Oblivion - PC
Introduction
Like this needs any introduction. Well, for those few crazies who may not know, The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion is the latest installment of the Elder Scrolls series of RPG's, the last installment of which was the rather fab Morrowind. Like Morrowind, its a first person RPG (though you can slip into 3rd person if you prefer), based largely around open endedness. Though there is a main storyline, theres also a bunch of other stuff going on that can keep you as interested, if not more, for a very, very long time.
Gameplay
Generally, fairly similar to Morrowind. Wander about the place, kill nasty things, steal their stuff, sell it for better stuff. The experience system is the same as Morrowind, with you getting better at something by doing it, rather than by killing stuff, which is nice. Some notable alterations from morrowind that are very welcome are being able to cast spells mid combat (none of that daft "equiping your hands" type rubbish here), people *actually talking* rather than giving you huge amounts of text to wade through (though the text is still there as subtitles), slightly more varied combat (you actually have to block manually, and there are special moves, like lunges and disarming abilities).
The biggest, and most surprising difference though, is performance. Morrowind ran like a fat, one legged asthmatic on my machine, with huge loading pauses every few steps. Now, admittedly, the settings im running Oblivion at are not at their highest, and the resolution is a little low, but god damn! It runs smooth as silk, even outdoors, with hueg draw distances. Which brings me nicely on to....
Sights and Sounds
God. Damn.
Im running it on a rather under-spec machine, so can only get it at a low resolution with some of the shiney effects turned off, and It still looks utterly amazing. The landscape looks lush and full of life, the details are lovely, peoples facial animations are damn impressive (although the lip synch goes a little wobbly), and draw distances, despite what that doom-sayer who posted a preview of it might have said, go on for *miles*. yes, stuff like trees and rocks do pop in to existance closer than the mountains in the distance, but they are generally doing so behind other stuff that has already popped in. In fact, I only noticed this happening once, and that was because I was looking for it.
I would comment on the sound, but then this is only the third game I have played since getting my new sound card. It sounds great, but then, so did the other two games.
Stuff that sucks
The interface for doing stuff like inventory management has been quite extensively fettled with. This is, quite obviously, to make it more manageable with an xbox controller. Needless to say, this is a Very Bad Thing™. Stuff like dropping items, equiping items, seeing what items do....well, it isnt hard to do, as such, its just not as natural as the old interface. Clicking and dragging has been entirely removed, for example. And, to my mind, making a game worse for the PC just to make it easier for the console is unforgivable.
Other than that, nothing so far has struck me as particularly noteworthy. You can no longer strip felled enemies bare, but thats not exactly the end of the world. Oh, and like I said before, the lipsynch is a touch dodgy.
Conclusion
With so many things done right, and so little done wrong, I cant see how this can be thought of as anything other than excellent. Its taken all of the best bits if morrowind, fixed some bits that were broken, added some new stuff and only introduced the mildest of buggerances. If you liked Morrowind, you will likely cream yourself. If you like RPG's, you will probably leak a bit. In fact, unless the idea of a single player RPG fills you with utter horror, get this now.
And wear easy to clean undies when you do.
Score :
NOTE: Ive only played this for a few hours, so I reserve the right to totally change my opinion of the thing once ive played it a bit more. I repeat, for one last time, this is just my FIRST IMPRESSIONS of a really, really big game.
