Asmodeusz
06-07-06, 03:50 AM
Hello. Just as I promised yesterday, I'm posting my Oblivion review.
You should keep in mind, I'm not trying to make a game magazine alike review. This is a fan/gamer review, so it's basically my thoughts on the game.
Here we go.
I'm a great fan of TES (The Elder Scrolls) series since Arena. Actually when I first played Arena, Daggerfall was already due in a few months. So when I finished the first game I immediately jumped on the sequel. After that I had to wait 6 years for the next sequel (Morrowind).
This time the wait was shorter (4 years since Morrowind) and Oblivion was the game I was looking forward the most I guess (except maybe DNF). Finally somewhere in the first days of April I got my Collectors Edition Copy of Oblivion. Oh the joy. The main quest took me ~1 week to finish, but I played the game in a very freelance manner, so I never rejected a side-quest.
My first impressions were amazing. After fine tuning the game to my rig, I was jaw dropped for the first couple of hours by the graphics. They're amazing. This is indeed the first REAL next-gen game in terms of graphics. Since the beginning of the series TES is a first person game, and as usual the perspective is quite amazing and really enjoyable (nothing beats experiencing a fantasy game from 1st person).
The combat system proved to be quite realistic, and I think it's nicely polished and tweaked. The magic system is also a huge improvement to Morrowind. The main quest was cool, maybe a little rushed for my taste, anyway, horses and fast-travel may have taken me out of Morrowind numbness. Overall the game is quite amazing, and it's probably the best RPG, or maybe even game I ever played.
But unfortunately it has it's flaws...
When I first heard bitching that "there are not enough NPC's" on the TES forums, I was skeptical, and sure the developers will make it "feel" right. To be honest it is unfortunately a mood breaker in the game. The wilderness and small camps are OK, but damn the Imperial City? It is as big as it gets in this universe isn't it? It felt as a ghost town at times. Well OK, only when I realized "Dammit, this is the friggin' capital of Cyrodil where did everybody go??? Bethesda had some problems with many NPC's on screen at once, I suppose because of the heavy stat/AI package every NPC carry. But come on, Radiant AI is only relevant when we actually SEE it in action. I don't care if NPC X is having a meal right now if I can't see him/her.
A small flaw I noticed with the stealth system. If you use a medium graphics quality option forget about stealth. Unless your card handle shadows extremely well. But that may be a problem on my side.
Finally here's the thing that ruined the game for me. It was not in the beginning of the game, nor in the middle of it. It was when I became a high level character. Enemy scaling (adjusting the NPC levels and armor to the Player Character) is the most disappointing thing in this game. If not the feature itself, than the lack of an option to turn it off. You don't get any reward for your effort. When you're level 36 you feel like level 6, because basically the enemies are equally hard to kill on level 36 as they are on level 6. So somehow advancement is useless. That's one of the reasons I stopped playing Oblivion some time ago. Why should I? If 3 friggin' bandits are a great threat for the Champion of Tamriel, Arena Champion, head of the Fighters Guild and 36 level knight with over 9000 kills then something is wrong. I got my ugly Dragonscale armor, just because the Daedric is no fun anymore. Every corner you may find a folk with full daedric equipment. In comparison in Morrowind I met 1 person wearing daedric armor (without the helmet!).
And gaming is stupid because this feature is for not-so-hardcore x360 players that will always have a challange... bleh.
I see it this way: If you're a low/medium level character and want to have some fun play Oblivion. If you want to be actually gratified for your efforts play Morrowind. At least until there's a patch that allows disabling the auto-scaling "dis"feature.
Still it is a wonderful game, nothing beats it's open endness.
You should keep in mind, I'm not trying to make a game magazine alike review. This is a fan/gamer review, so it's basically my thoughts on the game.
Here we go.
I'm a great fan of TES (The Elder Scrolls) series since Arena. Actually when I first played Arena, Daggerfall was already due in a few months. So when I finished the first game I immediately jumped on the sequel. After that I had to wait 6 years for the next sequel (Morrowind).
This time the wait was shorter (4 years since Morrowind) and Oblivion was the game I was looking forward the most I guess (except maybe DNF). Finally somewhere in the first days of April I got my Collectors Edition Copy of Oblivion. Oh the joy. The main quest took me ~1 week to finish, but I played the game in a very freelance manner, so I never rejected a side-quest.
My first impressions were amazing. After fine tuning the game to my rig, I was jaw dropped for the first couple of hours by the graphics. They're amazing. This is indeed the first REAL next-gen game in terms of graphics. Since the beginning of the series TES is a first person game, and as usual the perspective is quite amazing and really enjoyable (nothing beats experiencing a fantasy game from 1st person).
The combat system proved to be quite realistic, and I think it's nicely polished and tweaked. The magic system is also a huge improvement to Morrowind. The main quest was cool, maybe a little rushed for my taste, anyway, horses and fast-travel may have taken me out of Morrowind numbness. Overall the game is quite amazing, and it's probably the best RPG, or maybe even game I ever played.
But unfortunately it has it's flaws...
When I first heard bitching that "there are not enough NPC's" on the TES forums, I was skeptical, and sure the developers will make it "feel" right. To be honest it is unfortunately a mood breaker in the game. The wilderness and small camps are OK, but damn the Imperial City? It is as big as it gets in this universe isn't it? It felt as a ghost town at times. Well OK, only when I realized "Dammit, this is the friggin' capital of Cyrodil where did everybody go??? Bethesda had some problems with many NPC's on screen at once, I suppose because of the heavy stat/AI package every NPC carry. But come on, Radiant AI is only relevant when we actually SEE it in action. I don't care if NPC X is having a meal right now if I can't see him/her.
A small flaw I noticed with the stealth system. If you use a medium graphics quality option forget about stealth. Unless your card handle shadows extremely well. But that may be a problem on my side.
Finally here's the thing that ruined the game for me. It was not in the beginning of the game, nor in the middle of it. It was when I became a high level character. Enemy scaling (adjusting the NPC levels and armor to the Player Character) is the most disappointing thing in this game. If not the feature itself, than the lack of an option to turn it off. You don't get any reward for your effort. When you're level 36 you feel like level 6, because basically the enemies are equally hard to kill on level 36 as they are on level 6. So somehow advancement is useless. That's one of the reasons I stopped playing Oblivion some time ago. Why should I? If 3 friggin' bandits are a great threat for the Champion of Tamriel, Arena Champion, head of the Fighters Guild and 36 level knight with over 9000 kills then something is wrong. I got my ugly Dragonscale armor, just because the Daedric is no fun anymore. Every corner you may find a folk with full daedric equipment. In comparison in Morrowind I met 1 person wearing daedric armor (without the helmet!).
And gaming is stupid because this feature is for not-so-hardcore x360 players that will always have a challange... bleh.
I see it this way: If you're a low/medium level character and want to have some fun play Oblivion. If you want to be actually gratified for your efforts play Morrowind. At least until there's a patch that allows disabling the auto-scaling "dis"feature.
Still it is a wonderful game, nothing beats it's open endness.