Bethesda The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion - Game of the Year Edition

Fast delivery as usual. Added another great game to my collection.

I won't say I'm a long time fan of the Elder Scrolls series; in fact, I grimaced the first time I tried playing Morrowind on PC. It looked fun but was just cumbersome and the learning curve was awkward. Thankfully, eventually I decided to try Oblivion on Xbox 360 some years ago, and was instantly impressed. While Bethesda is infamous for unattractive character models, their knack for architecture and environment and overall quantity of content makes up for it. Oblivion doesn't do anything too revolutionary for the RPG or Fantasy genres, certainly nothing that hasn't already been done, but it does everything with a sort of clumsy effectiveness.If you want to pick up a sword and hack (first person OR third person) though hordes of trolls, imps, demons, bandits and any number of other adversaries, all the while flinging spells hither and thither and picking every darn lock you come by, you won't be let down. There's a handy (pun-intended) pick-pocket feature, and you can steal anything you see lying around, but be ready to be labelled "criminal scum". You can infuse items with magical effects, enchant staves with spells, plunder dungeons for rare lost treasures, and slay all manner of hideous, forgotten creatures. However if you're looking for an immersive, rich story with deep characters, etc. then look elsewhere -- I recommend Bioware's Dragon Age (or for a sci-fi stint, the Mass Effect series). Where Oblivion excels in variety and flexibility, it lacks in polish and depth. Sure there may be 100-something caves and ruins to explore, but they're all very similar. The overworld is mostly steep cliffs, rocks, and forest, and while somewhat realistic in that you can walk in a straight line for an hour without ever finding anything interesting, well, this is a video game and you should really be finding a little bit more unique places. In all honestly, the game does feel a bit like an MMORPG scaled to fit a single player, including a persistent world and scaled difficulty. You never have to grind, and if you grind you only end up fighting harder monsters -- they scale up in power as you do, too (a double edged sword found in all of Bethesda's recent RPG releases).One of the coolest features in the game is the class system. In essence, there IS no class system. You are forced to pick a class, or make a custom class, during the beginning portion of each character you make. However, any character can use any weapon, any spell, any armor, and learn any ability, so long as sufficient practice or training are endured. There is nothing stopping you from making a swordsman proficient in healing magic, and later on you decide you like using bows and fire spells more. Further yet, abilities are strengthened through direct use, ie. casting fire spells strengthens your Destruction Magic, landing arrow shots strengthens your Marksman skill, and so on. There is no experience system to speak of, and your character level is merely a summation of your "primary" skills. You level up by leveling up your "primary" skills, then going to sleep. You are allowed a number of attribute points to distribute, as well as the automatic attribute increase each level. All in all, your class and starting skills have almost no effect after about 5 hours into the game. The only class-related obstacles encountered are strict limits on spells; you simply cannot attempt to use a spell (or enchant with a type of spell) if you do not have high enough skill in the respective school of magic, although all characters have at least enough skill to learn the most basic spells of each type and practice them.The Game of the Year edition specifically includes the "Knights of the Nine" and "Shivering Isles" content packs, which include a lengthy quest and an entire new region complete with quests and unique loot respectively. Both are top-notch content and add an estimated 5+ total hours of gameplay per character/playthrough. Unfortunately, this version does not include any of the smaller DLC packs such as the spell book loot add-on, or any of the housing add-ons (Frost-Crag Spire being my personal recommendation).Overall, I would say this is a Love It or Hate It game. You'll likely either be bored to death before even finishing the mandatory introductory tutorial (which doubles as the character creation), or you'll find yourself 2 weeks later having spent every waking minute delving through moist dungeons and dragging hauls of loot back to market. So get out there and hack up some Daedra, hero!

Let me start off by saying I am not a RPG fan or a console player.I like PC action and adventure games and mostly first person shooters.However Because of the lack of these games being produced that are any good plus all the newer PC games are loaded with DRM and playing restrictions.I decided to try this older game not really expecting much.How wrong I was,the game was amazing.But at the same time it was the Buggiest game I had ever played.I wont go in to all the details but eventually it Destroyed my PC and this was a middle of the road gamming rig.I then bought a top of the line Voodoo gamming machine.It came loaded with VISTA 64 bit.Well that won't play Oblivion.It's funny how XP OP will play VISTA games but Vista will not play XP games.Guess that showes which OS is the best.I realized after I bought this expensive PC that because of the VISTA OS there wasn't much to play on it.The ones that were being produced were console games adapted to play on a PC and very badly at that.I broke down and bought an X-BOX and A 27in Hd Tv to play it on.I tried The witcher revised edition and to be honest it SUCKED.I then got Oblivion for X-Box and it is truly great.Plays Great and even looks better than the PC version.I am about half way through this huge game without even one problem.The one problem I have is using the joy stick.When I played it on the PC I had great controll but using the joy stick added a whole new level of difficulty.On top of that I looked on my PC and found all these articales on how to level up.I took the advice and chose Britan as the race,Battlemage,and all the other stuff on major and minor skills.By level five I realized my character was so wimpy his specialty was getting killed.I also realized that because using the joy stick was so bad in a fight I needed some defense big time so I started over.This time I chose REDGUARD and went for pure power in every thing major and minor.Let the geeks use Magic I want to kick Butt.The first thing I needed was money to get the best armor I could in order to live long enough to kill before getting killed.I joined the fighters guild.Not to fight but so I could sell all there equiptment.I striped and sold every thing movable in every city.Then I did the same to the mages guild but I kept all the soul gems.After that I joined the Thieves guild and that is whear I discovered two things.The joy stick is easier when it comes to picking locks and the city guard don't show up when you are robbing the place as often as on the PC game.I striped the Imperial city then started on all the other towns and there Palaces.I did keep a Katana sword I found in one Palace and sold every thing.The first thing I bought was the AEGIS of the APOCALYPSE and HANDS OF THE ATRONACH.Then I bought the staff APOTHEOSIS.Then I went out of the Imperial city and killed an Imperial city guard with the staff and compleated my armor.Now I am broke again even though all the stors are filing for bankrupcy and all the Nobels are eating with ther HANDS.( I did kill Umbra but decided to waite till later when the Umbra sword was more powerfull)I now went to the Arena to try out all my new DUDS.Did pretty good,made a few bucks and robbed the $500 dollar chest.I finally killed Umbra at level 21 took part of her armor that was better than mine.That is when I made another earth shaking discovery.On the PC the Umbra sword was so powerfull that all it took was a couple of blows to kill.On X-Box outside of the soul trap it isnt that good.I found GOLDBRAND to be much better.I am now at level 25.I am the Master of the Fighters Guild and the Leader of the Mages Guild even though I still can not buy over the counter spells because I DON"T HAVE ENOUGH MAGICA.My armor is rated at 85 and is a little bit of everything.Still have the CURIASS and GUANTLETS I bought at the start of the Game.I added UMBRA GREAVES,Spell Breaker sheild,Oreyn Bearclaw Helmet and boots of the thrall.I feel my greatest accomplishment was defeating the GREY PRINCE in the ARENA head on without any Enchantments and he hardly made a dent in my armor.I have came a long way and there is still a lot of game to play.NOW IF I COULD JUST LEARN HOW TO SPELL.I DON'T MEAN CAST THEM.I MEAN SPELL CORECTLY.Well I just became the GREY FOX.When I entered the guards chamber I entered with no shoes and in sneak but with the slightest movement the guards were alerted and killed me.I tried this 3 times with the same results.OK NO MORE Mr.NICE GUY I put back on my boots went in and when thy attacked I Killed them all.Then went in the Dinning Hall and Killed the ones in it.I then plundered all the chests.After I got the SCROLL I proceded to kill every body and left.I have decided MY ARMOUR IS UNBEATABLE.

I am not a hardcore RPG gamer. And I have to admit I got interested in "The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion" after playing "Fallout 3". I was curious about the previous work from Bethesda, which was allegedly better than the 3rd installment in the Fallout universe. "It's like Oblivion with guns", that's what people told me about Fallout 3. Boy, how wrong they could be...Oblivion is the wet dream of any RPG fan. The lore Bethesda created for the game borrows a lot from Tolkien's works and classic D&D elements. I do not want to make this long, so let me break down each aspect of the game I want to review:Story: compelling enough to keep you wandering what the next chapter is going to be. Some people might complain that due to the mind-blowing scope of the game, the main plot gets diluted and may seem dull and weak at some points, but if you sum up all the subquests you can follow and all the "literature" generated to enrich the whole setting of the game, you are forced to give two thumbs up to the guys of Bethesda, as you can almost feel their sweat and tears putting together the massive amount of text and plot the game has.Graphics: at the time of this review, the game is 5 years old. Therefore, the graphics are outdated enough to test if they still keep up with recent productions. Well, character wise, they don't. Faces are a little bit bland and flat, though models and animations are good enough. On the other hand, the landscapes and dynamic shadows are still eye candy. In my opinion, they are much better looking than all the rubble and ruins of the Capital Wasteland (Fallout 3). Anyway, if you are playing Oblivion you must not be looking for cutting edge graphics, but for all the RPG elements.Sound: Great score, famous voice actors (Sir Patrick Stewart and Sean Bean), perfect sound effects and one of the best Dolby 5.1 mix I have ever listened to in my 360.Gameplay: that is the big achievement of Oblivion. In a nutshell: MIND-BOGGLING! You can get lost into the story, with all the sub-quests, all the looting, potion-making, buying houses, collecting unique items... Pick what you like the most and enjoy hours and hours of exploration, NPC interaction, real-time fights with tons of different characters. It might seem slow paced in the beginning, but as soon as you start leveling up your character, you will find yourself embraced in the story of Tamriel, its legends and myths, visiting every corner of Cyrodiil while at it.Replay value: Infinite.While Oblivion is one of my favorite games ever, many people find it tedious, boring and even frustrating, the latter applying for the ones who got stuck because of the many bugs the game has. As I was discussing with a good friend of mine, if you liked Fallout 3, you need to try Oblivion at least once, give it a chance, get deep into the whole story of Tamriel and get yourself ready, because the dragons are coming... :-)5 out of 5 stars.

My Review: This is by far the best RPG currently offered for Xbox 360, the only games it's rivaled by as far as graphics, gameplay, and storyline are Fallout 3 (also made by Bethsda) and the Mass Effect 1 & 2. Why? Because it's everything an RPG should be.PROS:-More than enough quests with a vast variety.-A whole world to explore.-Four different guilds and you can join them all: warrior's, thieve's, mage's, and assassin's guild.-Great graphics, 4.5 out of 5 stars.-Fantastic storyline.-So many different characters and you can converse with them all.-Can join the arena and fight against AI to become a champion gladiator.-A huge market system. Several different stores to sell loot and buy new equipment.-Very long RPG, unless you just focus on the main quests, then just mediocre.-The expansion, Shivering Isles, brings about a whole new world with new quests, characters, and achievemants.-Isn't a simple button masher. Have to actually learn to parry, use spells, & flee when you're overwhelmed.-Have total control over your character's appearance from eyes to hair to skin color. You can also choose gender, race, birthday, etc.-So many options for clothes, armor, spells, attributes, weapons, etc.-Hours upon hours of looting and exploration.-A mass amount of different enemies.CONS:-Occasionally glitchy and will freeze at least once, very seldom though.-Can get tiring by the time you get to the expansions.-I didn't even think about a second playthrough so very little replay value.-No multiplayer or online play whatsoever.-Somewhat of a lack of different landscapes and enviroments. Most of landscapes are mountains, meadows, and caves.-The little, cheap add-ons like Battlehorn Castle are a bit of a rip-off. You get a lot of rewards like a home and supplies, but not a whole lot to offer as quests goes.-Most AI comrades are idiots. You can't really command them, they get stuck behind doors, and aren't all that helpful in an actual fight other than being a great decoy.Games it most compares to are: Fallout 3, Fable 2, & Dragon Age: Origins.BOTTOM LINE: If you already own Oblivion and have bought the downloadable content from Xbox Live, then DO NOT purchase this game. If not, this is the #1 RPG for Xbox 360 and you should BUY IT!!!