Ok seriously for RPG players..

Renegen on 27/11/2006 at 14:51

I've read in some places that Morrowind is the better RPG and that Oblivion is crap. I only started playing Oblivion about a week ago and was very impressed by the beautiful world but I understand the 'crap' part comes from scalable difficulty and plenty of rares, things mods take care of right now. I haven't gotten tired of the game yet, the immersion is so good, the combat is fun and there's plenty of exploration, quests and stuff to do. Maybe it changes?

I want to know if Morrowind is an experience actually worth playing(having never played it past 1-2 hours) that's different from Oblivion, if it's some kind of special game that needs to be experienced. I heard the mods do a lot, can the TTLGers here give me a good list for some good realistic RPG fun? And should I go back to Morrowind and play that instead of Oblivion for my open ended RPG fun?

Thirith on 27/11/2006 at 14:58

I'd say that in terms of gameplay, Morrowind is "Oblivion, but more". There are more options, there are more skills. On the other hand, the game world is much less eager to please than Oblivion (which has a world that is easy to like but fairly generic), the combat is worse in my opinion, and if you're a fan of sneaking, Morrowind is quite disappointing. It took me three attempts to get into the game, and when I did I appreciated it for its richness, but it doesn't go out of its way to please every player. Chances are that there are fewer players who love Morrowind than gamers who like Oblivion, but those who do will be more fanatic about it.

Hyeron on 27/11/2006 at 15:48

Quote Posted by Renegen

Not only that imho - I'm one of those Morrowind fanatics. Oblivion is short, and way too hollow to be interesting in the long term. It took me around 100 hours to finish it, doing every quest the game has to offer... That wasn't what I was expecting from an Elder Scrolls game. It feels more like a hack and slash with sweet eye candy to help forget its flaws. I hated that feeling so much I jusn't couldn't sell the game - I GAVE it. Not even worth a second hand price to me. Yeah right, combats are great. So what ?

(yeah, I'm a "fast travel" freak... Daggerfall had me for so much time, I can't help it. And yeah, I know it's cheesy. :cheeky: )

(not to talk about the so-called "translation" those damn retards gave to the french-speaking people - my mother could do better. I'm not saying I'm the best translator out there, but at least I know how to translate a GUI/HUD without making it unreadable (think "your alchemy talent increased" translated to something reading like "your increased alchemy you talent" - and this is no joke) - yeah, yeah, I know there's an unofficial patch. Worthless excuse. Burn those so-called professionals alive. :mad: )

Quote:

I want to know if Morrowind is an experience actually worth playing(having never played it past 1-2 hours) that's different from Oblivion, if it's some kind of special game that needs to be experienced. I heard the mods do a lot, can the TTLGers here give me a good list for some good realistic RPG fun? And should I go back to Morrowind and play that instead of Oblivion for my open ended RPG fun?

On the other hand, I just can't finish Morrowind. I always seem to find something to do, and at 300+ hours my quest list still has "holes" in it (well, with Tribunal and Bloodmoon installed, at least ) - I still haven't had to find a list of quests to make sure the fun is over, unlike Oblivion.

I guess the Gothic series could be a good bet if you're looking for something else, though it hardly gets as good as good ol' Daggerfall (which you should also try if clumsy graphics (by today's standards) don't bother you).

... Well, the list could be quite long anyway, those are just two examples.

Anyway, I guess there are more people that'll tell you Oblivion is far better than Morrowind. I suppose it's a matter of taste, but I want fun for my money, and Oblivion couldn't give me that anymore after about 30 hours. It began to be so... ridiculous, with bandits in glass armors and stuff...

Morrowind is quite an experience, I'd say. Not as good as its older brother, but probably the last fun, PC-oriented Elder Scrolls we'll ever see, seeing how things seem to be going. And well worth every moment spent on it once you get used to the static combats and stuff.

Just my two cents, not worth much in front of the oh so many Oblivion fans, but hey, what would our world be without diversity ? :)

*starts waiting for flaming answers* :cheeky:

(edited : damned brackets... hate them ^^)

Gorgonseye on 27/11/2006 at 16:25

IMO, Morrowind was indeed a very good game, but the travel system was a pain and the combat was somewhat disappointing. Frankly though, I felt Oblivion did somewhat feel a little hollow, but not really enough to hate the game, and did fix the somewhat annoying combat system and the compass as well and the quick transit system made things rather easier, because in Morrowind, to many times did I get directions that I felt weren't specific enough, or were just so far away, and I didn't have enough cash for a boat or Silt Strider, which made going places quite tedious, which after playing Oblivion, I ended up losing my patience with going back to Morrowind again. Though, in the end, I would say, both are very good for their times.

Thirith on 27/11/2006 at 16:43

Quote Posted by Hyeron

Anyway, I guess there are more people that'll tell you Oblivion is far better than Morrowind. I suppose it's a matter of taste, but I want fun for my money, and Oblivion couldn't give me that anymore after about 30 hours. It began to be so... ridiculous, with bandits in glass armors and stuff...

You should try some of the mods. They address many of the shortcomings of Oblivion, first and foremost the balancing system. Check out Oscuro's Oblivion Overhaul for one of these mods - highly recommendable.

Hyeron on 27/11/2006 at 17:20

I know it, but I just like to play the games the way the devs intended it. Or at least I did. The only mods I usually install are graphical and sound enhancements etc., as well as quests. Never system modifications.

The only system-changing mod I installed for Morrowind is the Water Life one (and I still regret there is no version without the new ingredients - well, not that I know of ^^). And I still try not to pick the new stuff. Those waters really WERE too empty.

Even worse, I carefully pick my mods to be lore-respectful (as much as they can at least, let's say I don't like to leave Tamriel for some bastard son between it and our world)... Maybe I'm still a little too much of a purist. ;)

PeeperStorm on 28/11/2006 at 03:27

Count me in with the Morrrowind crowd. I'm not saying Oblivion is a bad game, just that the improvements that it had were less important to me than the "unimprovements".

Shayde on 28/11/2006 at 13:54

I'm on the Oblivion team.

I just could not get into Morrowind and believe me I tried!
Most irritating thing by far was the travel system, drove me insane. Funny how I can wait for 30 minutes real time to work out guard rounds in Thief but in Morrowind everything just felt tedious.

I also felt that it was less immersive than Oblivion, which felt cleaner, more real and a lot easier to get lost in. Add the fact that it is much more fun to be a thief in Oblivion and I was sold.

Renzatic on 28/11/2006 at 19:31

Ultimately, I have to give the nod to Morrowind. While Oblivion has much better combat and sneaking gameplay, Morrowind's world was so much more interesting to me. Nothing in Cyrodiil was so inspiring as Azura's Coast, with it's craggy rocks poking out of the sea and weird organic architecture. Everything in Oblivion felt kinda generic in comparison.

Garriath on 30/11/2006 at 02:32

I really enjoy both games, for different reasons.

Oblivion is much more generic. Uninteresting 'grass' landscapes, typical white-guy (and by that I mean 'Western') archetypes, and relatively little to distinguish it from any other fantasy world.

That said, it also does an excellent job of making a 'typical fantasy world.' The gameplay's really superb, the graphics are gorgeous, and the AI's pretty nifty. The quests too are pretty well thought out- I appreciated how most of them had at least one sort of twist or unexpected factor.

Morrowind is sort of the opposite. In my humble opinion, the gameplay is much worse than Oblivion, the combat, magic, and sneak systems are much less interesting, and the graphics, at least technologically, don't compare. However, what Bethesda managed to knock far out of the ballpark in Morrowind was the world they created. Unique only begins to describe it. I can place 'Oblivion' next to 'Lord of the Rings' and 'D&D' as far as worlds go. Morrowind has its seperate shelf high above all of those. You really get into the Dunmer culture and politics to the point that the gameplay is almost an annoyance to furthering a plot much more interesting and far less cliche than Oblivion's. Even the graphics take on their own personality, and I can recall moments of beauty travelling Azura's Coast and the Telvanni Grasslands that were far more impressive than any Oblivion experiences I have.

It also deserves to be said, as was mentioned before, Morrowind is huge. There are a huge amount of guilds, compared to Oblivion's four, and while each isn't quite as developed, you have many, many more options as a character. You can play an imperial legionarre deployed in Vvardenfell to protect the people. You can play a Dunmer House Warrior, trying to move his house above all others. You can play a Morag Tong assassin, legally assassinating people and presenting justification to guards afterwards. You can even play a benevolent Imperial cultist or Dunmer priest, and not kill a single creature while completing many, many quests.

Granted, it took me a while to really appreciate Morrowind. But as soon as I got it, I found it much, much harder to get out than it was getting out of Oblivion.