Walkthroughs & Tips

Review by: Jake Delfeir

Reviewers Score: 10 / 10

Posted: April 19, 2006

The Elder Scrolls 4 - Oblivion
System: PC
Genre: RPG
Difficulty: Medium/Hard
Score: 10/10

The Elder Scrolls is now a famous series of excellent RPGs, caused largely in part by the excellence of the previous game, Morrowind. There has been a lot of hype concerning the next game in the series, Oblivion, and a number of people have been itching to get their hands on it. Trailers and leaked videos of amazingly beautiful locations, improvements in all facets of gameplay from Morrowind, a huge world to explore... people were drawn to it from day one. Now it's here, and did it really live up to the hype? Read on to find out.

Graphics (10/10)

Whoa. Every teaser video or screenshot that was released onto the internet set gaming aficionados into a drooling frenzy, and the finished product is just as amazing. The game is amazingly beautiful - immense detail, vibrant colours, incredible graphical affects, and every other little piece of eye candy under the sun. Even playing on low settings is still a treat, because it's an extremely beautiful game. Wandering through dense forests, dark dungeons, magically lit ancient ruins, snow-capped peaks... it's amazing to see just what they've done. However, it's not all rendered at once, so you won't see detail from a distance - this was done to make sure that the average consumer could actually play the game. Nonetheless, it is truly a wonderful sight. Perfect score here.

Sounds (10/10)

The music in this game complements the graphics perfectly, I find. Beautiful orchestral pieces really sound beautiful without being too demanding - it doesn't slam itself to the forefront of the game, but takes a place in the background. It's mellow and almost soothing, but still creates the sensation of danger and threat when it needs to. Mostly though, you don't consciously notice it... it just flows perfectly in the background. Turning it off, however, leaves a definite feeling that something is missing. A well-done effect. And for Morrowind players, the very popular main theme returns with a remix, so that's another plus. Additionally, the sound effects all sound appropriate and well done, adding to the immersive feeling of the landscape.

Finally, every single last line of NPC conversation is voice-acted. All of it. Sure, there's a little repetition - they didn't exactly go and hire voice actors for each individual NPC, considering just how many of them are there. But again, it does add to the overall feel of the game, and puts a highlight on some of the major characters in the storyline, who are acted by people like Patrick Stewart and Sean Bean. To wrap it up, the sound is excellent.

Storyline (9/10)

Oblivion focuses much more on being a vast, open-ended experience rather than an epic fantasy tale. As such, the storyline isn't a major focus in this game, despite the presence of a good main quest. Just like the rest of the game, though, the storyline is exactly what you make of it. The world of Tamriel is incredibly vast and well-detailed, and you can choose to just breeze through it without knowing anything about it, or you could spend your time studying the in-game books, the history behind the world, and much of how everything works during your time playing. It could prove just as epic and amazingly detailed as any other story, and it does it all without requiring you to have an encyclopaedia rammed into your skull.

As far as the main quest goes, the story is not a bad one. The current Emperor of Tamriel, Uriel Septim VII, has been the target of an assassination attempt. At the same time, all three of his sons have been murdered, and now he is fleeing the Imperial City of Cyrodiil to save his life. The main character, as is now Elder Scrolls tradition, starts off in prison. By an extremely lucky break, there is a hidden escape route located within your cell that the Emperor uses to leave the city. Before he escapes, however, he takes in your face and says that he has seen it in his dreams... it is you that will be the saviour of Tamriel in the coming days. Then, escorted by his bodyguards, the Emperor escapes through the secret passage with you following from a distance.

Not long after the group is beset by assassins, and the Emperor will be backed into a corner while his guards attempt to defend him. When he realises that his life is at its end, he gives you the Amulet of Kings, the true symbol of power of the Empire. An Emperor of the Septim blood must hold the magical amulet, or else the fabric between this world and Oblivion - the home of the demon-like Daedra - would be torn, tearing the world apart. Leaving you the amulet and instructions to find his hidden heir, the Emperor is then killed. Taking the amulet in your hand, you go forth to find Martin, the lost Septim, and restore him to the throne. And in the meantime, the gates to Oblivion have been opened...

Gameplay (9/10)

I had intended to give this a full score after the early days of playing it, but after a while I started to see the slight failings. So it gets a very high but not perfect score for gameplay. So, let's get started. Immediately once you begin the game, you choose your character's appearance and proceed to bust out of prison. The entire opening dungeon is set up like a big tutorial - it will teach you all about the game, which is quite handy for a beginner and gives you a feel for what you're going to stick with later on. Eventually you choose your class, and that allows you to either take a pre-designed setup or create your own custom one to your liking. Once the introduction dungeon is done, you take your first step out into the world, and that's where things get interesting.

Like Morrowind, Oblivion's level up system is based on using your skills. Most actions have a skill level which is raised by using it repeatedly. For example, picking up a sword and bashing Goblins with it will eventually give you a Blade level. This makes your blade do more damage, and can eventually give you a skill perk - you'll be able to do a Power Attack that can disarm an opponent, for example. Depending on what skills you selected to be your major skills, then that will affect your overall level. Getting 10 major skill levels nets you an overall level, and then you can choose three of your stats to raise. Depending on which skills you leveled, both major and minor, you may get a significantly higher bonus. Getting 10 Blade levels, for example, will let you get a Strength boost of 5, but the other two stats will only be 1. Thus, to make use of your levels, you also have to raise minor skills and boost your potential bonus that way. It's a good system, but somewhat flawed - in order to really get a big stat boost, you have to work your minor skills quite ruthlessly at times. But that's only if you're powergaming - if you don't care so much and just go with what you can, then it'll seem much better. Bethesda saw fit to compress the various skills, though - there are a number of noticable disappearances. Spears no longer exist, Short and Long Blades have been compressed to just Blades, Axes are now merged with Blunt Weapons, and all that's left is Marksman and Hand-to-Hand. Several skills are gone or have changed, and while it's not a huge loss, it's a noticable one.

This leads to the main problem most people have with Oblivion - the scaling system. Like in Morrowind, new enemies appear when you reach certain levels, so that you're not always bashing up really weak things that are far below you. However, this becomes quite a problem for some... randomly generated human NPCs will ALSO increase. This wouldn't be so bad if it was just their stats... but they also get very powerful equipment. By Level 15, every single bandit out there will be wearing armour and using swords that are worth a grand total of maybe 3000 gold. It keeps things fair and challenging, sure, but it can be really frustrating. It also kills any sense of feeling epic... the enemies are never far below you, or are even above you, so you don't get the godly feeling that becomes frequent in other games. As well as the enemies, the loot that is scattered throughout dungeons is randomised too. So unless you get lucky, you may just find fairly average stuff when exploring. The days of rushing to a hidden cave and getting a super-powered weapon in Morrowind are gone - now trying that will just get you something completely different. Even robbing houses gives you randomised loot, so it's really not worth it in most cases. But those are the only real complaints in the game system.

With the level system covered, the rest of the world is your oyster. Rather than leaving you to get completely lost as has been done previously, you now have a compass on the bottom of your screen. When you're out wandering, icons may appear on the compass to represent places of interest that may be coming up. Your active quest is also marked as a big red or green arrow, so you're never really feeling lost. Some people may not like this, since it's like having a GPS tracking device all the time, but I find it makes things a little less frustrating when you're giving bad directions from a drunk.

The combat system has also been improved from Morrowind, which was a major cause for concern among some players. In the previous game, you simply had to click and click and click and hopefully hit your enemies. In Oblivion, you won't ever miss. EVER. If it looks like you're going to hit something, then you probably will. The damage is calculated according to your stats with the weapon/magic that you used compared to their armour. There's also a little mroe variety than just bashing your mouse button, since blocking is now done manually. It doesn't just randomly occur according to your Block skill, this time you just raise your shield. This can decrease the damage of an attack or even nullify it and stagger the opponent, depending on your skills. So while you can just go in Rambo style and hack apart everything without pause, playing it smart can save you a number of potions.

Magic is also much less useless in this game. In Morrowind, Magicka points were hard to come by, there was no mana regeneration, and spells cost far too much. Well, all those problems have been solved - it is now much easier to have a large amount of Magicka points, so spells are much more handy to have around. Additionally, they do regenerate, and they regenerate very quickly depending on your Willpower stat. Spells don't always cost hideous amounts of points, either - as usual, your skills and stats will directly affect how much each casting will set you back. So you get a real feeling of improvement when your big powerful orb of death spell seems to be draining you less and less.

So. That covers most of the gameplay elements - the rest is up to you. The world is very, very large, and there's a whole lot of places to go exploring. The cities are large and full of NPCs, many loaded down with sidequests. There aren't as many guilds or factions as there were in Morrowind, and those that are here seem a little smaller and less immersive, but they're still available, useful, and fun to play around with. Ultimately, despite the little problems I've mentioned, they really don't factor into the gameplay as much. It is still obscenely fun. I just can't give it a perfect score for Gameplay, as much as I'd like to.

Replayability (10/10)

What did you expect from an Elder Scrolls game when it comes to longevity? Oblivion has a whole lot to do. Skipping the fast travel option and deciding to walk from one city to another will, undoubtedly, turn up a large number of places to explore on your compass, and most of them have a quest attached or are just fun to explore. Sure, a little dungeon crawling can get tiring after extensive periods, but like Morrowind, there are heaps and heaps of quests out there to do. It's not so much a matter of finishing the game - it's more about how much you pour into it all up. My only complaint is that Morrowind had a dozen or so factions, each with a very large amount of sidequests to complete. Mixing and matching for a certain character type was fun, and still gave you freedom but held a rope there for you to follow when you wanted to. Oblivion doesn't have that - even for the very few factions, it feels like just another sidequest. There's little structure, you're just thrown in the deep end and you do whatever. I have no problems with this, don't get me wrong, but I did enjoy the Morrowind system. Nonetheless, there is a whole lot to do in this game, so what are you waiting for?

Overall (10/10)

I've had this game for a fortnight more than a week now, and it's perhaps the most alluring experience I've encountered in quite some time. I'm constantly drawn back to finish another quest, explore another dungeon, close another Oblivion gate... very fun. Like all games of this calibur, it does have a few problems, but that's to be expected. The sheer size and fun offered by this game more than makes up for any little bug that appears. If you have an Xbox 360, or a powerful PC that can run this, then do yourself a favour and get this game. It may consume you at first, but it's definitely worth it. And hey, if you don't like a certain element of the game, it took all of a day before mods were released that fixed up most things. Sure, you shouldn't HAVE to go and get mods for it... but the option is there if you want to increase your gameplay performance.

And what a surprise... this review was ridiculously long.