Minosla wrote: »

Tabbycat wrote: »

When my character traveled to Ald'ruhn and put her hand in front of her face to cover her eyes during an ash storm.

BGS does a great job at world building.

In Morrowind you were an Outlander. NOBOBY liked you. You did not hear NPC's extolling your virtues as you passed ("Did you hear? Some stranger saved King Casimir's life! I'd like to buy that adventurer a drink"). What you heard instead was "We're watching you, scum" and "Make it quick or go away." In ESO no one really cares that you are the Vestige. In TES III EVERYONE cared that you were an Outlander, and made their feelings known.

At first, yeah, but as you built a reputation they would gradually become more polite. The Ordinator quotes show that. I liked that you start off as just some random hobo scumbag, but eventually would be a respected citizen. Unless you never built up a reputation with whatever faction the NPC belonged to. It was immersive.

One thing about Skyrim that annoyed me was that I could be leading the charge against the Stormcloaks and be able to walk around Windhelm without anyone noticing before completing that questline. In Morrowind, by contrast, if you were in the Mage Guild the Telvanni would dislike you and it would affect what you could do in Telvanni areas.

Solsthiem might come back because of the bloodmoon appearing near the end of each era for hunt of hircine also Shivering Isles is the same with the greymarch happening at the end of each era too...

Solsthiem I expect to be a zone for with more werewolf content similar in size to murkmire or something... Shivering Ilses would be a full expansion zone I suppose.

I never liked Morrowind. After Daggerfall it felt like a downgrade and combat system was absolutely terrible in comparison.
I liked the vibe, lore extension, story line, but gameplay actually what eventually pushed me off.

In my case:

- The worldbuilding. Morrowind was alien, weird, and refreshing. Very few normal animals (mostly rats) but insect-like hounds with too many legs, scaly thing with a giant maw, and scaly thing with a giant maw and tusks, and way too many pseudo-dinos. Very little normal food stuff but kwama cuttle and things like that. Mushroom towers, chitin armour, lava pools, giant concrete blocks, a giant crab, ash storms.
- House wars. The three Great Houses managed to create a kind of partisanship and identity that was quite special. Oblivion totally sucked in that regard, and only Skyrim had something reminiscent of that rivalry, with the Stormcloaks/Imperials.
- Steampunky dwarves.
- How unimportant the main quest was. Usually in CRPGs, the game is over when you've completed the main storyline. Not so in Morrowind. You could ditch the main quest altogether (I know someone who threw the Package for Caius Cosades into the ocean immediately after leaving the Census and Excise Office, and never touched the main quest). You could continue playing after you defeated the end boss. The main quest was just another quest line - a bit bigger and more fleshed out, but one quest line among many.
- Mods. When Morrowind came out, I was semi-active in modding Baldur's Gate, which was all based on fan-created tools and, basically, hacking the game data. Having a built-in mod editor was astounding, and it was both powerful and easy to use.

I still start up Morrowind once a year or so.

That said, there are serious problems with the game.
- Graphics-wise, it seriously needs mods to pretty it up. Mods are doing a really good job at it, though.
- The one major exception are player/NPC models and movement. They were kind of not-good when the game was released, and they have aged really, really badly. And the quite terrible animations are the one aspect of the game that mods never managed to fix.
- Combat. I dislike real-time combat; Morrowind was just too good in other areas so I ignored it.
- The levelling system. Gaining experience by doing things was a decent idea but the execution was not good. It was very easy to abuse the system.
- Contrary to posts above, dungeons were a bit boring and not really imaginative. Yes, you could enter that dwarven ruin or ancestral tomb over there, but in most cases, it consisted of a rather basic dungeon with not too much happening in it. Even story-related Dwemer ruins were a bit meh.
- I didn't care for Solstheim at all. It took away the alien-ness and replaced it with boring standard forests and bears and wolves and so one. And I don't like werewolves. (Or vampires. And I especially find that idea that they are mortal enemies boring.)

In terms of game systems and playability, and graphics, Oblivion improved a lot of things. In all other aspects, it was worse than Morrowind. It was a bland mix of pseudo-medieval Europe and pseudo-Rome, it had the same trees and meadows that I can see outside my window, the factions were kind of non-interesting, and then, the heads. Oh god, the heads. I can't bring myself to play Oblivion any more, because of those ugly, balloony, puffed up heads. Also, the overly aggressive level-scaling was a bad idea.

Skyrim was great after that. Better worldbuilding, better everything. Yes, it had exterminated most stats and numbers of Morrowind's character system, which was much more oldschool. But I don't care that much about that. I don't think videogames should try to mimick pen-and-paper RPG systems.

In ESO, I quite liked the Morrowind expansion. I came back to play it, after quitting the game in early 2015. Sure, it's an MMO, with all the problems that an MMO will have. But I think it did a decent job at re-creating the Morrowind feeling. Yes, you can't enter this or that ruin or tomb. But then, even though you could in TES3, it didn't actually matter - the same two to three rooms connected by hallways and populated with the same enemies as almost every other ruin of tomb of that type. I don't think it's that much of a problem. The ESO version of Vvardenfell tries really, really hard to hit that nostalgia button, and for me, it worked.

I general, I think that much of that adoration for TES3 and the disappointment for the ESO DLC is that nostalgia. Even if you still play the original and are confronted with its shortcomings, it has a certain connotation. You remember the feeling of how it was, and it was great and new and exciting back then. ESO can't re-create that feeling; they couldn't recreate it even if they had cloned TES3's Vvardenfell, including quests and only rudimentary level scaling. It's an emotional connection to the original, not a rational one.

Nothing at all. I played Arena and loved it. Got caught up in school and college and didn't game again until I saw Oblivion in the store. Bought it and loved it too. Saw lots of posts about how great Morrowind was on the Bethesda forums and bought it to try it. Good God it was terrible. I left the starting city went into a delve, had a bow, I couldn't hit the broadside of a barn with it. I could have reached out and poked the dude with the arrow but nope couldn't shoot him. It was so stupid I shut the game off and never returned.

Morrowind is the game that assured that I was going to play similar games for the rest of my life! I actually remember how incredible it was at the time. Remember it was game of the year for a reason. Most of you sound just a little too young to have been there when this game actually hit the market. But when it came out, it carried a devoted army of players that fell in love with the game. It was the most advanced game at the time when it came out, there was nothing that was remotely close. I believe it influenced games then, now and tomorrow.
The atmosphere was something that no other game had ever achieved. The combination of the incredible music and the air you seemed to breathe in while you played, was a new and totally absorbing experience that just hadn’t been invented yet. The sky was something you could watch from the shell of some ancient beast near the ocean’s edge and be mesmerized. Nothing was like the camp of the (forgive my spelling) Urshliaku with its bone wind chimes and the ocean sounds plus the music. That was definitely my favorite place to be in the game.
It was a highly creative game, the enchantments and spells you could dream up were only limited by your imagination. It was possible to make a ring that made you permanently invisible which I always named either Precious or the Hobbit, pure corn I know. You could make a ring that allowed you to fly around the countryside. You could invent bizarre spells to cast on enemies, or combined charm/calming spells on friendly npc’s. Reguarded you needed to be a pretty high level to achieve most of these kinds of feats. But when you replay a game so much, it gets pretty easy to have control over the outcome.
Besides who can complain about the semi-secret Mudcrab salesman, without which the economy would be joke like it is in ESO, LOL.

Browiseth wrote: »

I think Morrowind is an overrated and outdated game to begin with, so this post will be more of a critique than singing its praises. This is from 30-40 hours play experience:

- combat is awful, nothing about it is particularly fun. The enemies you fight are never all that fun to fight either.
- exploration is whatever. Everything looks the same and with how sluggish and rigid movement is, the simple act of moving through the world is draining on my patience.
- NPCs are uninspired encyclopedias
- The way the game handles background music is atrocious.
- Sometimes questing is pretty cool and leaves you with a "eureka!" feeling after you've figured something out or where to go, but the amount of time wasted wandering around just makes it not really worth it.
- the main quest is cool
- the game is less of an open world and more of a series of narrow pathways that link between landmarks and towns disguised as an open world
- related to the previous point, being able to use levitation spells to ignore said narrow pathways is neat and appreciated
- spears are nice
- the amount of text you're expected to read baffles me, and yet I hear people like this sort of thing?
- the number of things that are left up to a DnD style "chance" skill check in a real time action RPG has not aged well
- Cliff racers are not something to be remembered fondly with nostalgia, guys. Stop pretending this game is better than it is.
- leveling and building your character kind of sucks, but to be fair only Skyrim has handled this process half-decently
- the only truly great thing I've ever gotten out of this game is the world building. Morrowind really does feel like less of a fantasy land and more of an alien world with alien culture and perspectives on the world. Can't really say much negative here, it's a very unique fantasy setting.
- lack of reliable fast travel is mostly awful

And I could go on...

Basically, this game isn't as good as you remember.

Well, I still play it and it is still fun imho. I have more then 1400 hours in it since its release. Yes, it feels outdated now but it's still a great game imho.

In comparison I have only 600 hours in oblivion according to my save game and only 120 hours in Skyrim.

I have more hours in Daggerfall, but I really don't know how many.

And I don't understand "lack of reliable fast travel" . It has mage guild travel, silt strides, propylon chambers which work great.

Knootewoot wrote: »

Browiseth wrote: »

I think Morrowind is an overrated and outdated game to begin with, so this post will be more of a critique than singing its praises. This is from 30-40 hours play experience:

- combat is awful, nothing about it is particularly fun. The enemies you fight are never all that fun to fight either.
- exploration is whatever. Everything looks the same and with how sluggish and rigid movement is, the simple act of moving through the world is draining on my patience.
- NPCs are uninspired encyclopedias
- The way the game handles background music is atrocious.
- Sometimes questing is pretty cool and leaves you with a "eureka!" feeling after you've figured something out or where to go, but the amount of time wasted wandering around just makes it not really worth it.
- the main quest is cool
- the game is less of an open world and more of a series of narrow pathways that link between landmarks and towns disguised as an open world
- related to the previous point, being able to use levitation spells to ignore said narrow pathways is neat and appreciated
- spears are nice
- the amount of text you're expected to read baffles me, and yet I hear people like this sort of thing?
- the number of things that are left up to a DnD style "chance" skill check in a real time action RPG has not aged well
- Cliff racers are not something to be remembered fondly with nostalgia, guys. Stop pretending this game is better than it is.
- leveling and building your character kind of sucks, but to be fair only Skyrim has handled this process half-decently
- the only truly great thing I've ever gotten out of this game is the world building. Morrowind really does feel like less of a fantasy land and more of an alien world with alien culture and perspectives on the world. Can't really say much negative here, it's a very unique fantasy setting.
- lack of reliable fast travel is mostly awful

And I could go on...

Basically, this game isn't as good as you remember.

And I don't understand "lack of reliable fast travel" . It has mage guild travel, silt strides, propylon chambers which work great.

I can travel between major towns, sure, but when I actually want to go into the unknown parts of the land I need to hold W for 20 minutes.

And yeah, I know you could argue this is actually good world design (specifically world design, in terms of game design it's still pretty bad) since of course there isn't going to be some kind of reliable travel network into the dangerous outback. Maybe if walking around and fighting things along the way was actually kind of fun, one could make a case for this being good game design.

Unfortunately, the thing TES:III is meant to be good at but ends up being awful at (exploration and discovery) is made worse by how much time you spend doing nothing along the way.

Browiseth wrote: »

I think Morrowind is an overrated and outdated game to begin with, so this post will be more of a critique than singing its praises. This is from 30-40 hours play experience:

- combat is awful, nothing about it is particularly fun. The enemies you fight are never all that fun to fight either.
- exploration is whatever. Everything looks the same and with how sluggish and rigid movement is, the simple act of moving through the world is draining on my patience.
- NPCs are uninspired encyclopedias
- The way the game handles background music is atrocious.
- Sometimes questing is pretty cool and leaves you with a "eureka!" feeling after you've figured something out or where to go, but the amount of time wasted wandering around just makes it not really worth it.
- the main quest is cool
- the game is less of an open world and more of a series of narrow pathways that link between landmarks and towns disguised as an open world
- related to the previous point, being able to use levitation spells to ignore said narrow pathways is neat and appreciated
- spears are nice
- the amount of text you're expected to read baffles me, and yet I hear people like this sort of thing?
- the number of things that are left up to a DnD style "chance" skill check in a real time action RPG has not aged well
- Cliff racers are not something to be remembered fondly with nostalgia, guys. Stop pretending this game is better than it is.
- leveling and building your character kind of sucks, but to be fair only Skyrim has handled this process half-decently
- the only truly great thing I've ever gotten out of this game is the world building. Morrowind really does feel like less of a fantasy land and more of an alien world with alien culture and perspectives on the world. Can't really say much negative here, it's a very unique fantasy setting.
- lack of reliable fast travel is mostly awful

And I could go on...

Basically, this game isn't as good as you remember.

Umm, to begin with dude you are obviously one of the youthful types I pointed out. That are too young too have been there when this game was released.
You have to understand this was a ground breaking game when it came out. Nothing had ever been released like it. Everything since then has been, in some way, a derivative of Morrowind. It brought RPG’s to the forefront of the gaming world. Only a small number of gamers were playing RPG’s until then. It was the best game available at the time. Yes, sometimes it crashed and had some other problems but it still exceeded anything available at the time.
Do you need me to point out that ESO crashes and isn’t perfect either.
If you like gaming currently, you owe a debt of gratitude toward Morrowind for accelerating gaming to where it is today.
You just don’t get it. “Wasn’t as good as I remember” you are just not placing things in their context. You are making comparisons to today’s games. You are the one not seeing or “remembering” things correctly.
Your 30-40 hours are mouse droppings compared to my thousands of hours I put in to that game.
Did you seriously complain about having to read something in a game? Wow.
Anyway I will go weep for the future of this world. You go ahead and tear it up. But this is about context. You show zero context. You cannot compare yesterday’s games to today’s games. Except in a then and now comparison, which this was not.

Nave_Horsespitoon wrote: »

Ah well, you misunderstand. Number one yes you do have to examine things in their context. Again yes it matters that you weren't there for the release because you are wrong about the impact Morrowind had. There were zero games like it on the market. It did flood the market with new RPG styled releases. It was game of the year and so were each subsequent games from Bethesda.
Also I have no idea where you got the idea that I said your age determines your ability to play games. You also suggest that I said and you wrongly quote me as saying " the older the game the smarter you need to be to enjoy it ". I never said, or inferred any such thing. I only said because you weren't there for the release, you dont actually know what it was like when it came out. You lack context. Your critique was a comparison to today's games. Your complaints are due to your current knowledge of games. It is not a slight on you, it is just fact. There is nothing for you to get upset about. End of story.

@Nave_Horsespitoon What are you talking about, "context"? the game sucks and hasn't aged well. I played it, that's what I got out of it. Stop making these excuses.

You can love the game all you want, but stop creating this nonsense to justify why you love it.

also.

Nave_Horsespitoon wrote: »

Umm, to begin with dude you are obviously one of the youthful types I pointed out.

That's where I got the idea you were belittling me because of my age. My age that you don't even know, yet you jumped to making an inappropriate assumption about it to use as a point of argument.

I've never played it. I didn't even know that game existed until i started playing Skyrim.