Pro's and Con's of TES 4 and 3

[Wolfie]

NO DEBATES
If you HAVE to talk to someone pm them
Here is how it goes
A lot of pepole say TES 3 was better or 4 was better
so why dont we list the pro's and con's of each game?
Reasson behind this: Me and freinds have realized the reasson we like 3 or 4 more is not because it did more things right
On avreage the cons of the one we liked more was more then the one we did not like (in other words morwwind cons where 5 while oblivion cons where 3 yet they liked morrwind more) and the pros of the other where higher more times then not

It was usely one or two things that made it better
E.X better fractions and A unique world

E.X Directions, and being able to hit

ECT
there whrre more and there where about 30 of us
I'm wondering how this will turn out
The only way this will work is if you are honest and put what you like and dont like

Once more No debates in this thread if you dont agree dont post it here okay?

[Vendetta]

No game is better than the other. Every game has a different feel, content, style of play. Comparing oblivon to morrowind is like comparing apples to oranges. Why waste your breath saying "MURRWIND IZ BETTEUR!!!1!!!1!111"

[Wolfie]

This is no part of the "pros and con;s"
so I'll allow this talk



okay I'm not saying morrwind is better or orbli is
I'm saying put the Pro's and Con's fo both
the one you like more most of the time we found how more con's and less pro's weird huh?Has nothing to do with which is beter
only your ophion on what you like and dont like on both games

[MARS]

They may be different but they are part of the same franchise. There are always common elements. But I can't discuss this here.

Pro's of Morrowind:
Better faction mechanics. A strange and interesting setting. No leveling. More diversity in armour and weapons. More dialogue. Better looking characters. (I'm talking about the artistic appeal, not the textures.). More spell effects. More skills. Better class mechanics and overall better stat mechanics. Better dungeons. Better birthsigns. Travel systems instead of fast travel. Open cities. More decisions in MQ.

Pro's of Oblivion: Better graphics. Voiced dialogue (although not all of it was good.). Radiant AI. Better inventory. Better map. Better combat. Compass.

Con's of Morrowind: At times there were confusing directions. Awkward combat.Bugs.


Con's of Oblivion: Dumbed down factions. Somewhat (I repeat somewhat) casualized gameplay. Weak story and mostly badly written quests. Less diversity in weapons and armour. QUEST ARROWS. Ugly character models. Too few voice actors. Bugs.

[Moeboid]

Morrowind wins in:
Graphics - If I were role playing a permanently invisible tourist (not recommended btw), I'd prefer to do it in Morrowind (especially with MGE installed!)
Story - Morrowind's story is so much better than Oblivion's. It's more interesting, more complex, more original and more believable.
History/setting - I know a lot about Vvardenfell. I know what drives its economy. I know what's going on politically for each guild/faction. I know what motivates certain people and guilds. I know only a little about Cyrodiil.
Other stuff:
- No quest markers
- Potion stacking
- Skills and attributes can be fortified past 100
- Less "even" weapons - weight doesn't always correlate with damage like it does in Oblivion
- Text worked better than voice acting
- I enjoyed the faction and side quests quite a bit more (same reasons as "story")
- Less (insignificant amount, almost) levelled stuff
- More interesting characters
- Shops open 24/7
- I like the bartering system more
- Best weapons and armor were rarer
- Levitation
- You can wear clothes and armor

Oblivion wins in:
Combat system - Seriously, what's with Morrowind's auto block?
Magic system - Cost of spells is far more balanced then in Morrowind. I also like that you don't have to put away your weapon to cast.
Stealth system - Stilly flawed, but far less so. At least they took light into consideration.
Other stuff:
- All creatures souls can completely fill a soul gem
- You can buy houses

Tie:
Music - I like Morrowind's slower title theme better, but Oblivion has some better in-game music.

Overall, Morrowind wins by far.

Edit: aded more stuff...

[Stendarr]

Morrowind

Pros:
-Great sense of exploration with a good travel system that makes getting around more realistic, that asks you to prepare your travels accordingly.
-More or less realistic journal, and getting indications to quest rather than being directly told where something is.
-A good number of factions with diverging interests which affects how you are seen by other factions. A good number of quests to satisfy you even if you stick to only one or two factions.
-Exotic and alien culture and geography.
-Cool China-esque prophecy story.
-A good selections of artifacts and different types of dungeons with really interesting ones.
-Less campy characters and mood, great atmosphere, almost gritty at times. More interesting quests.
-Low level scaling, making several areas more accessible or dangerous than others. The Red Mountain and surrounding areas being quite well done.
-More skills.
-Better designed province with more distinct areas.
-Text based dialog with occasional voice acting provides more conversation options.
-More freedom, more immersion.

Cons:
-Combat system could've been a bit better.
-Quests can be hard to track at times.
-Irritating bugs (although relatively rare).


Oblivion

Pros:
-A bit more appropriate combat.
-More detailed quests (although not necessarily better or more appealing).

Cons:
-Game breaking level scaling. (seriously, I'm playing - and stopped countless of times due to being highly frustrating - an assassin character with skills ranging from sneak, archery, short swords to alchemy and acrobatics, and after doing most factions and side quests I wanted to do, I diminished greatly the difficulty and still am having an hard time getting through Kvatch, throwing countless arrows (even while sneaking) to kill enemies. I'll have to lower the difficulty to the minimum, but I'm afraid I'll have some problems before the end of the game or during the Shivering Isles. It's a wonder they didn't found the level scaling to be so problematic on a fundamental level. Even my barbarian had to take potions after a fight with a single bear, with the best armor and weapons.
-Leveling and level locked items.
-Significantly stronger enemies appearing in places they weren't before, sometimes killing characters on the roads.
-The province doesn't feel alive, a couple of major cities, ridiculously small villages and empty wilderness, most of it is there only for the adventurer, featuring similar forts and caves which get old fast. Lack of variety in dungeons too.
-Lack of real artifacts.
-Campy characters, too many of them feel like being from the Cyrodil Theatre Troupe, particularly the Dark Brotherhood.
-Lack of quests for those who keeps themselves to only one faction. Side quests are relatively limited too, and most of them being more detailed, they are more irritating to do over and over again, and you get over them all fast.
-A GPS in a fantasy game? Where's all the work to do quests and exploration?
-Journal made too much in the completed/uncompleted fashion. Ie. your quests have a state, they don't truly end when you desire and encourages you to complete them or do as much as possible of them. Plus, it's not quite realistic.
-Fast traveling and the lack of travel systems. Too easy to get around (should at least be more like in Daggerfall, which requires a bit more preparation and is more immersive/realistic.
-Oblivion gates get old fast.
-Lacks a bit skills.
-Less weapon types.


I probably forgot some in every aspect.

[Iamgoofball]

Oblivion

Pros: "Flyyyin'... flyyin' in the skyyyy.... cliff racer flys so high.... flyinnn'..."

Cons: No PS3 Modding.

[OblivionDuruza]

Morrowind wins on:
1. The night sky - simply beautiful
2. The in-game lore and culture
3. The dynamic and vibrant factional system - interaction and effects on each other e.g. Thieves and Fighters
4. The sense of accomplishment at becoming Nerevarine (not so much with other titles like Archmaster for instance) and at tackling many different guilds and achieving many different things
5. The Main quest
6. The Pre-determined PC designs (they looked pretty good)
7. The general interest created by all the NPCs - possibly just becasue they are so exotic being Dunmeri
8. Being a High Fantasy setting
9. The quantity and size
10. The massive re-playability factor

Oblivion wins on:
1. General graphics
2. The player's interaction with lore as far as completing guild questlines that really effect history
3. The depth of individual guild questlines and quests
4. The sense of accomplishment at gaining many significant titles (each one is very siginifact as you must achieve it through a significant questline.)
5. The final battle and the trip to Paradise - Mankar is just so crazy it's funny
6. The ability to customize your PC to no limit (double edged sword but)
7. The few memorable NPCs
8. Being realistic and familiar
9. The quality and finesse
10. The quality of the first playthrough

Overall, Morrowind is much wider and gives they player much more to explore and do. Oblivion is more refined and provides much finer options, but significantly less. Morrowind is therefore more re-playable, but Oblivion gives a good first play-through. This is all IMO though .

[H8Ball]

TES 4: Oblivion

Spoiler:

Pros
- Rendering: Realistic lighting, shadows, water and bump/specular/gloss/glow mapping, due to use of SM2.0 and SM3.0 shaders.
- Meshes: Realistic high poly weighted skeletal meshes (skin mesh deforms as skeleton moves).
- Textures: High resolution. Even higher (near photo-realistic) on PC if you install Qarl's Texture Pack 3!
- Rideable Creatures: Yes. Horses.

Cons
- Main Quest: What, I'm a delivery boy? Oh, and then I'm a delivery boy doing collections as well. Occasional bodyguard stuff. Also too short and not that interesting, apart from the timed run closing the Main Oblivion Gate. No final face-to-face battle with Mehrunes Dagon. He's just scenery. King Kong going ape on the city, basically. You just run past avoiding him, then the guy you've broken your back to protect commits suicide while you watch. Meh.
- Quests: 99% of them are too simplistic. Go there, fetch that, get a mediocre reward.
- Guilds/Factions: Fewer to join than Morrowind. Relationships are non-existent or aren't obvious. Player joining and increasing in rank apparently has NO effect on Dispositions of other factions/guilds. I'd have actually preferred it if Guilds HAD serious dislikes for each other, i.e. Mages don't like Fighters & vice versa. Neither likes Thieves or Dark Brotherhood, but both like Blades. And so on. Would have made Guilds/Factions much more dynamic.
- Navigation: NO on-screen minimap makes it difficult. You're forced to frequently pause the game to see where you are. Can't create notes on the Local Map. You can create potions AS notes, but they don't appear on the map.
- Fast-travel: Ruins exploration. You're only forced to slow-travel to a place ONCE. After that, you can simply fast-travel to it. This creates ONE giant fast-travel network, rendering slow-travel mostly unnecessary. It becomes TOO convenient to fast-travel most everywhere, so you miss out on exploring the world extensively unless you CHOOSE to, which lessens the experience. Fast-travel makes the larger world (roughly 16 sq miles) "feel" too small.
- Difficulty: WAY too easy. You never miss with weapons. Spells don't misfire. Enemies stay roughly at your Level so there are NO dangerous areas. You don't even have to close ALL 60 Oblivion gates, only 10 of them, the 9 city gates and the Main Gate at Bruma. Main Quest can EVEN be completed at Level 1! No real sense that you're ever in danger. No real reason to level up. No real sense of accomplishment. You end up HAVING to roleplay to GET any sense of danger or accomplishment!

TES 3: Morrowind

Spoiler:

Pros
- Main Quest: Fantastic. Long and involved storyline with lots of travelling, knowledge and clue chasing, plot twists and turns, and a gradual build-up to a glorious final showdown.
- Quests: Guild ones are much more involved. Not just go/fetch to ONE place, but find clues by asking around and get passed from one NPC to another with lots of travel!
- Guilds/Factions: Plenty of them. Joining one and increasing in rank noticeably affects Dispositions of others. Having THREE Great House factions with different likes/dislikes for standard Guilds/Factions was a brilliant move! And ONLY allowing you to join ONE Great House was a master stroke! It means you can play every character you create THREE times to see how things turn out differently!
- Navigation: On-screen minimap makes it VERY easy. You DON'T have to keep pausing the game, just glance at the minimap as you explore. You can even create NOTES on the Local Map, making it VERY easy to mark stationary NPC's, items, places you've visited, etc!
- Fast-travel: Doesn't ruin exploration. Limited fast-travel networks (transportation systems) between fixed points. You're still required to slow-travel everywhere else, forcing you to actually explore the world extensively. This makes the smaller world (only about 4 sq miles) "feel" far larger.
- Difficulty: Brilliantly thought out! You start off fearing to even leave Seyda Neen because you're a weakling who can't hit a barn door with a shovel, and gradually grow into the saviour of the land who gets to give Dagoth Ur a well-deserved kick in the unmentionables! The feeling of danger on entering new areas is just fantastic. Finally, you MUST level up before you can take on the more dangerous dungeon types, and certainly before you even THINK about setting foot inside the Ghostfence (Dagoth's domain)! This means you CAN'T complete the Main Quest without some serious exploring, battling and levelling up! You get a strong feeling of accomplishment when you finally level up enough to enter dangerous Dwemer Ruins, Daedric Shrines and the Ghostfence.

Cons
- Rendering: Looking seriously dated now. Poor lighting/shadows. No advanced shaders except SM1.1 for water.
- Meshes: Low poly doll-like jointed characters, looking more like puppets with no strings.
- Textures: Low resolution & therefore blurry. No advanced bump/specular mapping.
- Rideable Creatures: No.

As you can see, it's a complete turn-around. Morrowind has very dated graphics but great storyline and depth of gameplay, with real sense of difficulty, danger and hard-won accomplishments as rewards. Oblivion has great modern graphics but falls down on the lame storyline and mediocre gameplay, too "dumbed down", too easy, and no real sense of danger or accomplishment.

You have to remember that Morrowind was released in 2002, back when PC's were slower, had less memory, and the first SM1.1 shader-based 64Mb video cards were JUST beginning to hit the market. As such, Morrowind had ONE SM1.1 shader thrown in at the last minute, for the water.

In contrast, Oblivion was released 3 years later in 2005, when PC's were MUCH faster, had MORE memory, and video cards were mainly 128Mb or 256Mb, with SM2.0 (and SM3.0 had recently hit the market). As such, Oblivion made extensive use of shaders and looked far better for it.

My biggest bugbear, though, is the "dumbing down" of Oblivion's difficulty and quest complexity compared to Morrowind. Oblivion is obviously firmly aimed at younger console players with short attention spans. To me, Oblivion might be far better graphics-wise, but Morrowind is still the better RPG gameplay-wise, with a far greater depth of storyline, quest complexity and experience to be had.

If ONLY they'd re-release Morrowind with the Oblivion graphics engine under the hood, I'd rush out and buy it!

[OblivionDuruza]

The main point of difference between the two games is that Morrowind focused on intrigue and Oblivion focused on finesse. You could really connect with some of the stories of Oblivion, but you find yourself getting wrapped up in the world of Morrowind.

If ONLY they'd re-release Morrowind with the Oblivion graphics engine under the hood, I'd rush out and buy it!

Would you be interested in something like this?

[MARS]

And once again, H8Ball makes my post obsolete

[H8Ball]

Har har!

Actually, the quality of my posts stems from experience (9 years in Morrowind, 6 years in Oblivion), knowledge and research (UESP Wiki and loads of other ES-related websites), and the willingness to spend/waste HOURS editing ONE "lengthy article" post until it's spot-on. I joke with myself that I suffer from Borderline Obsessive Perfectionism (BOP). It's my biggest failing, but if I can turn it to good use to "BOP" a post out that helps/teaches others, what the heck.

In some schools of thought, the Universe has spent 13.7 billion years evolving intelligent collections of subatomic particles (i.e. life, US) with an insatiable thirst to "know it" so it can finally "know itself". It's given US the ability to expand our minds to infinity at the creative speed of thought. I for one don't intend to disappoint my beautiful "Parent". Yeah. DEEP, isn't it?

We can even imagine, i.e. "create", universes at will. Morrowind and Oblivion are two such examples of "created universes". Indeed, ALL imaginary inventions, music, stories, games, movies, even in a sense our own individual life experiences, both real and virtual, are "created universes".

Knowledge and the intelligence to seek and use it are the greatest treasures of all. Let's SHARE the wealth!

[Moeboid]

Would you be interested in something like this?

Hahaha. As soon as I read H8Ball's post, I knew a link to that was coming.

@H8Ball:
I love reading your posts. I don't know how much time you spend on them, but don't think it's not appreciated. When I see your name on a post, I'm more excited about reading it than reading replies to my own posts. I still remember one you wrote about the economy in Oblivion. Something about leaving "a quarter-million" worth of loot around in the streets while the beggars ask for a single coin. Can't remember exactly, but I had a good laugh.

On topic now: What do you think of Morrowind's graphics subjectively? Obviously Oblivion's graphics technology is far superior, but...

If I were role playing a permanently invisible tourist (not recommended btw), I'd prefer to do it in Morrowind (especially with MGE installed!)

[H8Ball]

@Moeboid: <bows deeply> Nice to know the time I spend on 'em is well-appreciated! Morrowind's graphics are now very dated and the game engine is highly "CPU-bound". What do I mean by that? No matter HOW powerful your video card is, the game still has to do a lot of work via the CPU to prepare each frame, so CPU speed is the most important factor in determining framerates.

When I upgraded from 64Mb Geforce 3 (SM1.1) to 128Mb GeforceFX 5900XT (SM2.0), the card was about 10x more powerful, but I only went from average 8fps to 9fps. I then upgraded my CPU from 1.4GHz to 3.2GHz and saw a massive leap to average 20fps! I've since upgraded to 512Mb Geforce 7900GS (SM3.0 and about 6x more powerful in terms of shaders) and I've only gone from average 20fps to 22fps.

Oblivion is still pretty CPU-bound, but it relies FAR more on shaders, so video card horsepower makes a big difference too. In fact, the REASON I upgraded from GeforceFX 5900XT to Geforce 7900GS was to get rid of the FX's notoriously slow SM2.0 shaders and replace them with fast SM2.0 and SM3.0 shaders! Result? Oblivion has gone from running like a 1-legged hamster with its tail superglued to its wheel at average 7fps in 640x480 with most details disabled to running like a 3-legged horse at average 20fps in 1360x768 widescreen with almost every detail maxed out!

It's acceptable for a slow-paced RPG, but I've had to extensively tweak and optimise to get it to look good. The reality now is that I'm back to being CPU-bound again. It's my older 32-bit single-core CPU that's now holding Oblivion back. Once I (eventually) upgrade to a 64-bit multi-core PC, Oblivion should be running at 70fps+ like a Cheetah chasing my car with the dead dog AND the horse tied to it! <whistles> Here kitty!

And Morrowind will get a huge framerate boost from the faster CPU as well, so I win twice!

Yeah. The Beggars asking for 1 Gold coin while Daedric armour carpets the street around their feet. One of these days, I'm gonna bury a Beggar under my entire loot collection as he/she sleeps, then watch as the pile wakes up. Another one is the Highwayman demanding 100 Gold while wearing about 100x that! Oi! Just hock yer armour and leave me alone! You want 5000 Gold's worth of Daedric Warhammer? BAM! There you go! The metal traces from the dent in your head should be worth more than 100 Gold. You've got a Glass War Axe. Go scalp yourself behind that bush! Here. You can use my shiny metal butt as a mirror.

[NoirciCoeur]

Okay, it seems as though pretty much all ground has been covered, but the one pro of morrowind (some would see it as a con)
that made the RPing experience more enjoyable for me was the absence of physics in items. I really enjoyed decorating
my home with all the neat things I found on my travels; filling my shelves with my favourite items and having them stay the way I left them. In Oblivion I found it to be very time consuming to pick things up and move it over to the shelf and make sure it sits
the way I want it to, then after a lengthy period of arranging my house to look like a home; only to have it ruined by accidentally bumping a desk and have the items fly off and scatter across the ground, this really bugged me.

[Jingles]

Morrowind - You get your own fortress depending on which House you join, and a quest for building it too, including all the minions like guards to go with it.

Oblivion - A meagre selection of overpriced houses.

Morrowind - 191 in game books.

Oblivion - 127 in game books. Most of which are copy pasted from Morrowind.

Just thought I'd point these out.

[Vendetta]

Morrowind: HORRIBLE combat system

Oblivion: Still bad but better..



Morrowind: I really love the inventory system more than oblivion

Oblivion: boring inventory, not customizable.

[Check-Nate]

Morrowind
WAyyy too slow
got boring at times

oblivion
somewhat goes fast
got dull at times.

olivion SOMETIMES fast travel would come in handy...... I would get so [&@%!] if i had to travel across the province without fast travel for one quest.... morrowind can get annoying because of this

Oblivion was to easy
morrowind was to hard.

Oblivion is guilty of Being too fast and too easy
morrowind is guilty of being to slow and too hard
maybe skyrim could find a spot in the middle