Emotional Attachment to Oblivion.

[Natural Hazard]

Okey people i need some opinions. I am currently doing a report for University about the emotional differences in JRPGS and your typical western open-ending RPG. To clear something up, to those who have played oblivion, have you ever felt emotionally attached to the game by what your character does? Such as you steal from someones house you are a little fearful/scared that you might get caught? but the actually story itself just feels like something that needs completing? Does creating your own side story within the game bring emotions to the table? Opinions would be nice.

Thanks

Rob.

 

[tiredinnuendo]

Oblivion was an FPS.

An FPS where all the characters looked ugly.

- J

 

[_Janny_]

I got emotionally attached to my character, but that happens to me in almost all RPGs anyway.
Other than that I felt sorry for the beggars I saw. And just looking in their little bag of food near a crappy bed they had to sleep in just made me feel like trash. (jeez, just look for stuff in the crates around the city and you'll end up rich, how the beggars didn't see that is beyond me...)
Felt rather sorry for that guard that follows you in the first Oblivion Gate and ends up killed one way or another.

 

[marfoir(IRL)]

In Oblivion I got bored with the main quest, completed the dark brotherhood quests, wondered what to do next and setteled on luring people into allyways at night and maiming them with various nasty daggers for giggles. Never had an emotional attatchment to the game, or any game related things really...(except Gordon Freeman ofc)

 

[Mausenheimmer]

I thought the characters in Oblivion were very compelling and while they never did send your character to the gallows if he were a murderer, it still offered an insane amount of freedom. Likewise, when playing as your character, you had to use an iota of imagination to enhance your experience. Conversely, in JRPG, the main character's personality is pre-determined to be an angsty androgynous teen.

 

[Chilango2]

I got attached to character in Morrowind, but everyone in Oblivion felt strangely flat.. I just couldn't be brought to care.

By the same token, I've cared about a great many jrpg characters and their travails a great deal.

 

[Kogarian]

I feel attached to creatures you can summon...my 'pets' as they were. But I'm a prick, as I have stolen out of beggars' bags.

The strongest emotion I've ever felt was a sense of anger and confusion that overshadow's my loyalty to my character (which is slightly above average). Here you have these strong arena fighters, tons of mages and fighters in the guilds, and psychic guards that are stronger then you...so why don't they make a huge army out of them and fight back the Daedrics? Instead of making them rely on you, a prisioner with no back story?

 

[John Galt]

Morrowind was a lot easier to develop attachments to the characters because their motives all seemed real. Be they religious fanatics, ashlander tribes or the string-pullers of a great house, the conflicts seemed realistically laid out. This coupled with the large amount of factions and Great Houses helped flesh out the world to an extent that just wasn't there in Oblivion.

 

[Retloc20]

I didn't get attached to the "morality" or characters in Oblivion. Their focus ended up being not on the characters or the system or inducing guilt or retributions for crimes or even actually affecting people's lives in any way, but on content, just the amount of content.
If you steal from somebody and they don't see it, they go on as though they never needed it in the first place. No loss to them, no loss to me. The Archmage has his staff stolen, well, heck, I don't need that, I'm magical! Peasants lose their food, keep living anyway, people lose their fortunes, can be robbed blind, and are never evicted, never starve, just exist.
They own merely in name and in the response of "Oh, attack the thief!" but aside from that, the fact that they are automatons becomes quickly clear.
If they want us to care, they need to have things matter. Steal this man's food, he'll starve unless he can get more. Burn this crop, a town goes hungry, poison the water with a dead body, people get sick, kill a man quietly, no-one finds out for a while. Steal a house, people ask questions and investigate. If I had to sneak in and out of houses I stole in Oblivion for fear of the neighbors seeing, that would be a different game entirely.

 

[Joeshie]

If you want emotional attachment in a Western RPG, look to Biowares RPGs. They put much more focus on story and characters than Bethesda does.

 

[Colodomoko]

Oblivion was an FPS.

An FPS where all the characters looked ugly.

- J

Someone hit him over the head with this bat!

http://www.kingpepper.com/gifs/bat.gif

RPG NOT FPS!!!

 

[tiredinnuendo]

Oblivion was an FPS.

An FPS where all the characters looked ugly.

- J

Someone hit him over the head with this bat!

http://www.kingpepper.com/gifs/bat.gif

RPG NOT FPS!!!

*Morrowind* was an RPG.

Oblivion is an FPS.

- J

 

[The Potato Lord]

I didn't get attached emotionally because i usually only kept characters I found useful or necessary alive in order to be able do do as much as i can, Sheogorath was the only character that made much sense to me which is a tad ironic seeing as he's the god of madness and all because he should be doing things for arbitrary reasons. All of the other characters just seem stupid with thier "hey you moved MY cup with the grab button half a micro meter! die thief!"

 

[Kogarian]

Oblivion was an FPS.

An FPS where all the characters looked ugly.

- J

Someone hit him over the head with this bat!

http://www.kingpepper.com/gifs/bat.gif

RPG NOT FPS!!!

*Morrowind* was an RPG.

Oblivion is an FPS.

- J

It depends. You could hack, slash, punch, electrocute, or fire arrows and missiles, etc, but you could use first-person or third.

You could also just run away, but I'm not sure anyone counts that as a type of game.

 

[Alphavillain]

I have a certain "emotional attachment" to my controller as it whizzes its way towards the wall after getting killed in some random battle in any one of the Final Fantasy games. as for "Oblivion", I kill and rob as many people as possible, without feeling guilty once.

 

[Echolocating]

Okey people i need some opinions. I am currently doing a report for University about the emotional differences in JRPGS and your typical western open-ending RPG.

Um, I must be getting behind the times because this sounds like the wrong topic for a university paper. Maybe attack it from simply Japanese games vs. Western? ...and you might find a lot more content to draw conclusions from. But what do I know? I never went to video game university. ;-)