Hand-on-heart, I'm not trying to troll here, I'm just trying to figure out why anyone plays this. (TL:DR version at bottom)

To put it into perspective, I still hold that Morrowind was fantastic and a joy from the moment I picked it up. As I see it, Morrowind can be picked up and played as is, where as Oblivion needs EXTENSIVE work (via a plethora of mods) to be even passable. Also, I bought Oblivion when it was launched, tried it, cried, and threw it in the "don't play" pile. This will have been the 2nd time I've picked it back up and tried to play it. Each time I went in with a completely open mind and the mindset of "oh, the last time I was totally wrong, this has to be awesome." Also, I really liked Fallout 3.

Oblivion just falls flat in everything compared to Morrowind, save the combat. It's so sad that Morrowind, with it's complete lack of scheduled NPCs and VO feels more alive than Oblivion; now this does have something to do with the fact that Oblivion voice acting is some of the worst in the business and downright embarrassing to even listen to, coupled with the fact that Betheseda only hired 2 voice actors for the entire game (save Picard). When you talked to a NPC in Morrowind, you could actually have a conversation with them; background, people in the city, places, certain regions, lore, etc. Oblivion just has "rumors" and even fails at that. "I bought some pauldrons at the smith" is not a rumor, it's just another pathetic piece of voice acting. Not sure what kept Bethesda from just saying "Nothing" for every response under the "rumors" (read: only) topic for NPCs.

The entire presentation of the game leaves the impression that it was designed by an 8-year-old for other 8-year-olds. The bartering system wasn't thought out and, again, Morrowind has it beat by a significant margin. The character faces all look like they're still in the alpha stage of production with every color from the entire visible spectrum showing up on every NPCs face, Dark Elves that look like humans who tripped into a fireplace, and the changes in facial expressions being as subtle as a rhino with marble boots. Perfect 8-year-old example: I'm in Cheydinhal, behind the abandoned house, and glance at the well which is clearly marked "SUPER SECRET BAD GUYZ HERE!" Granted, the giant, glowing, neon arrow made it difficult to read, but I just stood there, shocked, as I tried to figure out why the Dark Brotherhood felt the need to take ad space in Cheydinhal.

Coming from Morrowind, it was also quite a disappointment to see all the weapons skills consolidated into blunt and blade. I understand the removal of medium armor (though I much prefer it to be in) but making all weapons fall under one category is just lazy and takes away from character development. I realize that Oblivion wasn't supposed to be Morrowind 2.0, but you don't gather up your Morrowind fan base, strap them to chairs, and make them watch as you slowly tear the Morrowind manual in-half all while setting fire to the stack of lore-related books in front of them. It's not like these are Role-playing concerns, or just general nitpicks, these are very flawed, core game mechanics. So it's not like another Morrowind fan-boy is upset over this game; breaking it down from a perspective of someone never introduced to the Elder Scrolls till now would be just as bad, as the core game mechanics are so sub-par it hurts.

Sad part is I could easily keep going (the terrible design of Oblivion itself, the main quest being about as interesting as a wet sock, the persuasion system and it's fail pie, the lock-picking system, lack of factions like the great houses, lack of exploration, the complete removal of the enchanting skill, etc) but doing so will just cause me to sink deeper into a state of depressed confusion. Worse still is the fact that Oblivion only did well for two reasons: graphics and previous fans of the ES series. Anyone who went into Oblivion with any sort of standard in mind (that Bethesda, themselves, placed) and wasn't disappointed either already knew of its poor quality going in or just didn't care.

So here's the honest question (TL:DR starts here):

Why, as flawed and poorly done as this game is, do you all play it? Currently, my guess is that none of you are actually playing Oblivion, rather you're using Oblivion as a base and have transformed it into something worth playing (through mods). Oh, I'm not asking for a list of mods either, as I'm faily certain it would take far too many to make the game playable, and even then the hauntingly bad voice acting (seriously, why Bethesda left it up to an intern and his cronies to do VO is beyond me) will remain to sap the blood from my ears.

I still play it on 360. Its great, one of the best games ever imo.

Great. Game. :tes:

Bla bla bla bla, period.

Why people play Oblivion?
That is your question.

I will answer that.. every human have been inserted with something called 'taste' but ones taste may not be the same yours.

We have different opinions and taste and to question why, is foolish, period.

I think this guy just likes to b**** about nothing...

Every now and then you just hate a game even though it is popular to mainly every gamer.

For example, the Battlefield games are my least favored games.

I agree on most of your points. But I still think it's a great game.

If they only combined the best of Morrowind and Oblivion into a new game, spiced it with a few new features, and added the size and complexity of Daggerfall, it would be the greatest game ever made! Nothing would topple it

well oblivion for me is one of my all time favourite games 360 (have never played morrowind,but would like to) i can understand some of your points though (especially the npc comments) but would have to disagree with you about the game world.it's one of the best designed gameworlds that i have ever been in.from being able to scale mountain tops,to the beauty of the flowers,seeing deer,visiting the cities e.t.c every time i visit the world,am just stunned by finding more detail in it.unfortunately am not playing it at present as i cannot find a copy of goty.will be waiting to buy the 5th ann edition as soon as it's released in uk though.

Morrowind was better, but not as enjoyable. People complain about that quest marker, but I prefer that over instructions like "go south until you see the sun ****ing the moon, if you see the naked dog, you've gone too far". What the hell am I supposed to do with that? Besides, most the time, Morrowind's "directions" were so far off it isn't even funny. Tells me to go southwest I end up going East and finding it.

I love Morrowind, but after a long day's work, I'd rather play Oblivion and follow that little marker than have to think about every little move.

Your post simply strikes me as silly and ridiculous. I think none of your complaints have any foundation whatsoever. Almost every NPC, save for a few, have something totally unique to say about the city they live in. That alone breathes a ton of life into the world. There are ongoing feuds in the Imperial City, as well as friends and enemies in other towns. You can learn WAY more about a character by asking them about the town than ANY of the generic Morrowind NPCs who simply said the same rumors or advice that any other run-of-the-mill NPC would say. The only "unique" dialogue Morrowind NPCs had was stating their name and profession, which was always delivered with no personality whatsoever.

The Cheydinhal Dark Brotherhood well complaint is just nonsense. It is not at all an obvious hideout. It is an abandoned house, and the well looks no different than any other well you see around Cyrodiil.

I also have to take offense to the insult to the main quest. It is highly entertaining and way more interesting than the story to the vast majority of other games I've played. Admittedly, I find the main quest of Morrowind much more interesting, but Oblivion's is certainly not bad.

The voice acting may not be the best ever, but I certainly don't think it's as terrible as you imply. And the facial expressions vary quite a lot, when someone's angry at you, you know they're angry. When they're surprised, you can clearly tell. When they're sad or frightened, it's expressed. Maybe it's just me, but I find it perfectly noticeable.

I honestly don't understand how someone could love Morrowind but find Oblivion unplayable. Despite your claims, I don't think you've ever really given Oblivion a chance. You probably just repeatedly take the wrong approach.

I covered this in my OP. Just because you like chocolate and I like vanilla doesn't mean that bad voice acting is good.



If holding a company to the level of quality that they've set themselves up to is "[censored]ing about nothing" than yes, that's all me.



That would be truly epic. Sadly, Skyrim won't be that game (my educated guess, obviously no one can be sure yet).



That's what makes this so difficult, is that I see people experience this kind of gameplay for the first time (western, free-form RPG) and yet it isn't anything like what it SHOULD be. I'm not even making a wish list! I'm not asking for anything new even, most of my complaints are from Bethesda doing something GOOD then going the complete opposite direction. What you described is exactly what you do in Morrowind, however it is MUCH
more diverse in Morrowind. Also, Morrowinds game world was hand-crafted, and it really shows. Actually, on that note, Oblivion has A TON of gap problems. I've been through one sewer, a handful of buildings and about 1/20th of the landscape and already have seen at least a dozen broken seams and panel gaps.



Haha, that's odd, I honestly never had any trouble with the directions in Morrowind (and I played a loooooot). I understand if you're more of a casual gamer (don't read into the word "gamer") but some people, like myself, enjoy the simple challenges of getting to the right spot based solely off of our ability to read a map and word-of-mouth instructions. A "hard" mode in Oblivion would be nice so the game doesn't feel like a theme-park ride for everyone.

Quick tidbit; if anyone feels offended (like Velorien has mentioned) it's not intentional, and I apologize.



Of the 2 dozen or so NPCs I've talked to, half of them only have "rumors" for discussion and the other half have "beds" or "directions" (which you can tell the responses were glued together from fragmented pieces of VO). Feuds and friends existed in Morrowind as well. There were NPCs in Morrowind you could literally spend a half-hour talking to because they could talk, in some detail, about the various factions, races, regions, towns, etc instead of "pauldrons"



ERRR! Wrong. The actual name that comes up when you look at the well (hover over it) is "Dark Brotherhood"....lair, hideout, or sanctuary. Seriously, go to it in-game. I wasn't being facetious with my neon sign remark.



I'm sorry, the main quest in Oblivion involves you going to a seemingly endless number of randomly-generated dungeons about two dozen times. This takes several hours, I'm sorry but padding game play length by putting a banner above copy-pasted dungeons that says "STORY" is not good story telling OR game play. Yes, if you describe the actual main story in the length of two sentences, for Oblivion, it does sound pretty good, but the actual execution of it left a lot to be desired.



My complaint about the facial expressions was based on how much of a gimmick they are. You're right, you can tell when they're mad, but watching their face go from "I want to run you down with a burning tractor" to "I want you to be Santa and my little boys birthday party" is, aside from being a massive invasion into immersion, sad. When a game mechanic could be replaced by smilies from a message board, something is wrong. And yes, the VO really is that bad. Simple comparison: compare the spoken dialogue from Morrowind Orcs to Oblivion Orcs. Suddenly all the Orcs in Tamriel went to Imperial finishing school!? I also won't mention how the dialogue assignment is a complete hack. "Spare a *cough* coin sir?"...."Ah, yes, quite the lovely day, mhm, yes, quite. Think I'll go shower with my money again".



No no, every time I start this game up (even loading saves, not just fresh installs) I go in WANTING this game to be great. I don't go in with expectations of it being the second coming, I just expect to be able to enjoy it because I really do WANT to enjoy it.

I know. No apology necessary. :thumbsup:


And how often could you go to the next person in Morrowind and have the same exact discussion with about those factions, regions, etc.

Those NPCs who have Directions are guards, and aren't meant to have anything interesting to say. Talk to any random person in a city and you'll see almost all of them have something totally unique to say.


Arbitrary gameplay element. It was not a neon sign or a big advertisemant. I can't imagine why you would think to walk around behind Cheydinhal homes and put your mouse cursor over a well (when no other well in the game can be interacted with) unless you already knew that that well was significant. I had no idea it was significant until I was told so by the Dark Brotherhood members, which was several quests into the questline.


A lot of the same could be said for Morrowind. The whole bring-the-Great-Houses-and-the-Ashland-tribes-together part could not have been more poorly timed and is one of the biggest examples of bad story flow. There's certainly a lot of busy-work in Oblivion's main quest, but it's just par for the course for The Elder Scrolls.


It is a roleplaying game, and the suspension of your disbelief is required. Don't cooperate with the game, and it won't cooperate with you. I guess I just don't mind the voice acting. Most of it seems charming. The major characters, such as Martin and Mankar Camoran, have fantastic voice acting. Personally, I'd rather have sub par voice acting than none.


I'd like to ask you to read http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1203031-immersion-and-gameplay/ thread and let me know your stance on it. I think it would help me better understand why you feel the way you do about Oblivion while still holding Morrowind in such high regards.

Just to throw it out there, I, too, do not mean to offend with my arguments. I'd honestly like to make suggestions as to how you could approach Oblivion and enjoy it. I love both Morrowind and Oblivion, and personally, I prefer vanilla Morrowind over Oblivion, yet I've spent twice as much time playing Oblivion.

How far have you played the game?

I will admit the intro can get very annoying after multiple playthroughs, but there is alot to do afterwards

I still play it because i like smashing thingas over the head with sharp metal objects made of glass and stone

i also like shooting at things with arrows that i can retrieve (can not do that in morrowind)

and sadly oblivions graphics are so advanced compared to the unmodded goty morrowind that i cant even force my self to play morrowind (but i guess the lagg it gets while trying to run morrowind on the 360 doesnt help much either)

Okay, here's the thing - Oblivion is incredibly flawed, I agree. But the fact of the matter is, it's still the best open-world RPG in a traditional fantasy setting I can find. Yes, it's disappointing, and yes someone else could probably do a better job... but to my knowledge, nobody has (TC mods like Nehrim excluded)

Name another fantasy RPG outside of the Elder Scrolls series that has all of the following:

• An open-world that's fully explorable and is as large, if not larger than Cyrodiil
  
• A traditional fantasy setting, lush forests, etc
  
• Primarily first-person gameplay (important)
  
• No voice-acted player character (important)
  
• Full customization for player character (important)
  
• A beautiful soundtrack (may seem pointless to a lot of people, but to me it's important)
  
• Over 300 hours of gameplay on offer
  
• A non-linear main questline I can walk away from at any point or avoid entirely
  
• An enormous modding community with thousands of mods available

Find me a game that meets every last one of those requirements and does a better job than Oblivion and i'll throw Oblivion in the bin right now and send you a cheque for ￡10,000.

well the 1st time i looked at a well it had a sewer entrance and ever since then eevry time i saw a well i was like can i go in here and then i found this a week later i finnaly managed to kill some one and start the dark brotherhood quest line :/

they should just remove titles off things would make it way more realistic (cuz you dont see words saying "Mouse" floatng in mid air when you hver your hand over it

:foodndrink:



Yes, there were a lot of repeat topics, of course, but I'd rather have repeat topics than none at all. Also, there was always city and region-specific dialogue, and usually in the form of interesting events or back-story.



Sad part is, this was through the most recent play-through where I left the starting area, and headed straight to the east to Cheydinhal; it's not like I found this after hours and hours of looking, I found this within the first hour of gameplay. It's an abandoned house, of course I want to get in! The front was being watched, so I went to see if there was a back door (thief character), and I run across the neon sign pointing at the well. Also, it's my nature to check for things like that. There's a well in Bloodmoon that leads to a MAJOR artifact, for example; it's that inquisitive nature that lead me to finding all of the Deadric helms in Morrowind by myself.



I'll grant you that becoming the Nerevarine was the slowest part of the main quest, but at the same time still being different. Each house had it's own requirements and the tribes all wanted you to prove your worth. Remember becoming Hortator? What did you do to become Hortator? Kill a Redoran lord, uncover an entire drug operation and kill a cartel lord, deal with a woman held together through strictly necromancy and who was insane, and kill a Telvanni lord and his Dremora minions, it was truly EPIC!



I would much rather still be reading mountains of text than to hear bad voice acting for two reasons: bad voice acting constantly breaks immersion and VO also means, with most games, that the actual dialogue is shorter, and it's true. Much more was "said" in Morrowind than in Oblivion.



Read and responded.



Thanks.



On one play-through I went through the entire Dark Brotherhood, most of the thieves guild, and a LOT of exploration. I either finished the main quest or got through about 90% of it, sadly I can't remember.

The starter dungeon actually isn't a problem, as I got a mod that allowed me to skip it since I was trying various things that required me making new characters.

I completely understand where you're coming from, and it's why I get bothered by Oblivion because I love Morrowind and that type of gameplay so much. It's why I responded, earlier, with this post:



You're right, there isn't another game out there to take it's place (that I'm aware of) so it's that much more disappointing when Bethesda had such a strong starting point (Morrowind) and just dropped it. I'm with you though, I'd pay good money for another title, of this genre, that did it right. It's also why I was asking how people played it. It seems like extensive mod work is the only way to get it up to par.

Fair enough, but I would advise, if you do give Oblivion another chance, to select the city-name option in dialogue more frequently. It seems like a lot of people overlook that and only see "Rumors" since nearly all NPCs have it. You can find out a lot of interesting things with the city-name option, as well as meet some charming characters. I felt it gave more personality to the individual NPCs.


That is unfortunate then. My first time through, I had seen many other wells just like the one behind the abandoned house in Cheydinhal, so I never thought to look at it as anything other than a well. Even my natural thief-like intuition told me to wait until the front door was not being watched before ever thinking of looking at the well.


True enough, but what did you do during the main quest of Oblivion? Since I don't know how far you've made it into the main quest, and since this is OB General Discussion, I'll put this in spoilers: It was certainly epic by my standards.


Understandable, but this is where it just comes down to opinion only. If it bothers you badly enough, you might just consider muting the Voices in the audio settings and just reading the text.


My only real suggestion as of right now is to not let Oblivion hold your hand, as I think that's a problem a lot of players experience. Oblivion offers to hold the players hand a lot, and I think the experience is hindered a lot if you allow the game to do that. Challenge yourself instead. Do not use fast travel, or use it sparingly. There's a lot of nice scenery and unique experiences you can find while walking from place to place. There may not be nearly as many scripted events like Morrowind had, but there are an infinite amount of unscripted events that make for positive memorable experiences. Not using compass quest markers can improve the experience as well, which is as easy as ignoring them or setting a different quest active than the one you're currently on. "Seeking Your Roots" is great to have active, as it typically has no quest marker. Those two things alone can really improve the experience, as it gives you time to think and reflect on the world and the quests.

Also, responding to this kind of late, but...

Really?? Are you playing with the latest patch? Honestly, in my years of playing Oblivion, 1000+ hours, I have never seen a single panel gap or broken seam that was not mod-related, and I've probably been everywhere in the vanilla game. Do you happen to remember where you found any of these?

I don't see how you consider Oblivion's voice acting terrible. I thought it was pretty good. If you want to hear actually terrible voice acting, go play Two Worlds.

Also, Oblivion's limited NPC dialogue was way more realistic than Morrowind's NPC novels. Seriously, go up to some random person walking down the street and strike up a conversation. Odds are the person will say a couple of words before continuing on with their day, assuming they talk to you at all. Nobody is going to talk to you for hours on end about every single specific thing about their life, their town, their friends, their big toe, etc.

We play it because we like it. If you don't like it, don't play it. Simple huh?

Quasi-related side note: I've been sitting here digging up old soundtracks from Total Annihilation (amazing RTS) and I just found out that the person who did the incredible soundtrack for TA (Jeremy Soule) is the same person who did the soundtrack for Morrowind, Oblivion, AND Skyrim! LOL! Funny, because I thought the Morrowind soundtrack was MUCH better than Oblivions, and I'm a music guy.



This isn't a complaint so much as a funny conundrum, but when I select the city name they usually respond with "X is doing Y because of Z" but because these are Elder Scrolls names they're a bit hard to understand which leads me to not remembering them, and then forgetting the entire conversation. Obviously when it was in text it was easier to remember and identify.



There's enough sewers in both Morrowind and Oblivion that it's just a natural reaction for me to check the wells.



I had forgotten that fight. Like I said, I will concede that Oblivion has Morrowind beat pretty good when it comes to combat. That said, I still maintain, that though that fight was enjoyable the majority was (albeit probably due to other game mechanics and not strictly the story itself) a disappointment.



I actually thought about this, and will probably turn off the voices on my next play-through. Just typing that out is sad. I'm sorry but the Oblivion VO really is pathetic; if you can stand it, more power to you, but I cannot.



You're right about the hand-holding. I've never used fast-travel as I think it's a terrible mechanic for a single-player game of this nature. I also DL'd a mod to lower the range in which icons for points of interest appear; now I actually SEE the ruins before the neon lights up. The quest marker I largely try to ignore, and if the "Seeking Your Roots" quest removes it, than I shall never finish that quest for that reason!



For example, the sewer entrance found near the starting area (exit the jail sewers, turn left, follow the coast and it's close by), I explored that sewer area, and all throughout the sewer there is a ceiling piece that does this number: _--_ (lol) where there's a gap between the top of the wall, and the ceiling because of the shape. Also, in a building (don't remember which) I was leaving I could see the blue of the world through it (not a windowed door, just a gap where the door should be flush with the doorway). There was another in a cluster of rocks somewhere around the starting area as I got close, it just started to tear away and boom, endless, blue nothingness.

Never said it was that worst, but it really is embarrassing that Bethesda released it. Remember though, half of VO is its implementation, and BOTH are some of the worst I've had to endure. It's like someone trying to sound like a fantasy character having only read about a fantasy character from a Bazooka Joe wrapper.

Your second point is odd. Why would you be disappointed in there being MORE optional dialogue?

Also, as far as talking to people on the street, that actually can happen and quite easily. Maybe it's my area or the way I strike a conversation, but I've meet new people and talked for a LONG time right then and there because they happened to have a nice car, or wearing the same shirt, whatever it was that started the conversation in the first place.

And I'm sure these people were perfectly willing to divulge every little bit of information about their life to you? Wading through 20+ dialogue options just to find the one I actually wanted became a bit frustrating in Morrowind.
Also, often times if you wanted to discover a new quest or new location you might find yourself clicking on every single dialogue option until you saw "your journal has been updated," in the dialogue box, and then you'd finally read through the text. That is not an intuitive way to acquire new quests.