Why do some consider Morrowind a better game than Oblivion?

[Kortney]

Morrowind is better than Oblivion because it was unique. It had this beautiful and at times creepy aura and everything felt really alien. Oblivion was just re-hashed LOTR.

 

[almostgold]

Another thing about Morrowind: you are literally dropped off a boat and left to fend for yourself. You pick your class and thats it. No combat tutorial or anything. Your told to take a package to Balmora, and you're free. I've heard a lot of people say those first few hours wandering around Balmora in the rain at night have been some of the best in videogames; you feel lost and alone, just like your character is.

EDIT:

I actually registered after two years of visiting this site at least once a week for ZP just so I could post in this thread.

First of all, it almost always boils down to which one you played first, in my case it's Morrowind. The only things Oblivion has are graphics and spell casting. Many people have already posted most of the following reasons, but just to reiterate:

1. Setting. Like Yahtzee says in his review, it looks like Oblivion copied and pasted the same square mile or so over and over; added some mountains here and some snow there, and you've got the world map. Morrowind has swamps and valcanoes and mushroom cities and deserts.

2. Fast travel. Again, taking from ZP here, what's the point of having a huge world if you can just instantly travel everywhere? I know except for cities you have to discover the places before you can fast travel, but it just seems pointless. Also because of fast travel they removed some of the best spells from morrowind (mark, recall, intervention). I know in Morrowind there were silt striders and the Mages Guild offered some instant-travel service, but you have to pay for those.

3. Levitation. I really don't know why they took this out. It's 4 years after Morrowind takes place and everyone has forgotten how to levitate? Maybe someone can explain it to me.

4. Side quests/Skills/Items. I don't know if Morrowind has more side quests or not (it certainly seems like it though), as I have not actually completed Oblivion yet, but Morrowind definitely has more interesting side quests. There are more skills, and more useable items.

5. Arcane University. I just didn't like the fact I had to do half the Mages Guild quests before I could create my own spell or enchant an item.

6. Creatures. I just liked them better in Morrowind. Those damn cliff racers were something to be feared in yer youngin days, but it added to the suspense of the game.

7. Failing. In Morrowind you could fail at casting spells and making potions (I DON'T like how you could just not hit some things with melee attacks, but whatever), it just made it more believable.

8. Alchemy loop. This might be someone of a glitch/cheat, but in anycase it gave a different playing perspective. For those who don't know, if you create a Fortify Intelligence potion and drink it, your alchemy skill goes up. So make another potion (which will turn out better) and drink it. Loop this for as long as you want, and your Intelligence will be through the roof (so will your Alchemy skill). Then make any potion, say fortify strength. Your strength could go up to 100000 and higher (depending on how long you looped). This kinda removes the threat of ever being killed, but there again you could turn yourself into an awesome being all within the rules of the game.

I could probably go on, but this post is already too long.

First, welcome to the Escapist. Or at least the boards, I guess. Second, OP, this is a pretty good summary of the argument for Morrowind. Finally, the levitation was taken out due to non-open cities presenting problems (they required a loading sequence, unlike Morrowind where you just walk in). In game text mentions a ban on levitation to explain this.

 

[Slash Dementia]

Morrowind has placed items on their world. Oblivion has randomly generated items... this is one thing I love about Morrowind.

Morrowind was also more populated with inhabited areas, as Oblivion was just empty with a few caves scattered here and there.
Sure I like Oblivion's combat a bit better, but that's the thing; in Morrowind, you have to train to get better, and training didn't mean that the enemies leveled up with you; also, Morrowind's main quest actually had you do stuff that felt important, unlike Oblivion where you just close a dozen gates and go on to the end...with no real boss battle.

Both games are fun, but I much prefer Morrowind than Oblivion.

 

[Fallen-Angel Risen-Demon]

Cus there fanboys whodont like to admit new is better in morriwind i was just going around in mud killing mudcrabs and got bored in 3 hours of it. In oblivion i was areana champion in about 2-3 hours of gamplay. I seriosly cant stop playing oblivion Ive done every quest got all skills and stats as high as possible and filled all my houses with junk. No offence but MORROWIND SUCKS!!!!!! nothing anyone can say will change my mind. Everyones gona hate me now arnt they.

 

[shadowphade]

almostgold:
I think it's a pretty crappy excuse for removing levitation, and now that you mention it I remember seeing that text. Some more that I forgot:

9. Stealing. In Oblivion, "honest" merchants don't buy stolen items. As to how they know an item is stolen is beyond me. In Morrowind I literally made a living off going into peoples homes (forcefully most of the time) and taking everything they owned and selling it to the nearest shop.

10. Buying and Selling. In morrowind, you could buy and sell many different items in one transaction. It made it more like trading. I could trade someone a fancy potion or 10 in return for a weapon or a peice of armor. Oblivion makes being a merchant tedious and annoying. Also, on the PC version being able to hit ENTER and have whatever dialog text trigger like I clicked the "OK" button made everything go faster. In Oblivion it's point-click-point-click.

I don't think Oblivion was "dumbed down" so much as mainstreamed. These two might go hand in hand, but at the end of the day Bethesda wants to make money, and the more people buy their games the more money they make. So, making everything pretty and simplifying skills and items and factions and story with a more familiar world and more familiar creatures (goblins, trolls, ogres all missing from Morrowind). And you can't blame them because the developers need to eat and have a roof over their head, and at least they aren't taking EA's approach and copy-pasting the same game every year (see: every EA sports game ever). So a different story in a different setting is all part of a healthy process of trying new things to stay fresh. Unfortunately this time around "fresh" is the typical western fantasy setting, but hopefully next time around we'll see something different and again the next.

 

[Volafortis]

Morrowind was a bit more creative, the world was much more original, and I preferred more combat skills (spear, mace, longsword, shortsword, axe, etc...)

 

[MikailCaboose]

Generally I found that Morrowind just had more stuff to do, more locations, towns, etc. Plus for however good Oblivion was, because of the entire game leveling to you you kind of lost some of the reward to actually leveling your character.
Morrowind = More engaging, deep and larger
Oblivion = Better combat, spells, menus, and an overall easier time getting into the actual game (though I'll have to admit the Shivering Isles is by far one of my favorite video game areas)

 

[Bureacreative]

It's just so much deeper than oblivion, and it just...works better I guess. Oblivion has a few symptoms of early Indigo Prophecy Syndrome, but it's still an excellent game. It's not that Morrowind Is infitly better than it, it's just that Morrowind has so many more levels of gameplay, and Oblivion seems to be very cut-and-dried here are some gates to hell close them stop evil cult from from doing evil culty things eat some pie.

 

[Starke]

Yo, OP, whoaaaaa...... I literally just typed out an answer to your question on another forum about an hour ago. Here's a copy and pasting of that answer:

Well, for me, the reason Morrowind hooked me better also had to do with gameworld, but not the graphical side. Rather, it was the thematic content of Vvardenfell and the art design that backed it up. There was the clash between encroaching imperialism and local resistance and the struggle between the two religions that mirrored the politics. At the same time, there were the great house rivalries and the inter-guild rivalries. Finally, on top of that there was the main quest, which touched upon and linked up with all of the other themes.

Oblivion didn't really have that. They pared down the factions (you can see what Bethesda cut out of the game when you note the special 'faction' badges you get for helping out some of the towns) thus limiting the possibility of creating complex conflicts that would seem natural in a 'real' world. At the same time, the overarching theme (destruction from another plane) was so fantastical that it became somewhat cliche and difficult to relate to. In Morrowind, by contrast, the main storyline was tied to the idea of resurgent local nationalism versus the imperialists as much as it was about Aedra and Daedra.

To sum up, Morrowind had more 'human' themes and was therefore more relatable to, while Oblivion relied too much on fantasy and a 'dark threat' scenario.

Also, Oblivion had no levitation, jump, or slowfall. In addition, fast travel sucked compared to Morrowind.

That's honestly a really good discription. I'd wondered about this, but never thought it went beyond the simple variety and otherness that Morrowind inspired, but, you're right.

 

[Nigh Invulnerable]

I personally don't really care for either game that much. Sure, they're fun and deep, but I'll play actual D&D instead. As someone who does play D&D with friends on a fairly regular basis, I enjoy Morrowind more just for being different than the generic Tolkien fantasy setting. Also, the game is far deeper, in the sense that the sandbox is bigger and you really don't have much reason to follow the "main" quest line. I realize you don't have to in Oblivion, but for some reason the side quests were less interesting in the fourth game. Also, as someone who likes customization and creative solutions to things, Morrowind was more fun.

 

[high_castle]

I feel like I've replied to this before, and yet...whatever.

I personally find Morrowind to be more enjoyable because the world is far more varied, the plot more engaging, the characters better defined, and the leveling system actually works. Oblivion just failed on all those counts. Every corner of the world looked exactly the same. The land had no character, no soul. The monsters more generic fare instead of the truly wonderous creatures of Morrowind. And no one seemed to care about the world supposedly ending, while everyone in Morrowind stressed the problems in the land. But what really sets Morrowind ahead of the curve is that it's not frakking broken. The leveling system in Oblivion seemingly wants you to pick skills you don't actually use. If you try to select skills you will use, you'll get your butt handed to you in every fight after level 9 or so. Annoying, to say the least. How did no one catch this? Also...Oblivion was boring. It put me to sleep every time I tried to play it. I didn't get that sense of wonder that I got from Morrowind. And that's a shame, because the graphics were pretty and they got some talented voice actors. Too bad everybody just phoned it in.

 

[Brnin8]

Oblivion had better gameplay and Patrick Stewart, but Morrowind had a better story and more content.
I preferred Oblivion personally, but I can see why some would like Morrowind more.

 

[Plurralbles]

I've only gotten 28 hours into Oblivion and loved every minute of it but... eh. dont' really care which is better. Pretty irrelevant if you can manage to enjoy both.

 

[Bradd94]

Because Morrowind was agreat game and Oblivion was a terrible game? It's not complicated.

A little harsh, perhaps?
Lets not forget that Oblivion won the GotY in '06 I believe?

Regardless, Morrowind and Oblivion both have their strengths. Morrowind did have more 'depth' with regard to storyline, optional quests etc.
However, in comparison to the combat in Oblivion, Morrowind struggled.

And yes. That is most likely due to the age of Morrowind and what was available at the time, but still; both games were huge successes.

Personally I favour Morrowind.
Better and more varied gear, in my opinon xD

 

[Earthmonger]

This I echo completely. The problem with Morrowind and Oblivion is that they aren't sequels. Compared to Daggerfall, they're just Elder Scrolls mini-games; simplified and homogenized for the consoles. I'm still waiting for a real successor to Daggerfall.

(My avatar is a tree sprite from Daggerfall)

Yay for old timey RPGs.

If I ever have to stand guard in the basement of a Mages Guild to prevent thieves from breaking and entering again, though, I might have to get violent.

But, seriously, why doesn't anybody try anything like that anymore? That game was bigger than most modern MMOs thanks to procedurally generated content. Given the huge leaps taken in procedural animation, character creation and even map creation and "AI directors", you'd think that a new massive procedural RPG would be something somebody may want to try at some point.

Halt! Halt! Halt!

I miss those endless waves of suicidal town guards. I even miss Daggerfall's quirky bugs.

Honestly, I don't understand why Bethesda hasn't done what they did with Daggerfall-- they spent massive amounts of time building architecture in kit-able chunks in Morrowind and Oblivion, so why did they fail to really use it? NPC generators, city generators, naming generators, Rusty Goblin Tavern generators, quest generators... Were the randomization algorithms too hard to code? By the Cliffs of Solitude...

 

[Yokai]

because oblivion had damn near NO ROLE PLAY IN IT (bold + underline, no idea how to). morrowind had roleplay, opblivion is just a hack and slack that holds you hand so you dont get a boo boo. you need RPG in your RPG games. you cant just throw in a large world but leave it lifeless. they have repeated that same mistake over and over again.

So, what exactly do you mean by roleplay? Surely not just more dialogue options? I'm curious, as it's a rather broad term when applying to video games.

 

[Yokai]

I tried playing Morrowind at least 3 times but every time I do I'm driven away by the awful graphics and the shitty combat. If I could somehow upgrade the graphics to Oblivions level and change the combat I would TOTALLY dive right.

NOW that would be epic.. if they released a Morrowwind DLC that used the Oblivion graphics and combat.
That would pwn all the way to the bank.

They could just remake Morrowind and its expansions completely. I would buy that in a heartbeat.

I believe there are some mod projects that plan to do that, but like most overambitious mods, they will probably fall rather short of the goal.

 

[a7r0p05]

It's a lot deeper, I'll say that.

But that doesn't necessarily translate to better. I'd put them at the same level myself, they have their flaws, but they compensate each other nicely.

Oblivion is certainly more fun, but Morrowind has a better long term thing going.

^This.

 

[Mother Yeti]

For me, it's all about setting. Oblivion is generic fantasy, of the type you'll find in Barnes & Noble with a chick in a metal bikini on the cover. Morrowind is unique.

Also, the character models in Oblivion were ugly as balls. Everyone looked inbred.

 

[Xanadeas]

For me it was the story-line. Oblivion's main quest line seemed ridiculous... I didn't really feel all that compelled to help. I've only ever done it once and have skipped it entirely on repeated play-throughs.