Well it was fine as long as it lasted.
Do I think that there is a big number of people who exaggerate about it ? yes.
Does that make it bad ? No,not at all.
For some people it's a mind blowing experience. They never played in such a large world,being able to do so many different things in one game.
For others it's not so good as it could have been. There is a popular theory among fans of The Elder Scrolls series,and that is that usually the first game of the series you will play,will be your favorite.
Personally I enjoyed Oblivion way more than Skyrim,even though most people prefer Skyrim.
The thing is,while Oblivion lacks something in presentation (particle effects,art style,animations) it earns it on other aspects,like way more interesting side-quests,increased replay value etc.
It seems that Skyrim's development idea was to do as more things as possible and don't bother on refining them,like it goes for quantity instead of quality. In comparison to Oblivion,Skyrim has more 'features'. It has werewolf gameplay,crafting,and fighting from horseback.
But while it has more things,they are so simply materialized that they feel tacked on.
And you can see how Skyrim went for quantity over quality,when you step in one of those huge fires the Giants have started,and absolutely nothing happens to your character. In Oblivion if you would step in a fire like that,you would get health damage,and your character would literally get in fire with fancy visual effects. It's obvious that during the development of Oblivion the devs spent more time thinking of ways of making what the game already had to feel more organic/responsive/interactive/better than spend their time adding as much new stuff possible.
There have been many videos on Youtube commenting on the 'simplification' of the series.
Trying to have an objective view,I'd say that while the simplification of Skyrim made it more approachable to a bigger number of people,it also made it more shallow,and that shallowness doesn't generate the same amount of enjoyment some people found on let's say Oblivion or Morrowind.
Skyrim is more easy for a player that is not used on hardcore CRPGs to get into it.
People that play RPGs casually might get overwhelmed by Oblivion for example.
Yet if someone seeks depth,and the kind of experience of a 'hardcore' RPG,he will find more of that in Oblivion.
I'm not talking about graphics here or animation,I refer to the actual experience,which includes gameplay + story telling.
Do you want an easy to get into,action game,with not a lot of consequences,that has a huge amount of stuff to do,holds the player by the hand,and gratifies him a lot,without caring much about story and npc interaction ? Get Skyrim.
If you instead prefer a more 'classic' RPG with attributes system and classes,and lots of numbers and options to tweak for your character,and have your actions affect you or the world somewhat more,has more interesting side-quests,and NPCs with more personality,then Oblivion is a better choice.
If though you don't care about graphics at all,and you want the closest thing that exist in the video games medium to pen and paper RPGs,with all the depth that includes,with even combat being done with dice-rolls,then get Morrowind.
As you realize the ES series are gradually transitioning from pnpRPG simulators to action games.
With Morrowind being the closest to pnpRPG simulation,Oblivion the middle ground,and Skyrim the closest to an Action video game.
