» Fri Dec 16, 2011 10:49 pm
Skyrim doesn't quite feel like Morrowind to me.
It has the scale and the unique identity that defines it, but it's lacking some depth. To me, most of it seems to do with the lack of interaction with NPCs and in turn, the game world itself. I miss the ability to simply ask passers by about themselves or the latest gossip. In Skyrim it's all about business and what people want, or what they want you to do for them. Every time you walk into a group of people in Skyrim they stop what they're doing and watch you intently, as if they expect you to butt-in and ask them for quests and adventure. Seriously, take a second and look some time. They don't really feel like they have anything going on beyond their personal issues that they keep droning about with the same one or two lines of voiced dialog. They also don't care to talk to you much about other things happening in the world, or topics that don't end with you raiding a cave for their lost bauble.
This lack of interaction has caused me to completely forget about some towns and even a major hold, Falkreath. I spent maybe a half-hour trying to find something interesting to see or do there before I realized it was nothing but another quest hub. You have your generic tavern, your generic smithy, and your handful of talkative NPCs who send you off on tasks. The biggest highlight of the place was a scene at the graveyard which was entirely too short and lacked any sort of follow-up (NPCs completely ignored the fact they had even done anything).
With Morrowind, you may not have heard them talking to each other as much either, but they did often have loads to say. They even had context-specific general dialog. Whether this is because text-based dialog offers more depth than voiced is really only something the developers can answer. Sometimes I think in the effort to get everyone their own real voice, they left out what makes NPCs actually interesting to listen to.
My $0.02.
