Rome was also an Empire for around 500 years, are you saying that the Eternal City was comprised of simply a few guilds during Pax Romana? Unity does not mean peace or an end to competition. Cyrodiil controls an entire continent man! It gets taxes from across that area. A giant divine spike sticks out of its imperial capital, the Aedra have a direct and institutionalized connection to the emperor, and all you point to are the three measly guilds and an exhortation to "dig a little deeper?"

Morrowind has been under the control of three GOD KINGS for 3000 YEARS, and it's still more fun.

As others on this thread have also said, it's there for those who are willing put some effort into looking for it instead of simply looking into a book for everything. And it's kind of hard to have competition when you control enchanting, spellmaking, and magic training.


Not much control, at least not anymore. All they do is sit around and sustain the Ghostfence while mortals run the place.

Ahem, for the best part of three millenniums. If there is any society in all of Nirn that should be as sedentary, lethargic and turgid as Cyrodiil is in Oblivion, it should be Morrowind, owing to its 3000 year of reliance on a trio of God-Kings and an empire sized theocratic bureaucracy. But it's not.

Those are just the only government controlled guilds. There are plenty of other guilds like the MT, CT, DB and Blackwood Company. And the Thieves' Guild is not really one unified guild since they vary so greatly by province.

But the Great Houses, the Temple, and the Ashlanders have been fighting amongst each other all along.

You listed four landscapes in Oblivion. In Morrowind, there is Ashlands, and swampy mushroom forests. 4 vs 2, hmm...

And yes, there is an alternative to fast-travel and walking. Called horses. Guess what? They cost money, so they ain't cheat items, either. And again, I do not find the landscapes to be as dull as you do. The fact that there are multiple people who don't mind the Cyrodiilian landscape means that it is not a fact that they are more bland. It is a matter of taste.

Yeah, that's my point. When people aren't fighting, it gets boring. Do I care whether he saw a mudcrab? No, I want to know whether his local Count has had anyone assassinated recently. Yes, Oblivion may have had Radiant AI, but the stationary NPCs of Morrowind managed in sustaining their dynamic society.

So the Tribunal don't want Morrowind to be a Warring States State. That means nothing. If they really didn't want the Houses to fight themselves, then why did the Temple sanction the Morag Tong? Come on, ALMSIVI is practically the deification of murder and six!

Reach Heaven by Violence. The people of Morrowind mirror their gods and their teaching. What do the Imperials mirror?

1. Bittercoast (Swamp)
2. Ashlands + Molag Amur + Red Mountain (Ash)
3. Ascadian Isles (Greenland)
4. Grazelands (Prairy)
5. West Gash (Scrubland)
6. Sheogorath Region (Rocky terrain)
7. Azura's Coast (Peninsulas/Sunken Foyada's).
8. Zafir Fell Bay (Lots of little islands).

1. Nibenean grassland
2. Gold Coast moors
3. Great Forest pine forest
4. Colovian Highlands pine forest
5. Great Forest deciduous forest (autumn and summer)
6. Winter forest (deciduous and coniferous)
7. Nibenean swamp
8. West Weald grassland

That is a very flawed list because many of the categories are only slightly distinct. Other people could likely add other minute entries to the list. The differences aren't dramatic; they are subtle. Some might prefer it that way. It all looks like the real world, and suffers from the comparison because of it.

Oblivion's landscape was like driving through Pennsylvania and Ohio. It's amazing at first glance, but eventually you just don't want to see another tree again and the plains just stretch out in every direction. Morrowind was a very different place that no one had ever seen before. It was dynamic, exotic, and more interesting. The Ashlands in Morrowind were, in fact, wastelands which was why you were only forced to go there often through the main quest as opposed to most of the faction quests. The places other than the ashlands were dynamic and each their own different niche. It just didn't get boring.

You never did the Imperial Legion quests. Talk about ashen madness. Anyways, I could be just as justified in saying Cyrodiil's environments are varied from eachother as you are with Morrowind's. Nevertheless, I am not sure how ash can be any more exciting than trees.

http://www.greendioxide.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/08/tree1.jpg
http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/2005/3024/images/fs2005-3024_fig_13.jpg

Everyone, choose your poison. :rolleyes:

It's not so much 'Ash > Trees' for me, as it is the whole spread of enviroments and the layout.

MW's terrain is more otherworldly and weird for a start. Some love it, some are indifferent, some think that giant mushrooms are just goofy, so mileage does vary. Personally I really like it, it's weird but not so bat-[censored] crazy that you can't relate to it.

MW's varied terrains are often packed close together in a small area too. The start point is probably a good example, you've got the Ascadian Isles, Bitter Coast and ashy Foyada Mamaea all near to each other, with Pelagiad, Seyda Neen and Balmora all contrasting with each other too. Probably the only part where the terrain is similar for miles on end is the eastern ashy part of the island, Molag Amur, and I find that terrain interesting anyway because it's so chaotic and also sprinkled with interesting stuff like ruins and lava flows.

'Course, MW's enviroment is a million times more enjoyable if you make the [censored] Cliffracers chill the [censored] out with a mod. Then you can appreciate it for more than 5 seconds without being pecked in the head.

The problem with Cyrodillic culture is that it is, for the most part, a dead culture. It has long been crushed under the weight of bureaucracy and centralization, with atrophied institutions, a poorly performing economy, and a large class of outlaws, probably driven from productive activities by excessive taxation, an oppressive guild system (they have guilds for pretty much everything), and a burgeoning population of bandits, marauders, and goblins. Law enforcement is virtually nonexistent outside the patrolled areas within and between the major cities (the result of tax revenues which decline with productivity), with various criminal groups openly warring over territory. The energy of the nobility has been gradually undermined by the gradual assumption of their traditional roles by the Imperial City, and now largely exist as little more than old money families. Goblins flourish in the voids left by broken communities. Meanwhile, resources continue to be shipped abroad to keep the Legion supplied in the provinces.

Much like a Cyrodillic vampire, The Empire maintains a front of life and humanity by slowly draining its victims of their very lifeblood... all in the name of religious propaganda that is revealed as obviously false the moment you see Mankar Cameron wearing the Amulet.

Actually, the controversy surrounding the Amulet shows this forum to be extremely prejudiced against Oblivion. I remember it took a WORD OF GOD forum post to convince people that the fact that Cameron was wearing that thing was deliberate, and not merely an oversight or a failure of game mechanics. You people are willfully blind where Oblivion is concerned.




Dude, even in pen and paper roleplaying, sometimes you just say, "And you traveled to the city of such-and-such" without breaking out the random encounter tables. Fast travel isn't a "cheat", it's a video game implementation of a narrative device. Now, I do prefer Daggerfall's method which gave you some choices as to the specific details of travel, but that doesn't make Oblivion's way of going about it automatically wrong.



Spell failure is "DnD"? Have you ever even PLAYED D&D?




Familiar = bad; alien = good: opinion, not fact, and once again, having nothing to do with the thread topic; you just want to bash regardless of the topic.

The MQ willfully ignored or overwrote everything we knew on the subject and was devoid of logical and narrative continuity. The benefit of the doubt had been kicked in the head until it hemorrhaged. Next example, please.

Oh goodness, there's so much utter trash here (on both sides) that it's hard to even start. I'm probably making a mistake saying anything.

Anyhow, a few comments.

Lore and game mechanics are (mostly) seperate issues.

Whether you prefered the environment(s) in Morrowind or in Oblivion is more or less a matter of taste, and isn't really pertinent to a discussion of lore. On the other hand, the fact that Cyrodiil was not a jungle is a matter of lore (although it is explained; though obviously not everyone finds the explanation satisfactory). Comparing the variety of environments in Morrowind and Oblivion is difficult. To be perfectly honest, though I found the environments in Morrowind and Oblivion to be quite different from each other, I found the variety of environments within each game to be fairly limited, and not really that interesting. Yes, I've been to places (parks) which look basically like what most of Cyrodiil (in Oblivion) looks like. However, after it had rained the area around the house I grew up at looked strikingly like the area around Seyda Neen (except there weren't any Kwama or falling Bosmer wizards). The most alien thing in Morrowind (for me) wasn't the landscape but the architecture (Redoran and Telvanni, mostly) and creatures (though as Vvardenfell is something like the Australia of Tamriel, I can understand it having more unique fauna than Cyrodiil).

On that note: the distinctive creatures, architecture, cultural, and political features in Morrowind surpass what was available in Oblivion in both depth and breadth. We did not learn enough about what makes Imperials who/what they are in Oblivion; not enough information was given on how the province of Cyrodiil functions economically and politically in a normal state of affairs; we did not learn enough about the religious practices of the imperials, or the role of Aedra (and Daedra) worship in the lives of everyday people, etc; the effort taken in Oblivion to distinguish Cyrodiil, Tamriel, and Aurbis from any other fantasy world was lackluster (that said, here is where peering deeper proves worthwhile).

Having conceded those things (although I never meant to say otherwise), I'd like to conclude by saying there's a difference between saying there could have (and should have) been more, and saying that there wasn't anything at all, or that what was there wasn't worthwhile. Oblivion didn't offer enough, but it still offered a lot. Perhaps we might be more appreciative (and more cognizant) of what it has to offer if we'd use this forum to discuss/debate the lore in the game rather than discuss/debate whether the game has lore. (I already know someone is going to say that we don't discuss the lore because the game doesn't have any. I hope your birds taste good.)

Exactly. People just want Oblivion's politics to be more like that of Morrowind. Look at proweler's post on the other page if you have any doubts about this. Oblivion does not have Great Houses and its beaurocracy is centralised, so it is automatically wrong.

More like Morrowind in the carbon-copy-conflict sense? Nope. More like Morrowind in that it exists at all and in a way that affects and can be affected by the world? Sure.

What kind of conflict would you want when your Emperor and his three sons were just assassinated by unknown assailants and all hell is, quite literally, breaking loose all across the country side? As it is, the empire was starting to fall apart with border disputes on the rise, and the towns were doing what they could to keep people calm in the face of the invasion. That's one thing that rather annoyed me about Morrowind.. Dagoth Ur was taking the power of a god, threatening all of Vvardenfell and beyond, and the Great Houses were more worried about kidnapping other house family members and getting a kiss on the cheek. The Ashlander tribes were at least more believable in wanting you to prove your worth, but they were spread out in those god-forsaken Ashlands.

And the Oblivion Crisis starts with the assassination at the beginning of the game. Get the amulet to Jauffre, and you'll start hearing talk about the Oblivion invasion and daedra, even if you've never gotten to Kvatch yet. But despite that, you can see political unrest with the racial tension in Leyawiin (complete with a Countess that tortures her own citizens), the treatment of the people in Cheydinhal, the down-trodden conditions of Bravil, and the forced melding of the Imperial and Nord cultures in Bruma.

[quote name='KCat' post='14845121' date='Aug 7 2009, 03:25 PM']What kind of conflict would you want when your Emperor and his three sons were just assassinated by unknown assailants and all hell is, quite literally, breaking loose all across the country side? As it is, the empire was starting to fall apart with border disputes on the rise, and the towns were doing what they could to keep people calm in the face of the invasion.[/quote]

It'd be nice if that actually had an effect on the world:



But we're drifting away from a lack of Imperial culture now to a lack of conflict. They are related in the sense that people who think about things differently end up in conflict.

In Cyrodiil people don't seem to think much at all. You don't have any priest going through the streets claiming that the hedonism and moral rot of the nobility are the cause of the Oblivion crisis, there aren't any particular upperclass people to begin with, no big time merchants, no bureaucrats, no magocrates, no important priests.

Cyrodiils are also supposed to be well educated, but there isn't any sign of how this education is given and what exactly is taught? Economics? Politics? Oratory? Divine Law?

[src="http://www.imperial-library.info/obbooks/ten_commands.shtml"]The Ten Commandments[/url] are the complete extend of Cyrodiils moral guide. Yet no one talks about it much, it isn't even particularly interesting.

Have you ever had (or at least seen) one of those really exquisite five/seven-course meals in expensive restaurants? The ones where small portions of great tasting and prettily decorated food are served on large platters? Those where in most cases you still are hungry after the final course is over?

That's how I feel with Oblivion. It's really quite pretty and it was fun playing, but after playing, I still feel unsatisfied and ask myself "That's it?" and "Shouldn't there be more?". Oblivion is very nice as a game, but I'm missing the additional spoon of information to convince me that it's really another world - which, in my opinion, should be the goal of every RPG. Morrowind gave me that feeling, that when I start it up, I actually enter Tamriel. Oblivion did not.

To avoid a generic "Morrowind was better" post, just a few examples on what I miss (which are similar to those that Dumbkid already posted) or where I think the end result was poorly done:
* The guilds and Great Houses each had at least some occasions where they conflicted with each other, be it the Great House rivalries, those between the Telvanni and the Mages or the Fighter's and Thieves guild. Oblivion gave me the feeling of being able to play through a "guild campaign" without ever overlapping with other (playable) storylines.
* The religious cults in Oblivion serve only as a place to get healed up/cured and grab some spells. They do not have a "life" of their own: another factions would have made the Imperial Province as the center of a religion (the Empire is not secular!) much more believable. Not to speak of the Temple of the one, which is completely empty aside from the one or other radiant NPC getting lost there - and which is the only religious site in all of the Imperial City! The passage from the first Pocket Guide come to mind where it is said that the Imperial City was a bustling place of a thousand cults. Luckily, Knights of the Nine finally remedied some of those weaknesses.
* The Nibenese and Colovian "sub"-cultures are too homogenized. The potential to actually do something with the whole topic (conversations, rivalry, quests) is huge. In Morrowind, for example, you (I) knew an Ashlander when you saw him. Side note: to me, Morrowind actually gave me the feeling that I could smell an ashlander a mile against the wind.

What I'm really trying to say is: the world that Oblivion is based on offers a great variety of opportunities to tell stories - and storytelling is a vital part of any role-playing game. Sadly, many of these opportunites were either not used or only briefly adressed. From an economical viewpoint, Bethesda has missed an opportunity to further distinguish the Elder Scrolls as a brand from that of the competition. From a personal preference - and I realize that I'm probably not a typical gamer of a mass market - when I have to choose between two RPG games of similar graphical and gameplay quality, I choose the game which offers the better story, worldbuilding and overall feel of being "drawn into" the game world. Given the experience with Oblivion, the end effect is that the brand "Elder Scrolls" certainly has lost value (and also trust in the developer team) to me. Lost value to the point that I am more and more inclined to put TES into the "one game series among many"-category.

I'd already played it but Oblivion should have been more like Daggerfall when it comes to politics IMO (It has no plotting, scheming nobles with no political side of schemes and plots anywhere. Every noble is the other nobles' BFF. They had a great chance for this with the count of Cheydinhal at least whose wife mysteriously died.) and it also should be a jungle but their lore explanation was "Tiber Septim did it" which makes no sense since books after Tiber Septim's reign label Cyrodil as a jungle. So, no, Oblivion really did mess up the lore.

They say that Talos did it. The god, not the emperor. Oh, and don't discuss Daggerfall - off topic!

1) We are all going off topic this is a lore discussion.

2) You said we wanted the politics in Oblivion to be like Morrowind and I explained that I want them like the politics in Daggerfall. (You were complaining about a problem in Daggerfall. There is a difference)

3) This is a lore discussion.

4) Cyrodil still needs to be a jungle and as I just explained "Tiber Septim did it" does not work as an explanation as their explanation with that was he did it when they chose him to be emperor which ruins the time line if taken seriously.

I wasn't complaining about the problem in Daggerfall. Most of Arena is disregarded as far as lore is concerned, and the game that makes the first significant contribution to lore is Daggerfall. In Daggerfall, Dunmer had the same skin colour as humans. Morrowind changed this, and it is equivalent to changing the climate in Oblivion - with absolutely no explanation offered.