I am aware there must be a compromise, I don't know the right numbers (I don't even know how many people Oblivion had) but I know for sure there must be more than Oblivion's. I'll settle at twice as Oblivion's.

I don't even care if there are a ton of generics that don't say much. Oblivion felt so empty in cities

I'd take a game with less NPCs that ran well over a game with an overabundance of NPCs and runs like ass. :tops:

(Make them more interesting with fewer NPCs one would hope they'd spend more time to flesh out what little amount of people there actually were in the larger cities.)

A bit more than Oblivion, but NOT sacrificing depth. Depth > numbers.

Like people have said, even the capital of Cyrodiil, the supposed capital of Tamriel even, felt very desolate.

I agree with you, tbh.

Yea, Cyrodiil felt deserted :sadvaultboy:
I want a good balance between numbers and depth, but the numbers must surely be higher than Cyrodiil.
I saw here somewhere the numbers for each town in Oblivion and they were depressingly low.
I think they should keep the Oblivion depth per character for a given number of npcs (say, 1,000) and add another 1,000 that will of course have less unique history, but will be part of some big projects (such as ceremonials, ore digging, construction building, you name it) and will not be so talkative.

Skyrim should not have so many that is the reason why I want less

Even a cold area like Skyrim should have more people than what showed up in Oblivion...

Once you've played Oblivion for 3-4 hours, you've killed more Bandits then there were people

I would like more people and more depth.

I think this is a characteristic of the series that could benefit from some serious work. Oblivion felt fake at times because the cities were nearly empty. They felt like studio back lot versions of cities before all the extras show up. Cities, or even towns, need more people around even if those people have absolutely no backstory and are just filler to set the scene properly.

Grand Theft Auto actually does a really good job with this. There are certain npc archetypes that you'll meet while you're out in the world. Those people have nothing whatsoever to do with the story. The appropriate 'kinds' of people just show up in appropriate areas to make the world feel alive. The streets surrounding the player are, of course, completely empty and indeed probably not even fully rendered until you turn the corner and they contain no people. The dense population follows the player through the world so that you never feel like things are fake and constructed just for your benefit. You feel like you're in a living world. The Elder Scrolls should adopt this method of populating areas. Keep the depth on the named npcs that matter and scatter a few hundred 'drunkards' or 'merchants' around on the streets and roads.

If I could force them to change one thing about the series this would be it. It really breaks my immersion when I wonder "where are all the people?" and then I realize "oh, the GAME developer didn't think the game needed more or couldn't technically place more in the game world." When you start having thoughts like that your fun factor sort of starts to plummet.

But that's one thing that's always fascinated me about Oblivion and Morrowind - all characters are equally interactable (?), just like in real life. And that principle provides more immersion than quantity in my opinion. Even though it may seem like the streets in GTA are crowded, you still know they are static NPCs you can't interact with. They're just part of the scenery. For me, the ultimate realistic world (in the context of its universe of course) is where I, or any other character, can interact in any way with ALL characters; and all characters, including me, have the ability to do the same things (this has been done with the crafting animations you can take part in). I want this realism principle to stay in TES.

You can't get realisim either way. You can not both expect a full backstory for every NPC yet have a city will a proper population size. It isn't about realism vs unrealistic; both are unrealistic.

If Bethesda decided there would be, say, 100 people in a town with names and dialogue options, is it so bad to have another 100 or 200 of non-interactive NPCs? I mean, in Oblivion most of the people in the Arcane University are not quest related anyway and had nothing to say, so the system is already in place. It's not like you would ever really talk to absolutely everyone in a city, even in real life. Not everyone want to be your friend.

I think they need to find a balance between the value of each NPC and the number of NPCs. 1.5 to 2x Oblivion would be good I think.

Morrowind had about 3 times as many NPCs as Oblivion. You can check on the UESP demographics page.

Multiple problems here, first is that npc cost a lot in performance, first they take a lot of resources to render, but they also take a lot of memory and cpu power to control. However this is not the limit, the university contained lots of npc at times without any lags or other issues.
However Skyrim npc will not be the random background characters in Assassin's Creed who is created then you enter a zone and destroyed then you leave, they have schedules, relationships and a place to live, most people in Oblivion lived alone in big houses and was out on the street some hours every day, not surprising we saw few people.
Add more people and perhaps have something who limit it so everybody don’t flock at one location.

I think Oblivion did it fine. It's not meant to be exactly to scale, in fact it's hundreds of times smaller.

^^
this
I completely agree