Quigs/EvoG/Solik/D4's small reviews of OB

Played it for a good 5-6 hours last night. Damn fine game.

Got questions? Ask em. Ive only got it for the 360, and got the CE edition.

Complaints.

1. Light. A small complaint to be sure, in fact, its realistic, but still anoying. In most dungeons (only been in 3 at this point) the ambient light levels is very low, but enough not to bump into walls like a moron. In fact, you can see for quite a while, making out sillouhettes, etc. Except its hard to make out small details of things around you. Break out a torch, and its almost the opposite. you can see EVERYTHING 3 feet away, but the light blinds you from looking down hallways.

2. Shadows. The whole video with picking up rib cages? thats the very first thing you see in the game. That exact room and rib cage, and its wierd with the shadows gone. Yeah, I know theyve been announced out for a while now, but its still akward.

3. The compass. I hate it. With a passion. There is NO reason to explore. You are never going to find anything by wandering around, as you cant help but just go towards the icon on your compass, out of habit alone. It CANNOT be turned off at this point. I tried. Your cursor can, the compass, or even better, its icons, cannot.

4. Faces. They are all rounded. Everyone looks like eskimoes. Except Khajit and Argonian, which look amazingly well done.

5. Clipping. To be fair, only happened once, but it was damn obvious. A knight on horseback leaned over to talk to me, and you could see his forehead popping through the metal of his helmet.

6. Eyes. When in conversation, the eyes move around, alot. Someone is talking to you, but looks like they are trying to look at their right ear, then go back to looking at you.

7. Spotty Psuedo AI. Not referring to the AI of enemies or NPC's but deer. A minor point to be sure, but deer seemed to run away from you, in no intellegent direction. In fact, they ran into a giant pond, and got stuck. Where I killed them with my sword. IT led to me finding a really cool looking series of rocks and waterfalls, but sadly, no secret dungeon.

8. Conversation mini game. Couldnt figure it out. Pissed me off. No way to tell their affinity to you, and if your failing or doing better. Bribing only lets you get more chances to play the game.

Praises.

1. The length of Dungeons. I spent a good 3 hours exploring the second dungeon (The first being the training one). It just felt awesome. It took me about the same time to explore that dungeon, as it did the entire dungeon of tribunal. (Where as tribunals sewers were kind of obvious, keep going forward affairs, these seemed to be intellegently laid out, with a few surprise traps along the way.)

2. Inventory/map interface. Far superior to last time.

3. Fight system. Its very hard to explain without playing, but its just... fluid. Intellegent and fun use of momentum would be the best way to try.

4. Marksman system. The AI is intellegent enough to run and shoot at the same time, as well as try and take the best shots. Had an amazing fight with a bow enemy below me, and me on top of a crenulated wall, shooting back and forth, with her arrows bouncing off the wall, making the perfect sound, and yo ucould see them spinning off after they hit. I could have grabbed them after they missed in fact, had I run out of arrows.

Hmm I didn't have the problem with the lighting.

Yeah I was dissappointed when they removed dynamic shadows.

Actually there is a mod out on for the PC version which removes the compass :D
For 360... put a tape over it?

I don't have the problem with the faces.

Yeah I noticed clipping too.

Noticed that too.

Yeah, the deer is stupid. Well that's an improvement though, in Morrowind everything attacked you. At least it has the intelligence to run

Yeah the conversations mini-game is tough at first. You gotta look at their facial reactions to tell the affinity.

not so much figuring out if they will like or hate what you say, I couldnt figure out their overall reaction to the finality of it , whether you succeeded or failed in the end, and just by how much.

One of the first mods to be released is one that turns off the quest pointers. The compass is still active as a direction indicator... AS IT SHOULD BE, PERIOD. Erm... I don't have a direct link, but it's at the ESF in the Oblivion Mods forum. The creator of it is nominated for deification. If he figures out a way to reduce the size of the interface, he just might earn Our Lord and Saviour status.

Oh, wait... you're on an Xbitch360. My bad.

-D4

Not a problem. I dont mind laughing at you for being raped up the ass for paying too much to play the same game.

Quigs said:

Not a problem. I dont mind laughing at you for being raped up the ass for paying too much to play the same game.

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My computer is already up to snuff, champ. I paid about the same price for your XBox 360. Sure, my copy of the game cost as much as your's, but fuck it. Do taxes, photo manipulation, 3D rendering, and word processing on your XBox, then we'll talk.

-D4

About the same? Doubtfull. Considering the 360 sells at a loss to the company, and no pc parts manufacter nor retailer is willing to do the same, youve either got a much lower performance, or are flat out lying.

Personally I have both, and I think they both have advantages and disadvatages. Personally I like to play OB with the 360.

I think the pointer in the compass was added to help the more confused players find their way. This was one thing that set off a lot of new players in Morrowind. They didn't know where to go and so on.

Hopefully Bethesda will utilize XBOX Live and deliver patches and content to the XBOX, such as additional options.

Praises: Keeps dumbfucks entertained for 5-6 hours

Quigs said:

About the same? Doubtfull. Considering the 360 sells at a loss to the company, and no pc parts manufacter nor retailer is willing to do the same, youve either got a much lower performance, or are flat out lying.

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I should clarify... I got my computer upgraded for the price of your Xbox360. When you consider the difference in resolution and quality (excepting HDTVs which an added cost in and of itself), I'm willing to bet my graphics quality will be very similar to yours. Computer monitor at 1024X768 > TV at 800x600. Now, unless there's MS Office, Adobe Photoshop, 3D Studio Max, and TurboTax for the XBox, my virtual dick is still bigger then yours.

-D4

Elaborate a bit on combat to get me a little horny about my Oblivion download will you?

Morrowind's combat(which i recently reinstalled) just killed my hype.

Xanfire said:

Personally I have both, and I think they both have advantages and disadvatages. Personally I like to play OB with the 360.

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That boggles my mind. What on earth do you have both of them for unless you stole one of them?

RK47 said:

Elaborate a bit on combat to get me a little horny about my Oblivion download will you?

Morrowind's combat(which i recently reinstalled) just killed my hype.

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Well, the block button is a big part of it. Its all about momentum.

Like, swinging a two handed 40 pound hammer no longer takes an eight of a second to go back to a ready position. Miss, and it takes a few seconds to get back into a fighting stance. Get blocked, and takes even longer, as you get sent back from the recoil, giving your opponent a few easy free hits.

Opponents no longer walk straight for you blindly. If your guard is down, they will lunge right at you at a smal distance, hitting you before you get a chance to do aything about it.

You can no longer just hold the attack button, *magically* giving you full damage as soon as you let go of it. Hit attack, and your going to be swinging soon afterwards, depending on just how you swung.

Hit an enemy hard enough, and hes knocked down. He doesnt just take a knee waiting for you, the bitch goes flying like he got hit with a super sledge, well, not that far, but he goes down, and depending on your strength and weapon, he goes a few feet. Takes him a second or two for him to get up normally, but, again, momentum, you got a solid hit on him, and now your ready to pound his skull into the ground.

Data4 said:

Quigs said:

About the same? Doubtfull. Considering the 360 sells at a loss to the company, and no pc parts manufacter nor retailer is willing to do the same, youve either got a much lower performance, or are flat out lying.

Click to expand...

I should clarify... I got my computer upgraded for the price of your Xbox360. When you consider the difference in resolution and quality (excepting HDTVs which an added cost in and of itself), I'm willing to bet my graphics quality will be very similar to yours. Computer monitor at 1024X768 > TV at 800x600. Now, unless there's MS Office, Adobe Photoshop, 3D Studio Max, and TurboTax for the XBox, my virtual dick is still bigger then yours.

-D4

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Thats all well and good, but your still not winning that one. 360 can plug into a monitor just the same.

Obviously, ive got a computer, but I dont play many games on it. Id rather have the computer for work/internet, and the 360 for games/online play.

Quigs said:

Not a problem. I dont mind laughing at you for being raped up the ass for paying too much to play the same game.

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In Sweden the Xbox game costs 20$ more than the PC one.

A valid reason to pick up the PC one, all other things being equal I would think.

Dunno what it is about console games overhere, for some reason they're ridiculously overpriced in stores. New PC games usually cost between $50 and $60, which is a bit high, but new console games often ring in at $90, particularly high-profile ones like GTA, GT, MGS, Halo, and of course Oblivion.

You can still get 'em at a decent price online, but the amount of "ignorant" parents, who buy these $90 games for their kids... Well, it's enough for the prices to stay that high, and that's just terrifying.

I was going to start a thread:

"Hated Morrowind...Loving Oblivion"

:D *ducks* ...but alas, the whole site was completely gone for the past two days...

...so since Quigs started his thread, and we're both on the 360, I figured I'd just join him here.


First off, my major disclaimer to put things into perspective for all of you is that I DESPISED Morrowind. I hated the look, the feel, the combat and the lack of meaningful substance. For the people new here or who just didn't know, I'm an old school RPGer who shares all the same love for the predecessors and so on yadda yadda.



So, with that said, Oblivion has done what I sincerely did not expect. A year ago I wouldn't be caught dead playing it(considering how I felt about MW). Up to about a month ago, I was eager to at least give it a chance (I only bash games I play, not just from screens or videos :shock: :D ), and a lot having to do with me beating every game on the 360 and jonesing for something to do. What happened is that I didn't expect to actually love this game, what with 17 hours in two days (got my preorder early Monday).

First off, the presentation is great. The entire opening sequence, pacing of dialog with the title to the music all worked to sell me the setting and the mood.

I wont dwell much on the whole first section (tutorial dungeon) in context as you know what exactly is going on. What WAS cool is both its length and the realization that the world is VERY object dense. Objects are stacked and piled and hidden. I would've liked to been able to pick up items not as inventory but to simply move them off of other objects (digging around), but its trivial really. I enjoyed the little things such as being blocked off at one point, and having to find an alternate route via a crumbling portion of the wall. Knowing there was a full world waiting, all like this, I was genuinely anticipating emerging from this section.

Combat, just to get it out of the way early, is a lot of fun, though be warned, player-skill is just as important as character-skill. Anyway, my "credentials" above might be misleading, but I play all genre's as well as RPG's, so my perspective on combat is also tethered equally to shooters, both FP and 3rdP. Condemned for me is the best melee game ever made bar none. The hits are visceral and painful and the animation completely and fully reactive. Oblivion is certainly not Condemned, but it shares that 'impact' of exchanging blows which makes it very satisfying. No, no damage mapping, but enemies react to solid hits(high damage rolls?), by stopping altogether to apparently catch their breath or wince in pain. Their attacks are varied, with nice looking follow through attacks, but paying a little attention, you can find holes in their defenses to exploit for a good strike (and avoid getting blocked). There are knockdowns, disarms and parries, but I'm an archer so my swordplay isn't there to enjoy those perks.

The whistle of the arrow through the air is sweet, and duration of the 'pull' seems to affect damage like Fable, so you do have to keep moving and wait for the meaty shots, as quick ones are flaccid looking(arc straight to the ground) and do no damage. I'm also playing an acrobat, with tagged skills such as Marksman, Security and Stealth. Made it to Journeyman in Stealth so the penalty for boot weight is lifted, so I'm back to wearing heavier boots for protection. All in all, I'd want the stealth to be exactly like Thief, which is a preemptive system, meaning you know when you're hidden, vs. Oblivions, which is a "do they see you?" system. You have a reasonable idea when you'll be hidden, but I've yet to be fully stealthy through any long section with NPC's present. This could change when I'm a Master thief, so I'm not going to worry too much about this, as long as I get my 3x damage attacking from the shadows.

The other element I've always liked in design was the level perk. Similar to Fallout arguably, but this is where having a greater skill percentage not only makes you better, but comes with abilities. As I mentioned above (this is in the manual, so no spoilers), at Expert level stealth, I receive no penatly for my chance of detection while moving, meaning its the same as if I were standing still at lower levels. At Master, I ignore all NPC armor rating for an undetected first strike, which should do dramatic damage. As I said earlier though, the perks are make a valuable addition to just being 'better' and are meaningful. Other examples are counter-attacks and disarms for the Block skill to new attack types and staggering your enemy or paralysis for the weapon skills. Just to note, the hand to hand guy at Master level is really formidable, quoting the manual:

A Master gains Mastery Forward Power Attack, with a chance to paralyze, and when blocking, gains a chance of a disarm on a knockback attack.

So its seems the reward for sticking with a particular set of skills ( you can mix and match this btw...classless if you like), you can become very good at what you do, making focusing a worthwhile endeavour(as opposed to trying to be a jack of all).

Now, the dialog is going to be a big point of contention, as thats the 'narrative meat' of the game. Simply put, while the wiki dialog is there for 'misc. NPC's', its no different than the one liners you'd get from insignificant NPC's in Fallout. NPC's though that are plot or quest relevent are a bit more interactive, though unforunately it will never be like Fallout or Arcanum, where your dialog options are adjusted based on your attributes, the NPC's like or dislike of you or whether you want to be a nasty fellow or not. You get what you get and its more to tell you what you need to know so you can get back to 'doing stuff'. I'm not excusing Bethesda for not even considering doing a more meaningful dialog system, but its just not a game stopper. I still find the situations interesting and have even been sucked up into reading 24 page books about a vampire hunter, and another about a group exploring some ancient ruins.

I'm getting long winded here and need coffee, so to wrap up a few things:

The quests ARE far more interesting as was promised, and are multi-layered. You wont just go from point A to B and be done. You'll tail NPC's, investigate crime scenes or rummage through an NPC's stuff for clues to whatever. As I said, where the dialog might not be all that it could be, the 'doing stuff' part is more than satisfying.

The world is massive and again just cluttered with object density. There is always something to look in or behind or steal.

The graphics is what everyone has seen in the screens, but even videos don't really do justice to how important the draw distance is to that feeling of 'being' in a world. You're enveloped by it. Its almost overwhelming to see a sky full of bright twinkling stars, that moon up there (are there two?) and the silhouette of the forest and mountains all around you as far as you can see. I was right about one thing I tried my best to explain about the 'distant' graphics in this thread, page 7 (won't direct link to my post??)...the 'muddy' or 'blurry blobs' are from cells that have yet to be loaded. So its not even a product of mipmapping or lack of AF or what have you, its actually just low quality geometry, with a low quality normal map to make the far off terrain 'feel' bumpy but actually making it look worse. The moment you cross that 'threshold', the real geometry loads and it looks fine (though still with that dreaded texture patterning)

Overall, meh, it just doesn't matter as with all that parallax going on, the sheer distance at which you can see things and the density of your immediate surroundings make it all very very cool to explore. Oh, and yes it sucks they show you where some major locations are on the compass, but to play devils advocate, the world is SO cluttered with objects and foliage, I can hear people equally complaining that they couldn't find X or Y. A toggle to turn markers on/off would've been ideal, but its really not a huge issue.

Interiors are really impressive, with an overwhelming amount of detail and stuff. This is expected as every one of them is loaded, so you're getting a smaller area that is just filled to the brim. This includes dungeons which are genuinely spooky, especially when you know you're going after a witch thats raising the local dead.

I dont want to repeat whats been said a hundred times now, but I'll concur that Bethesdas decision to use FaceGen to make their hundreds(thousands?) of seemingly random faces was asking for 'crap' quality. This was a concious decision and why it looks bad isn't a big mystery. Detracts from the game? Nope.

The day/night cycle, even without real shadows still invokes a nice level of emotion and is well detailed with accurate lighting, haze and color. Oh and speaking of shadows, one thing I like thats subtle but works is their use of a projective map on the ground for the 'tree shadows', so you do feel like you're walking under the canopy. Its a world of great contrasts, which is very important for depth and to separate forms.

Lastly, after 17 hours of playing, I've only made it to level 6, joined the thieves guild, made a looong trek to one other town (having only been in the Imperial City for most of that time) so I could fence my loot, and I completely forgot I have to take the kings amulet to some guy in Chorrol(meaning I've yet to do even the first quest for the main story). I've been in two caves (not really dungeons as they were nowhere as involved as the one you start in) so I've yet to see a real dungeon and I've also yet to burgle anything of significant value (i.e. the ImpCity Jeweler), but I'm making a mental note of the very interesting shit I'm seeing locked in glass cases and glass cabinets filled with enticing and mysterious valuables (not just jewels...books and scrolls and weapons on display at a certain northern castle). I've found two houses for sale, both well outside my purchasing power, and one was an absolute shithole, so I can't even fathom what the nice places cost, but this appears to finally give gold some real value, so you dont end the game mad wealthy but with nothing to buy.

You get a wonderful and complete sensation like this game could never end. I seem to never be at a loss for things to do, with a back catalogue of stuff I wasn't either strong enough to do or close enough to want to travel to, and, I still have the kings amulet to take all the way fuck over to Chorrol.

Good stuff guys...too bad many of you will judge this without giving is a serious look. I'd be hard pressed to believe you couldn't find some aspect of the game you'd enjoy.



Cheers

Huh, odd that you avoided the other town. Me? I went straght for them, and have yet to go in the Imperial city.

*breaks out map* Cheydinhal is the name.



Anyway, in whats sure to be quoted as to why Oblivion sucks, or why only idiots like the game, There was one new part that I just took guilty pleasure from.

You can hit items.

Like, knock them over, about, etc.

I went in a mages guild, pulled out a great hammer, and just knocked all their glass alchemy sets off of tables, counters, etc.

Had no real effect, I dont even think they noticed. IT was just one of those bart simpson flinstones phone moments, where you just go "Hur Hur Hurrrr" and laugh at yourself.

Quigs said:

I went in a mages guild, pulled out a great hammer, and just knocked all their glass alchemy sets off of tables, counters, etc.

Had no real effect, I dont even think they noticed. IT was just one of those bart simpson flinstones phone moments, where you just go "Hur Hur Hurrrr" and laugh at yourself.

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Awww. This explains why guards see through walls and floors. You could kick stuff in a dark corner and then pick it up.

Quigs said:

Had no real effect, I dont even think they noticed.

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I'll admit that I like the idea of having real physics in an RPG, and having a world/objects that you can interact with, but having a room full of mages who don't notice you trashing their alchemy lab is pretty lame.

Quigs said:

Huh, odd that you avoided the other town. Me? I went straght for them, and have yet to go in the Imperial city.

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Well only because the ImpCity is like right behind you. I think its actually more curious as to why you went for a far and away city with the Imp towers staring you in the face. :D

Quigs said:

Anyway, in whats sure to be quoted as to why Oblivion sucks, or why only idiots like the game, There was one new part that I just took guilty pleasure from.

You can hit items.

Like, knock them over, about, etc.

I went in a mages guild, pulled out a great hammer, and just knocked all their glass alchemy sets off of tables, counters, etc.

Had no real effect, I dont even think they noticed. IT was just one of those bart simpson flinstones phone moments, where you just go "Hur Hur Hurrrr" and laugh at yourself.

Click to expand...

See thats just it...while it would take no effort at all(by Beths) to allow the NPC's to get angry with you as they do if you try to steal something, a part of me thinks the decision was more to avoid a 'bull in a china shop' syndrome, where a less than agile player is innocently knocking shit over. Then again, it could've been simply that hitting objects in a room (armed or unarmed) would trigger the reaction whereas simply bumping them would not.

micmu said:

Awww. This explains why guards see through walls and floors. You could kick stuff in a dark corner and then pick it up.

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Guards can see through walls and floors? No.

Besides you can't really 'direct' items too easily(to kick into corners), so it would be more effort than its worth. My stealth is at 50, so I was able to sneak behind a guard and pickpocket his two castle keys most deftly without being caught. Anyway, NPC's follow you around their shops/houses if you stray from their sight, so unless said corner was 'around' a corner, they'd catch you stealing it one way or the other, dark or otherwise..

Or, even better, after you knock something over the NPC would come up to you and say "WTF NOOB!" then you could say "OMG I SRY, DIDNT SEE TAHT THAR!" or "THATZ REIT BITCHS! I KEEL UR STUF!".

But that would take extra effort. Bethesda hates extra effort.

Actually, having just installed Half-Life 2 (I got it yesterday, GOTY edition ), the exact same thing happens there. Pick something up and throw it at those face mask guys and they're all like "Pick that shit up bitch!" and you're like "Fuck you!" and they're like *BEAT BEAT BEAT* and you're like "Hey!" and "Damn, where's my crowbar already?".