Ships Ahoy - Oblivion (Official) [Mar 22, 2006, 09:16 am ET] – Share – Viewing Comments
Stop the presses again, as another
overdue press
release announces the availability of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion for
Xbox 360 in North America. Here's the official announcement on availability of
the RPG sequel, which actually arrived in most stores by yesterday, and will
show up in Europe by Friday:
NEW YORK & ROCKVILLE, Md.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 22, 2006--2K Games, a publishing label of Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. (NASDAQ:TTWO - News), and Bethesda Softworks® today announced that the highly-anticipated role-playing game, The Elder Scrolls® IV: Oblivion(TM) is now available for the Xbox 360(TM) video game and entertainment system from Microsoft and PC in stores across North America and will be available at stores in Europe on March 24th.
The long-awaited Oblivion represents the quintessential role-playing experience for the next-generation of gaming, inviting gamers into the sprawling environments of Tamriel, the most vibrant game-world ever created. With a powerful combination of freeform gameplay and lush, unprecedented graphics, gamers can choose to unravel Oblivion's epic narrative or simply explore the vast landscape in search of their own unique challenges.
Oblivion's story begins with the mysterious assassination of Emperor Uriel Septim VII, leaving the kingdom's throne dangerously vacant. With the Empire ready to crumble, the gates of Oblivion are thrust open, scattering demons and other hellish creatures across the countryside. To turn the tide, gamers must journey to find the Emperor's lost heir and defeat the plot that threatens to destroy all of Tamriel.
"Oblivion is an engrossing and unique role-playing experience with incredibly deep gameplay," said Christoph Hartmann, Managing Director of 2K Games. "Gamers will be amazed when they see the revolutionary features that have made Oblivion one of the most anticipated titles of 2006."
Oblivion promises to be the defining RPG for the next generation, combining landmark visuals, a sprawling, sandbox universe with more than 200 hours of gameplay, intense first-person combat and realistic characters driven by the groundbreaking Radiant AI.
The Elder Scrolls® IV: Oblivion is available for both the PC and Xbox 360 in regular and collector's editions. The collector's edition includes a 112-page Pocket Guide to the Empire, detailing every aspect of the world of Tamriel, as well as an extensive "Making of Oblivion" documentary and an authentic replication of the Septim Gold Coin, the official currency of Tamriel. PC gamers will also be able to bend the world of Tamriel to their will with the extensive Elder Scrolls Construction Set(TM).
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion for Xbox 360 and PC, co-published by 2K Games and Bethesda Softworks, has been rated "T" for Teen by the ESRB. For more information on the title visit the official web site at www.elderscrolls.com.
This game easily has 100 hours of contentI agree. Literally I see 100 hours of play time in this thing without getting bored. While level 1 I found a Vampire colony by accident and killed them, did a quest, explored. Then I wasn't happy with my character and I started over. I went back and killed those damn Vampires again (Vampire dust is $$$) but I'm still not happy with my character so tonight I'm starting all over agin.
"Power leveling" isn't so attractive in Oblivion as it was in Morrowind. Mostly I think because there aren't any Misc skills anymore. But that's a good thing. This time around I'm giving my character the skills he truly uses most. I was trying to power level with my first two characters, the first much more than the second. But it became clear fairly early on that that wasn't a good idea.
The interface SUCKS. I can't believe how much worse it is than Morrowind. Much of it screams console--the big huge fonts, the need to scroll everywhere. And why the goddamn hell doesn't ESC get you out of every menu? It's ludicrous. But other sucky things are puzzling since they would benefit both consoles and PCs. Where the hell are the tooltips? For god sakes give us some tooltips! Is the interface customizable in the CS? In Morrowind you left-clicked your mouse and it brought up EVERYTHING you needed. This F1 through F4 stuff is getting old fast.
When people used to bring up how parallel Console/PC development invariably screws up a game, I'd agree with them but always mention Morrowind as the exception that proved the rule. Bethesda managed to do the interface right with Morrowind. So how they could fuck up Oblivion so bad is bizarre and puzzling and very sad.
3.6 GHZ, 2 MB RAM, ATI X800XT, performance is very very good.
It crashes a LOT. I would say half the time I try and load a save game it CTDs. Sometimes, rarely, it will crash when loading a new zone, once it crashed during lockpicking. But I don't have the latest drivers installed--I'm guessing I'm almost a year out of date--so I have no right to complain about that ... yet.
Weird weird slowdown when there are invisible characters in view. Remember in Morrowind when sometimes in a dungeon something would be visible--you never knew what--that caused you framerate to drop down to 1 or 2 FPS? This happens in Oblivion too. But again, not the latest drivers so I have no right to whine about it.
I can find no way to read a a book or scroll in a container without first putting it in my inventory, then closing the container, going into my inventory, scrolling aaaaall the way down to find the damn thing, reading it, then dropping it. In Morrowind you had something like 30 or 40 items in your inventory in view at once. Thanks to consoles, you now have something like 8, and they're overly huge, take up way too much space. But oh, I guess they're ever so easy to read on a low res TV sitting on the other side of the room.
Is it just me or does the water look WORSE than it did in Morrowind. I was blown away the first time I saw Morrowind's water. I'd never seen anything like it. As far as I can tell Oblivion's water doesn't look so good. The waves are all tiled or something.
But combat is sweet. I'm actually using a bow and arrow and loving it. Now I know if I aim right I'll hit something! And the little "health" arc is a nice improvement. Very unobtrusive and definitely useful. Things are MUCH more balanced, you can tell already even at level 1. Creating an übercharacter will not be as easy as it was in Morrowind, if it's possible at all.
Deers, horsies, and doggies! BAD doggy! I love them.
So 90% good things, 10% shitty things. I can live with that.
This comment was edited on Mar 22, 13:00.
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