nordic Ruins, Dwemer Ruins, Giant Camps, Imperial Forts, etc. 

Those significant locations are places of interest that are later marked on your map as “discovered” once you reach a certain radius around them. Icons marked on your map as black are places that NPCs mentioned or are locations that you need to visit as a part of certain quests. Those locations are not available for fast traveling, you still need to walk manually to them (or ride if you have a horse), but you’re aware of the general direction of where they are. 

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It takes a long time to fully explore Skyrim and discover all its locations, and most players will never bother with it. Once you’ve unlocked the achievement for discovering 100 locations, there aren’t really any rewards to push you to discover ALL of them.  

There are numerous reasons why you would need the command to unlock locations, but most of them revolve around the fact that some players just prefer to fast travel instead of traversing the world manually. Luckily, console commands allow you that. 

You can unlock all locations and toggle all map markers with a single command 

You can use the console command to discover all locations on a map. To do that, follow these steps: 

  1. Open the console by pressing “~.”
  2. Type “tmm 1” and close the console. 
  3. Open the map, and voila, all map markers should be visible. 

This command will show all map markers as discovered, and you will be able to fast travel to them at any time if no enemies are nearby. The same command can be used to discover all locations on Solstheim as well. 

This command, however, is useless for discovering locations that are not marked on your map. For example, some easter-egg locations contain interesting loot or other notable places of interest but don’t have an assigned map marker. 

All Map Markers and Locations in Skyrim discovered

Likewise, there is a command that allows you to unlock all map markers in the game without allowing you to fast travel to them. This is a perfect command for players that still want to explore the world manually but want to be aware of the number of locations to visit without missing a thing. To add map markers for all undiscovered locations, follow these steps. 

  1. Open the console by pressing “~.”
  2. Type “tmm 1,0,0” and close the console. 
  3. When you open the map, all previously undiscovered locations and map markers should be visible as undiscovered black icons. 

Just like with the previous command, this command can be used on Solstheim as well. 

Showing all undisocvered map markers in Skyrim console command

Hardcore players can hide all map markers in Skyrim with a single command 

There’s a significant portion of the Skyrim community that hold a certain disdain toward map markers and hold in high esteem the system of exploration that Morrowind had. Those players can utilize certain commands that will allow them to explore the map truly without relying on map markers or even a compass. To disable all map markers in the game, use the following command:

  1. Open the console by pressing “~.”
  2. Type “tmm 0” and close the console. 
  3. When you open the map, all map markers should be gone. 

This command will hide all discovered and undiscovered locations on your map. It will also hide all map markers that point toward cities that are available to you from the start of the game. To navigate around the map, you will have to rely on NPC directions, information written in your journal, and signposts that litter the roads of Skyrim. 

turning off all map markers in Skyrim with console commands

You can take it a step further and disable the compass completely. The process for doing that is a bit more complicated than toggling off map markers, but it’s doable. To disable the compass in Skyrim, follow these steps: 

  1. Navigate to Skyrim’s folder in My Documents. The path should look like this C:\Users\PC_NAME\Documents\My Games\Skyrim
  2. Once inside Skyrim folder, you should locate .ini file called Skyrim_prefs.ini 
  3. Open the file and use the search function to locate “compass” settings. 
  4. If you are navigating through the right file, this line should appear bShowCompass=1 .
  5. Change 1 to 0 and save changes. 
  6. Launch your game and enjoy your completely immersive exploration experience without a compass guiding your way. 
Playing withouth compass

Disabling the compass will make your Skyrim exploration experience more immersive but you will definitely have to rely on written or spoken directions more often.

Starfield Beats Skyrim’s “Concurrent Players Record,” but the Numbers Don’t Tell the Whole Story

Starfield surpasses Skyrims concurrent player count
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Bethesda’s most recent launch of Starfield promised to be the largest in the company’s history, just like the massive game itself. Even though the developers were criticized for some exploration aspects of the game, to put it plainly, lack of things to do on some planets and lack of diversity on the planets in general, the launch did manage to surpass another legendary game from Bethesda’s repertoire, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Skyrim turns 12 years old in just a few short months, and around 12 years ago, it registered the peak concurrent players count of 287,411, according to SteamDB. Starfield managed to surpass that number a few times now, as 13 hours ago, the game registered a peak concurrent player count of 330,723 players in the game. 

Starfield playercount

Although the peak seems humble when compared to some other games, it’s important to note that Steam is not the only platform on which the game was released on. Due to lucrative deals, many players instead opted out to try out the game on Microsoft’s Game Pass, so what we’re seeing on Steam is a far cry from the real number of players. 

Starfield also hadn’t managed to dethrone Bethesda’s other giant, Fallout 4. At one point 8 years ago, the game registered an all-time peak of 472,962 concurrent players, as the interest in the game was enormous.

Starfield’s number look humble, at least on Steam, but it’s important to take into account that the franchise is also rather new, and players really don’t know what to expect considering an overwhelming amount of both positive reviews and criticism of some of the game aspect’s that were supposedly overhyped. 

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In any case, we don’t expect Starfield to fall off the radar anytime soon. The developers have announced the release of modding tools, scheduled to launch sometime in 2024. Even in the absence of official modding tools, its modding community is thriving, with thousands of mods already uploaded and ready to improve the game in several aspects that the players found lacking.

One thing that ensures the longevity of most Bethesda games is its modding fanbase, and we have no doubt that Starfield will see some drastic unofficial upgrades in the next several months and, due to them, perhaps even dethrone Fallout 4. 

The Elder Scrolls VI Is Still 5+ Years Away & Might Not Be Available on PlayStation, Says Microsoft’s Mike Spencer

The Elder Scrolls VI Is Still 5 Years Away Might Not Be Available on PlayStation Says Microsofots Mike Spencer
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It’s been 11 and a half years since The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim was released, and despite the game being re-released numerous times and content being added both officially and through the modding community, fans are eagerly awaiting tidbits of news regarding the so-far unnamed sixth installment in the franchise.

Bad news came last week when during the Activision Blizzard FTC Trial, Microsoft’s Mike Spencer announced that the game might still be 5+ years away. 

In December of last year, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced its intention to block Microsoft’s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard, a deal worth $68.7 billion. Recently, a federal court in California issued a temporary restraining order, as requested by the FTC, which effectively halts the Microsoft-Activision Blizzard deal for the time being.

Last week, the FTC was seeking a preliminary injunction against Microsoft and Activision Blizzard. If successful, it would prevent the completion of the acquisition while the FTC conducts its review of the transaction’s compliance with U.S. antitrust laws.

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The granting of a preliminary injunction would have a significant impact on Microsoft and Activision Blizzard’s plans, potentially even jeopardizing the deal. The acquisition was initially expected to close by July 18, 2023. If the injunction is imposed, the parties would either have to renegotiate or face the possibility of the deal falling through.

An evidentiary hearing between Microsoft, Activision Blizzard, and the FTC is scheduled for August 2, which is after the upcoming deadline in July.

During the hearing, Mike Spencer mentioned the probable Elder Scrolls VI release window 

“It’s many years away, but it’s a game we have announced we would begin working on. “I think we’ve been a little unclear on what platforms it will launch on, given how far out the game is. It’s difficult for us right now to nail down exactly what platforms that game will launch on.”

IGN

“As I said with Elder Scrolls 6, it’s so far out it’s hard to understand what the platforms will even be at this point. It’s the same team that’s finishing Starfield, which comes out this September. So we’re talking about it being likely five-plus years away.”

Spencer’s words did little to quell the worry that Bethesda’s most famous franchise won’t be available on Play Station, and the fans that once welcomed healthy competition in the form of PS exclusives are now calling for fairer release practices. 

In any case, considering everything we’ve heard, there’s going to be quite some time before we hear & see anything solid related to Elder Scrolls VI. 

Bethesda is usually delaying its flagship IP as long as possible to ensure the best experience possible for fans, and considering the probable scope of the game and technologies involved in making it; it’s not surprising that the game is taking so long. 

How Do You Use the Investor Perk in Skyrim?

how to use investor perk in Skyrim
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A significant part of Skyrim’s gameplay revolves around its economy, and economy, in turn, is mostly influenced by your speech skill that can, when raised enough, help you accumulate quite the wealth. One of the most important speechcraft perks you can acquire is the so-called “Investor” perk, but some players have trouble utilizing this perk to the fullest due to the various bugs. So, we created this guide to explain how to use the “Investor” perk effectively in Skyrim. 

Investor perk will allow you to invest 500 gold in merchants to raise their overall gold available for bartering by 500 gold. All you need to do is navigate to the “I want to invest in your business” option while you are navigating through the dialogue options. However, You should consider that some merchants are affected by a bug that allows you to invest in their store for an infinite amount of times without ever remembering that you already invested in them. Their overall gold, however, will never increase. 

Now that we’ve covered how to use the investor perks, it’s time to analyze it in a bit more detail. If you’re interested in how to unlock the perk and how to utilize it the best, stay with us and keep reading!

What speech level do you need to be to unlock Investor perk? 

Generally, you will level speech every time you trade with the merchants or interact with other NPCs via special dialogue options such as bribe, threaten, etc., and it shouldn’t be too hard to max out speech in the mid-game, as there are various effective guides on how to do it. But luckily for you, you don’t have to be a master level in speech to unlock the Investor Perk. You just need to spend a lot of points in the skill tree and be fairly proficient at it. 

investor perk skyrim

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You can unlock the Investor perk as soon as you hit level 70 in speech, and if you’ve previously unlocked the “Merchant” perk, that allows you to sell any type of item to any kind of merchant. This is among the most useful perks in the tree, so generally, everybody who decides to orient their character to, well, the speech will strive to get this perk as soon as possible. It makes flipping goods faster than usual, but it also causes your “go-to” merchants to be drained of funds relatively quickly, and this is where the Investor perk comes on. 

What does Investor perk do & how to use it? 

Investor perk allows you to invest 500 gold in merchants that can be found all over Skyrim. The perk is not limited to a type of merchant since you can invest in alchemists, smiths, or general merchants. It really doesn’t matter as long as the merchant in question is not affected by a bug. You can find a list of all investable merchants here, but keep in mind that the bugs that affect various merchants can be fixed with the Unofficial Skyrim Patch at any given time.

As soon as you activate the perk, the first time you wander into a shop and activate the dialogue with the merchant, you will get the following choice “I would like to invest in your business.” As soon as you click on that line, the money will be subtracted from your inventory immediately, and the merchant’s gold will be raised by that amount (500 gold). 

It’s a pretty useful perk to have, but most people are just not willing to invest in it early on in the game. Luckily the legendary skills allow you to acquire all perks eventually if you’re persistent enough and willing to grind. 

You can invest only once in any given merchant.

Bugs that affect the Investor perk 

Most of the players get confused by the perk since the option to invest is not present for at least 1/3 of the game’s merchants, and it’s mostly due to random bugs affecting them. So if the option to invest is missing, there is a really large chance that the merchant in question is simply “un-investable” due to a bug and not by design. You can resolve most of those issues by using various unofficial patches. 

Some bugs are more bizarre in nature, like the one affecting Angeline Morrard in Angeline’s Aromatics. This apothecary will allow you to invest in its store endlessly; as long as you have the funds, the merchant seemingly forgets about it, but, there’s a catch, her base gold will never rise. It will always stay at the pre-investment levels, which results in all your investments being lost forever.

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It’s probably best to avoid investing in Angeline if you don’t plan on installing the Unofficial Patch. 

Ghorza gra-Bagol, an orc smith that can be found near Understone Keep, has the option to invest in her, but the only dialogue option is to refuse the investment making it impossible to raise her standard gold by 500. 

You can install Unofficial Skyrim Legendary Edition Patch to fix this bug, or you can simply “dispose” of Ghorza and wait for her apprentice, Tacitus Sallustius, to take over the store. In this case, you should be able to invest in the store without any issues. 

What is the difference between the Investor perk and Master Trader perk? 

Both the Investor perk and Master Trader perk allow you to raise the standard gold of merchants in Skyrim by 500 and 1000 gold, respectively, but there are some differences between the two perks. Namely, the Master Trader perk is significantly harder to acquire because it requires you to be level 100 in speech and it requires you to have almost all other prior perks activated. 

master trader perk skyrim

Master Trader perk will also add 1000 gold to all merchants, but it doesn’t require you to invest your own gold in traders. The game does it automatically, meaning it doesn’t cost you anything. It’s a useful perk to have, and it will allow you to accumulate wealth rapidly, but it might take some time for you to get there, and most players don’t want to prioritize speech in early or mid-game.

And by the time you are ready to invest all those points in speech, you might already be rich beyond your wildest dreams, so the perk might appear to be useless.