Zero Punctuation: Oblivion
- Thread starter Yahtzee Croshaw
- Start date
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wow
gone for a good 4 hours and we've gained that many pages. I think I'll respond to some of the early posts.
EDIT:
gone for a good 4 hours and we've gained that many pages. I think I'll respond to some of the early posts.
I would. Painkiller, anyone?sad_nerd said:
Some of that was fun, some of it was incredibly annoying, like how easy it was to get stuck in the Telvanni towers.PitrDeVries said:
Best mission ever.Kaos Incarnate said:
EDIT:
You need to get out more. Like to a friend who does have these games.
and he says he picked a Nord because he lacks creativity and then compares the dialog to "A middle school lord of the rings play to an audience of deaf budgies".
Awesome and accurate.
However with mods Oblivion changes into quite an enjoyable experience. And this is coming from a "story-driven/party-based/tactical combat WRPG" fanboy who has been loathing Morrowind and this game since they were released.
The dialogues remain horrible though.
However with mods Oblivion changes into quite an enjoyable experience. And this is coming from a "story-driven/party-based/tactical combat WRPG" fanboy who has been loathing Morrowind and this game since they were released.
The dialogues remain horrible though.
from what i could tell it a wasn't bad game for him, i personally love oblivion and i agree with what he says, i highly suggest get the game! 
Ninja Gaiden game just came out in the U.S. today, even if australia got it when we did, he wouldn't have enough time to review it. Expect it in the future...unless he thinks DMC4 is just like it, then he won't. I hope he does.Gahars said:
Dark Brotherhood missions and thieves guild...and some of mage guild missions. Those were fun. I never even went through the story line far enough that the oblivion gates opened for the first time...it's kind of weird watching people talk about the madness in this town where a gate opens...and I get there and it's still nice and sunny. Still, I borrowed oblivion for two weeks...only ended up playing it about half a week, then I finished all the DB and Thieves missions...and decided I'd done most of the fun stuff and turned it off.
Stalker Review would be bloody wonderful though.
I love this game, yet still had a good chuckle at this. Love the part with the PC - I tried installing it in two of the house PCs and both immediately decided they'd wimp out. Also tried the Oldblivion patch; it crashed the first computer and made the chunky graphics even chunkier on PC number 2. Even on the 360 it struggles - I've lost count of the times my 360 told me it couldn't read the damn disc.
Anyway. It's hilarious that you get such a mix of NPC voices in each town, even though each one is supposed to have a main race, if you will.
The levelling system sucks like nothing else, and I wouldn't have minded seeing it slated into next year. Sad thing is I can't even finish the Kvatch mission, and that's with both a strong magic user (first time round), and a strong powertank after. The fact that enemies level with you is an interesting twist, but makes the game so hard I actually gave up on the main quest and focused on the Brotherhood instead.
Best part of the game. And where was the praise for Lucien Lachance, sexy thing that he is? Come on, Yahtzee, you can put aside your complete and utter masculine traits for a second. And there's no way Martin Septim is sexier. NO WAY.
But I detract. Excellent review, as always.
Anyway. It's hilarious that you get such a mix of NPC voices in each town, even though each one is supposed to have a main race, if you will.
The levelling system sucks like nothing else, and I wouldn't have minded seeing it slated into next year. Sad thing is I can't even finish the Kvatch mission, and that's with both a strong magic user (first time round), and a strong powertank after. The fact that enemies level with you is an interesting twist, but makes the game so hard I actually gave up on the main quest and focused on the Brotherhood instead.
Best part of the game. And where was the praise for Lucien Lachance, sexy thing that he is? Come on, Yahtzee, you can put aside your complete and utter masculine traits for a second. And there's no way Martin Septim is sexier. NO WAY.
But I detract. Excellent review, as always.
Once again, Yahtzee strook with a firm, wellplaced hand. I agree with him on the fast traveling part, it's kind of awkward, although the game would have been extremely boring without it.
Perhaps, but then I stopped playing very very quickly. This is all I discovered, and had no desire to carry on.
Woah! Yahtzee has finally reviewed a game I actually play! I generally love his panning of moronic first-person shooters, as I only manage a few hours on them before I am mind-numbingly bored.
But Oblivion--okay, I admit it. I've actually finished the game. And I still play it. Yeah, I have plenty of complaints, but they aren't the same complaints that a person who has spent two hours on the game would have. That is, unlike someone who has spent two hours on it, I actually know that all of the landscapes aren't alike. (C'mon, Yahtzee, I bet you didn't even get to the Plane of Oblivion and discover what the game was all about, did you?)
Here are the real issues with the game: (1) Anything less than a super computer and you will be running it with lousy graphics and it just doesn't look the way it should. (PC only.) (2) The leveling system. Nuff said. (3) The mind-numbing aspect of a whole bunch of dungeons and caves that look just alike and don't even have good loot. (But all TES games have this problem.) (4) If you want to play a cute little elf or magic user or something, you will find that you can't carry around enough loot.
But the plusses are that you can create your own character class, and there are lots of great mods out there for it.
But Oblivion--okay, I admit it. I've actually finished the game. And I still play it. Yeah, I have plenty of complaints, but they aren't the same complaints that a person who has spent two hours on the game would have. That is, unlike someone who has spent two hours on it, I actually know that all of the landscapes aren't alike. (C'mon, Yahtzee, I bet you didn't even get to the Plane of Oblivion and discover what the game was all about, did you?)
Here are the real issues with the game: (1) Anything less than a super computer and you will be running it with lousy graphics and it just doesn't look the way it should. (PC only.) (2) The leveling system. Nuff said. (3) The mind-numbing aspect of a whole bunch of dungeons and caves that look just alike and don't even have good loot. (But all TES games have this problem.) (4) If you want to play a cute little elf or magic user or something, you will find that you can't carry around enough loot.
But the plusses are that you can create your own character class, and there are lots of great mods out there for it.
Full Bleed IS RIGHT!
I agree alot with the review but the biggest plus with oblivion in my mind is the mod support, and there are alot out there.
dont like the arrow curve? there's a mod for that!
dont like the way guards act when you've comitted a crime? there's a mod for that!
dont like the leveling? There's a mod for that!
dont like the scenery? there is, infact, a mod for that too!
once you've loaded it up with player made content then you can really embark into Cyrodyll and experience the game that Bethesda MEANT to make.
I agree alot with the review but the biggest plus with oblivion in my mind is the mod support, and there are alot out there.
dont like the arrow curve? there's a mod for that!
dont like the way guards act when you've comitted a crime? there's a mod for that!
dont like the leveling? There's a mod for that!
dont like the scenery? there is, infact, a mod for that too!
once you've loaded it up with player made content then you can really embark into Cyrodyll and experience the game that Bethesda MEANT to make.
I totally agree with all the points raised here, especially the bland landscape.
Two games that Yahtzee should review though:
- Haze
- Killzone (The first one - it's awesome)
Two games that Yahtzee should review though:
- Haze
- Killzone (The first one - it's awesome)
Has anyone ever heard the rumor that the Oblivion AI was at one point almost cutting edge advanced but the world kept imploding on itself. The story I heard was that AI subroutines kept following their goals way to strictly and would MURDER anyone who got in the way of them achieving their goals, so the game testers would come across towns completely depopulated because of this.
EDIT: I know this hurts the game on a review, since you shouldn't need third party modifications to make a game good, once you mod the hell out of PC Oblivion with the Graphics Fixes the game is down right gorgeous, even on a lower graphics setting. The Natural Environments, Natural Faces, Money, City Lights and Star Gazing mods are a MUST for this game.
EDIT: I know this hurts the game on a review, since you shouldn't need third party modifications to make a game good, once you mod the hell out of PC Oblivion with the Graphics Fixes the game is down right gorgeous, even on a lower graphics setting. The Natural Environments, Natural Faces, Money, City Lights and Star Gazing mods are a MUST for this game.
I'm disappointed.
Zero Punctuation really isn't as funny as it used to be.
I've felt this for months, and this review just confirmed it. There's no doubt Yahtzee still has his artistic flare and all, but maybe - and it's just a thought - he's tilting further towards taking this reviewing gig of his slightly more "seriously" rather than feeding his reputation as an online comedian.
Either that or I've simply gone shit-garglingly mad.
Basically, I just don't enjoy it as much as I used to.
Zero Punctuation really isn't as funny as it used to be.
I've felt this for months, and this review just confirmed it. There's no doubt Yahtzee still has his artistic flare and all, but maybe - and it's just a thought - he's tilting further towards taking this reviewing gig of his slightly more "seriously" rather than feeding his reputation as an online comedian.
Either that or I've simply gone shit-garglingly mad.
Basically, I just don't enjoy it as much as I used to.
Yep, this was a surprise to me. Then again, I haven't yet gotten around to writing my OWN review of Oblivion, so how can I criticize?
As someone who still plays Oblivion fairly regularly, I just have to say: Spot on, Mr. Croshaw. Every time I wanted to get "into" the game it sort of just shoved me away and told me it wasn't in the mood. (Kind of like my personal life, but I digress.) I found it troubling that you can walk half a mile away from Chorrol, then go to Cheydinhal (opposite side of the province, east to west), walk half a mile out and have everything seem exactly the same. Sure, there's snow on the ground near Bruma and lots of water and cattails past Leyawiin, but you don't get this sense that you're really somewhere different.
What really irked me was the sameness of interior areas. Caves, ruins and dungeons are all just sort of slapped together with a general theme- this one has water, this one has lots of traps- to where you have to start checking your map to be sure you haven't been here before. The Oblivion realms were particularly bad this way, and I started to dread having to go into them. And the voices got annoying as well, especially when you start overhearing necromancers in the depths of some corpse-strewn cave talk about how those with good hearts can be healed at a Temple. I really wish the actions of the separate questlines would have had more impact on each other (say, any at all); it's like most of these people live in a vacuum where everything that happens is just conversation fodder.
The quests also could have used a lot of tweaking. A lot of the "story" behind them feels about 30% finished, and for every one interesting or amusing quest ("Whodunit?", "Through a Nightmare, Darkly", Sheogorath's Daedric quest) there's three dozen others that devolve into simply "go here, kill this, bring back five of X". And for every epic-feeling buildup such as the last Thieves' Guild quest or tracking down an "old friend" in the Imperial City dungeon, there's a colossal disappointment like... the Arena.
And the ending of the main quest? Seriously, this is a case of deus ex machina that any Greek play would've been proud of. And what do you get for it? A suit of armor, and people calling you by a title on occasion. No rebuilding of Kvatch (or even the Bruma Mages' Guild, from that questline), no ongoing developments from the other provinces. Cyrodiil feels like a land frozen in time that depends on you to make anything happen, and that's not really all that immersive at all.
However, Oblivion does serve as testimony to why I prefer PC gaming. Mods plug in a lot of the holes that Bethesda left in ("Close shut the flaws of Oblivion!") and make for new and interesting experience. I hated the fact that there were absolutely no pitch-black areas in the game, but Ivellon and Bravil: Blood and Mud give you some nice ones to skulk around in. I don't understand how anyone could be satisfied with the plain vanilla gameplay.
And yes, Yahtzee, you're not the only one who had to do a reality check after a Thief bender. You have no idea how aware that game made me of the sound of my own footsteps. Now I scare people by coming up behind them silently.
As someone who still plays Oblivion fairly regularly, I just have to say: Spot on, Mr. Croshaw. Every time I wanted to get "into" the game it sort of just shoved me away and told me it wasn't in the mood. (Kind of like my personal life, but I digress.) I found it troubling that you can walk half a mile away from Chorrol, then go to Cheydinhal (opposite side of the province, east to west), walk half a mile out and have everything seem exactly the same. Sure, there's snow on the ground near Bruma and lots of water and cattails past Leyawiin, but you don't get this sense that you're really somewhere different.
What really irked me was the sameness of interior areas. Caves, ruins and dungeons are all just sort of slapped together with a general theme- this one has water, this one has lots of traps- to where you have to start checking your map to be sure you haven't been here before. The Oblivion realms were particularly bad this way, and I started to dread having to go into them. And the voices got annoying as well, especially when you start overhearing necromancers in the depths of some corpse-strewn cave talk about how those with good hearts can be healed at a Temple. I really wish the actions of the separate questlines would have had more impact on each other (say, any at all); it's like most of these people live in a vacuum where everything that happens is just conversation fodder.
The quests also could have used a lot of tweaking. A lot of the "story" behind them feels about 30% finished, and for every one interesting or amusing quest ("Whodunit?", "Through a Nightmare, Darkly", Sheogorath's Daedric quest) there's three dozen others that devolve into simply "go here, kill this, bring back five of X". And for every epic-feeling buildup such as the last Thieves' Guild quest or tracking down an "old friend" in the Imperial City dungeon, there's a colossal disappointment like... the Arena.
And the ending of the main quest? Seriously, this is a case of deus ex machina that any Greek play would've been proud of. And what do you get for it? A suit of armor, and people calling you by a title on occasion. No rebuilding of Kvatch (or even the Bruma Mages' Guild, from that questline), no ongoing developments from the other provinces. Cyrodiil feels like a land frozen in time that depends on you to make anything happen, and that's not really all that immersive at all.
However, Oblivion does serve as testimony to why I prefer PC gaming. Mods plug in a lot of the holes that Bethesda left in ("Close shut the flaws of Oblivion!") and make for new and interesting experience. I hated the fact that there were absolutely no pitch-black areas in the game, but Ivellon and Bravil: Blood and Mud give you some nice ones to skulk around in. I don't understand how anyone could be satisfied with the plain vanilla gameplay.
And yes, Yahtzee, you're not the only one who had to do a reality check after a Thief bender. You have no idea how aware that game made me of the sound of my own footsteps. Now I scare people by coming up behind them silently.