Finally picked this up, and am just getting the hang of it. For a more detailed review by far better gamers than I (Masterchief and Zbalance) read these comments. Haven’t had much time to play, but was disappointed with the lack of online help and the pamphlet of a manual. Yes, I’m one of those geeks who reads the manual before he does something.
Coming from WOW, I’m used to automated updates and tons of UI mods. Oblivion has many content mods built with their construction set, but very few UI mods. No nifty Lua scripting engine to make UI tweaks easy. Another interesting file type available, surprising because it’s been forever since I’ve played “adventure games”, are saved games! One useful one puts you right after the tutorial (with all possible loot) and right before you choose your final stats. I’m also used to many dedicated strategy sites, including a few professional ones. There are far fewer for Oblivion, and IGN has decided to charge a subscription for their guide. Booooo! Anyway, I found some useful links that I thought I’d post. If you have more, please let everyone know by commenting. Thanks!
Oblivion Character Creation Tips
Lockpicking Made Easy!
The Alchemy FAQ
I could really use a guide on magic. And a game that didn’t hang when you switched to window-mode.
Edit: The game now crashes my system, apparently due to some video driver or performance issue (and I have a decent card: Radeon X800 Pro). I recommend others hold off until a general bugfix patch is released.
I hate to admit to this, but about a week after I got Oblivion, I went to the store and bought the strategy guide. It made the game 10 times better for me for a few reasons:
1) Lets face it, we were all spoiled by Thottbot.com for WOW, and the strategy guide is pretty much the same thing, but printed out and bound for reading at a coffee shop, over lunch, or while watching some crap DVD that the wife brought home. With WOW, if some nerd wrote a poorly worded quest (cryptic is ok, incomplete or misleading due to a poor grasp of grammar is another), there was Thottbot to save the day. With Oblivion, the developers seem to think that riddles and puzzles are neato, so their quests kinda sucked for me due to severe ADD. I won?t argue right or wrong about using guides to play a game, cuz anyone who thinks I shouldn?t do something that makes me happier isn?t worth arguing with!
2) Ignoring Thottbot, we were equally spoiled by the massive, in depth users guide that came with the game. A flimsy little pamphlet doesn?t cut it for a game as complex as Oblivion.
3) Ok, I am guessing on the previous reason, because I got Oblivion on Gamefly, and therefore I had no manual at all. My complete and utter lack of understanding actually fit well with the first part of the game, where you start essentially as a blank slate, but after a while it really helped to have some clue what was going on. Lets face it, even an amnesia victim would understand how sleep works!
4) Being that I was playing Oblivion on my XBOX 360, I didn?t actually have my computer on while playing, so jumping out of the game to figure out something wasn?t required. Good thing too considering that my laptop died on the same day that Oblivion showed up.
So, my suggestion , drop a few bucks on the strategy guide, assuming you get the game working again.
On a side note, I popped Elder Scrolls: Morrowind in my XBOX tonight, and I actually enjoyed it LESS than I did last time I tried it. Seems that WOW and Oblivion have ruined other RPGs for me.
I can’t buy strategy guides. I’m not saying I’m too smart for it. I could definately USE it.
It’s an honor thing, I guess. It feels like I’m cheating. It would even embarass me to buy one. I’d rather buy tampons (at least that shows you got a woman at home.)
The geek behind the counter would look and say “Strategy guide huh? Yeah I don’t need it, but hey if that’s just me” Then I’d have to explain to him that I may not have as much free time as a 40 year old virgin making minimum wage selling video games. And so on.
So I won’t do it.
Now you want a game that I almost did get a guide for? It’s a space trading/combat sim called X3-Reunion. If you check the reviews on the game, you’ll see how many people say the game would be amazing if it wasn’t for the learning curve.
You need to be a brain surgeon AND a rocket scientist to figure this game out without checking every FAQ on the web. (and I only dabble a LITTLE in brain surgery.)
I’m STILL waiting for an answer from Bethesda, I’m guessing they just don’t care, or their help system is broke like their software. Not a huge deal, I’ve got other things to take care of anyway, and I’m not yet addicted to the game.
As for the guide, I may get it, as it definitely seems like it’s worth it with so little info available elsewhere. My biggest problem is that I have no previous experience (never played Morrowind) so I don’t know what to expect.
BTW, if you order it from Amazon, nobody looks at you funny.
Seriously, you care what the dork at the game store thinks about you?
Nothing personal against any of them in particular (I have met a few over the years that seemed nice), but in my experience there are two distinct types of people that work at these places; the hard core geek who has realized his personal high school dream job, or the older dude seriously considering that position as a viable career path. I trump the first one by the simple fact that I have a naked woman in my bed every night and the last boobie he touched was his mom’s, and that was for a meal. The second one takes every bit of my self control to not slap and tell him to try a little harder so that some day he can help pay my social security checks! Being judged by either of these people would simply make me laugh.
Obviously if the clerks opinion was really the deciding factor, I would just order the thing online…
I actually DO flip through guides after I complete the game just to see all the cool things I missed.
I always find it funny that when there’s two clerks at work, they are ALWAYS talking about gaming. I understand that shop-talk is sometimes necessary, but…
Just once I want to hear this when I walked in…
“Dude, check it out. I was SO fucked up last night. I met this chick at Woody’s and she bet me that I couldn’t remove a shot glass from her boobs with my teeth without spilling any. I said OK but if I CAN, I get to…”
That’s all I’d hear because at this point I’d be passed out in disbelief.