Originally published August 13, 2024. The original article can be found here.
The free Update 43 base-game patch brings a variety of new features and quality of life changes to ESO, including Home Tours. This new feature allows you to share and visit player homes and experience the incredible creativity of the ESO housing community. This update officially arrives August 19 for PC/Mac and September 4 for Xbox and PlayStation consoles, but you can try out these changes on the Public Test Server right now.
Opening the Door to New PossibilitiesEdit
"Home Tours is a way for anyone, regardless of where they are in their housing journey, to share that creativity and become inspired," says Cullen Lee, one of ESO's Senior Systems Designers. "We wanted to provide a tool that would help connect folks with a shared interest in housing, introduce folks to what's possible in housing, and generally help build the housing community with a focus on positivity!"
"Home Tours is our next evolution toward building a stronger housing community," explains James Sammartino, a Senior UI Engineer. "It gives you a way to share your creativity and passion with everyone easily and in one central place."
So how does the new tool work? In short, it allows you to find, visit, share, and recommend ESO's player-made homes.
"Anyone can go into a new section of the Activity Finder and list their homes for folks to tour, and tour homes themselves," explains Cullen. "You can choose to anonymously recommend a limited number of homes each week, and those recommendations help determine a rotating selection of fantastic homes to visit in the Recommended section of Home Tours. You can also choose to favorite any home (even outside of Home Tours!) and revisit it later. When listing a home, you can include a custom nickname, as well as up to three tags to help communicate the overall vibe or focus of the home."
Building a Strong FoundationEdit
"We always start by asking ourselves what we want to accomplish, and by thinking about the people we're building the system for," says Cullen. "For Home Tours, our two big goals were to make it easier to find amazing homes, and to help grow the housing community in a positive way. By keeping these in mind, we were able to make sure that the system is easy to hop into and keep our focus on creativity and visual variety."
When building this new feature and the way it categorizes houses with tags, the team looked closely at the housing system's existing player experiences and creations.
"As we iterated on our tags, we looked at a whole bunch of houses that the community has shared previously," says Cullen. "We practiced tagging them to find which areas we wanted to reinforce with additional tags and which tags could be cut to keep the overall list concise. Once we were happy with our list internally, we asked for community feedback on PTS, and incorporated that feedback. Once the community has had a chance to play further, we plan to continue to evaluate feedback and iterate as needed."
Of course, this is only the beginning of what's possible with Home Tours.
"Home Tours is powered by you, the creator," explains James. "If you have homes that you want everyone to check out, then we encourage you to list them. There is no limit. You could list one home, two homes or even every home that you own—it's up to you."
Be Welcome in Tamriel with Home ToursEdit
When the feature goes live, the team is excited to see how players embrace its potential, visit new homes, and share their own creations.
"I'd love for the folks who are masters of the system to get more widely recognized for their creations, and to continue to inspire each other to greater heights," says Cullen. "I'd love for more people to see what's possible in our housing system and eventually get the itch to build some homes of their own."
"Our housing system is one of my absolute favorite features of The Elder Scrolls Online," says James. "As a member of our vibrant housing community, I have had the good fortune to be able to see some truly incredible homes and custom builds created by our players. I cannot tell you how much I am looking forward to giving everyone that plays our game the opportunity to find, enjoy, and share those amazing designs."
"Everyone who tries out housing should be proud of their creations," says Cullen. "You don't have to spend 1,000 hours on a home or have a master's degree in architecture to make something meaningful or cool. We built this system, but it's your passion and dedication that will bring it to life."
Are you ready to see the housing experience in ESO expand and evolve with Home Tours? Share your plans (and your favorite builds) with us via X (formerly Twitter), Instagram, and Facebook.
Update 43 is a free base-game patch for all ESO players and arrives August 19 for PC/Mac and September 4 for Xbox and PlayStation consoles.