Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Discussion Thread

meisdavidp said:
I appreciate the info, however, I am avoid ATI cards at the moment. I despise the kinds of nonsense they use with their Catalyst packages and I play a lot of games designed for Nvidia. I'm pretty much decided on the GeForce 7600GT and was simply seeing if anyone had heard any specific problems with it. Thanks for the info, though.
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You know, that makes about as much sense as avoiding Macs because they can run Windows software... but the software wasn't 'designed for Macs'. I play World of Warcraft, which was designed for nVidia.. and it works as well (if not better) on the ATi than it does on the nVidia, especially with the texture corruption issues which still remain unsolved with the more recent Detonator drivers. And, as far as I know, they've not 'tweaked' the drivers in the way you're implying here for years... no more than nVidia's been tweaking the Detonators to 'work better' in some games by leaving out some features.

And, currently, the x1900xt runs neck-in-neck with the GeForce 7900's, although the SLI implementation on the nVidia cards remains better. The main problem with the 7600's, IIRc, is that they're not as good a value for the money as the 7800's or 7900's. That, and texture corruption/creeping im some games (like WoW).
 
Well, he dislikes ATI because the ATI drivers are not as good as the nVidia ones. Makes perfect sense to me.


Anyways, the game is pretty nice. The bonus DVD is useless, like the one in C&C, but, who cares. I do think that the leveling system is kinda stupid, and the enemy-leveling system is very stupid.

I also recommend BTMod for those playing the PC versio, it makes the interface better.

And PLEASE, people, do NOT spoil Dark Brotherhood missions.
 
I got my 7600GT and the game took on a whole new life... I have everything cranked up except the blood decals (seem kind of pointless) and the shadows exterior and interior are set fairly low (not a high priority for me). I love that you can tweak the water to reflect actors and trees as well, really makes the game that much spectacular during fully HDR enhanced sunsets and sunrises... I just wish I wasn't on dial-up for another week so I could put Obscuro's Overhaul and that edited Behem leveling mod on... then my dream character (Sneak alchemist thief) would stand a chance in the harsh world of Oblivion. Also, anyone playing an alchemist needs the harvest mod. All it does is make plants go away once you've taken what you need from them and then they come back when they respawn. Very annoying to try to havest something twice...
 
I had it before. It's a useful mod, but I'm really just not messing with the game too much right now. I need the balance stuff and the stuff to take the compass markers off before I can take the game seriously. BT mod's on my list of mods to download.
 
I recently finished Oblivion with my female Breton: Saboteur class character. My major skills were blade, acrobatics, athletics, destruction, speechcraft, sneak, and light armor. I try to choose skills that I think I'll be using most the time. Destruction was nice cause I could just create a spell to shock damage myself and this helped make the leveling up process easier.

Anyway, there were lots of things I loved about this game. The physics were fun to play with. I liked how you could move bodies around or blast them into the air with a fire spell. It made decorating my house fun too. I placed the Welkynd stones all over my house. And stacking skulls on a table is sort of a mini game in itself.

The excitement of the physics does wear off eventually. After awhile I barely notice that I knock things over when walking to close to them. But the physics are still better than the harsh rigidness of Morrowind.

As far as the graphics, it really depended. Sometimes I think Morrowind still looks better than Oblivion. What bugs me about Oblivion is how things are either really dark to where you can barely see, or everything is so bright it's glowing. Like in the Imperial City the whole place is just radiant and it looks kind of tacky to me. Of course you can get light spells to counteract the dark caves.

The trees and bushes swaying in the breeze is a nice touch. And I don't care if you get close to them you can see how untextured they are. It still made everything appear more lifelike.

The radiant AI was kind of funny to me. It was nice to that NPC's didn't stand around in the same place their entire existence. But at the same time, you really don't do much in the towns unless it's day time. Since all the shops are closed. So usually I'd see the NPC's standing around in the same place anyway. Basically, unless you're willing to follow people around their whole day, you don't really get to see the extent of what they do. But I guess that's realistic cause we usually don't follow people around all day to make sure they're mixing it up.

The combat and magic use is much better in Oblivion than in Morrowind. Like everyone says, spells are more worth using. And I love the hotkey system for getting to my most frequently used spells and weapons.

In Oblivion, I found the faction quests more interesting the the main plot itself. I won't talk about the main plot right now, but my time spent in the Thieves Guild and Dark Brotherhood was some of the best gameplay I experienced. The Fighters and Mages guild quests were not as great, however. And I'm like most peopel when they wished the Morag Tong was in the game. But if I remember correctly, the Morag Tong was native to Morrowind anyway, and I seem to remember the DB not originally coming from Morrowind so it seemed to make sense I guess.

One way that Morrowind is superior to Oblivion is the main plot. There was so much to learn in Morrowind and I was really into reading all the books. Even of the same stories told by different perspectives. And there is pretty straightforward plot to Oblivion, but it was still much shorter than in Morrowind I thought. I have more to say about this game, but I'll get into it more later.
 
meisdavidp said:
The Dark Brotherhood missions seem pretty awesome to me. First bloody mission you have to infiltrate a pirate ship and kill the captain. Don't know about everyone else here, but I loved the mission impossible-style dynamic of missions like that. I seriously only was detected by/killed the captain despite numerous close calls.
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I love the quest where you can keep that woman's head as a memento.
 
I was underwhelmed by the main plot as well... I abandoned it... at the end of the sewers I think... I've recently been pursuing realism mods with reckless abandon. Not FAKE realism mods, mind you.

At the moment, I'm running deadlier sneaking, attack and hide, no more psychic guards, lots of darkeners and daylight enhancers, realistic encumbrance, arrow fletching, natural wildlife, no compass markers, no map landmarks (this includes the map in the inventory screen. means I have to go entirely by absolute directions and relative directions based on where I know I am. In other words, getting lost in the woods is terrifying if I don't keep an track of where I am. There's a bunch of other mods but those are the core realism ones. Those and the leveling-fix stuff. That and I keep the music turned off because let's face it. Real people don't have their own soundtracks anymore.

The end result is that the forest is a scary place at night... wolves hunt in packs and if I don't have a torch equipped I'm blind. The eerie silence/nature sounds only add to the creepyness. Just the way I like it. Once I have all my mod's set and fix all the conflicts I'll be able to commit to a new character. Should be fun.
 
meisdavidp said:
I was underwhelmed by the main plot as well... I abandoned it... at the end of the sewers I think... I've recently been pursuing realism mods with reckless abandon. Not FAKE realism mods, mind you.

At the moment, I'm running deadlier sneaking, attack and hide, no more psychic guards, lots of darkeners and daylight enhancers, realistic encumbrance, arrow fletching, natural wildlife, no compass markers, no map landmarks (this includes the map in the inventory screen. means I have to go entirely by absolute directions and relative directions based on where I know I am. In other words, getting lost in the woods is terrifying if I don't keep an track of where I am. There's a bunch of other mods but those are the core realism ones. Those and the leveling-fix stuff. That and I keep the music turned off because let's face it. Real people don't have their own soundtracks anymore.

The end result is that the forest is a scary place at night... wolves hunt in packs and if I don't have a torch equipped I'm blind. The eerie silence/nature sounds only add to the creepyness. Just the way I like it. Once I have all my mod's set and fix all the conflicts I'll be able to commit to a new character. Should be fun.
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With all of that I'm surprised you aren't using OOO or a similar mod.
 
Shipgate said:
There are talking lizards? Oh I get it. The Argonians. Cause they look like lizards, right?
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What other reason would there be? The sure look like lizards to me.

vampface.jpg
 
Delance said:
I really like realism on games with talking lizards.
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It helps with immersion if certain things are realistic. Talking lizards is probably possible with the right evolution. However, it isn't possible to carry 3 sets of plate-mail and jump 5 ft. into the air or run like normal. This is the kind of realism I strive for. The magic however, I don't have an explanation for that.;)
 
ChrisReid said:
What other reason would there be? The sure look like lizards to me.
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Yes, I understand they look like lizards. I was saying that having lizard-like creatures that talk isn't one of the things that lessens the realism in Oblivion.

That'd be as silly as me saying, "A talking lion? How unrealistic."
kilrathi_1_th.jpg
 
Lt.Death100, Actually, I'm doing a lot of research into the whole OOO vs Adventurers/etc debate. My problem with OOO is that it changes so many things in the game even in the "light version". I like being able to easily pick and choose which mods are doing what.
As far as the debate about realism in games that's sprung up, my stance on the issue is pretty simple. Something established like argonians or khaajiit races need not break immersion. A soundtrack or long distance teleporter, on the other hand, does break immersion. Conversely, did anyone else find it particularly distracting that all the ingredients (plants and so forth) in Cyrodiil are much more "real world-centric" than Morrowind's ingredients? I just found my well established cat and lizard-people a little less believable when they sell you nothing but pumpkins and apples and strawberries.
 
meisdavidp said:
I was underwhelmed by the main plot as well... I abandoned it... at the end of the sewers I think... I've recently been pursuing realism mods with reckless abandon. Not FAKE realism mods, mind you.

At the moment, I'm running deadlier sneaking, attack and hide, no more psychic guards, lots of darkeners and daylight enhancers, realistic encumbrance, arrow fletching, natural wildlife, no compass markers, no map landmarks (this includes the map in the inventory screen. means I have to go entirely by absolute directions and relative directions based on where I know I am. In other words, getting lost in the woods is terrifying if I don't keep an track of where I am. There's a bunch of other mods but those are the core realism ones. Those and the leveling-fix stuff. That and I keep the music turned off because let's face it. Real people don't have their own soundtracks anymore.

The end result is that the forest is a scary place at night... wolves hunt in packs and if I don't have a torch equipped I'm blind. The eerie silence/nature sounds only add to the creepyness. Just the way I like it. Once I have all my mod's set and fix all the conflicts I'll be able to commit to a new character. Should be fun.
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You turned Oblivion into Medieval Doom3.
 
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