To quote Walter(from Jeff Dunham) on Bethesda's handling of the TES franchise: "Dumbass!"
I hated the horse controls in Oblivion and I would rather run around on foot. And I hated the fact that horses did not exist at all in Morrowind. What, did the Ashlanders EAT them or something?!?!?!

Nnno, Ashlanders were using guars (I just can't remember if packing guars were present in original game... But I think they were)
Edit: I was more disturbed by the fact Ashlanders obviously ate all children :D

This is off-topic, but:
I do believe that the choice to remake the second one instead of the first one was a mistake. To me, the original is a much more pure experience. It's almost perfect. I believe The Settlers 2 adds complexity that's not needed, which bogs down the gameplay.
This isn't to say The Settlers 2 is bad. But for me, it feels like most of the stuff that's good about it has been lifted directly from the original, and very few of the extra features and complexity actually make the game better.
Some of the new ideas are very good, but implemented in a flawed manner that's actually detrimental to the overall experience. Like the ships (which had a very random behavior in the original S2) and the catapults (which are overpowered, IMO).
The donkeys were a good idea too, but they (and the new multiple carrier system) made proper road planning much less important. To counter this, the devs came up with the incredibly annoying idea that trees should block the roads.
(it's perhaps also worth noting that I prefer the Amiga version of the original Settlers over the PC-version).
Edit: Darned quoting-system...

Surely this is a Tamriel-wide problem, as I don't think I ever saw a child in any of the TES games...
Perhaps no-one at Bethesda knows about the birds and the bees...

Fair enough, you do have to be careful when you construct them, if you're playing against a competent AI or player. I always found them a bit too "cheaty", though.
Thinking about it, maybe "roads" is the wrong term to use. The "roads" in The Settles 1 and 2 are nothing but narrow dirt paths, which should easily be able to go past a three or two, or even through a dense forest.
I definitely prefer the way they work in the original. Roads can go through forests, but you need clear spaces to put up flags to make intersections (which also ensures that you need extra space to build buildings, as they have a flag attached). This way, trees are obstacles that you need to take into account, but not impassable.

then explain their god like existence in fallout 3!

Actually I hear there is a cure for that little problem...
I have noticed in many games these days that despite the ultra-violence in most aspects, there are artificial controls on who you can and cannot kill.
Fallout 3 is a perfect example, cannot kill children or certain other NPCs, and also in Half-Life 2, you can kill hordes of people but not "friendly" people. In both cases, earlier games in the series did not have such restrictions...

From HL2 onwards, all the "friendly people" serve to move the story along. If you could kill them, the story would fall apart. Since Valve chose to continue the series as an extremely linear story, not being able to kill the actors of the story is a necessity.

Surely they could have let you shoot them, but then shown a "game over" screen? much like if Alyx dies, or if you manage to lose the buggy over the side of a cliff...

Of course they could, but what would be the point? If killing a friendly NPC means the end of the game anyway, why let you do it at all? Every time you did, you'd have to load your last savegame. So why would you want to?
If you're into killing friendlies, why not play a game where that is allowed, such as one of the GTA games? Whereas, if you're into linear storytelling in an FPS environment, play HL2.
Given that the entire concept of the game negates the killing of NPCs, I suggest that if you want to do that so badly, then you cannot really like HL2 anyway.

I always liked Perfect Dark and Goldeneye's take on it. "The mission is failed please abort."

It could be that any kid born into Tamriel (in the Morrowind version) is made into Soylent Green....

Mmm... gotta love that soylent green.
"Soylent Green is people!"

Some Civilization or Master of magic or SimCity or such DOS game, in a pen drive with portable DOSBOX. Anywhere, anytime.
If I can install any game I want and if I want a newer game, Knights of honor or Civ 4. Extreme replayability.