Elder Scrolls: Oblivion

[Snorkius]

I would say that it's what a "bad" government does. A "good" government would try to find the optimal solution - a solution that would bring benifit to the maximum number of people it governs.

And, if you think about it, that's what our moral values try to do as well, but morality is clouded by human judgement whereas laws should not be.

 

[NakedGamer]

All this ethical chat and moralising is really boring guys. I don't think the debate is likely to change anyone's opinions or practices in any respect at all - so it's a complete waste of time and effort.

Let's get back to talking about the game itself.

I've got the game but haven't fired it up yet - too busy playing Silkroad online. But I loved Morrowind - so I'll get to it soon.

And I agree with the points above about 3D. Yes, the eye candy is glorious. But the gameplay seems to be far superior with 2D isometric - maybe the developers have more time and money to invest in the game proper rather than in elaborate graphics? I don't know for sure - but I definitely prefered BG1 and BG2 to NVM, and it was probably for that reason. I thought that AOE3 was very poor compared to AOE2 - again 3D vs 2D. And I didn't enjoy Fable much - but I think that was more the trivial plot and gameplay which spoilt it for me rather than the graphics.

Is there any way we can let the developers know what we are thinking? Do the developers ever read this sort of forum.

 

[Wolfy]

I was about to say this went waaaaaaay off topic.

 

[jkburk]

I was about to say this went waaaaaaay off topic.

Maybe. . .but I'm not gonna sit by and watch as certain people in these forums condone software piracy, and then try and rationalize it by stating that more "good" was created because of it. And I don't believe it's a waste of time to verbally pounce on those who practice piracy. Those of use who support this industry we derive so much enjoyment from shouldn't hesitate to either. It has the potential to affect the companies that develop and support the games we love so much.

But I digress. . . Oblivion is amazing. I've invested 30 hours in it, seemingly in the blink of an eye, much to the chagrin of my wife.

 

[red_onion]

I'm not gonna sit by and watch as certain people in these forums condone software piracy, and then try and rationalize it by stating that more "good" was created because of it. And I don't believe it's a waste of time to verbally pounce on those who practice piracy. Those of use who support this industry we derive so much enjoyment from shouldn't hesitate to either. It has the potential to affect the companies that develop and support the games we love so much.

Keep fighting the good fight, friend. Vivre la révolution!

 

[red_onion]

So in the interest of getting back on track a bit ...

I think the idea of scaling was so that the game would be consistently challenging throughout and never become too much of a cake walk. I know some people like cake walks by end-game, and enjoy that feeling of confident superiority. (Again, they're welcome to it.) But the Elder Scrolls series is all about giving players a huge world and no particular rules or timetables, so the game creators really can't be sure at what level the players would be doing any particular thing. So everything scales to be a reasonable challenge no matter when the player hits it. In some ways, it makes sense.

Now that I've played a bit longer, I'm going to have to qualify this opinion. I still understand the idea of scaling, and still think it's a valid approach for keeping the game challenging at all levels, but what I've since discovered is that it also makes it WAY TOO EASY to screw up a character. In ESIII, you'd pick your major skills smartly, but with maybe 1 or 2 skills that are fun and easy to improve (like Acrobatics or Athletics) for the sake of rapid levelling. In ESIV, that's a great way to ruin a character. Level up too quickly without keeping a close eye on your primary fighting/defense skills, and you'll find yourself at level 8 or 10 surrounded by enemies a lot tougher than you are. Go ahead, try unleashing your excellent Athletic/Acrobatic ability then and see what happens. 😛

I ended up having to restart the game with a new character. This time, rather than picking skills I thought were the best fit for the character, I had to ask myself, "what skills do I think MUST be improved before I'd be ready to compete with a higher-level enemy?" That's at the expense of roleplaying, I'm afraid, which is a shame.

Once you understand the system, it's still an okay system. But if you try to play ESIV the same way you played ESIII, you may find yourself in trouble.