Everyone has their own opinions.You also have to remember people who like arena or DF may not be around on this site that much. of course this an older poll but still more and more fans of MW and OB join every day

For me Oblivion is the better game.

Morrowind was better in Lore, Dungeons, skills, racism, towns (not nature and wildlife. only towns, i didnt like the alien [censored]) and then it had Werewolves but thats really it.

I was just wondering about the second question, that obviously should be answered only by those who actually played and know the WHOLE serie, if some of the fresh TES fans, with their only knowledge of the last two TES, did voted for one of them in this question.

I mean, the poll is done OK, so those with a more limited knowledge of the last two games may express objectively their opinion about those both ones. But, I fear they couldn't resist the temptation to give weight to those games in front of the old TES one (in the second question) though they didn't really know about them (probably thinking that newer automatically means better).

So, my question was : for those who actually played all TES, is the ratio of supporters expressed in this poll, the correct one? Or, and that is my theory, some players without knowledge of Arena or DF, still voted to push Oblivion or MW, therefore masking the opinion of the legitimate answerers.

Personally, I think many people who've only played Oblivion voted. My votes were Morrowind, Daggerfall, I haven't played them.
I rank the TES games (no TESL or TESA included):
Daggerfall>Morrowind>Arena>Oblivion as I value the traditional RPG aspects above all, and Arena gets extra props for starting it all, despite its flaws.

Why? Because more people than you like voted Oblivion? face it, there is alot of people who actually prefer Oblivion.

The point of the poll was to see what the community believed was the best game, but when people who have only played one game vote in the second poll, it creates a false read out. One should not judge the other games despite not having played them.


And just for the record: I played all 4 and voted Morrowind on both.

Thats just going a little overboard. There is definitely people who didn't play all games that voted, but to say Daggerfall should have won is narrow minded. I believe Morrowind is the best shortly followed by Daggerfall, but if Oblivion, Daggefall, or Arena had won I wouldn't say Morrowind should have won and it was because of illegitiment voters that it lost. I would've have said that I thought Morrowind was the better of the games and put up my argument, but to say that Daggerfall should have won but people didn't vote for it is counterproductive to what this poll is for. Of course the results are going to be to an extent scurred, but not corrupted.


The point of the poll was to judge the opinion of those who played all games listed in each poll. I guarantee that 30-50% if not more of Oblivion's votes came from people who did not play all. I guarantee that 15-35% if not easily more people who voted for Morrowind did not play all games. I guarantee that 30% of the people who voted for Daggerfall did so out of pure nostalgia.

Morrowind
Daggerfall
Redguard

What I dont get is why Oblivion forums is a quite busy forum and hardly anyone visits Morrowind forum now... but still people jack about how Morrowind is superior to Oblivion. I just don't get it. :banghead:

Well, I understand the place of MW, which, with its exotism and good 3d engine (compared to the firsts TES), can be considered as a great TES (though I have many rants against it and prefere DF game design...). But what puzzled me was the fact that Oblivion was above DF in the second question. I would be really surprised to see people who actually know the whole TES serie, favor Oblivion above all others.

The problem of this poll, is also that the TES classification can be seen from two point of views:

1/ Based on todays tastes, knowledge and technology, what is the TES you enjoy playing the most? (which is probably how most people who voted for the newer TES answered)

2/ By the time each TES was released, which of them did impress you the most or, said differently, which TES was the most addictive by the time you played it ?(Which I guess most DF or Arena voters answered to)

The forum host more Oblivion and MW fans than most other TES games. As you pointed it, there is a probable tendancy of a percentage of them to vote even without knowing the past games. What I say, is that slight percentage of voters probably mask the real answer classification of the minority of gamers who actually played the whole serie.

Indeed. You might as well compare System Shock and Bioshock. Still it's the same thing: the people who consider later and prettier games automatically better don't have as much weight behind their opinions.
And that's my opinion.

Although Morrowind is the game I've played longest so in that way you might say it is my favorite. But what I loved and miss about Arena was traversing the whole Tamrielic continent and so I chose Arena as my favorite game out of the 4. Funny thing is that in Arena I tended to avoid the Red Mountain area in fear of the volcano .. but when Morrowind came out it turned into my favorite province. tehe

I like Morrowind the most, followed closely by Oblivion.

And yet their vote counts the same. Good way of deciding things.

Morrowind was my favorite. I haven't played any of it's predeacessors though. Here are a few of the reasons why I think Morrowind is a much better game.

- Compared to Oblivion, Morrowind was much more immersive and had more of a "life-like" feeling despite the lack of voice animation.

- It was much better when there were certain named bandits, who wore the same armor and carried the same weapons, game after game. A static world is much more fun and realistic than a random one that regenerates over time and levels up with you.

- There were only a few sets of the best armors throughout the game and they were harder to get. It seems really generic to see everyone wearing fur and iron armor at early levels and then all the sudden everyone's wearing glass and daedric. :rolleyes:

- The leveling system is way overdone in Oblivion in every way. From the bandits/marauders, to the loot, to the creatures in the forrest, it seems like a game, not an actual place.

For me, it really comes down to the leveling system. I want to be rewarded for building up my character. Conversely, there should be areas of the game that I don't dare venture into unless I'm at least level 10, level 20, level 30, ect. Gothic II did a great job of having areas of the game that were off limits to your character depending on what level you were at. It was very satisfying to clear out a cave of black goblins, when you ventured there a month ago they killed you in five seconds.

I really hope Bethesda tones down the leveling system, or gets rid of it all together. People are going to power-game and find ways to cheat the system no matter what you put in place. Don't sacrifice the immersion facter, please.

That is why I think most "best TES" polls will always fail to answer this simple question : which of them is the best.
People can read a same question differently and answer to questions they can't answer to (like answering which is the best of the 4 TES games while having only played Oblivion or MW+Oblivion).

I tried one poll taking the precaution of comparing the teams creativity and ambition, leaving technical and esthetic evolution appart, but even there, I suppose many people voted though they did not really realised what was asked, or without the appropriate knowledge to answer.

bump... no need for more TES3 vs TES4 threads

I cant say if I liked Morrowind more than Oblivion, or vice versa.

Both games svck because of their underlying rulesystem which made me restart characters endlessly and made me spend 90% of my time busy trying to level my character optimally, instead of actually playing the game.

OTOH both games have quite a chunk of nice story etc. Wished I ever was able to actually explore it.

The problem comes from a dated character management, common to most CRPG : you start as a noob inefficient character and spend your game powering up to finish as a god within a few monthes. Therefore, all CRPG tend to create a frustration due to your character unability to assume his role at the begining of the game. Frustration that drives most players to powergaming and other gaming strategies aiming at building, in game, the role you were supposed to play right at the start of the game. This same developement structure is also the source of the lack of interest of the game at higher levels, when your character do not face any more limits, as well as the creation of weird game mechanisms such as the rightly criticized leveling system.

I would like a TES with a stronger character creation, more detailed and more involving. I would like to pick and design my role at the start and play it in the game. I like to have some adjusting mechanism to take ingame experience into account and allow to sightly alter the role as the story and monthes go on. But I do not want to start again as a ridiculous character and build him as a god in a few monthes.

Nope. I dont have any such problems in other roleplaying games.

It comes from lack of control and from very many bad ideas in the rulesystem.

For example, to level Acrobatics, you have to jump all the time. IMHO the most idiotic idea ever.


I fully agree with you that I want less "freedom" and more complexity instead.

mmmm, thousands of charts and tables of abilities, all for the pure noy of NOT being able to use them, yeeees, I can almost see your point... :lmao:
anyways, I kinda feel sorry for you, 'cause you actually played TES for the "G" part in the "RPG" - terrible idea, try forgetting that you have to level up when playing next time and when you do it's gonna be just a nice surprise every now and then(then mostly):)

But it is still a problem not to be able to really rely on your character role to play the game. Playing as a supposed warrior, at low level, I feel my character may be anything... but a warrior. At higher levels, it is also weird not to feel challenged by non warriorish challenges.

I feel the game should have each quest designed with at least 3 pathes. Each would set a challenge to different skills and stats. But the level of challenge of each of them should not necessarilly be the same. For example a quest may feature a warrior way, a mage one and a thief one. The first should require you to be level 5, the second level 2, the third level 7. Obviously, it is a quest for mages, but everybody might try to do it. It will simply set a different level of challenges depending on who your character is.

The whole point of choosing a class is to be sure that you might overcome some challenges other classes won't. It is also to have a little chance to face some very high challenges in this area, that will be completely out of range of other ones. It is also to know that the world will be hard, challenging, and sometime limitating, because you can't do everything.

I'm still dreaming of a RPG where we'll have to play our role during the game instead of crafting it. Initial character creation YES, ingame character building NO.

I chose Oblivion, Daggerfall, and Redguard

I knew fewer people would check Oblivion first, and since it isn't attrocious I chose it. I then chose Daggerfall, because the demo is awesome, and after looking up what the best skills are to choose, I didn't svck. Last I chose Redguard, because although it is ancient, it is a most righteous story and has an awesome intro by any standards.

Tried that before. Only gets you slaughtered soon from the opponents if you just level without powergaming.

Plus, I'm an optimizer. If I feel I dont play the optimal character, I start hating it and restart the game.

It's a bit of an ask to single any one of the TES games as being the best, but if i have to, i choose Morrowind. Daggerfall is by far the most feature rich in terms of rpg options (spell/item/potion creation, character options etc) but it is waaay too generic. Morrowind provided the right touch by adding a hand crafted world, enriching the aspects that needed enriching the most, with an acceptable amount of dumbing down to the overall game mechanics. Both provided a benchmark in their own right, but in different areas. Even with the potential of such pedigree, Oblivion took the ball, ran in the wrong direction, and scored a goal for the opposing team. Arena was merely the radical concept game which set the standard for daggerfall.