The Elder Scrolls V

[tiredinnuendo]

See, but for those of us who played Morrowind, you just sound uninformed.

Morrowind *had* fast travel, and it made sense. You had striders, boats, mark and recall, the various interventions, and the super jump artifact that everyone made for themselves at some point. Oblivion's fast travel was *lazy*. That's the problem.

Right, I never played Morrowind. Poor me, I guess that means my opinion doesn't matter then.

It may be *lazier* compared to what Morrowind had, but if you loved that so much than only fast travel from cities to other cities or whatever. Just act it out if it bothers you so much.

Now now, don't get your panties in a bunch or whatever. All I'm pointing out is that you can't really take a stand on the intergrity of the Elder Scrolls series if you only played part 4. It's not unlike someone who only saw Terminator 3 saying that they loved it and all Terminator movies should follow that model, whereas the rest of us are saying, "If they want to make more movies like that, fine, but they don't belong in the Terminator mythos.

In short, there are already plenty of super generic RPGs that basically play themselves for you. The Elder Scrolls was never that way, and that's not what this series of games is for.

Likewise with the compass. In Morrowind, you would have quests that had directions like, "Head to the east along the mountain range until you come to two trees growing in the center of the field, from there, head south until the river curls past you, the follow that southwest to an alcove in the rocks, at which point the light of the sun shall shine upon the temple doorway." And if you followed those directions, you got there.

In Oblivion, the quests were, "There is a cave to the south. Follow your magic compass." The option to not use it just wasn't there in the same way. It was, again, lazy.

Don't get me wrong, your arguments sound good on paper, they just don't hold up against experience.

- J

With the compass, sure, we could have those type of directions and the compass as an option. That way it could work out for everyone.

I'd be fine with them implementing a difficulty setting and the compass only being available on the easiest difficulty, but again, that's not what the Elder Scrolls was for. It's for exploring, and a magical compass is the enemy of all that is exploring the world. The fact is that, in Oblivion, the compass was required because the landscape was not hand-drawn. There was nothing to distinguish any 100-yard square from any other 100-yard square. The attention to detail was gone. Therefore, there was nothing to give directions based on. Go north until you're in a green field exactly like all the other green fields?

If they put back in the detailed world, there would be no need for a compass, but again, I guess they could put an easy difficulty or something for people who feel that they need it.

- J

 

[social_outcast]

I would like TES5 to take place in Morrowind again, and this time the whole of Morrowind. If that's not an option Skyrim is my second best.

Kill fast travel
don't give the protagonist and everyone else the stamina of a marathon runner
Bring back the extensive list of skills
Bring back staves and spears for god sakes
Bring back TES3 Dark Elf voice actor
Get rid of every-idiot-can-use-spells/repair armor/join any faction-gameplay
Axes are NOT blunt weapons
Bring back TES3 levelling system
Death to immersion-killing conversation system
Better lore than previous TES
More landscape diversity
Stop making it so damn easy to earn piles of money
Make legendary/very powerful items expensive as hell again (I liked the way the 210000 looked at me while I was checking out my Staff of Magnus in my inventory )
Interesting main story line
Bring back TES3 persuasion system (never understood how my character knew if this person liked being threatened or not, or how much gold you have to give him/her to get god knows how much disposition up)
Get rid of map markers
Make it harder to obtain legendary/Daedric artefacts.
Better AI
Don't tell the player what to do with every quest update; some people can figure out they have to go talk to Johnny because he was last seen with the murder victim themselves.

That's about it, can't think of anything more right now.

Yes I'm a huge TES3 fan and maybe I just like to revive the glory days it was the best one of the series. Loved it, still loving it, will always love it and no RPG I played after pulled me in like that game did.

You Forgot: Make the main plot semi-optional and more subtle (always enjoyed tossing the package to balmora in a seyda neen swamp when I first got off the boat to good old vvardefell )

location wise I wouldn't mind BlackMarsh but that may lack diversity - I would geuss they'll be taking use back to highrock or hammerfell if there was to be a sequal, they really didnt portray cyrodil as awsomely in TES 4 as they should have.
Akivir would also be nice, but I realy doubt that would be a visitable location.

 

[OuroborosChoked]

I'd like to see a return to the scope of the original games. Every sequel is smaller than the previous game. Arena was HUGE. Daggerfall, while large, was smaller than Arena. Skipping the side-story games, Morrowind, while still big, was smaller than Daggerfall. Oblivion was just TINY. I don't care if the game has to take a hit in the graphics department... just do away with those damn invisible walls. Give me the whole continent!

And give me back my levitation, dammit!

 

[XxRALxX]

This post isnt a suggestion, this is ...well...i forgot the term, read it >:0

You know, i think what would spice up Elder Scrolls is moving away from tameril, we have only known one continent, i mean i dont even think that the game developers know how big the world is


There would be new races, or possibly the same races, possibly extinct races, like the aylieds, or
un-hostile demora. And ofcoarse the other problems people have labled, but i think im mistaken, i belive this story is on a lich or watever, i remember reading on the offical forums somone said that. But i think that would be a good push off for Elder Scrolls, and who dosent mind walking around 2000 miles of game map to kill a huge dragon?!

And none of us have been to underwater palaces or fortresses, except the knights of the nine...but that dosent count.

Im just saying, they should expand the story, for....what more then 7 hours of game play, because this is suposed to be an epic story, not some a "Main Quest". I say the side quests should only be on the way to the Epic story, and offcoarse veering off is totaly do-able.

Oh, and horses are a burden....enough said, that is the only problem i have with oblivion, besides everything else, aslong as i get "epic lootinz", it over casts the stupid horse/fast travle oxymoron, for me atleast.

OH, and i think they should do somthing like Neverwinter Nights 2, make it action based but semi-turn based, i think it would add on the deep down rpg aspect, and you can take care of npcs that decide to join up with you, stupid friendly fire. >:i

THE END

yay

 

[OuroborosChoked]

This post isnt a suggestion, this is ...well...i forgot the term, read it >:0

You know, i think what would spice up Elder Scrolls is moving away from tameril, we have only known one continent, i mean i dont even think that the game developers know how big the world is


There would be new races, or possibly the same races, possibly extinct races, like the aylieds, or
un-hostile demora. And ofcoarse the other problems people have labled, but i think im mistaken, i belive this story is on a lich or watever, i remember reading on the offical forums somone said that. But i think that would be a good push off for Elder Scrolls, and who dosent mind walking around 2000 miles of game map to kill a huge dragon?!

And none of us have been to underwater palaces or fortresses, except the knights of the nine...but that dosent count.

Im just saying, they should expand the story, for....what more then 7 hours of game play, because this is suposed to be an epic story, not some a "Main Quest". I say the side quests should only be on the way to the Epic story, and offcoarse veering off is totaly do-able.

Oh, and horses are a burden....enough said, that is the only problem i have with oblivion, besides everything else, aslong as i get "epic lootinz", it over casts the stupid horse/fast travle oxymoron, for me atleast.

OH, and i think they should do somthing like Neverwinter Nights 2, make it action based but semi-turn based, i think it would add on the deep down rpg aspect, and you can take care of npcs that decide to join up with you, stupid friendly fire. >:i

THE END

yay

NO!

It's Tamriel

http://i73.photobucket.com/albums/i201/Vality7/TamrielMap.jpg

and that's how big it is.

 

[Rooster Cogburn]

For me, Morrowind set the bar by which I judge all other RPGs. I was hoping that Bethesda would build on that success with Oblivion. I'm tempted to list every reason why Morrowind > Oblivion, but I don't think anyone has that kind of time.

I wish that TES V would take place in Cyrodil again, and do it right this time.

 

[poleboy]

The Elder Scrolls games have always had tons of issues. It's not strange, seeing as how their vision is much more ambitious than most developers'.

As for the inevitable TES V... I think Skyrim is the most likely province they will set the story in. They've already done Daggerfall, Morrowind and Cyrodiil (twice, if I'm not mistaken). There's an old spin-off game called Redguard that takes place in Hammerfall. My Tamriel lore is bit rusty, but I believe Black Marsh, Valenwood and Elswyyr are not under heavy Imperial control. A game set there would probably look a lot different due to the lack of imperial influence. They are also quite "uncivilized" compared to the other provinces with lots of jungles or desert.

Gameplay-wise, I think they are certainly learning from their mistakes. However, there are a couple of things that have failed in most of the games that I think are in dire need of a total make-over:

1) The AI is abysmal. Like really, really bad. A lot of enemies still have trouble with doors and pathfinding and NPC companions are insanely suicidal. It would be nice if the NPC's in general had other settings than "fight to the death" or "run at the sight of blood".

2) Magic is still very easily exploitable. If they simply changed the system so that your spells only give skill points when they actually hit of affect something that would make a big difference. Of course, you could still max them out by casting on yourself, but then it would at least be limited to non-combat spells.

3) More money sinks or more economic balance. The houses in Oblivion was a nice addition, but there could be more. Why not let the player buy an entire town or some titles or some ridiculously expensive art objects or something... it wouldn't take much effort to add a few more static objects or extra titles to the game and it would give players more motivation to play the game after the main storylines were completed.

4) Don't dumb it down. Console players are not idiots. Some of the changes from TES III to IV were excellent, others were unecessary simplification. Fast travel is a nice idea, but I think they overdid it a bit. Somewhere in between Morrowind and Oblivion would be nice, though I am personally more a fan of the way Morrowind did it. I think they cut out the right skills though. Three armor skills are too much and enchantment was completely broken. The way enchantments work in Oblivion is much better I think. Although axes are not blunt, they way they are used are basically the same. However, why no spears? I also think the magic schools need some more work. They claim they redid the entire magic school system, but I don't see it. Destruction is still basically the only school you need, because 99% of the quests end in a fight to the death at some point, and Destruction is the only school that permanently removes health. All the other schools are reduced to utility, such as healing, grabbing something out of reach and invisibility. The only school that has even a slight offensive use is Conjuration.

6) Spend more time on voice acting. The actors were fine, but the AI fucks up a lot and the conversations between NPC's is too often nonsensical. There are also some glaring mistakes, such as the beggars who only use beggar-voice for some dialog and nobleman-voice for other. I can't believe how that got past a single playtester.

 

[DarkHyth]

poleboy, your avatar is the greatest thing ever. And perfectly fitting for this topic. Die Fargoth!

 

[Squarewave]

A lot of people seem to be looking at morrowind with rose colored glasses and/or jumping on the oblivion sucks bandwagon. Completely ignoring the downsides of morrowind and upsides of oblivion

A major complaint people bring up with oblivion is that its too easy, while ignoring that once you go to level 10 or so in morrowind you could kill almost anything with ease, and by level 13 you could have enough money to buy your way to the level cap by using the trainers with no limits on how much you could train all it took was a little gold to cap a skill in a few min. Around level 30 nothing could stop you, or was even remotely a challenge without even the need for enchanted items. With self made enchanted items you could make yourself immortal at even very low levels

Oblivion's combat system was much much better; morrowinds system was an old school type ware hitting attack the game would factor your skill and fatigue to tell if you would hit, blocking was based entirely on skill and chance. oblivion ware you always hit your target but skill effected damage and what moves you could do. Shields are active allowing you to keep the shield up on an enemy that is wildly attacking

AI was much much better; It wasn't perfect but having npcs go thew the motions of a normal life, added much to the game. NPCs would get up in the morning eat breakfast go to work, after work they would go somewhere to relax and eat, then going home to read a book before going to sleep. Part of the reason for the quest markers is that some npcs would travel all over the map, some even explore caves and ruins. The AI did bug out at times but was vastly better then having them stand still 24/7 like a majority of games

Yea there was lots of things in morrowind I wish they added to oblivion, mostly skills. I just have a hard time seeing why some people jump on the oblivion hate bandwagon

 

[vede]

Wait, I read that Morrowind's combat was not repetitive?

Oh, really? Strange, seeing how the two combat systems were almost identical, except Oblivion had special attacks based on your skills...

Heh, I didn't say Morrowind's combat wasn't repetitive, just it seemed more so than Oblivion. Yeh, Oblivion had the 4 direction-and-hold-attack "special attacks" but really, compared to the not-hold quick slash attack, they were the only ones worth using as they did far more damage and depleted fatigue less than it would if you did the same amount of damage with multiple weak slashes. Also, you needed to obtain high proficiency in Swords to be able to use the "sideways" and "backwards" special attacks. In Morrowind, there were 3 types of attack from the start: Chop, Slash, and Thrust, and each could be held as long as desired. So really, Oblivion has little more than Morrowind in terms of variability in attacks, especially early game.

Still, Morrowind combat may get repetitive, but it just felt to reach that point slower than Oblivion

Oblivion also had "Special Attacks" that were based on your skill with the weapon. You could perform a side-power attack with a mace and if you were good with a mace you might have a chance to stun your enemy, or disarm him, or something like that.

Also, to everyone who is saying that Morrowind is better than Oblivion in every way, how?

It seems that hating Oblivion is the big thing, but no one seems to have any reasons. They just do it. What is it that makes Morrowind the savior and messiah of RPGs and makes Oblivion the equivalent of a pile of elephant shit? Am I the only one in the world who is not a complete idiot and thinks that Oblivion was better?

 

[Yx0que]

I only played Oblivion and it could use some improvements.
* The fast travel system doesn't need to go, it just need to make sense. Use magic or portals or some kind of flying creature.
* Guards authority should be limited to their city. Or they shouldn't know everything. But sometimes they come storming in when nobody could see you. This doesn't make sense.
* Deeper combat system.
* And I don't want to be able to join every guild. You can become Arch-Mage without ever casting a spell,once again: try to make sense with this.
* If you're going to have stealth make it a valid option. I find that once you reach a certain level stealth is useless because it doesn't do enough damage.
* Better voice acting

And some said: don't dumb it down because it's on a console. I wholehearthly agree with this. Console gamers aren't completely retarded.

 

[DarkHyth]

Wait, I read that Morrowind's combat was not repetitive?

Oh, really? Strange, seeing how the two combat systems were almost identical, except Oblivion had special attacks based on your skills...

Heh, I didn't say Morrowind's combat wasn't repetitive, just it seemed more so than Oblivion. Yeh, Oblivion had the 4 direction-and-hold-attack "special attacks" but really, compared to the not-hold quick slash attack, they were the only ones worth using as they did far more damage and depleted fatigue less than it would if you did the same amount of damage with multiple weak slashes. Also, you needed to obtain high proficiency in Swords to be able to use the "sideways" and "backwards" special attacks. In Morrowind, there were 3 types of attack from the start: Chop, Slash, and Thrust, and each could be held as long as desired. So really, Oblivion has little more than Morrowind in terms of variability in attacks, especially early game.

Still, Morrowind combat may get repetitive, but it just felt to reach that point slower than Oblivion

Oblivion also had "Special Attacks" that were based on your skill with the weapon. You could perform a side-power attack with a mace and if you were good with a mace you might have a chance to stun your enemy, or disarm him, or something like that.

Yeah, that's what I meant by the direction-and-hold-attack "special attacks"... the power attacks. I'd forgotten their name. My point was basically that you needed to be a high skill level to get these attacks, and they make regular non-power attacks obsolete.

Also regarding Morrowind > Oblivion discussion, firstly Morrowind is a far better roleplayable environment than Oblivion. And TES series are RPGs. You should be able to roleplay as whatever you wish within the games limits. Morrowind's roleplay limits are far more extensive than Oblivion. Your skills are more important.

Secondly, the environment is much more detailed and fun to explore. It was mapped out personally, and as a result there are a lot more interesting places and things to see.

Squarewave mentioned difficulty... there are plenty of mods to up the dificulty in Morrowind if you want them, along with things to make the NPCs do things, like in Oblivion. Thats nothing special.

They took a lot out of Morrowind... some fun skills (Levitate, Mark/Recall), spears and staves, the decent magic system, the enchanting system and so on. In short, Oblivion is just a step forward in looks, but a step back in gameplay and replayability. After the 1st Oblivion gate, you're not going to see anything new in the others.

Someone mentioned earlier (I forget who) that Oblivion was built for the consoles. And they are right. Its toned down for the consoles, and as a result it lacks the intricacy and immersion of Morrowind. (something Yahtzee mentioned, immersion)

 

[KraitRazer]

It seems that hating Oblivion is the big thing, but no one seems to have any reasons. They just do it. What is it that makes Morrowind the savior and messiah of RPGs and makes Oblivion the equivalent of a pile of elephant shit? Am I the only one in the world who is not a complete idiot and thinks that Oblivion was better?

I totally agree that Oblivion was better. It is probably the game I have spent longest on in my entire life and I even bought Morrowind when I cut down on my Oblivion addiction. I found that I played it for about 10 hours and went straight off it. I have completed Oblivion several times now and created the perfect character for combat, magic and stealth. I completed all but about 3 of the side quests and 2 daedric quests.(Mainly because for one of them you needed low intelligence but I had 100.)I still go back to the game sometimes because the dark brotherhood is such a good quest in it. The best one would have to be when you go into the house with the people who are convinced there is gold in the house but they are there so you can pick them off one by one. I loved convincing them that I wasn't the murderer and watching them pick each other off. In Morrowind I did prefer the quick travel system but even though the directions to the quests were more realistic and interesting sometimes they were hard to follow.

 

[DarkHyth]

I totally agree that Oblivion was better. It is probably the game I have spent longest on in my entire life and I even bought Morrowind when I cut down on my Oblivion addiction. I found that I played it for about 10 hours and went straight off it.

This is the problem. You played Oblivion first. Morrowind and Oblivion are rather different games to play. And as a result, people who played and enjoyed Morrowind find Oblivion to be lacking.

 

[Yx0que]

Someone mentioned earlier (I forget who) that Oblivion was built for the consoles. And they are right. Its toned down for the consoles, and as a result it lacks the intricacy and immersion of Morrowind. (something Yahtzee mentioned, immersion)

But they shouldn't tone it down because it's on a console. Console gamers like immersion just like pc-gamers, same goes for difficulty.

 

[DarkHyth]

Someone mentioned earlier (I forget who) that Oblivion was built for the consoles. And they are right. Its toned down for the consoles, and as a result it lacks the intricacy and immersion of Morrowind. (something Yahtzee mentioned, immersion)

But they shouldn't tone it down because it's on a console. Console gamers like immersion just like pc-gamers, same goes for difficulty.

It's not a matter of them being less into immersion, it's a matter of the consoles not being up to the job of providing it, modern PCs are capable of far more than consoles. And then developers get lazy and don't make the PC version better, they just port to it.

 

[BardSeed]

Immersion is what made Morrowind better.

Edit: Sorry I typed this before refreshing the page to check if anyone else had stated this. Turns out there were an extra 5 or so posts.

 

[Copter400]

Haven't we got a thread like this?

 

[SimuLord]

For starters, they should have the Oscuro's Oblivion Overhaul team working on the leveled lists and quests. Get Kobu (of KCAS fame) working on the level-up/skill advancement system, since Oblivion was borderline unplayable (at the very least you had to be extremely willing to forgive its flaws) in vanilla.

If they must have a fully voice-acted world, they'll need oh, about six or seven dozen voice actors before they're even on the start of the path to avoiding immersion killing. Wes Johnson can stay. So can the dude who voiced the male Redguards. But they're just the start of a voice acting team, not the end-all, be-all of one.

I'm not a fan of procedural generation in an overworld so I'm perfectly OK with a hand-drawn map set in just one province of Tamriel, and considering that Bruma and Solstheim (from Morrowind's Bloodmoon expansion) were the best-looking environments in their respective games, setting a game in Skyrim (and perhaps some borderlands outside the province) would make the game much prettier.

And one other thing---the system requirements don't have to be Crysis-esque. Graphics on the highest resolutions are already astounding, so feel free to recycle the Gamebryo engine from TES4 and just pretty up the textures and do some framerate optimization.

As for the "magic compass", there are no shortage of mods to address that issue. PC gaming FTW.