ES4: Oblivion - Why We Love It @ GameInformer

[Dhruin]

This feels a bit like a marketing deal - we'll give you exclusivity on the Dishonored reveal if you can squeeze in some advertorial. Anyway, head to GameInformer if you'd like to know why they love Oblivion:

The Dark Brotherhood
Like Morrowind’s Morag Tong, the Dark Brotherhood is a sinister group of assassins who shift the balance of power in Cyrodiil with their hidden blades. To even be considered for membership in this guild, you must murder an innocent civilian. Once you’re in, the real fun begins. A precursor to the medieval cloak-and-dagger routine in Assassin’s Creed, these entertaining and inventive assassination missions test your ability to get away with murder and are some of the best the game has to offer.

More information.

 

[Drithius]

I think the proper response to this article is, "Speak for yourself."

 

[DoctorNarrative]

The Dark Brotherhood questline was alright, and the best of Oblivion's questlines for sure, but even that pales in comparison to the Morag Tong in Morrowind when it comes to mood, atmosphere and writing.

I'm not reading the whole article, it will only annoy me.

 

[Irian]

Some of the Brotherhood quests were pretty funny and creative (even as I still think that Whodunit had so much more potential), but so were other quests (especially some shrine quests). Of couse, one of the reason why those quests were so nice was the fact, that some others (the whole fighter's und mage's guild quests) were extremely boring.

 

[KapitanUnterhosen]

This feels a bit like a marketing deal

On GameInformer? Surely you jest.

The Dark Brotherhood […] pales in comparison to the Morag Tong in Morrowind when it comes to mood, atmosphere and writing

Howso? Best I recall the morag tong quests were more numerous for sure but mostly consisted of just getting a target's name, finding it and killing it. The dark brotherhood ones offered more variety in how to go about getting rid of the targets and the dark brotherhood members were the closest things to actual characters that game had, with individual personalities and different things to say depending on which mission you were on. It also had an actual storyline.

And as far as mood and atmosphere go I'd think that the dark brotherhood lair, with its sinister gate, the unique characters inside that treat you as family and whose opinion of you grows over time and eventually open up to you, the uniforms and goods and powers you're granted as you progress, the way you become familiar with how the brotherhood works, the hands/fingers etc are better than what you get with the morag tong's generic vivec city storage headquarters, generic morag tong npcs with no unique dialog, and generic character progression (congratulations you are no longer a toad, you are a grasshopper, enjoy your new title) .

Morrowind's legalized killing contracts thing might be more interesting lorewise, but it's something that's barely touched upon.

I didn't like OB but the DB was one of the few things it did right, and it certainly stood out.

 

[Morbus]

Oblivion is a complete waste of time, and I can honestly say that I think with all my heart that people who play it either do it because it's their job or because they simply have nothing else to do that's more interesting.

And yes, I'm well aware that many people watch reality shows too. For the same reason.

A few months back I installed Oblivion to try and finish it. I played for about 20 hours (over a week or so). And then I installed The Witcher again. I haven't touched Oblivion since. 50 euros down the drain, most definitely. The first and last Bethesda game I will ever buy, of that they can be certain. (I'll play others, probably, just to check them out if I have the SPARE time).

It's just hard for me to understand why anyone would dedicate hours of their lives to grinding through badly designed generic levels, back writing and mediocre storylines when they could be doing something worthwhile.

Oh wait... Facebook is one of those too. Gosh...

 

[DoctorNarrative]

Howso? Best I recall the morag tong quests were more numerous for sure but mostly consisted of just getting a target's name, finding it and killing it.

I'm big on narrative, dialog quality and atmosphere. I think the Morag Tong (and Morrowind in general) were much better at those things than anything in Oblivion. Just my personal belief.

I do grant you some visual aspects of the Dark Brotherhood in Oblivion were okay, but for the most part it was generic and the dialog was terrible. Compare the mysterious and interesting look of the Dark Brotherhood in Tribunal to Oblivion's and it's a real shame in my opinion.

 

[Alrik Fassbauer]

Oblivion is a complete waste of time, and I can honestly say that I think with all my heart that people who play it either do it because it's their job or because they simply have nothing else to do that's more interesting.

Well ... regading the sales, it must be quite a lot of people who fit into your description ...

 

[JDR13]

Oblivion is a complete waste of time, and I can honestly say that I think with all my heart that people who play it either do it because it's their job or because they simply have nothing else to do that's more interesting.

*snip*

It's just hard for me to understand why anyone would dedicate hours of their lives to grinding through badly designed generic levels, back writing and mediocre storylines when they could be doing something worthwhile.

I'm not a big fan of Oblivion, but I think you're being overly harsh. Fallout 3 was also pretty terrible out of the box, but with just the right mods it actually became one of my favororite RPGs in recent years.

I haven't played Oblivion since it was released, but I plan on giving it another chance soon. With the right selection of mods of course.

 

[DArtagnan]

Oblivion is a complete waste of time, and I can honestly say that I think with all my heart that people who play it either do it because it's their job or because they simply have nothing else to do that's more interesting.

And yes, I'm well aware that many people watch reality shows too. For the same reason.

A few months back I installed Oblivion to try and finish it. I played for about 20 hours (over a week or so). And then I installed The Witcher again. I haven't touched Oblivion since. 50 euros down the drain, most definitely. The first and last Bethesda game I will ever buy, of that they can be certain. (I'll play others, probably, just to check them out if I have the SPARE time).

It's just hard for me to understand why anyone would dedicate hours of their lives to grinding through badly designed generic levels, back writing and mediocre storylines when they could be doing something worthwhile.

Oh wait… Facebook is one of those too. Gosh…

I think you need to understand how people work before you can begin to understand why they play something you wouldn't enjoy.

The "easy" conclusion is that they must be "stupid" or "ignorant" to play Oblivion - but it's also the wrong conclusion. Not that they can't be stupid or ignorant, but they don't have to be because they disagree with you about what's worthwhile.

 

[Tragos]

Few games capture a sense of wonder and exploration like Oblivion

Is this guy for real ? generic landscapes and dungeons + level scaled everything = fantastic exploration ? Maybe we played a different game!

 

[Alrik Fassbauer]

Maybe it's just naiveness ?

If you look at a landscape in a naive way, then you are fine with ...what you call "generic landscapes".

On the other hand, I was quite disappointed when I reached Morrowind for the very first time ... ("Ah, yes, but it has Style !")

 

[crpgnut]

Of course, he's for real. Did you honestly think that because, little old you, didn't enjoy something, that the rest of the world would follow your opinion? Are you that conceited? I loved Oblivion and have been playing crpgs as long as anyone. It was a great, great game. Did it have some flaws? Of course. Level scaling doesn't matter at all to fun exploration. I was absolutely stunned when I left the sewers and saw the Ayleid ruins across the water. I kept that sense of wonder for many, many hours before noticing the repetition.

Here's another little secret: Everyone who plays Oblivion plays a different game. No two people will make the same exact decsions as another person. Unlike The Witcher 2, you're not funneled along a dual-layered path, but allowed to go anywhere, do anything, after the first dungeon. In fact, with mods, you don't even have to do the first dungeon.

Another tasty tidbit? Skyrim already has over a quarter-million preorders on the 360alone. Those people must have all enjoyed Oblivion too

 

[Pessimeister]

Here's another little secret: Everyone who plays Oblivion plays a different game. No two people will make the same exact decsions as another person. Unlike The Witcher 2, you're not funneled along a dual-layered path, but allowed to go anywhere, do anything, after the first dungeon. In fact, with mods, you don't even have to do the first dungeon.

Uhh, what decisions are you actually referring to? The choice about whether I should go north, south, east or west? If I should chase the wolf and kill it? Or what my character should wear today?

There are barely any choices to be made that actually affect the gameworld in any way in Oblivion. During the whole time I played the game, I felt everything that I did had very little impact, the gameworld having very limited reactivity. It's an open world, granted, and you are free to roam. I really enjoy that as a concept. I also loved Morrowind. But the world is almost static in the sense that there are very few consequences resulting from "decisions".

In fact, I would daresay that there are more interesting decisions to be made in the Witcher 2, though I have yet to play it. Considering the first game was heavily marketed as a game with choices and consequences and to a fair degree it delivered, I think my assumption is a reasonably safe one. So here's a secret: Unless modded, the game people are all playing is essentially the same. It just doesn't deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence as the Witcher when it comes to choices and consequences or decisions that actually have weight and aren't superficial. Sorry.

 

[Drithius]

It's a testament to the game's generic gameplay and environments that I quit out of sheer boredom after investing 20-30 hours into it. I wanted to give it a chance but it never got better.

Granted, this is my personal impression of the game, but I've heard the same story from multiple people and it makes me wonder just what it was about the bland dungeons with no backstory, the terrible dialogue, and the bandits in glass armor that earned the game such rave reviews from people on the other side of the aisle.

Enter the mod entourage. I have yet to play Oblivion modded. I can't build up the enthusiasm to try modding something so fundamentally flawed into something worthwhile when there are games out there that don't require such longwinded efforts and whose developers have a modicum of common sense for gameplay mechanics.

 

[Motoki]

Maybe it's just naiveness ?

If you look at a landscape in a naive way, then you are fine with …what you call "generic landscapes".

On the other hand, I was quite disappointed when I reached Morrowind for the very first time … ("Ah, yes, but it has Style !")

Yes. Exactly this. The thing with Bethesda games is at first glance if you just give them a cursory view they are impressive. You have a wide open world with quite a nice aesthetic landscape you can wander around in and feel as though you can go anywhere and do anything. While any sandbox RPG will give the same early impression, Two Worlds II for example or even Morrowind with enough graphic mods, there still aren't a ton of totally open world RPGs like this at this level of visuals.

The problem comes in that the longer you spend in the game, the more the cracks start to show and the more you realize it's all just a very pretty facade with nothing behind it. The deeper you look, the more you see all the shortcuts they took and how generic the game really is in every way from dungeons, to npcs to enemy encounters. The longer you play, the more you also realize that nothing you do, even up to becoming grandmaster in all guilds, has any effect on the world at all beyond getting a different generic greeting from the npcs.

To me, a statement about the sense of wonder of this game is most likely a genuine one. It's also most like a naive one of someone who either hasn't played the game for an exceedingly long time, or simply hasn't delved too deeply and thought too much about it.

The other thing is these gaming site reviewers probably aren't RPG players, at least not long time ones from way back, and they probably don't look for the same things that most of us do or have the frame of reference of classic RPGs to compare back to. Most of them probably haven't even played the earlier Elder Scrolls games, let alone Ultima or Wizardry or anything of that sort. To them if they get a Grand Theft Auto style sandbox in a fantasy setting that's probably a cool thing.

 

[Tragos]

Of course, he's for real. Did you honestly think that because, little old you, didn't enjoy something, that the rest of the world would follow your opinion? Are you that conceited?

Besides the overall gameplay experience what was there for the explorer to find? after you saw a couple of dungeons you have seen everything , caves were the same , ruins were the same ( and made no sense ) , loot was the same and level appropriate opponents was all you had to face .
I dont expect anyone to have the same or even similar idea with me but WTF exploration in OB was both pointless and boring .

 

[ChienAboyeur]

It's just hard for me to understand why anyone would dedicate hours of their lives to grinding through badly designed generic levels, back writing and mediocre storylines when they could be doing something worthwhile.

In my case, that is because I think developpers like their job and want genuinely to deliver a game that is what they claim it to be. At present times, it is just simply because they have not enough how to do to achieve what they want to achieve.

The result is that after a few hours in those kind of games, I no longer play the game per se but look at it as a platform to build on it and what their next production could be like.
I have been replaying Oblivion with many mods to see what kind of expectations RPG wise one could expect from building on Oblivion's platform.

 

[wolfing]

Oblivion is a complete waste of time, and I can honestly say that I think with all my heart that people who play it either do it because it's their job or because they simply have nothing else to do that's more interesting.

And yes, I'm well aware that many people watch reality shows too. For the same reason.

A few months back I installed Oblivion to try and finish it. I played for about 20 hours (over a week or so). And then I installed The Witcher again. I haven't touched Oblivion since. 50 euros down the drain, most definitely. The first and last Bethesda game I will ever buy, of that they can be certain. (I'll play others, probably, just to check them out if I have the SPARE time).

It's just hard for me to understand why anyone would dedicate hours of their lives to grinding through badly designed generic levels, back writing and mediocre storylines when they could be doing something worthwhile.

Oh wait… Facebook is one of those too. Gosh…

The human race is a beautiful thing. I am completely the opposite. I played and loved Oblivion, it's my favorite TES game. But then I tried The Witcher and only lasted like 5 hours. Just didn't like it.

 

[GhanBuriGhan]

Uhh, what decisions are you actually referring to? The choice about whether I should go north, south, east or west? If I should chase the wolf and kill it? Or what my character should wear today?

Well, actually to an extent yes, that really IS part of what makes these games so interesting. You are absolutely right that these choices are supreficial in a way and do not lead to distinct consequences. But why should they? They nevertheless make these games unique. Compare that ot a game like Dragon Age or The Witcher. Sure, here your actions have consequences on the gameworld - but you will be channeled down a prearanged course of events regardless. Now the above are great, great games, but they can NOT scratch that itch that fantasy to just be transported to a fantasy universe and live your own life of adventure there. Sure, the larger the world, the more generic the content has to be, the more the "cracks start to show" as someone put it. But its a tradeoff I am willing to make. Of course, how interesting all that is, how much unique places, character, loot, quests you can discover, how interesting the world itself is, is partly subjective and but also a valid criterion to judging these games - which is why I consider Morrowind and G3 (CP) superior to Oblivion.

All games have their limitations. Bioware games, as much as I like them for their stories and characters, often drive me up the wall with their restrictive and non-interactive environments. TES have annoyed me with generic dialogue and uninspired main quests, and too much generic content. I love the Gothics, partly because they kinda represent a happy medium. But still, the "go where you want " freedom of TES is something very real to me - you shouldn't scoff at it.