In my case, I ran the installer once, and then cancelled the installation to choose a different place to install. Depending on your folder of choice, that could be as severe as wiping an entire hard drive! Basically if you change the install path from “%systemdrive%Program FilesZenimax Online” to anything else that does not include the “Zenimax Online” subfolder, the installer will delete everything else in the folder you select. There is a major and frankly inexcusable bug present in the installer included with the on-disc version of The Elder Scrolls Online.
Considering that Bethesda and Zenimax are still asking for $59.99 for the base game, a lot of people will be looking to get the game much cheaper through retail channels (I got it for less than $20), and therein lies the problem. Okay, so technically this is old news, but with the recent announcement that The Elder Scrolls Online is switching to a one-time purchase and then free to play model, there is a lot of new interest in the game, so I wanted to make sure everyone knows about this so that they don’t go through what I just went through.
