Skipping the Main Oblivion Plotline

[Hiphophippo]

I did complete the main plotline but it's nothing special. In fact, I feel that about mostly the entire game. While I would never argue Oblivion is a "bad" game, I just had the pleasure of being weened by previous Elder Scrolls games. Games that make Oblivion look bland and tiny by comparison.

 

[Tears of Blood]

I liked the main storyline well enough. Take it slowly and do everything the game has to offer.

 

[WaywardHaymaker]

The Main story was... okay, I guess. It wasn't original, or well executed but the dungeons were fun.

And the last thing that happens in the main story is a fight between Satan and a dragon that's on fire. I really don't care about how lame the story leading up to that is, I think that's badass enough.

 

[Kialee]

Oblivion's main plotline is actually horrendously boring. The sidequests (and if you play on the PC, modded content) are usually quite a bit more engaging.
The ending is also rather lackluster. Really, you should do everything else and then slave your way through the main quest. It's not worth the (questionable) effort to watch someone else fix everything magically.

"but kia you're not the hero of the story" I had to fix everything, that makes me the hero. It's a boring plotline.

 

[i64ever]

1) Yes, finish the game if just so you can say you did it.
2) Yes, I beat the main quest, though I always did a couple of fighters guild or mages guild quests inbetween each main plot quest just so it didn't get too boring.
3) The ending was easily the best part of the main plot.
4) I grew up on games like Ultima 4 and the early Final Fantasies, so to me an RPG without a "save the world from disaster" quest is like pizza without cheese. I couldn't have enjoyed the sandbox quests without it.

 

[demoman_chaos]

I did, and was disappointed. The most annoying part was having to close the Oblivion gates, which are very tedious.
I also loved the Dark Brotherhood stuff, though I had to use the console to unlock everything because I am terrible at the lockpicking (the PC controls for it are poo). It and the thieves guild are the 2 that felt like they required more skill than just running in and commiting mass murder. I did the fighter's guild and it was ok when it picked up but started out quite bland.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

Should I finish the game? (I'd say I'm approximately 40% through it) [br]

Sadly, most of your time with the main plotline is spent closing various Oblivion portals. There are a few decent quests sprinkled about however.

Did you finish the main plotline yourself?[br]

The first time I played it, yes.

Is the ending worth the hours put in?[br]

I seem to recall an achievement was gained from the deal. I also got a sweet suit of Armor that would have been awesome had I not had a full suit of custom enchanted armor that perfectly fit my playstyle.

What were your thoughts on the Main storyline as a whole?

It isn't bad to be honest. Fairly standard fantasy fair and all. The problem is, Oblivion lacks any real "characters". Sure there are people with names and faces that figure prominently into the plot, they just seemed entirely flat and uninteresting. Sadly, those that support the various Guild questlines (especially the Dark Brotherhood) are better in most respects.

 

[Denizen]

Get mods.

There are mods for everything, overhauled combat system, npcs, new spells, new locations, new quests, new weapons/armor, new creatures and of course mods expanding the guilds and adding guilds.

Before you venture off, check out these first and then head to one of the biggest sites dedicated to oblivion mods:

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Must_Have_Mods - best resource

http://obse.silverlock.org/ - for mods that push the boundaries of the game but carefully coded in such as custom npc companions that can do way more than what bethesda intended and lower in the page are a list of mods that the makers of obse acknowledged.

http://www.tesnexus.com/ - best website for oblivion mods and extremely active

A few i recommend is the oblivion patch by the community, a new user interface for the menu, and the mod manager that allows you to activate and deactivate each and every mod at will. It may seem tedious at first to learn and load them in but trust me, this is the next level of Oblivion especially if you thought the "Vanilla" version (modding term for original game files) was incredible. Once you see what the modding community has been doing, it's almost iresistable to not want to try what they have done.

Every summer (best time to play an addictive game) I add more mods and so far have 38 mods installed and all compatible with each other but most are compilation which have more than one feature installed at a time. People on tesnexus.com are very friendly and have up to 100 mods installed at a time... but i'm good with my 38

Prefferred way of playing oblivion is dungeon crawling. I take my custom made npc companions into a dungeon made by the community where all the item's dropped are extremely powerful and aesthetically pleasing. I got so involved in the mods made that I tailored each of them to have a unique fighting style and their own arsenal.

P.S. if you're unable to get the console up, they made a simple mod to change the key to open it up.

 

[Gizmo]

My first time playing I focused on making money and getting the best gear, then I completed all the guilds and expecting a epic story line I was terribly disappointed as I beat it in one day.

 

[Flig]

I'd say it's worth it, but if you plan on doing the Daedric Shrines, make sure you finish Boethia's quest before you close finish the Main Quest Line, you need a Daedric Heart to start Boethia's.

 

[Calum_M]

The main questline is probably the worst thing about oblivion. Though I did it for the sigil stones you get when you shut down the oblivion gates.

 

[xuberfail]

I avoided starting the main story because i didn't like the look of these oblivion portals ruining my lovely (heavily moded) fantasy country side.

 

[OojahHalo]

Personally, I finished the story just so it would never come back to bother me ever again. Plus, it is an easy way to grab a few gamer points.

 

[Shepard's Shadow]

Should I finish the game? No,the main story is boring.

Did you finish the main plotline yourself? Yes, I did.

Is the ending worth the hours put in? No.

What were your thoughts on the Main storyline as a whole? It's boring, too linear and too average. It just wasn't that great.

You seem to have a negative opinion about the main plotline, I'm curious as to your opinion on the game as a whole.

That's fair. Honestly, Oblivion is very good overall. It has lots of flaws that keep it from being great, the main story, 10 voice actors, bugs, glitches, repetitive areas, etc. But I still enjoyed the game and would recommend it to people who like open world fantasy games. That said, I would make sure to tell them Oblivion's flaws before they decided to play it.

Hmm I agree with the vast majority of that. I noticed more repetitive areas in Fallout 3 than Oblivion, but I can see where you are coming from. A lot of the bugs and glitches can be fixed by unofficial patches however, not to mention the modding community for Oblivion is huge! I guess I love the mods more than the game, but kudos to Bethesda for including a modding kit in the first place.

Unfortunately, I am a console gamer. Unofficial patches and mods don't matter to me. I have seen some awesome mods for both Oblivion and Fallout 3. Some of the mods for Fallout 3 almost tempted me to go out and buy a good gaming PC.

 

[Poofs]

id finish the story cause you get a badass suit of armor and the final set peice is unbelievably epic
i can honestly say that Bethesda was touched by His noodly appendage

 

[SextusMaximus]

Should I finish the game? No,the main story is boring.

Did you finish the main plotline yourself? Yes, I did.

Is the ending worth the hours put in? No.

What were your thoughts on the Main storyline as a whole? It's boring, too linear and too average. It just wasn't that great.

You seem to have a negative opinion about the main plotline, I'm curious as to your opinion on the game as a whole.

That's fair. Honestly, Oblivion is very good overall. It has lots of flaws that keep it from being great, the main story, 10 voice actors, bugs, glitches, repetitive areas, etc. But I still enjoyed the game and would recommend it to people who like open world fantasy games. That said, I would make sure to tell them Oblivion's flaws before they decided to play it.

Hmm I agree with the vast majority of that. I noticed more repetitive areas in Fallout 3 than Oblivion, but I can see where you are coming from. A lot of the bugs and glitches can be fixed by unofficial patches however, not to mention the modding community for Oblivion is huge! I guess I love the mods more than the game, but kudos to Bethesda for including a modding kit in the first place.

Unfortunately, I am a console gamer. Unofficial patches and mods don't matter to me. I have seen some awesome mods for both Oblivion and Fallout 3. Some of the mods for Fallout 3 almost tempted me to go out and buy a good gaming PC.

I can't help say much but that I'm sorry, the mods are really spectacular. If you have the chance to get a second hand copy of it for PC, GET IT. The Mods are more than worth the money!

 

[TheIr0nMike]

Do it. No reason not to.

 

[fanklok]

I beat every quest in the entire game.

My favorite part was the Dark Brotherhood and the Thieves guild. I remade characters over and over to beat those two guilds again and again and would then quit.

That said how can you call yourself a fan if you never beat the game? Lol.

Why shouldn't I? I enjoyed the games thoroughly and put many hours into them. The main quest just bored me, I'm still of a fan of - essentially - the game.

You can do as you please, but if someone were to walk up to me and go man I love Portal... I would expect them to understand where the song Still Alive comes from.

Your argument is understandable, however flawed. A fan of Portal will have finished the game because it's approximately 3 hours long worth of linear puzzles. It would be impossible for them to get side - tracked. Oblivion on the other hand has numerous amounts of side quests, and the game is enjoyable JUST from that.

Another point is that, just because a person hadn't finished Portal, doesn't mean that said person shouldn't be allowed to be a fan.

EDIT: Also, I hope I don't come across as assertive, I was just stating a point.

I beg to differ, I've spent hours putting the physics engine through the ringer flinging myself about the map at the speed of HOLY FUCK WHAT WAS THAT.

 

[ZeppelinFan29]

The main story line to Oblivion always seemed rather blah compared to Morrowind's. Maybe I just hated closing gates.

As has been said- you'd like Morrowind if you can look past the inferior graphics and terrible combat/magic system. The world feels much much bigger (at least it does to me) and since you like guilds you'll be in luck because there are more than twice as many factions to join.

Plus Morrowind kind of cons you into playing through a couple of more times to play through Bloodmoon differently and to try and sample all three Great Houses (shame Indoril and Dres aren't options too, that'd be epic)

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

Just a quick note. After reading this thread, I decided that I should install Oblivion again in order to actually finish the Shivering Isles and Knights of the Nine. As per my new policy, I install games to a large capacity secondary drive rather than the array that houses my OS and common use programs. It turns out, if you are running the 64 bit version of Windows 7, the game will crash to desktop unless you install the game to the Program Files (x86) directory. Apparently (as near as I can tell at any rate after fighting the issue for about 8 hours), if you install it anywhere else, there are problems stemming from either the use of multiple cores (though forcing the program to run on even a single core failed to resolve the problem. This idea was presented by Bethesda support) or the x64 instruction set (By default, a program installed in the x86 folder will execute using x86 emulation).

Just thought I'd throw that out for anyone who might run into a similar problem.