Oblivion

For discussing role-playing video games, you know, the ones with combat.
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Klerik
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Post by Klerik »

Open world Thief: The Dark Project was fun. So was Gauntlet, the journey of the retard. Also, autism sperg gamebreak mage action adventure was fun.

What's Oblivion?
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Emphyrio
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Post by Emphyrio »

KnightoftheWind wrote: March 23rd, 2023, 05:42

The problem you are referring to may come from the lack of a dedicated writer during the development of Oblivion, the developers had to take on that role themselves and so they couldn't really afford to delve in deep with branching quests. Especially when they had deadlines to meet and engine troubles to iron out. Given these limitations, and how many people hold Oblivion quests in higher regard (myself included), things turned out pretty well.
Agreed, Oblivion has the best quest writing of any TES game. Morrowind and Skyrim were pretty weak in comparison. Curious. :scratch:
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rusty_shackleford
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Post by rusty_shackleford »

Emphyrio wrote: March 23rd, 2023, 16:19
KnightoftheWind wrote: March 23rd, 2023, 05:42

The problem you are referring to may come from the lack of a dedicated writer during the development of Oblivion, the developers had to take on that role themselves and so they couldn't really afford to delve in deep with branching quests. Especially when they had deadlines to meet and engine troubles to iron out. Given these limitations, and how many people hold Oblivion quests in higher regard (myself included), things turned out pretty well.
Agreed, Oblivion has the best quest writing of any TES game. Morrowind and Skyrim were pretty weak in comparison. Curious. :scratch:
Good post.
God Bless Todd Howard.
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Post by Tweed »

I thought this was Role Playing Game Head Quarters not Retarded Plebian Gamer Head Quarters.
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KnightoftheWind
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Post by KnightoftheWind »

Tweed wrote: March 24th, 2023, 03:07
I thought this was Role Playing Game Head Quarters not Retarded Plebian Gamer Head Quarters.
If you want autism and autism only, post in the Codex. Real gamers can enjoy the simple things, and despite it's shortcomings, Oblivion is a good game. And isn't that all that matters here?.
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Post by GhostCow »

Tweed wrote: March 24th, 2023, 03:07
I thought this was Role Playing Game Head Quarters not Retarded Plebian Gamer Head Quarters.
I have been wondering if we are being targeted to send all of the Bethestards from the Codex here. I've seen more awful game related posts here in the last couple of weeks than I did in three years on the Codex.
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KnightoftheWind
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Post by KnightoftheWind »

I thought this forum was for those rejected by Codex, for refusing to tow the "Morrowind is God's gift to gaming" line. I see that I was wrong.

By all means, return to Codex and leave us decent gamer folk out of such nonsense. Oblivion is a damn fine game, especially with mods like "Better Cities". In fact, with such mods, Oblivion is twice, maybe three times as good as Morrowind could ever hope of being. And Daggerfall?, Oblivion with Better Cities uses Daggerfall as a wet nap.

That is to say nothing of those godawful CRPG games. Baldur's Gate?, yeah that's about as fun as doing my taxes. I struggle to even call that a video game lol.
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Klerik
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Post by Klerik »

On the other hand, Let's Play Temple of Elemental Evil as a multiclass on hard.

But I don't like talking about real life.
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Tweed
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Post by Tweed »

KnightoftheWind wrote: March 24th, 2023, 03:50
I thought this forum was for those rejected by Codex, for refusing to tow the "Morrowind is God's gift to gaming" line. I see that I was wrong.

By all means, return to Codex and leave us decent gamer folk out of such nonsense. Oblivion is a damn fine game, especially with mods like "Better Cities". In fact, with such mods, Oblivion is twice, maybe three times as good as Morrowind could ever hope of being. And Daggerfall?, Oblivion with Better Cities uses Daggerfall as a wet nap.

That is to say nothing of those godawful CRPG games. Baldur's Gate?, yeah that's about as fun as doing my taxes. I struggle to even call that a video game lol.
Why should I leave when you're the one who's wrong? Go on, beat it.
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Klerik
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Post by Klerik »

Another butthurt autistic social reject wants to organize his underwear on the internet because he's a helpless fuckup.
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KnightoftheWind
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Post by KnightoftheWind »

Tweed wrote: March 24th, 2023, 04:14
KnightoftheWind wrote: March 24th, 2023, 03:50
I thought this forum was for those rejected by Codex, for refusing to tow the "Morrowind is God's gift to gaming" line. I see that I was wrong.

By all means, return to Codex and leave us decent gamer folk out of such nonsense. Oblivion is a damn fine game, especially with mods like "Better Cities". In fact, with such mods, Oblivion is twice, maybe three times as good as Morrowind could ever hope of being. And Daggerfall?, Oblivion with Better Cities uses Daggerfall as a wet nap.

That is to say nothing of those godawful CRPG games. Baldur's Gate?, yeah that's about as fun as doing my taxes. I struggle to even call that a video game lol.
Why should I leave when you're the one who's wrong? Go on, beat it.
Hey you want to know what the best CRPG game is?, it's called Microsoft Excel!. Yeah you get to make your stats, keep track of them, roleplay. It's a REAL RPG for REAL RPG gamers. Baldur's Gate IV is already on the way, but you know what they'll call it?, TurboTax 2025. WAOW, checkmate Oblivion CHUDS!.
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Tweed
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Post by Tweed »

:smug: I bet half the posters
on this site are just Rusty's socks. :smug:
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GhostCow
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Post by GhostCow »

KnightoftheWind wrote: March 24th, 2023, 03:50
I thought this forum was for those rejected by Codex, for refusing to tow the "Morrowind is God's gift to gaming" line. I see that I was wrong.
Yes, you are wrong, retard. This site is for people who were too cool to deal with the administration's faggotry over at the Codex. Not for people with shit taste in games.
KnightoftheWind wrote: March 24th, 2023, 03:50
By all means, return to Codex and leave us decent gamer folk out of such nonsense.
You get the fuck out, newfag.
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Post by KnightoftheWind »

GhostCow wrote: March 24th, 2023, 11:54
KnightoftheWind wrote: March 24th, 2023, 03:50
I thought this forum was for those rejected by Codex, for refusing to tow the "Morrowind is God's gift to gaming" line. I see that I was wrong.
Yes, you are wrong, retard. This site is for people who were too cool to deal with the administration's faggotry over at the Codex. Not for people with shit taste in games.
KnightoftheWind wrote: March 24th, 2023, 03:50
By all means, return to Codex and leave us decent gamer folk out of such nonsense.
You get the fuck out, newfag.
How's the weather in Tel-Aviv, faggot?. Imagine being anal about a quality game because it's not autistic enough for you. The CRPG genre is the most jewish genre in gaming history. They are largely stats and numbers based, and barely have any real gameplay. It must be good training for young kikes before they enter the banking industry and inflate the money supply, and they hate masculine power fantasies because they aren't masculine. Oblivion requires at least some physical skill to play, therefore it's automatically hated by kikes like you.

Have fun with your Microsoft Excel games faggot.
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GhostCow
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Post by GhostCow »

Imagine coming to a site about RPGs when you don't like them. You don't belong here.
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KnightoftheWind
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Post by KnightoftheWind »

GhostCow wrote: March 24th, 2023, 14:51
Imagine coming to a site about RPGs when you don't like them. You don't belong here.
I like ACTION RPGs, games with real gameplay and real fun to be had. Not spreadsheets and graphing calculators.
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GhostCow
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Post by GhostCow »

You should head over to gamefaqs. You'll find plenty of people who share your shit taste there.
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rusty_shackleford
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Post by rusty_shackleford »

Oblivion was still heavily numbers-based afaik.

I dunno, I never really understood the hate for Oblivion. I was not, and still am not, a fan of Morrowind or Daggerfall. Most of my praise of Morrowind would be surface-level and didn't age all that well. Morrowind had impressive graphics at the time. I like the art style for being different at a time when games were starting to look uniformly pastiche — a trend that has gone the other way now to the point where a game with a style like Oblivion is refreshing.
The characters were entirely devoid of life, cold and uncaring machines. Stand in one spot, never spoken to, only queried for information like a knowledge database. I hated that my character could be the best at everything and there was no real choice being made my character played.

Sure, Oblivion shares some of these aspects, especially the one about no real character building due to no limitations. But the attempt to make the world feel lived in made it much more interesting to me than Morrowind. A Skooma addict traveling to a drug den to get his fix is interesting to me, I want to follow him, I want to know more about his life. I no longer considered them to merely be automatons that spit out information at request, the character is telling a story entirely through their actions that I can willingly participate in. The overly acted characters reminded me a bit of traditional acting, known to overly exaggerate, and it has a certain humorous charm to it. Significantly better than characters that do nothing at any rate.

The complaints of level scaling and such in Oblivion always felt like they missed the mark. I never really cared about combat in these games because it was never good to begin with. It's like telling me that the latest professional wrestling event had poor acting. It's not really the point. Could they have put more effort into it? Sure, but I'm there to watch muscular guys beat the hell out of each other and suspend my disbelief for a bit. The acting & stories are just window dressing… That's how I view combat in these games. Great if they get it right, but if they get it right at the expense of things like worldbuilding, characters, exploration and such then it's a complete loss, which is why dork souls fans who praise those games for any such qualities are the equivalent of morrowind fans who praise morrowind for combat.
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Emphyrio
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Post by Emphyrio »

GhostCow wrote: March 24th, 2023, 15:03
You should head over to gamefaqs. You'll find plenty of people who share your shit taste there.
I would, but then you'd probably pop over there to keep crying and seething about Todd too.
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Post by ds. »

rusty_shackleford wrote: March 24th, 2023, 19:08
The complaints of level scaling and such in Oblivion always felt like they missed the mark. I never really cared about combat in these games because it was never good to begin with.
The level scaling doesn't just affect the combat though but also the items you find as well as the creatures and enemies you see in the world. If the armor that random bandits wear and dungeon contents depends entirely on your level then that actively works against the world feeling believable.
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Post by rusty_shackleford »

ds. wrote: March 24th, 2023, 19:33
rusty_shackleford wrote: March 24th, 2023, 19:08
The complaints of level scaling and such in Oblivion always felt like they missed the mark. I never really cared about combat in these games because it was never good to begin with.
The level scaling doesn't just affect the combat though but also the items you find as well as the creatures and enemies you see in the world. If the armor that random bandits wear and dungeon contents depends entirely on your level then that actively works against the world feeling believable.
:scratch:

Probably. Again, I've never made it very far in any of these games — maybe 20 or so hours with each. I just bounce right off of them. I just like the idea of Oblivion more than the others.
Oblivion still has a wide array of artifacts to find:
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Artifacts

But I'm unsure how they compare to level-scaled gear you find.
If a game can be 'fixed' with a couple mods that are simply tweaking values, compared to needing entirely new systems added and large rewrites of dialogue, I think it's in a better position. I'm aware of mods for Oblivion that remove level scaling, but I'm not aware of any (good) mods for Morrowind that make NPCs stop being wikipedia.
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Post by Emphyrio »

The artifacts were also level scaled. With a few exceptions like the skeleton key and azura's star, artifacts would quickly become useless.
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KnightoftheWind
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Post by KnightoftheWind »

In a world where most fantasy games subvert the genre with dark, edgy themes and world design, games like Oblivion are a rarity. It's one of the few "feel-good" fantasy adventures that exist, aside from Fable and maybe Kingdoms of Amalur. We see less of the supposedly generic high fantasies of Lord of the Rings, and more brooding and depressing adventures, which can't be good for the soul. Yes the Oblivion gates exist, but you can choose to ignore the entire main quest if you want and remain in the overworld.

There is something about the bright, pastoral fields of Cyrodill that you don't find in any other Elder Scrolls game. And for that reason alone I give Oblivion an edge over Morrowind and Skyrim. Your comments on NPCs are also spot-on, they rarely feel like genuine people you are conversing with and more like static terminals.
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Post by Tweed »

rusty_shackleford wrote: March 24th, 2023, 19:08
The characters were entirely devoid of life, cold and uncaring machines.
"I saw a mudcrab the other day."
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Post by KnightoftheWind »

These moments never happen in Daggerfall or Morrowind, unintentional as they may be.

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Post by rusty_shackleford »

When I saw the title, it reminded me of the goblin farm quest.
Video overall hits exactly what I mean when discussing Oblivion. It tried to do things that most RPGs don't, and was sadly walked back with in Skyrim. Even the minor goblin side quest, the town starts rebuilding afterwards and when it's rebuilt they give you weekly gold as a gift. It makes the characters feel like they exist for more than simply giving you a quest.

Tribes of goblins having wars over religious idols you don't understand the importance of and are never explained, that can (and did) go right past most players. I love this sort of stuff.

From the video: "Skyrim had a civil war, and it was all scripted and instances…"
Exactly. Bethesda just threw their hands up in their air and gave up at trying to make a living world, sad.
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KnightoftheWind
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Post by KnightoftheWind »

You can't even say that Bethesda took these elements away in the name of simplicity, as Oblivion is just as accessible as Skyrim is and it looks better too (Skyrim NPCs look like ghouls). Perhaps the departure of Ken Rolston caused an ideological schism within the company, but Skyrim seemed to sacrifice a lot of this stuff for the sake of cinematic flair.

But Todd Howard is nothing if not inconsistent, he designs Elder Scrolls games based on his current mood at the time. So whatever is the next big thing in 2025+, he'll base ES VI on that. If it's set in 'Hammerfell', I'm excited to be able to base my char on George Floyd though just saying.
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Post by rusty_shackleford »

KnightoftheWind wrote: March 25th, 2023, 03:14
You can't even say that Bethesda took these elements away in the name of simplicity, as Oblivion is just as accessible as Skyrim is and it looks better too (Skyrim NPCs look like ghouls). Perhaps the departure of Ken Rolston caused an ideological schism within the company, but Skyrim seemed to sacrifice a lot of this stuff for the sake of cinematic flair.

But Todd Howard is nothing if not inconsistent, he designs Elder Scrolls games based on his current mood at the time. So whatever is the next big thing in 2025+, he'll base ES VI on that. If it's set in 'Hammerfell', I'm excited to be able to base my char on George Floyd though just saying.
I assume they did away with it because it was just too hard to get it right and the payoff for getting it wrong is too high. Nobody will make fun of your janky AI having conversations if they simply don't have conversations at all.
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Post by Lhynn »

The hate for most bad and mediocre rpgs released in the years following 2003? 2005? Has mostly to do with the steep decline in the quality of rpgs being released and their potential to be better.

Oblivion in particular could be a good game, it has many elements of one, but it still manages to have a horrible plot and the execution of every idea seems to have been the most retarded possible.

Nowadays we are spoiled for choice, both classics and new games worth playing are available, and even bad games have been so heavily modded after all these years, that they are playable and enjoyable now.
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