Why Skyrim Won’t Let You Become a Trillionaire: A Gamer’s Dilemma
So, the big news is that Elon Musk has officially become the world’s first trillionaire. While that might be impressive to some, it got me thinking: have I ever played a video game that allowed me to accumulate such mind-boggling wealth? Sure, I’ve gathered heaps of coins and in-game currency in various titles, but trillions? That’s a whole different ball game!
Honestly, I couldn’t recall any game that let me hit that trillionaire mark, except for a vague memory of Balatro, where I managed to stack up a mere 48 billion chips. But that’s not quite the same as dollars, is it?
Curiosity got the better of me, and I decided to jump back into the world of Skyrim. If there’s any game that should let you flex your wealth, it’s this fantasy realm filled with dragons, elves, and all sorts of magical craziness. I figured I could just cheat my way to a trillion dollars, thinking of it as receiving a massive inheritance. After all, we all know the classic Skyrim console command, right? It’s time to put it to the test!
I got my console open and typed: player.additem 0000000f (the item code for gold, which I have memorized). Then, I added a 1 followed by what felt like a never-ending string of zeroes. Seriously, counting zeros is a workout in itself!
Let’s break it down:
- 1,000: thousand
- 1,000,000: million
- 1,000,000,000: billion
- 1,000,000,000,000: trillion!
That’s a hefty amount of zeros, don’t you think? But guess what? I typed player.additem 0000000f 1000000000000 and, instead of basking in my newfound wealth, I ended up losing a whopping 2,147,483,647 gold. Wait, what? That can’t be right!
Was it possible that Skyrim couldn’t even display a trillion gold? After all, this game came out in 2011, back when the thought of anyone being a trillionaire was probably just a sci-fi fantasy. So, I dashed over to the nearest shop, The Bee and Barb in Riften, ready to buy a bottle of Alto Wine for just 19 gold. But nope, I was over 2 billion in debt instead! I even tried loading another character, but the result was the same.
Feeling a bit puzzled, I did some digging and found out that in Skyrim, gold is stored as a 32-bit signed integer. This means the maximum value is capped at 2,147,483,647. If you exceed that amount, it flips to a negative value. So, it turns out I was trying to do the impossible!
There you have it! Even in a fantasy universe where you can turn into a werewolf or shout at the weather, becoming a trillionaire is just not on the cards. If only our real world had such straightforward rules!