So I just replayed through the main story line in morrowind again, for the first time in quite sometime, in anticipation for Skyrim and I noticed something. OB lacked a very fundamental part of the MW story the creepy/fear factor. Now believe me I loved the Oblivion gates and thought they were cool, but they pale in comparison to the 6th house bases with the creepy chanting and grotesque monsters. Also the ancestral tombs and necromantic chamber all just seemed scarier. I liked to see this continued in Skyrim, but idn potentially what could have that "fear" factor in Skyrim. Thoughts?

I think it has a lot to do with the overall lighting in oblivion. Everything seemed extremely glowy, so nothing really seemed scary by looks. But yea I'd really like to see the creepiness return in some places for sure

I hear you, I used to freak out when I see sixth house symbols and stuff

hope we get better fear this time, maybe some zombie hordes ! like left 4 dead, an ancient catacomb closed for 500 years has got to have 2000 hungry flesh eating raging zombies

I've always favored the idea of having 'monsters' that aren't based on human legends like zombies, vampires, ghosts, etc. I'd like them all to be abstract-based looking, not relying on any legends.

There's a zombie mod for Fallout 3/NV. I really hope they port it to Skyrim.

Most of the no-fear in Oblivion is because of the lighting. It becomes most evident if you use the Morroblivion mod that lets you travel to Morrowind in Oblivion. You realize just how crazy the light scheme is.

I really hope they work on the lighting. I hope that they realized Oblivion was glowing too much.

The elder scrolls games have mainly had these as enemies. There is an entire set of lore for the series, and thus it is easy to have these types of creatures. They do have some monsters from other sources, but most of them are not as well known as things like dragons, unicorns, etc. (well dragons are in it, but not very often)

I'd just love being in a dark, snow-covered alpine forest, by night. Tons of creepy stuff can be imagined to be found there.

Also, finding some sort of strange dark wiccan-styled witches doing some sort of ritual...just creepyyy.

hmmm interesting, maybe the deep ones :sweat: man that name still gives me chills, although they blew it in oblivion by not actually showing them or making their quest epic (it was a short side quest) they might be able to fix it now by giving us some scary creepy new threat !

I just want darker nights and dungeons.

Its a simple change tht would really help.



also use some of those ghast sounds from minecraft, those are [censored] scary. And their boxes....


also make zombies should make louder moans.


also a good use of fog and smoke in a forest. its all about setting and abience. And timing.

If one says that he never got scared when exploring one of them undead dungeons and suddenly got attacked by a zombie or skeleton from behind, he is a liar.

Or how about those creepy sounds skeletons make. I definately want more scary events!

I loved the creaking, its like a sound I dread now..... oh snap a skeleton!

A zombie from behind is a shock, not actual scary tension though

Oh but that dungeon music, footsteps and sounds that those undead makes really builds up a scary tension. And finally reaching the apex when it attacks you unexpectedly

What enhances the fear factor is not knowing what might be on the next corner, with great help from music and sound. If you play a game (horror or not) dark or light without sound, it′s not the same thing.

Ah dude ^^ I'm sitting in dark room here, making me a lil uneasy

I want Draugrs back, they were the scariest monsters in all the games so far.

And I remember being in a cave on Solstheim once, picking up an artifact (can't remember what it was), and I got a journal entry that began with "I picked up this old sword, bla bla...." and ended with: "I hear something. I am not alone." It was just two old skeletons that appeared behind me, but that journal entry in the dark cave really created a scary "Mines-of-Moria-drums-in the-deep-they-are-coming" kind of atmosphere. A few little things like that would be nice in Skyrim.

The 6th House was great. It had a very Lovecraftian feel/influence to it, and I'd love to see something along similar lines in Skyrim.


I didn't really get creeped out by anything in Oblivion, in large part due to the reasons previously stated.

I hate that show.

I think that it's all about lighting and sound design. No one has ever been afraid of the light, it always the dark Darkness = scary, or at least, weariness. So in essence... darker nights, darker dungeons, dramatic musical score (not high tempo, just... dripping with tenseness), perhaps a distant sound that make the hair on the back of your neck stand up. Sound design plays as big a roll as the visual in setting the tone.

But yes, yes, I want to be afraid to go places

I'll admit the quest in OB where you have to go to that undead cave and rescue that mage was somewhat scary for me the first time. But like the previous post have said it was darker there was fog and ooooo those creepy noises.

Wait....


For how long has Morrowind been 'Creepy'?

When i first started morrowind i kept imagining skeletons coming out of the ground or chasing me around the ashlands. When a rat kicked my ass in the cave next to Seyda Neen i kept in towns for ages before I actually went out to find a skeleton.

Oblivion has some scary places as well. But I agree it is mostly the Ayleid ruiins or forts with undead that are the most scary. Those moaning sounds and creaking bones and the glowy weird fog. To this day whenever i enter such a place and see that tell-tale unded fog and see a faded wraith i make sure i cast a lot of buff spells before attacking. Those wraiths are tough. And what's with the bad breath as well

I think because almost every non-humanoid mob you'd find in caves in Oblivion was undead, you just sort of get desensitized to the whole thing.

Well, part of that was because the nature of Dagoth Ur and the nature of Merunes Dagon are actually very different from one another. And I think both stories reflected the over all theme of each of their villains pretty well. Oblivion's story was more of an action adventure epic like the lord of the rings, while Morrowind's story reflected sort of a light horror element to it. Both villains are something out of a nightmere, just different types of nightmeres.

But yeah, I would love for them to bring that feeling I got from the disturbing dreams and horrific creatures and corpus victims. Or when I entered the crypt of the King of Worms in Daggerfall. Skyrim really should bring that forbidden feeling back to it.

That was quite deliberate. Some of them were "Deep Ones" and the guy who did that was no doubt involved in that one village in Oblivion and the creepy house with the Lovecraftian cave in Fallout 3.