Oblivion is not exactly lighting me on fire so far
I bought Oblivion because the more I played Two Worlds the more it made me want to play Oblivion.
I finally gave in and bought it for the 360 because I figured it was the most stable platform. GOTY edition of course. I've played every Elder Scrolls game so far, so I really was overdue for the latest.
The gameplay mechanics I'm kind of neutral on. While they've simplified some aspects they've also introduced new complexities. I like and dislike the various changes equally, so I don't see a net gain or loss. I appreciate they've done a better job on the console menus this time around. I played Morrowind on the PC and X-Box and I could never get into the X-Box version because the user interface, especially the character screens (inventory, map, stats, etc.) was nigh impenetrable. Especially if you were carrying a lot of stuff. At least they fixed that much.
It's the story itself I'm struggling with. One thing I liked about Morrowind was the way they got you started. You had a contact, you went into a "starter" town. Got a feel for the place, maybe did a few of the simple side quests and then headed on for a real town. Once you got there you did a few more storyline quests, if you were still getting your feet wet, and then the game cut you loose to do your own thing and get back to the story when you damn well pleased. Although some people were intimidated by Morrowind's scope, I think for players genuinely interested in the concept but unfamiliar with how an Elder Scrolls game played it was one of the best for getting started.
If I had never played an Elder Scrolls game before Oblivion, I probably would have given up before I got out of the starter dungeon. If that wasn't bad enough, once you're out the main quest line is probably something to be avoided at first, but they don't really encourage you to do that. So when you come upon an open portal to hell...er..."Oblivion", my instinct was to jump right in.
Big, big mistake.
So what am I supposed to do here? What would a new player think to do here? Me, I'm ignoring the giant flaming gate for now and doing some side quests. The fighter's guild is always a good starting place for me. The twist on the old "rat quest" was kind of humorous. I'm liking the game once I started ignoring the story. At what point should I go back? The game doesn't really let you know or provide any hints. I think I could figure out how to close the first gate and I am ready to do it, but that's based on my own estimation of trying the quest once already.
Maybe the game will get better, but I think the early stages of a game are there to draw a player in. I could see someone giving up on this game.
I'm enjoying it now, but do we really need to introduce people to this series by making them slog it out and then providing them no direction past the initial slog?
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I didn't pick it back up until about two weeks ago. I closed that first gate but, now that I'm doing more of the sidequest-y stuff, I realize that going straight for the first gate was probably not a good way to work myself into the game and world.
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Botswana I completely agree with you. I had the same feeling with the game, but was probably a little more disapointed. After my initial honeymoon phase enjoying the scenery I ran into an 'ok what now' moment (this is of course excluding the painful character creation). After a while I felt that there was no reason for me to play. The story wasnt making me care and leveling up wasnt meaning I could go into those old dungeons where I got spanked poking around early in the game. I haven't been able to make myself go back.
Assassin's guild... that is all..
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Seconded. Best quest line in the game, IMHO.
Oh, and the main quest in Oblivion kind-of lets you off the hook once you get Martin to Cloud Ruler Temple. After that, it's kind-of the equivalent to Morrowind's "get back to the story when you damn well please." For the record, I finished the main story in Oblivion, whereas in Morrowind, I never bothered. I think it's a better story.
There is an interesting little side-quest in Cheydinhal that has probably the most brilliant stylized environment I've ever seen in a game. If you ask around in town, you'll find out that Rythe Lythandas has disappeared. Find his house, and ask his wife about it to start the quest.
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Just adventure. Role-play. The game has some brilliant moments and some game-ruining flaws, but I think if you sit back and just play rather than worrying about how you're playing you'll have a better time. If it doesn't work for you after that, I'd just give up.
Occasionally
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a stupid haiku
That's what I'm doing now. I just think the introduction to the game setting needs work. I'd much prefer they go the route more like Morrowind. As I recall, the starter dungeon was damn near a showstopper for me in Daggerfall as well. I actually played Arena after Daggerfall, so that was my introduction into the series. It was after I got to my first town that I really started to get into Daggerfall, but I had put the game aside for a month and get back to it.
I also hit a starter dungeon in Oblivion and found it full of Vampires. If you elect not to do fast travel you'll likely stumble on to it while walking to Kvatch! Holy crap I was not ready for that! Killed them all, mostly out of stubborness, but I was already a Level 3 by that point. Again, imagine if I had gone into it first thing as a new player and at Level 1. Bye bye.
On the other hand, I'm surprised how weak the Vampires are now. Even the lower ones in Morrowind would have handed my ass to me at Level 3.
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Did you go into the gates while doing the main questline or did you enter when you first saw one? Enemies typically scale up with you and are either a couple of levels above or below you, but the Daedra guys and others on the other side of the gate might have a base level that you can't match until you're further along on the quest.
What's the race/class you're playing?
Oblivion is my first Elder Scrolls game, and I must say that I love it. However, I did have some of the same feelings that you did at the beginning, Bots. I stuck with it, and I'm glad I did. I played with the main quest line for a while, but had the most fun with the side quests. I will admit that I got bored with it for a while and quit playing for a month or so. I just picked it back up again this morning and I'm back to enjoying the game. I'm currently powering through the main quest line (I'm almost done) just to get it out of the way, then it's off to more adventuring and finishing the guild and daedric shrine quests.
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"I might have gotten away with it if it wasn't for a damningly tenacious clinger." - Crouton on a childhood excrement escapade
The entire game scales to your level, to some degree. Including the first gate and creatures like Vampires. So rather than make the game unapproachable for new people, it's actually meeting them at their level regardless of where they are and what they're doing. Doesn't mean you'll survive anything of course, but that first gate at level 1 is much easier than it would be at level 10. I don't see how offering a stronger direction to the player is somehow less user friendly that the Morrowind style of just throwing you into to the world.
I yearned for more story and direction in Morrowind, I wanted a more clearly delineated line to follow when I got bored wandering.
PS: I'm glad the game didn't light you on fire
Yeah, it's scary. I'm staring into the abyss right now, and it's staring into me, which I think is kind of a dick move on the abyss's part. - Nyles
Funkenpants -
I always roll my own class just out of habit. I entered the gates while doing the main questline. I didn't realize they scaled the enemies. I actually wish they wouldn't do that. It felt really weird to be able to kill a Daedra so early on. I'm probably somewhat close to a Battlemage this time around. I'm also using hotkeys for spells, something I didn't bother with in the past. The interface is actually working ok, so I've been able to switch back and forth between my major Destruction and Restoration spells in the middle of combat.
Oldmanscene24 -
Just curious, are you doing the main quest because you feel you must? I almost always finished off at least one guild just to get some extra stuff before the main quest.
Anyway, I'm not giving up on the game. I'm just saying I can see how new players would give up on it. My Dad is a huge WoW fan and I always described Morrowind as a MMORPG you didn't have to play on-line to him. He skipped Morrowind and got Oblivion and didn't like it. I could never figure out why he wouldn't like it and then I started playing the game last week. Suddenly it became very clear why he couldn't get into it.
At this point I'll probably go ahead and do the fighter's guild before going back to the gate.
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Ahem, The Dark Brotherhood. Get it right Prole.
Oblivion, like every game, is not for everyone. And it seems that most folks who could not get into it need to be asked "Would you kindly...?"
Yep, that was me. That is all.
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I tried Oblivion on the pc back when it came out, and never made it very far. Partly because I kept paying more attention to the convoluted character advancement system than I did to the game itself. And when I did pay attention to the game, I kept getting put off by the voice acting and AI.
But perhaps it's something to come back to now that I'm becoming more mature in my gaming habits and more willing to forgive or ignore such things. Did they ever put proper 360 controller support into the pc version? I remember never getting particularly comfortable with the mouse and keyboard set-up.
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My experience was I little different. I never touched the main quest, not even the first mission. I just ran to the capital and started mucking about doing side quests. I managed to finish the thieves guild and battle arena and explore a lot of the world before I finally got sick of trying to keep track of my skills (I was trying to level 'efficiently') and haven't picked it up since.
This is weird because I usually play single-player for the story, but for some reason the 'side-stories' interested me a lot more than the main quest.
I might fire it up again at some point and try to actually start the main quest of the game.
and I agree, the first dungeon full of vampires was way to big to be a starter dungeon. I didn't mind the enemies, it was the freekin' size, it just kept getting deeper and deeper.
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something about the frank, unprovoked admission of assault with a deadly weapon tickles my funny bone
That doesn't surprise me. A lot of WoW players already have a view of how a RPG should operate. In Oblivion the leveling happens fast, the combat less complex but more theatrical. I loved the game and was drawn in from the initial scenes in the dungeon, but that might be because I haven't played an RPG since Wizardry. After playing about 120-130 hours, I had advanced two characters to high levels and had completed almost all the quest lines. In WoW, 130 hours in nothing. A drop in the bucket.
Hm. An interesting thing... I got a friend into Oblivion, and he stopped playing it and re-subscribed to WoW, because it had rekindled his old addiction.
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I put 150-200 hours into Oblivion on the PC, and loved almost all of it, though the main quest IS a bit of a slog.
I picked up the Game of the Year edition on the 360 and am having a harder time getting into it. Part of it may be that I'm a little burned out on it, but I also think that the controls on the 360 are little more "slushy." The combat seems a little loose and the game just feels harder. Maybe it's my character this time around, I dunno.
I played Oblivion on the PC, which allowed for a lot more modding/customization of your game. Still, I think the key to enjoying this game is to focus more on the experience of playing it. Grab a horse and wander off somewhere. See what you find. This is a single player RP game that you really do have to RP to get anything out of, as others have mentioned.
Maybe I'm alone here, but I thought it did have a few quests that were memorable--none of which belonged to the main story. Try the guilds for starters. Beyond that, just roam around for a while, poke your nose into little out of the way cottages, and talk to everyone. Try not to get turned into a vampire unless that's one of your RP goals, btw. De-vamping yourself is a pain in the ass.
Ken Levine wrote:
I've been playing Oblivion for quite a while now. I'm terrified to touch the main quest line, because it seems to be so short and I don't want to miss out on anything. Since I know I'm not going to play through the game again, I'm trying to grab as much as possible before I win.
That being said, I have, for the most part, quit closing oblivion gates. I've probably closed about 20 or so, and the layout of some of them is too annoying for me to willingly accept. Unless there is a good reason for me to close a gate, I just leave it to terrorize the neighborhood and get on with my business.
I've been doing the Mage and Fighters guild stuff, but I was going to avoid the Assasin's Guild track. What is it that makes it so compelling?
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It's really more of just being ready to get it over with so I don't keep running to the damn Oblivion gates all over the countryside. My level is somewhere in the 20's and I'm just tired of running into the same upper level daedra. For the record, I've finished almost all of the city/village/inn side quests and Mage Guild quests, all of the Thieves' Guild quests, most of the Fighters' Guild quests, a few Daedric Shrine quests, and some of the Arena battles. As you can see, I've played around/explored a lot, I'm just ready to put the main quest in the rear view mirror.
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"I might have gotten away with it if it wasn't for a damningly tenacious clinger." - Crouton on a childhood excrement escapade
Yeah, and it actually pays to hit that first Oblivion gate at as low a level as possible, because the scaling enemies make it really really difficult if you wait.
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QFT. I really learned the significance of that in doing the Allies for Bruma quest. I ramped down the difficulty on that one so I could blow through it as quickly as possible.
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"I might have gotten away with it if it wasn't for a damningly tenacious clinger." - Crouton on a childhood excrement escapade
I think the bulk of the enjoyment of Oblivion comes from ignoring the main quest. Which, as you say, is not entirely newbie-friendly of them. The guild quests and world exploration are where it's at.
Fedaykin98 wrote:
I found it easier to wait till I was around level 20 or so to take on the main quest. At that point the level scaling pretty much stops, your skills are at their peak, you have the best gear, and you can slaughter daedra with ease.
For owners of the PC version who dislike the "world levels as you level" aspect (I hated it, myself), download Oscuro's Oblivion Overhaul. Among other things, it sets a level range for creatures. You'll no longer face hordes of otherwise low-level bandits with high-quality gear at higher levels, nor be able to face the Arena grand champion at low levels.
For those of us with classic CRPG backgrounds, it feels like a much tighter, more planning/skill-based game. Combined with increasing the game's difficulty level, it provides hours and hours of the frustration-based RPG gameplay that I hate myself enough to crave.
Not to kick you while you're down, Botswana, but KT and others have mentioned the PC version's trump card: mods. The game's just too modtastic to tie yourself down with the 360 version, even if just for the UI tweaks. I got some nice houses and cool basement areas with display cases and mannequins for my acquisitions.
Fedaykin98 wrote:
I haven't done all of the mage and/or fighters guild quests, but there's no boring running-around and getting signatures or recommendations crap with the Dark Brotherhood. Murder someone, and then go to sleep. Murder someone else, then go to sleep again. Start your contracts. A few of the contracts are just, "Go here and kill this guy, because someone asked for it." Others are more interesting, like killing a "cop," or my personal favorite, the treasure hunt party. The quests are just more creative, and mostly different from what you'll find elsewhere. And as the story for the quest line ramps up, some interesting in-fighting begins among the dark brotherhood, and your ascension to power (hopefully not a spoiler by now... Any Elder Scrolls veterans should know that the end of the quest lines results in you being the boss) is quite unique and fun, and even shocking. Plus, finishing it basically gives you some nice, steady income.
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I played it on PC back when it came out, went through the main quest and such. As I mentioned above, the assassin's guild "Dark Brotherhood" quest line is not to be missed.
But with that being said, I recently acquired a copy of the 360 GOTY edition as well. As soon as I could, I headed straight for the shivering isles content and I've really enjoyed it so far. I prefer it to the main quest truthfully.
I'm also one of these weird people who enjoys playing an archer in the game. Oh and I despised the lack of focus in morrowind. It's one thing to have a large world for people to explore, it's entirely another to not give them any direction what so ever.
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I think I hit it at around level 2 or 3, and it was nothing approching easy. Perhaps that's because I didn't power-game my leveling or character creation. On the other hand, the near impossibility of some of the encounters in there made the RP that much better.
I think that's really the ticket. The game doesn't do too much to motivate you as a player, and sort of assumes that your character wants to go on any quest an NPC can dream up. If you imbue your character with an actual personality and story, though, the game can become all sorts of compelling.
My character is a street urchin who's struggling to figure out how he's all the sudden Mr. Hero Guy to everyone when he spent most of his life as a petty thief.
On the plus side, he is good enough at picking pockets to steal guards' keys if/when he finds himself in jail again--Old habits die hard, even for Mr. Hero Guy.
rabbit wrote:
1Dgaf wrote:
XBL: E Munnie
To me, Oblivion was all about the Dark Brotherhood and Thieves Guild quest lines. They both felt very interesting and had a few twists (specially the Dark Brotherhood one) that kept me going. I said this before on the GTA4 thread. I'm not a big fan of sandbox games because I start to wander the world and get bored and the main quest line didn't grab me enough to keep going.
I did want to finish the quest line, but my main problem was that I gimped my character so badly that I could not kill anything inside the gates. That's because I had no idea of how the leveling in Oblivion worked and since I rolled a thief/assassin type of character, I got a LOT of level ups from sneaking only, making all my other attributes useless.
I tried the game for a second time knowing the rules, but I was so worried about maxing out my attributes bonus on level ups that I completely lost interest in the whole thing.
Overall, I felt like Oblivion was not really the game for me, but the Dark Brotherhood and Thieves guild was so awesome! That was worth my time and money spent on it.
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