I haven’t touched Skyrim in almost a year. What, you ask, could have possibly torn me away from its awesomeness? Getting married in January. To a non-gamer.

My brother gave us an Xbox 360 as a wedding gift, which made me all kinds of happy. Previously, I had had to share gaming consoles with my gamer siblings -- all five of them, excluding one who’s a junior doctor and has no time to sleep, let alone play games. But now, I am Undisputed Queen of the Xbox.

My other brother bought me Skyrim for my birthday. So when my husband goes to work, in between my freelance writing and editing work, I am battling beasts in Skyrim.

Sadly, it’s not the same.

Can Skyrim be enjoyed in total isolation? I doubt it.

I have many fond memories of watching my little sister play her Skyrim storyline. She was a lot more -- how can I put it? -- inclined to the dark side. Her sage advice to me was, “You only get rich in Skyrim by playing the bad guys. Check out my horse!” And then she showed me her freaky fire-eyed horse.

She won a ridiculous amount of gold -- 20,000, I if I recall correctly -- after the Dark Brotherhood was reduced to ashes. I pointed out the minor detail about that money being given to her to rebuild the Dark Brotherhood, but in true villain style, she grinned and waved it off.

Although rising in the ranks in the Dark Brotherhood didn’t appeal to me as much as it did to my sister, I accomplished a fair bit in my Skyrim storyline. I bought a house in Whiterun after becoming Thane, kept colliding into Lydia, collected many shouts, and bought two horses after one leapt to its death over a cliff (how I grieved). I even became Harbinger of the Companions.

It wasn’t fun though, when I accidentally turned into a werewolf in Windhelm, swiped Farkas, and ended up being hunted out by him and all the guards. Admittedly, before that happened, he got in the way of my fireballs, and um, he kind of died. Luckily, I save my games like it’s an addiction, and I can always reload.

Still, I was disappointed about the anti-climax of killing Ulfric Stormcloak. So disappointed that my interest in Skyrim faded. After being the Imperial Juggernaut who finally dispatched Ulfric Stormcloak, I expected at least some kind of significant change to the story arc. But nothing really changed.

Now that enough time has passed from my post-Ulfric-assassination disappointment, Skyrim is exciting again. But to me at least, playing Skyrim is a lot more fun when I can actually talk about it to a fellow gamer, especially someone who knows me well.

With the release of Dragonborn on December 4th, I’m looking forward to a whole new level of immersion. And maybe, just maybe, I can get my husband on board.