The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
- Platform: PC, Xbox 360
- Published by: 2K Games
- Developed by: Bethesda Softworks
- Release Date: March 2006
- Genre: RPG
- Multiplayer: No
- Online: No
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Preview Continued..
-- February 24, 2006 by: Chris Remo
The combat system has been overhauled, and has a much more active feel to it now. Basically every combat action your character performs directly translates to a button press. There are two main kinds of melee attack, the standard attack and the power attack, which is a briefly "charged up" version of the regular attack. Blocking is done manually with the right mouse button rather than automatically, and you can always cast your currently selected spell by pressing the cast button, regardless of what other weapons you're holding. Up to eight weapons, spells, items, and so on can be assigned to number keys 1-8. This makes it easy to quickly swap between spells or weapon configurations without having to move your hand much or start worrying about menus in the middle of battle. There are seven skills each in the categories of combat, magic, and stealth. As in Morrowind, skills are improved by actually using them, and as you reach higher levels of mastery with particular skills you will receive special corresponding abilities.
Oblivion introduces an upgraded stealth system over the previous game's. When going into stealth mode, your targeting reticle becomes a glowing eye; the eye becomes brighter as enemies are more likely to detect you. This is based on a variety of factors, including the amount of light, the amount of noise you're making, and (mostly) your skill level. Enemies and NPCs will have various reactions when they realize you've been sneaking around then. Sometimes, of course, that includes trying to end your life. Lockpicking is essentially a simple minigame, in which you are presented with a cutaway diagram of the lock and must lock the internal pins into place such that the bolt can be withdrawn and the door or chest in question opened. It's easy to figure out once it's in front of you. As locks become more complex, there are more pins, but as your lockpicking skill is raised, the pins become easier to set.
At a certain point during the "tutorial" segment, the emperor is killed, and you are entrusted to find his lost illegitimate son, the only heir to the throne. Thus begins the main adventure. At that point it is possible to go back and revise any major elements of your character: race, class, and birthsign. Once you've confirmed your choices, you are sent out into the world. And, since this is an Elder Scrolls game, you are completely free at that point to do anything you want. Your compass always contains a directional arrow that point you to the location of your active quest, so it's certainly possible to play through the whole main storyline as you would a traditional RPG; complete one quest, get the next, and continue until the "end." Of course, at any time you can completely diverge from the quest and pursue any of the innumerable side quests and objectives of the world. The main quest will always be waiting for you when you decide to return. "It's definitely something you go back and forth to as you see fit," Hines said. "You can do the first five main quests, then decide you want to dedicate the next two weeks to being the best assassin and becoming the head of the Dark Brotherhood. The main quest will be there for you. You'll see the effects of [the main quest] as you go around, people will talk about it. You'll have these random Oblivion gates which will appear in different parts of the world, which again you can 
choose to ignore, or you can choose to go in and they're basically mini-dungeons. You can go in and explore and close the gate. It affects the world; the world is being invaded by demons and it doesn't stop just because you decided to go away and be an assassin." Still, he went on to explain, you'll never miss anything because you didn't do it in time or because you were off somewhere else. While the world is always operating, it's not "realtime" per se. It is possible, however unlikely, to complete every objective in the game at your own pace. That said, the main quest is about 20-25 hours in length, and Hines estimates that it comprises less than 10% of everything there is to do in the game. "It's this big grand thing that you accomplish, but in the grand scheme of the game you're just getting started," he said. "That's what The Elder Scrolls is about."
I did stick with the main quest for a bit longer, and eventually made my way to the town of Kvatch, which had been utterly destroyed when an Oblivion gate opened up inside it and it became overrun with goblins and demons. It was there that I found Martin, the king's lost heir, who is a member of the priesthood and is completely unaware of his royal birth. Martin is voiced by Sean Bean, of Lord of the Rings fame, and brings to the role a competent blend of strength and resignation in the face of a seemingly unstoppable demonic invasion. In Oblivion, every NPC in the game is fully voiced; there will never be lines of dialogue you must read without an accompanying voice recording. In terms of other celebrity talent, Terrance Stamp (Superman's General Zod) plays the villain of the game, and Linda Carter (Wonder Woman) returns from Morrowind to voice various female characters. Bethesda always makes liberal use of veteran voice actors from their local Washington, D.C. area as well. For example, the announcer in the game's combat arena, at which you can bet on fights or participate in them yourself, is played by the official announcer for the NHL's Washington Capitals.
Oh, and that Oblivion gate I mentioned? I have no idea what's on the other side. Bethesda didn't let anybody go through. With so many fans trying to figure out every last detail of the game before it even hits shelves, the team has certain things they want to keep absolutely secret until players can discover them on their own.
There are various means to get around the world. For one thing, there are five types of horses available in various cities that you can acquire, either by honest or dishonest means, as mounts. They are for transportation only; there isn't any kind of horseback combat system. To make getting around even easier, there's a fast travel system allowing you to instantly travel to fixed points in areas you've already discovered. That is, once you've been to a given town, you can return there instantly by clicking an icon on your map. You'll start the game with a few fast travel waypoints ("If you're in prison in this world, then clearly you've been to a few places," Hines noted), but beyond that they must be discovered to be used. The quest log is integrated with the map as well. There is a page listing all of your currently available quests and a page listing all of your completed quests. One of your available quests is set as your active quest, and will have detailed information on exactly what you need to do to complete it; in almost all cases, the location of the quest's objective will be marked on the map.
In terms of the world itself, there's obviously a lot more of it. The game features over 1000 NPCs spread out through the various cities, and they all make use of Bethesda's Radiant AI system. This was developed to improve upon the NPCs of Morrowind. In that game, NPC behavior was entirely scripted. In Oblivion, on the other hand, manually scripting every action of every NPC would be an impossible task, due to the sheer size of the world. Instead, each NPC has goals he or she must accomplish; for example, a shopkeeper knows he must get up every morning and open up his shop. Rather than having a preset scripted path to accomplish this, the AI determines the best route to take. The overall effect of this is that NPCs respond to the events that are happening around them rather than ignoring them. If you drop a weapon, an NPC might pick it up. If you enter a bar, two NPCs might be in the middle of a completely unscripted bar fight, at which point guards will notice the violence taking place and will come to inflict painful justice.
"It just feels much more realistic," said Hines. The goal is to make it realistic enough that it seems like real cities are operating. "You go into a town and it's not like, 'Wow! Look at Radiant AI in action!' You go into a town and there are people walking around doing stuff, and they're having conversations, and they're going in and out of buildings. You go into a town at 6am and you can't get into a store anywhere because they're all locked and you walk around awhile until it's 9am and suddenly you see people walking around and opening their shops. We want it to be something that's almost not noticed, because it's natural and it feels right, as opposed to something that's noticed like it was in Morrowind. You know, where you think, 'Hey, all those people are just standing around, and they're standing in the same place they were last time I was in this town, and the last fifty times I was in this town.' We want it to be a more organic thing that makes the world seem alive." Those guards I mentioned will be perfectly happy to arrest you too, by the way, if they catch you stealing or murdering anybody in a town. I ended up in jail more than a few times; my video game instincts, complete with years of inventory-hoarding adventure game training, made it practically impossible to avoid stealing stuff left and right. Too bad my sneaking skill wasn't higher.
Even with just the scant hours I played the game during my preview, I could go on with more details, but I think that's enough for now. Instead, let's move on to the Xbox 360 version.
Turn the page to learn about the Xbox 360 version!
