Bare bones Oblivion unmodded yes....didn't like it very much.

But anyone with the PC version of Oblivion playing vanilla version and not taking advantage of the thousands of mods, some of which are amazingly done is just missing out.. lol

Sadly, no amount of modding can fix the world's ugliest faces ever created. But, outside of that, a massively modded Oblivion was a lot of fun. And I hate sandbox games.

Mods can only fix so much, the entire structure of the game was bad.

LOL, you obviously a newb to the mod scene these days....these aint simple graphics or weight makeovers. These are wholesale changes to the game due to a nice "script extender" utility which in the right hands (talented modder) basically changes the whole game.

I really like The Witcher 2. I really liked Dragon Age: Origins. (I thought DA2 was badly done in many ways and nothing near as good as DA:O.)

But the game that ruins other RPG's for me is The Witcher 1. Yeah, TW2 looks cooler and has lots of jaw-dropping moments. But to me, TW1 had more charm and more heart, so much so that it has even spoiled me for TW2. :-)

Speaking of Witcher 1 I just finished downloading this. Purchased it as a digital download enhanced edition for 9.95 at gamersgate.com

Plan on checking it out...

I made mods for oblivion, they help, the OOS mod was good, but none make the game great, the underlying game is still bad. I have at one time 50 mods unstalled, but keep being ignorant and think ima noob.................

yeah, there are several mods that completely redo the leveling system of Oblivion. You can actually choose how you want to level. There are other mods that reduce or eliminate level scaling, fix the UI, among other things. But skyrim's leveling system sounds much less frustrating. I know some are upset at the removal of some stats, but I think in the end it will be a lot better than Oblivion's system, for sure.

That being said, I did enjoy vanilla Oblivion, but will not deny I enjoy it more with mods.

But I hear the UI for Skyrim is a thing of beauty, the previews keep talking about it (but never show it, frustratingly, aside from the perk trees) like it's the best UI ever. I think Bethesda did actually learn from their mistakes on Oblivion with UI. I do't think Skyrim will be Oblivion 2.0 anymore than TW2 was like TW1 in many respects. They seem to have integrated many ideas from the mod community, the combat seems to pretty much use everything in the widely popular Deadly Reflex mod and then some, archery was rebalanced based on a mod, and so on. there are some things that are a little iffy sounding to me, but overall I think it will be a great game, even in it's vanilla form.

Its probably because theyve now gutted most of the RPG elements you ever needed a UI for. Easy to make a minimalist UI when all your character is defined by is 3 colored bars now.

I've had enough of your disingenuous assertions.

(+2 renegade)

That's hyperbole and you know it. The stats you removed would have amounted to eliminateing one screen, not how the UI as a whole was designed. it's not like the strength stat was ever displayed on the HUD or your skills page. And I happen to agree with them, as long as some of the perks (like carry weight which was dictated by the strength stat) is rolled into the skills somehow, I don't think it will make much difference in how the character plays.

LMAo agreed if all you have is a good ui...

Skyrim does look much improved, but, I remember the Oblivion hype, radiant AI, etc.. Game was garbage as an RPG. Not falling for the bethesda and skrim fanboy hype train. Most TES fanboys will say a turd with TES written on it is the best RPG ever.

The only reason Oblivion and TES games are as popular as they are is they have no competition, who else makes big open world fantasy games? Two Worlds is not near good enough to compete.

I would love for skyrim to be awesome, as RPG's are by far my fav genre. But people fall for marketing hype so easy, im taking a wait and see, especially after how shallow oblivon was.

Also worried about perks, dragon shouts. What makes dragons fun is they are rare, powerful beats. Looks like bethesda will make them way to common in the game.

They compete with themselves.

Well seeing as the thread topic encompasses all other RPGs, the scope is pretty broad. It does pretty much invite RPG comparisons. And all RPG comparisons inevitably turn to how Skyrim is going to be terribly disappointing.


(just kidding about that last part, Raye. Mostly.)

If you like big open worlds I would recommend the first two Gothics and Risen. They're much better than Two Worlds while still retaining much more of an RPG feel than Bethesda's games.