Oblivion: Elder Scrolls IV. Review(xbox 360)
Main Review:
Its hard to know where to start in the vast, vagrant as well as beautiful and seemingly endless world, which by no means is a bad thing seems you'll lose yourself in the game and you wont want it to end. It is clear form the word go that this game is an elder scrolls game from the music to the visual and spoken references to previous installments, almost everything is typical to elder scroll.
You will begin watching a powerful and compelling opening video in which you'll see the emperor setting the stage, telling the tales of what lays beyond the gates of oblivion as it cuts to a hellish and demonic world of flames and hoards of monster, then you'll find your sweeping across the imperial city and in to a prison cell for some unstated crime, where you get caught up in a plot where the emperor and his sons assassinated, you can now customize the look of your character in a way never seen before its time, you can change and adjust all of the facial feature, age and skin color also race like elves and orcs, the game put you through a tutorial which if you spend time in this mostly uninspiring dungeon it gives you an early chance to explore the durable game mechanics which will help explain and chose from the many ways you can play this ranging from warrior, mage, stealth or more likely any combination of the three. The game will go as far as to suggest a class based on the way you played, The way you choose to play will have a profound affect on your game experience to the point if you choose a different way to play it can be like playing a different game, which you only notice if you got to your friends game and you'll see the way they play the game is completely difference like a lot of stuff other the game.
With out giving to much away the plot is that the gate of oblivion are open now there is no hair to the throne and monsters are free to rome you got to find a way to close the gate and free the world from hell.
When you exit the tutorial dungeon you are unlashed in a bright and colorful world then you get a big taste of what this game is like for the most part with grand views which you'll never see twice in two places due to the impressive verity from here the world your oyster the meaning open ended will never ring more true from here you can ignore the main quest and chose to go to the many cities for a load of side quests as well as the five gilds such as fighters and mages guilds or adventure the forests of cyrodiil for the views and dungeons. The well whiten story line has already gave you a compelling reason to go on with the main quest and rest assured that it will give you more but that said whatever route you chose you'll have a satisfying time a head of you, which is made better by the many, many people that will introduce themselves to you in fully voiced well acted and scripted also unique to each of the people you talk to they all have there own look and and have the own believable life and personality but not all is well and good as there are a very limited number of voices actors and the issue becomes ever more noticeable when you go through the games, not forgetting that the NPC when talking to each other seem to be about the same topics only consisting of the same “horrible mud crabs” but this is easily over looked after all every one of the several hundred of the NPC go round there daily lives feeling more living and breathing but with most things when there something done right there something with could be done better in this case the way the NPC interact are a bit rusty and doesn't always react to what one character says to the other, its like there in there own world and aren't really talking to each other, just talking random lines about the same topic.
This world you are consumed in will feel like it has a lot of history even culture, politics and you find your self wanting to learn more about, the world your in but weather you'll go as far as pick up books of tables and shelves or even goto the imperial book shop and read the books is questionable, but saying that you will learn a lot on the many and diverse adventures or what some people talk about on the streets. There are a few gameplay issues such as long loading times which is an annoyance seem it take you out of the submersive experience or if you travel through large areas or county side you get lag and bad frame rate where the area your walking in to need loading, this isn't as bad as loading screens but it still affect the experience.
It is a shame that such a big part of the main story line, the oblivion gates are for the most part all of the 8 realms are the same. The same red pointy scenery and the same objective with the same monsters.
Also the game dose have a ugly side at a click of a button or stick, seems when you go out of stunning 1 person view where the sword, shields and maces look wonderful detailed and spells animation is at its best, 3ed person is altogether is full of weird moon walking if you move in any other direction than strait forwards and the rest of the animations are a bit weak, there are also a few other little unsightly problems such as if you look down at the grass it looks meshy or if you look up the trees from underneath and turn round you'll see the leaves follow you and not all things look good up close, most of this is easily over look and you wont come across this to much as you manly haves to go out you way to notice.
Now to the gameplay, lets start looking at the simple and robust combat system the left trigger is for blocking with your shield or weapon, wile the right trigger is used for swing your sword or to fire your bow and right bumper is to use your allocated spell if you hold the right trigger to do a strong attack or press for a weak attack as you do level up you gain skills which will allow you a chance of knocking down or paralyze your enemy. If you press the left analog stick you crouch and enter a stealth mode which has an icon which lets you know weather your being watched or not along side that the “talk” buttons turn in to a “pick pocket” this function is manly for the stealth classes, for mage classes are made easier as magic points recover over time which morrowind sadly lacked. So all the classes are balanced. You also level up by using your primary skills and not by killing enemy as such but for casting spells, sneaking around, lock picking, making potions and repairing armor.
The sound track is very good, has a ripped from morrowind feel and done to a high standard, in the style of classical it depicts an adventurers and epic adventures mostly upbeat, you'll also learn to fear, love or hate the fight music as you look round hurriedly to find monsters. And I'll put it on my mp4 very soon.
The overall feeling is that it look and sound great for the most part and the freedom is a major hook for the game, you can do what ever you want, however you want and when ever you want. The game has so many thing to do you can't complete the game and do everything in one ten maybe twenty or more sittings and if where a warrior you might want to play as a mage or thief so there is a lot of replay value and and tremendous value overall and if your really like it you can buy download content for it, shivering isles and knight of the nine as I would think many would. These just so much content in this game you'll find yourself playing this for along long time. This game is a very strong and you know that time has been spent making this game. And many will regard this a one of the best RPG for a long time to come.
graphics: 8.2
apart from a few blips, textures and cut corners here and there the graphics are great.
game play: 9.1
simpler and easy to use. And yet theres lots of thing you can do.
Sound: 9.2
great voice acting and smashing metal sounding appropriate and everything sound great inducing a impressive sound tracks.
Plot: 7.9
the story is straight forwarded but a few twist and turns are implemented, you care what happening to characters with the ability of keeping a great interest throughout and the ending I worth it.
Overall: 8.6
I have to rate it high because of how much hours and weeks of great, high quality game lay you get for your money.