TES: Oblivion < Fable: The Lost Chapters (PC)

[Snipawolf]

what the hell? level 100? Ive been playing it for like 30 hours and by not sleeping much im still level 7 and like the king of the arcane university.
if only you could summon multuple beasties at once..

Level 100 marksmanship

And there is a mod that lets ya do that somewheres, I saw it before.

[KDR_11k]

Where does Gothic figure into this comparison?

[Wolf-In-Exile]

Like any other skill, Archery requires specialisation.

If you want to be a decent fighter/archer/mage, you have to invest heavily in the relevant skills or you *will* suck, especially when it comes to the later parts of the game.

If you think Oblivion's combat was bad, you obviously never tried Morrowind's: imagine swinging a sword, seeing the thing connect, but "MISS"! because your skill was low, causing you to "Roll" a miss. WTF MATE?

In Oblivion, they fixed that. If it hits, it hits. The difference is how much damage it does, whether it can knock down enemies, stun them etc. Blocking and parrying is also very much improved, a good block will make the opponent be vulnerable to counterattacks, while a poor block will make you stagger, thus making you vulnerable to attack. Just keep in mind the enemies also can do the same to you.

Personally, I liked Thief, and one of the developers for Oblivion worked on Thief too before coming to Bethesda, so I found playing as an "Assassin" character was really great, most environments were perfect for it.

Fable, on the other hand is a very different type of RPG and its strengths and weaknesses lie elsewhere. It is a thoroughly linear game, with a comparatively poor selection of items and is..... cute.

By setting absolute restrictions on the gameplay, Lionhead could craft a story, and Fable plays like a story. The only replay value is nostalgia or to play as an evil character, other than that there's nothing new to try.

I enjoyed Fable alot for my first play through, but its like reading a book; after reading the first time you already know what all the story is about. You can't add extra details, read it in a different way...

Comparing Oblivion with Dark Messiah is also not a very fair matchup. DM has far less freeform gameplay, the character customisation is much less sophisticated, you can't see a third-person view, the selection of items are but a fraction of what is available in.
Imo, sacrificing all those for the combat isn't a really good tradeoff.
DM is a cool game, but not one i'd be playing.... 3 years later?

Haven't had the chance to try Gothic 3 yet, but i'll comment on that when I do.

[rattle]

I've seen a small portion of Gothic 3 at a friend... well I can say for sure it's combat system at least seems to have evolved from Gothic 1 and 2. I'm not much a fan of Gothic though...

Anyway the best non-linear RPG tied to a linear story is Fallout 2. There are no random quests but about ~4-5 ways to solve each of the quests and there are tons. There also was a lot of freedom in such a restricted and small world (compared to larger games such as ESA3 and 4 now) and the replay value is very high in my opinion.
I still have my hopes up for some donor to save F3...

Haven't seen any of Fable but I can say of experience that games like that just like Fang said will get played through once (or twice) until you maxed out your stats and then gets discarded.
Games like that can be fun, looking at Dungeon Siege 1 and 2 now. They're totally linear but got a lot of stuff which requires the player to play it again. Personally I like games which can be played through more than once.
This was often seen in SNES (and PSX) RPGs, a load had an "EX Mode once" you finished the game featuring either the same monsters with a different colour palette and stats or even completely new, or new parts of the game became accessible, new items to collect. It's just a different way to climb up the ladder until you're maxed out but it's more fun.
I kinda miss that...

[Erom]

The Fallout games are still my most favorite RPG's ever, on any platform. I even liked Tactics, mostly because it let you play as a super mutant

But seriously, I aggree, the fallout series did the best of any series I've played at keeping a main quest moving while allowing appropriate degrees of sandboxing.

I hated Morrowind because it was too open. I mean, you try to do one quest and suddenly theres somebody else, and up, now you have to walk accross the whole continent on some stupid escort quest before you can get back to the important things. I don't want to have to pick flowers, and reunite twins, and build a better mousetrap while I'm trying to save the world. Now, I also dislike most of the Final Fantasy games because they are too closed. The nothing kills imersion in a world faster than a town full of people that serves no purpose other than a save point before the next scene.

In Fallout, you have over-arching quests. And if you let yourself get distracted, instead of being rewarded with sidequest trophies, you fail, or get penalties. So you have to keep moving on your main quest. But the quest isn't totally scripted- you basically have an end goal, and some tools on hand, and you have to get yourself from point A to point B yourself. And there are at least 5-6 ways to beat nearly every quest. Plus quests that only become available to certain characters, plus only good and only evil quests, plus the main plotline can be done in 3-4 completely different orders. Like, in Fallout 1, you normally have to either hack/stealth/fight your way through an enemy installation to find the location of the enemy military base, OR you can do the other main quest first and come back to the military base once you did that, OR you can make a character with the maximum amount of hitpoints, let yourself get captured, survive the interrigation, and then get taken to the military base and fight your way out Prison Break style. That's three completely different paths, each one with multiple steps that all have a half dozen potential resolutions. So it's very open, but instead of being frivolous all the openess points you further along the main plotline.

Whew... ok that was a bit of a rant, I appologize.

[Caydr]

Having played Fable a little more today, the only way to describe it is a combination of KOTOR, Zelda, Jedi Knight, and a bit of Oblivion.

Oblivion's archery was crap at any level. Ok, first you zoom. Woot. Then you have this bigger and bigger damage multiplier if it's a sneak shot. Woot. You're still only doing some pissy little bit of damage that isn't worth anything unless you exploit the game by constantly bunny hopping while your enemies chase you to their inevitable, slow, arrow-filled doom.

I'm not saying Fable is the very best RPG, I just started this topic to say that I found it more enjoyable in many ways than Oblivion. Oblivion does have many stronger parts though, as you mention. Replayability, lots of quests, lots of guilds, etc.

Don't get me wrong: I played Oblivion constantly for about 2 weeks. Obviously I was having a good time. It's a very interesting game with a lot of impressive features. But all areas where it faulters, Fable succeeds brilliantly.

Fable has a lot of the same sort of levelled creatures like Oblivion does, but they're not as noticable and you actually still see the old weak creatures in the places you're used to. It's not just a mass-extinction of wolves in favor of mountain lions. Then bears. Then minotaurs. Etc, etc... Fable's magic system is much more diverse than Oblivion's, in my opinion. For instance, in Oblivion you could do neat stuff like fireball/lightning/snowball/otherball... but they all did the same thing for the most part, unless you were fighting the one enemy in the whole game that is weak to a particular kind of element. Oblivion's inventory system was a massive PITA unlike anything I've ever experienced before. It's like, you need to run back to the dungeon 8 times to pick up each item of loot you couldn't carry... That's retarded. But at least there's mods to fix that. And there's mods for archery and many of its other weak points too.

Maybe Oblivion < Fable wasn't the best topic title, heh. What I was trying to get across was just that Fable is an excellent RPG if you're into that kind of thing, or an excellent shooter if you're into that kind of thing. It's a very good hybrid, with the majority of the emphasis on shooter. Oblivion's emphasis was obviously on RPG, since its combat system seemed like it had been tacked on in the last week of development.

One last kick in the teeth I've got for oblivion was the voice acting. They touted it like it was some amazing feature - and sure, that's a LOT of spoken dialogue. It's just a shame that it was all spoken by one of two different actors, depending on if the NPC is male or female. HORRENDOUS.

Fable is a one-playthrough game, but at the price you can buy it for right now, does that even matter? It's a lot of fun, and IMO it's on a level with Jedi Knight in terms of overall quality, as far as I've played it.

Oh and Fallout 2 is a great game too. I think I'm getting close to the end of it. I just wiped out the "Hubologists" (any similarity to any organization/cult is purely coincidental) ^^ I wish I hadn't gotten hit by the disappearing car bug... but time doesn't really matter much so I'm not too concerned.

[Zoombie]

Why is everyone so down on Oblivion's voice acting? It wasn't schreeachy or annoying or anything. I found it not exactly the best, not the worst or anything. The only real stand out is Martin Septem. I just liked his voice, damn it.

But I found Fable's voice acting to be a bit more on the annoying 'fake brit' side, but even that wasn't that bad. If anything I think DM has the worst voice acting. The guy pronounced it im-pale, for crying out loud...

[Candleman]

Im-pall him, Sareth, and it will be over!

x50

That's what annoyed me the most of DM.

[rattle]

Speaking of Fallout 2, there are some cool mods for it. Wish I had bookmarked them, cba to go link hunting now. Also recommended is one the fan patches, can't remember which one now but it fixes a load of bugs and other stuff. Guess they're on http://nma-fallout.com (as well as links to the fan patches).
edit:

Time DOES matter in FO2. It's only 13 years and yes that's hardcoded... it's more than enough to beat the game but not enough to build your level up to 99

<spoilers>
I hope you did the Zeta scan before wiping the floor with them, +2 LK for free or -1 if you're unlucky. Anyway I skip most of the quests now anyway after having it finished several times. It's amusing just to go from town to town and kill everyone but the people crucial to beat the game with a powerfist in my Adv. Power Armor (you can get that actually right from the start as well as a level boost up to level 6 (20k XP)).
The only bad thing are those bloody bounty hunters which seem to appear when your reputation drops too low or you kill a kid (or two), accidentally of course... though their stuff sells well.


Now that you mentioned KoToR as well, I enjoyed that actually. That and KoToR2. Though didn't like it that the game forced you to become a Jedi Knight... what ever it was fun to play through each of them twice (good and evil). A lot of the evil quests made me laugh hard, especially that farmer quest on <what was this planet called?> where you trick them into killing each other.
</spoilers>

[SpikedHelmet]

Oblivion's voice acting would have rocked if they used Morrowind's actors -- insanely deep-voiced Dunmer, screechy annoying Falmer. I added a mod to remove fast travel and make each of the Stable owners a transporter person like in Morrowind and for the mod the guy used Morrowind sounds... it was a hit of nostalgia, running up to the Dunmer guy and him saying "Where would you like to go? Walk with virtue, Outlander." like the good old days.

[1v0ry_k1ng]

yeah, morrowinds voice acting was ownage. its a pity the quest conversations wernt voiced over. oblivions voiceover = lol

[Caydr]

What made me sick when I was playing oblivion was the constant use of... "I've heard others say the same" in the most ridiculous places in NPC conversation, all with the same voice, from every "race" in the game.

*freaking out* "Did you hear!? Kvatch has been destroyed! We're all doomed!!!!"
*bored* "I've heard others say the same"

"The altmer have powerful wizards!"
"I've heard others say the same"

"My glasses need cleaning"
"I've heard others say the same"

"I need TP for my bunghole"
"I've heard others say the same"

[Zoombie]

Well at least they tried something bold and ambitious. Sure it didn't work perfectly, but what the hell does the first time around?

[bamb]

Despite being a big fan of pc RPGs neither of these games really stuck with me.

Theres only one pc rpg you'll ever need though.

This one rocked the most imo.

[Optimus Prime]

i think what most ppl here miss is the fact that Oblivion is a bit like Spring and XTA. The pure and only Oblivion is good, but far not perfect. Than you have this MIGHTY Construction Set which allows you to create a completely new world.
You think archery is crap and does no damage... go, change it yourself or download one of the hundreds of really good mods, which already fixed that. You dont like the ever equal forrests, go and download one of the plugins which change that. You feel lonely while travelling the streets, go get the travellers plugin. You dont like the arena, go download my arena plugin :D, you dont like the noise of the guardsman who is in front of you swinging his sword, go load the editor and change his noise!
If you say Oblivion is bad because of some balancing problems like weak archery, to me its the same as if you say spring sucks because in XTA the balance is crap. Changeing archery in Oblivion needs you 10 minutes (if you know a bit of the editor - its much easier than making something for spring).

Oblivion is more than just the story you got, its the entire engine which you can use to create your own adventure and even that is not necessary because others already did that for you. I think 90% of your wishes is already made and in a plugin - you just have to find it.

[Peet]

i think what most ppl here miss is the fact that Oblivion is a bit like Spring and XTA. The pure and only Oblivion is good, but far not perfect.

Rather than get "ad hominem" waved in my face, I'm going to stick with a simple >_<

[Erom]

i think what most ppl here miss is the fact that Oblivion is a bit like Spring and XTA. The pure and only Oblivion is good, but far not perfect.

Rather than get "ad hominem" waved in my face, I'm going to stick with a simple>_<

Don't do that little text thing.

[Ishach]

Ultima 4

I liked alot of things in Ultima 4 but never really got into it because I just didnt know where to go or what to do. Lord british told me I had to do some tests to become the avatar and then sent me on my merry way

[pintle]

Im really sick of people badmouthing XTA.

I know this is off topic, but to call the xta balance crap when half the AA community is playing BA because in AA there are about 5 viable unit choices is complete idiocy.

I got bored of fable pretty quickly, took me a little longer, but i kept wishing it was morrowind; I finished morrowind +bloodmoon and tribunal, the only 2 things that i saw as major flaws in morrowind were the facts that:

a) make an absorb health enchated daedric weapon and you are nigh on invincible

b) insta-reflect magic. You cast your custom made fire damage 150 on target spell on something, and instead of the fireball bouncing back at you, you take the damage instantly

[Ishach]

The thing that ruined Oblivion for me was 5 second invisibility, once you had that you could kill anything in the game without taking a hit.

Sneak attack for 5x damage!