VATS strikes me as a First Person Shooter cheat and so I believe that it is there to attract the attention of the First Person Shooter gamers, successful or not.

Morrowind did not have sells that could compete with today's sells. I find people all the time that never heard of Morrowind but think Oblivion is the cat's meow.

Again, we can still find some very good RPGs in the indie market. I can't think of any mainstream rpgs's that are better than TES games (including Oblivion) or Fallout:3 and NV. There is not a good market for the non-mainstream games and that said, the word "mainstream" itself means "majority". The majority of RPG gamers today enjoyed Oblivion and Fallout:3. There are a few of us around who wish for the older style and difficulty of the older RPGs but we are very few in the game world thus Indie game makers continue to do fair but won't be seen breaking into the mainstream very often.

We were also more forgiving of bugs and glitches. Morrowind and Daggarfall were riddled with them and while Morrowind was patched pretty well, nobody was screaming so loudly as they do today about it.

Again, people who play RPGs are not more capable or intelligent than folks that play any other gamer, but for some strange reason we all like to pretend we are special and want more difficult aspects to our games. One example is the compass. While most mainstream players like the compass, most old style RPG players prefer NPC's to give us directions. There is nothing harder about walking in circles for a couple of hours in game to find something. It's just more tedious and not much fun. So some that isn't dumbing down, it's just a change that really does nothing but give direction. The compromise in Oblivion was that we had a compass but were also given directions and the ability to set the compass on a different quest and use the NPC directions. There were a couple of players on this forum that played through the entire game never using the compass for quest directions and still found their way through.

But then I personally don't see this dumbing down stuff others discuss. I see games getting more difficult, more immersive and more interesting but less tedious. We all have our own opinions and we all get to vote with our buying dollars. Don't pay for something that does not meet your desires. And if you buy it, don't complain if you already suspected it would not.

I'm not going to comment on the tabletop buzzwords, but... really? You think a feature that lets you skip the FPS parts of the game was included to appeal to FPS fans?

I mean, maybe I'm wrong, but I'm fairly sure the subset of FPS fans who look at an FPS and go, "You know, this is great and I'm a fan, but I really wish there was some way to remove all that first person and shooting" is small to nonexistent.

No, VATS was a way to keep classic Fallout gameplay in the new game.

On the subject of MMO and multiplayer, remember that some high priest at EA Games has said that stand alone single player games are history and that pay-to-play multiplayer and internet connected games are the future.

If you find following NPC directions tedious then I ask the question again, why are you playing an RPG? Just like I wouldn't expect Half Life to start adding RPG elements in the game, I don't think we as RPG fans should expect a compass that leads us by the hand.

If what you are saying is true, before long there won't be genres there will just be games that encompass everything. Those kinds of games don't sound very fun.

Because I love RPGs and play little to anything else. I've been this way since before RPGs were on video. And I love exploring but I don't love walking in circles looking for something. Never had that problem playing table top. And I would be more inclined to play Half Life if they did add some RPG elements.

I get to have an opinion however of what I want my RPGs to be like exploring and completing quests, building my character and the story and playing a role I would never live in real life. I like the adventure of immersing myself in another world with NPCs that are interesting. I like building skills and advancing in the world using them. I enjoy taking my time finding my way around the virtual world but not being stuck trying to find some item that I need to complete a quest for hours and hours.

So do you think an RPG must require a scavenger hunt to be called an RPG?

Because I love RPGs and play little to anything else. I've been this way since before RPGs were on video. And I love exploring but I don't love walking in circles looking for something. Never had that problem playing table top. And I would be more inclined to play Half Life if they did add some RPG elements.

I get to have an opinion however of what I want my RPGs to be like exploring and completing quests, building my character and the story and playing a role I would never live in real life. I like the adventure of immersing myself in another world with NPCs that are interesting. I like building skills and advancing in the world using them. I enjoy taking my time finding my way around the virtual world but not being stuck trying to find some item that I need to complete a quest for hours and hours.

So do you think an RPG must require a scavenger hunt to be called an RPG?

There was a great anology for the differences between MW and OB in another thread, and since nobody has mentioned it yet I will shamelessly plagiarise it.

Morrowind was like one of those birthday cakes with the thick icing that nobody particularly likes, but it's bearable because of the absolutely delicious sponge underneath. This sponge is the best cake sponge of its generation. It blew the sponge of other, lesser cakes (even those with better icing) out of the water. However, some people couldn't get past the sub par icing on the MW cake and so they never experienced the mind blowing sponge. It was for these people that Oblivion was made.

Oblivion had the gosh darned prettiest icing of the time, and upon biting into it one was transported to a creamy, soft and sweet heaven. This icing drew in the people who care exclusively about icing, but the fans of the MW cake - while appreciating the new icing - found the sponge to be stale and somewhat shallow.

Obviously the icing represents the surface features like the graphics and the combat system while the sponge represents more cerebral features such as lore, presence of fantasy and story. Now I'm not saying that icing-appreciators didn't notice that Oblivion's sponge wasn't great or vice versa, but we clearly need Morrowind's sponge and Oblivion's icing in the next TES instalment. Hopefully having dabbled in both of these aspects BGS has now found a happy medium. FO3 certainly seems to have taken a promising step in the right direction.

What i am afraid of is after researching i found out just how far mainstream OB went. im just scared that if it goes anymore mainstream it will lose all of the hardcoe TES fans..us..the most popular age group for games is around 13 which is all younger than us. I am afraid that skyrim wont be the TES that we..the minority want because to make the most money they might as well include a bunch of stuff that we hate because younger gamers love those things and they are the majority of the market

The problem is that they don't love all that stuff you hate. No, seriously, I got a poll up to track it and everything (although I seem to have botched the intro and got everyone in that thread thinking I'm on your side, which wasn't very bright of me in retrospect)