With all I have read on how conversations have been made more organic and natural it made me start to think "what about shops?" With that I started thinking about how they could have re done the shopping experience to make it also feel more natural. I started thinking that you could either walk around and look at the items on display like in real life and under the item or close to it would be a piece of paper you can examin that shows the details like the name of the item, stats, and price with the option to A buy or B cancel. If you chose buy it goes onto your in game "shopping list" you put all the items you want on the list then you approach the shop keeper and talk to him/her and it shows your list and says do you want these items? A yes, B no C bargin D edit. If you edit you can remove something from the list or go out and add something els you need. If you want to steal something you would look at the item its self and click steal like you normally would.

Another option I thought of was that it could be like how Zelda games do it where you talk to the shop keeper and you scroll through the displayed items and can chose to buy them or not.


Do you feel shopping could be made into a more organic and natural feeling experience much like how BGS seams to be trying to make everything els?

There will still probably be an inventory menu when talking to shop npc's. Really is the most convenient way.

Shop keeper, "How are we today?"
(inventory opens)(buy item)
"that's a good deal"
(inventory closes)
"Come again"

Anything else isn't needed.

Perhaps, but so was the old conversation system. You walked up to someone you hit talk, they stop and you chose dialog options, and yet they chose to change it to something more natural feeling. I dont feel my idea is so difficult that it is unconvenient but moreso more logical in the sense that it would not feel like the shop keeper has a million suits of armor in their back pockets.

It will be a menu which displays like apple's coverflow.

Now that they are using 3D objects for our inventory instead of icons, I cant see how they wouldn't capitalise on that in the shopping context also.

The only thing I would like to see is items on display actually being sold. Where I can walk up and pickup an item to buy it. And everything I sell is either put on display(not right away) or stored somewhere in the shop or a warehouse.

Edit: If you walk up and look at something the merchant will make a generic comment like "Oh thats a sturdy shield" or "Quality armour there".

Of course, I also usually play thieve characters so I may be bias.

Dont get me wrong I have absolutely no problem with how buying and selling works in Oblivion I just feel that with all this talk on inovation on how they are now doing conversations they could take that concept and make buying and selling a more interesting and natural experience. Even if it is still a menu I wont mind, Im just stating what I feel would be in the same general mindset as their new conversation system.

I can tell you from personal experience that what you just thought of is actually a bad idea. Surprized? Way back when I had my PS1, I played a game called Crusaders of Might and Magic. There, you bought items by looking at them and pressing X (the "Confirm" button on the Playstations). However, I didn't understand that instantly. I spent maybe like an hour trying to get the clerk to sell the goods to me, and was frustrated by no response from him whatsoever, before I tried it and realized the system. This shows how unintuitive such an approach is in games. People are too accustomed to the convience of walking up to the seller, popping open a menu and buying items from it. It's the time-tried solution and that's what people have come to expect. Forcing them to go through the tedium of having to form a "shopping cart" before buying would annoy a lot of people, as they would not understand how a much more efficient menu system would've been worse.

Tutorial popups.

Well what about a more Zelda style system? you walk up to the shop keeper, you talk to him/her and you can scroll through the items on display which would be the items that are for sale. This system has been in use for a long time and would not cause the confusion you speak of since as a 8 year old It made perfect sense to me playing Zelda back in the day. It would feel more natural and still remain simple.

or as Achromatis says tutorial pop ups.

Well, it's still essentially a menu, just in a different form. No one's saying the form of the menu can't be messed with.
And as for the popup tutorials, they still wouldn't change the fact that menus are the most efficient way to do it. I mean, picture how much time you would waste looking at each item just to see what is the best stuff that you can afford? Quite often a shopping session is a case of "I have 300 drakes. Let's see what's the best loadout combination that I can buy for this total".

I love your idea. Doubt anything like it will be in the game, but would be awesome if it was.

Perhaps they may have revamped the buying and selling system. We wont know unless we are told, see a vid or untill the game is released. Though I would like it if they did something.

I would like to be able to pick up an item and look at it closely without being accused of stealing it. I would also like to be able to invest in a shop, but only if I actually recieved money back for my investments-not just an increase in the shops available money.

what I would like for shops is that I won't feel like I'm the only one that actually shops there. Show me some people browsing the wares! I don't mind the pop-up or the feeling as if 'I'm buying out of his/her pants' but I would like to see some customers looking around, contemplating what they are going to buy. It would make me feel as if I'm not the only thing keeping the poor guys business afloat.

That part worked well enough in Oblivion and Fallout, it was other people in shops, might want more people and some shop related dialogue.
Primary wish is a shopping chart like in Fallout 3, it made buying and selling stuff easy and you did not need to confirm buying a single apple, and show total weight in the shopping window, so fun buying a set of armor and be unable to carry it, press a button to sell a stack.
3d view of objects is inn and sounds nice, I do not want a fancy or realistic system I want something effective, we will use a lots of time buying and selling junk so having to haggle for each item would be boring very fast.

This sounds like a personal problem

When I go to the candy store at the mall with my nephew, he doesn't walk up to the cashier and say "I want 2 caramal apples and a cookie". he looks around, finds what he wants, and goes to the cashier with it.

When I go to stores, I do the same thing.

Probably simular to oblivions, minus the faceplant

Go to the shop, have a menu brought up with the items, click and drag inventory into another part of the menu which is a list of things you intend to buy/sell. They don't repeatedly say things like "That's a good deal" "I let that go too cheaply" "You...blablablaba" every time I buy one single thing. When the list is complete, go to check out, and THEN they say something about your purchase. Barter level is up automatically when your player's merch skills increase... so no need to screw around with that.

That's what I think.

How about a menue option where the items disapear off the shelves once they are bought. Or you can look around the shop and test items and buy straight off the rack. Everybodies happy.