Articles
By Spud Gun
Published: Mar. 4, 2007 9:46 AM
In June of 2002, the face of console RPG’s changed completely with the release by Bethesda Studios of “Elderscrolls III: Morrowind”. Morrowind allowed a level of interaction with in game characters and the game environment that was unparalleled on the first generation Xbox. So when Bethesda announced that it was working on a sequel to Morrowind for the Xbox 360, expectations were high. Could Bethesda retain the features that made Morrowind so unique while bringing the series into the next generation? The answer is an uncategorical ‘Yes’. Oblivion is an offline game that boasts over 200 hours of gameplay, and a wealth of improvements on the previous iteration.
Bethesda has released two different types of packaging for the game, the standard and the Collectors Edition. The Collectors Edition costs $10 more than the standard game, and for the extra $10 you get a very nice presentation box, game manual, game map, a bonus material DVD, a metallic Imperial Septim coin (which features in the game), and a pocket guide to the Empire. All in all, the Collectors Edition is worth the extra $10 if you are a fan of the genre.
You start Oblivion in a prison cell where you create your character. Any complaints regarding character generation have clearly been addressed by Bethesda as this aspect of the game has been completely overhauled. You can specify your character's race, age, complexion, hair style, hair colour, eye colour, and facial features. And by facial features, I mean every single facial feature you can think of and then some. In fact, the facial tweaking can be compared to a trip to the opticians. You move a slider for a feature and ask yourself “Better or worse”, and in some cases you honestly can’t tell the difference. Quite understandable considering you can adjust things like “Nose Sellion Lower”.
After character creation, you begin the training tutorial where you are introduced to movement controls and the new menu system. Movement is as it was in Morrowind using the two thumbsticks (with the external view of your character still available by pressing in the right thumbstick), but what is different is the interaction your character has with the environment when you move. Walk through the manacles in your cell and they swing and jangle about. Walk over a pile of bones and see them move underfoot, or fly forwards as you kick them while walking. You can also use the left bumper button to grab an object and move it. Pick up some bones and throw them about, or move the corpse of a dead creature into amusing poses. This new ability to interact with your environment only makes the game more interesting to play. The backbone of your character is Morrowind through and through. You have your attributes, major and minor skills, and derived attributes (health, magika and fatigue). Using any of your skills will increase your proficiency at that skill. One improvement in Oblivion is that you get to see how near or far you are from increasing a skill by the use of a bar beside each of your skills in the Stats menu. The bar fills red the more you use the skill and you’re skill increases when the bar is filled. The menu system in Oblivion is completely different and takes a little getting used to. It is brought up using the ‘B’ button and is broken up into 4 categories, Stats, Inventory, Magic and Maps, with each being accessed using the left and right triggers. Each category has 5 tabs, the nature of which changes depending on the category selected. The tabs can be cycled through using the D-pad or the left thumbstick. You can also bind hotkeys to a D-pad direction so that you can access a weapon or spell with speed. Assigning hotkeys to the D-pad is intuitive but the diagonals are hard to hit consistently, though those proficient with the controller shouldn’t have an issue. The problem remains if you have a lot of items as you still have to trawl through a long list, though this can be avoided if you don’t pick up a lot of crap. All these things are explained as part of the tutorial, and it finishes with some further character definition (sign and class), after which your new character is dropped into the world.
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