Yes, that's kind of a problem with morrowind even : the weapon skills grow fast (and faster).

I love a good rpg but I didn't have the patience to trawl through endless conversations without being overwhelmed by boredom. I played it for about 6-8 hours and decided it wasn't for me and uninstalled it with a sense of sadness.

I almost feel like I should apologise....

The thing is, it may sound weird but morrowind isn't about patience/grinding/levelling at all. Everything is at arms reach, you can do whatever you want : grab a book, speak to the folks. Just gather some provisions, fix you a goal, and go on a hike. There are plenty of stories to guess indifferent caverns, lots of lore to uncover through discussion. It really is a game where you can't get 'stuck' (lost, yes for sure, but not stuck)

That's most RPG's you know.

I really enjoyed Oblivion (other than the Oblivion gates themselves). I also quite liked Daggerfall so naturally I thought I'd love Morrowind but it just didn't do it for me. I genuinely feel like I'm missing out as it receives high praise indeed.

Nah, you've summarised quite well why you are a prime candidate not to like Morrowind. Morrowind feels almost entirely different from Oblivion, and the jump from Daggerfall to Morrowind is significant. Add in the fact that if you really liked Daggerfall, you were probably the right age for it and just a hair old for Morrowind, and it adds up.

There's nothing wrong with not liking Morrowind. But you *are* missing out. It's the best of the five ^_^

[url=queue QQ about subjective bests =) ][/url] [url= "queue QQ" is too fun not to say aloud][/url]

Oblivion was fun for a while but there were too damn many mines/caves and by the time the Spires started showing up I just totally lost interest. Well that and my FPS died with those.

Ah, that takes me back. Though to be fair, Vivec was one place in Morrowind that I tended to stay away from. Too many meandering hallways and confusing geometry. I'd get lost just going from the bookshop to the alchemist shop which was just down the hall in the foreign quarters. Then there's the floating prison rock thing which was almost too much for me to handle, levitation spells not withstanding. The whole city seemed like one big quest maze from which one could get lost forever.

Indeed I am surprised you enjoyed Oblivion and have a hard time with Morrowind. Out of curiosity, while either way is fine, are you referring to Vanilla Oblivion or some overhaul ? I admit I am not sure I remember exactly what the standard Morrowind was (as I tried a lot of mods in many games) and I only played vanilla Oblivion (and I didn't like it as much, far from it).

Obviously dunno what pigdog's going to say, but I think an analogy that'll hold up is that Morrowind : Mass Effect :: Oblivion : Mass Effect 2. [url= or substitute Witcher 1 and Witcher 2 for the Mass Effects. Similarly they changed the entire feel of the game between installments][/url]

There are perfectly good reasons to prefer Morrowind over Oblivion (god knows I can't stand Oblivion) but there are perfectly good reasons to prefer Oblivion, too. Like ME1 -> ME2, you didn't just increment the series number. The games feel like entirely different genres, so there's a lot that comes down to personal taste.
[url= Thus, Skyrim is almost entirely better than Oblivion (story preference aside) because it kept the same gameplay feel but improved graphics, movement, and UI handling, but Oblivion to Morrowind is a different game. ][/url]

Oh yes I respect that. It's like the whole Fallout 3 <-> Fallout NV : I'd expect a consensus here when there clearly isn't any.

Little late on a reply to this, but I have a shit load of mods installed that are supposed to help leveling; at least that's what all the folks around here told me when I bought the game.

Morrowind will eventually make it to GOG and it will be an Instabuy. Although how many years it will take, who knows...

As for Oblivion, it was such a breathtaking scenery for the time it came out but the horrendous enemy leveling system that matched your character was a disaster. Later on in the game, all the enemies were pretty much the same. Awful idea.

One of my preferred playthrough was to specialize in acrobatics, athletics, enchant .... and all those skills that grow very slowly. I never really understood how bethesda tuned their whole levelling systemS (but I really respect them for trying something diffrent than generic XP mechanics)