Another Oblivion Thread

[Drakron]

One of the most important thing on a game is its GUI, consoles and PCs need a diferent GUI due to interface diferences.

One of KotOR complains was that the inventory was console like, in the PC we are so used to Windows interface that "click and drag" works, anything else is simply not intuitive for the user.

It seens Oblivion learned NOTHING from other Xbox multi-plataform RPGs by going with a system that is not PC user friendly.

Mini games, console like GUI, streamline of the RPG mechanics ... is anything else they can remove at this point before we start to put this next to Zelda?

 

[Twinfalls]

If TES forums got word of this, they'd go craaaazy.

OMG thats Illegal!! Illegal. I'm telling moderators. Illegal!!

(Why are so many of the little TES tardies so excited by using that word?)

 

[Drakron]

Because they freaking stupid teens with the mentality of a 9 years old.

Reminds me of The Sims Community ...

 

[Tetragrammaton]

If TES forums got word of this, they'd go craaaazy.

OMG thats Illegal!! Illegal. I'm telling moderators. Illegal!!

(Why are so many of the little TES tardies so excited by using that word?)

Nonono, they'd go crazy with excitement, not with outrage.

 

[Twinfalls]

is anything else they can remove at this point before we start to put this next to Zelda?

There are little pink hearts. You can put it there.

 

[jasondragon]

What was so hilarious during the spur of DVD leaked viewers were the idiots at TES boards who posted,

"I don't care if theres illegal footage out there! I wouldn't even search for it because I know its illegal"

Christ get me away from the stupidity that is the TES user.

http://media.putfile.com/Movie1023

easier viewing. no torrent needed.

 

[Mech]

One of the most important thing on a game is its GUI, consoles and PCs need a diferent GUI due to interface diferences.

So in otherwords, you're just talking shit cause you have no idea what the GUI is going to look like on the PC. K, thought so.

 

[GhanBuriGhan]

@ MSFD:

Any chance that the PC version won't feature that horrible inventory interface? Btw, who was the genius behind it? Who was the first who said "hey, let's make a really shitty interface - no, I mean REALLY shitty - and see what happens"?

What the fuck is wrong with that interface. It looks nice and oldschool - stat-heavy to me - Shouldn't you guys LIKE that? I think you are all grasping for anything to hate about this game, I keep laughing my socks of everytime you guys desperately try to beat each others to the most negative reply.

So tell me guys - WHY is that interfaces so fucking unforgivingly doomsday horrible?
:D

Are you blind, by any chance? Have you played console games exclusively and have never seen a decent PC interface? What "stat-heavy" are you talking about? 2 lousy stats = stat-heavy? You've gotta be kidding me.

Anyway, to answer your question, the interface is cumbersome, you can see only 5-6 items vs an entire stock as in prev games, the stats spreadsheet is unfriendly, the icons are childish (well, consolish) - a heart? a fucking heart? give me a break, and the window is too small.

The only part I agree with is that it shows too few items at once, but if it is like MW, that will scale with screen resolution and the size of the window. On the other hand, unlike MW's it is clear what something is at a glance (no cumbersome mouseover), I see four stats on there, which is basically everytihing that is essential, I think the "parchment" design is much more suited for a classic fantasy game than MW's windows, and I don't see anyting particulary childish in the simple small icons. So I see nothing to get my pants wet, friend.

Its a cleaner design thant this at least
http://www.fallout3.phx.pl/obrazki/nowi ... entory.jpg

Blasphemy, I know, I know...

 

[Tintin]

What was so hilarious during the spur of DVD leaked viewers were the idiots at TES boards who posted,

"I don't care if theres illegal footage out there! I wouldn't even search for it because I know its illegal"

Christ get me away from the stupidity that is the TES user.

http://media.putfile.com/Movie1023

easier viewing. no torrent needed.

Yes, because we all know not wanting to do illegal things is STUPID AND UNCOOL!! HAHAH! PUNK ROCK 4EVER!



...

 

[Vault Dweller]

It's like GhanBuriGhan said -- it's a stats-heavy interface, much more so than Morrowind's. It's easy and fast to use, and gives you a lot of information at a glance.

It reminds me of those phones with big-ass buttons for people with poor vision and/or crappy manual dexterity. They are also easy and fast to use. About that easy and fast to use thing though, don't you think, it would have been nice to see the entire inventory, locate an item, click on it and see all that "heavy-stat" information superhighway for that item? TES system is very basic, so it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that a daedric katana is better than an iron short sword, thus, there is no need to waste space by displaying all those heavy stats. Speaking of heavy stats, why do you believe that 2 stats, 4 if you count price and "health" is stat-heavy?

Unless you're simply offended by the large text, or maybe the color scheme, I'm not really sure what the problem is.

I have a feeling you are not being totally honest here, but then again, I doubt you can say that the interface is god-fucking awful openly (*hint* that's what alternative accounts are for, how about mrangryfacedude?), so I'll drop the subject.

 

[Drakron]

So in otherwords, you're just talking shit cause you have no idea what the GUI is going to look like on the PC. K, thought so.

How about you shut up, you fucking moron.

I played FF VIII in the PC (port), I played KotOR 1 and 2 (port), I own both a PS2 and a Xbox and played several RPGs on those systems.

I KNOW how a console RPG inventory looks like, what I seen in that picture looks what I seen in Fable and all FF titles I played so far.

Your point of "Oh you dont know if that is the PC version" would be valid if you happen to NOT quote that passage and of course its a not much of a point since you really think (if you are capable of that, something I doubt) they are going to completly redesign the GUI interface for the PC version?

Of course not, they simply make it mouse driven and leave it at tha, fuck the PC users since that is not the sales are (and funny enough they depend on modders to expand the game life ... ).

 

[Vault Dweller]

The only part I agree with is that it shows too few items at once, but if it is like MW, that will scale with screen resolution and the size of the window.

Ok, so instead of 5 items, you'd be able to see 8 or even 9. Considering the average number of items one may carry in TES games, that's nothing. If those useless "heavy stats" weren't displayed, then you could resize the window like in MW and fit more items. Unfortunately, that doesn't appear to be an option here.

On the other hand, unlike MW's it is clear what something is at a glance (no cumbersome mouseover), I see four stats on there, which is basically everytihing that is essential

Like I said above, the TES item system is very basic. It's very clear to see which item is better by recognizing type and color.

Its a cleaner design thant this at least
http://www.fallout3.phx.pl/obrazki/nowi ... entory.jpg

Blasphemy, I know, I know...

First, nobody was crazy about the FO3 ideas and interface. Second, it's not the inventory screen, it's the upgrade window, which follows different rules then a general inventory display.

 

[Twinfalls]

Thanks for that link, Jasondragon.

@MSFD: Does your speed stat influence how fast you draw a weapon and strike/block (like Daggerfall)? Or not (like Morrowind iirc)?.

Cos it looked to me like he was drawing and slashing way too fast if that's the default.

So... thoughts on the video?

What I liked: Graphics are undoubtedly impressive - shadowing looks good. Stealth section reminded me a little of Thief (partly due to the ambient sounds). Good to see there are some actual dialogue response options for PCs now. Dungeons actually seem interesting this time.

What sucks: Quest compass, to use the Toddling's words, "lets you find cool stuff near you". How do you 'find' something when you are led right to it? In my view, it's worse that every single dungeon, shrine, whatever in the wild is on that compass. Just quest items/npcs wouldn't have been so bad.

I'd hope at least that the player can toggle off 'non-quest' stuff from the compass.

 

[Tetragrammaton]

Also @MSFD:

Everything looked good except perhaps the AI of some monsters/animals. Will a deer really allow you to get that close? What about the part with the trap, where a goblin saw his fellow get blown away and didn't react?

 

[Micmu]

This atrocity is a GUI for PC version. I've seen the video, it's the same on the video, too: HUGE fonts and childish icons. I assume it's a PC version (mouse cursor).
Yes, spellcasting is almost instantaneous and rapid (just point your hand and kaboom).
And what is so fucking special about clicking a COLORED WHEEL (yes, it's that famous persuasion minigame).... In MW you at least had to spend some gold.
Dialogue? Wikipedia. It's just that background is transparent now (no windowed interface) and no hyperlinks in text. And already browsed keywords get greyed out... No sign of choices in that demo. Voice acting and dialogue (content) in demo sucked. It was like watching harry potter or something.
Good job on facial animations though.

Edit: DOG BURNING!

 

[Tetragrammaton]

Something I just noticed:

Dialogue is based on a topic system like with Morrowind, but it's not like a wiki. You click on a list of topics in a column (e.g. "Chorrol", "Daedra Attack"), which seems to change with context. The demo contained a small dialogue tree; I don't know how common that will be.

Todd:
"I asked about Chorrol, now that topic is grayed. This tells you that if you ask again you'll get info you already know so you can quickly see what topics you can learn something new about. This is often based on how much someone likes you. You can use your speechcraft skills to make them like you more.

 

[Twinfalls]

It's true, the NPC dialogue in that sample was very 'unsophisticated'.

 

[nakanja]

That inventory screen reminds me a lot of Daggerfall's in the size, shape, and the number of items it can display, so I wouldn't say this one's been console-ized. I don't really understand why they'd leave so much of the screen unused, though. Daggerfall involved a lot of scrolling through long item lists and it looks like Oblivion will as well. (unless it's resizable, or this shot was taken at a low screen resolution)

 

[Micmu]

That inventory screen reminds me a lot of Daggerfall's in the size, shape, and the number of items it can display, so I wouldn't say this one's been console-ized. I don't really understand why they'd leave so much of the screen unused, though. Daggerfall involved a lot of scrolling through long item lists and it looks like Oblivion will as well. (unless it's resizable, or this shot was taken at a low screen resolution)

On your right, you'll have a looot of space for virtual barby now.
Oh, and those retard-friendly icons and excessively big fonts mean that they didn't feel like making a different (compact) interface for PC version which usually isn't played on TV screens. Shame on them.
Daggerfall's inventory surely involved some scrolling but wasn't so fucking childish. Not even close.

 

[MrSmileyFaceDude]

Just watched the video -- it's the same as what was shown at E3 (though that was live, of course.)

The demo doesn't really get into any real quest dialogue -- you only saw a portion of what's in character generation, and the girl in the book shop and her dog segment was put together specifically for E3.

Oh, and you can still bribe people.

 

[Fintilgin]

It's like GhanBuriGhan said -- it's a stats-heavy interface, much more so than Morrowind's. It's easy and fast to use, and gives you a lot of information at a glance. There are also information rollouts that appear when you highlight certain kinds of items that provide more information, such as the skill associated with a weapon, or the magical effects on an enchanted item, potion or ingredient. Unless you're simply offended by the large text, or maybe the color scheme, I'm not really sure what the problem is.

I think the problem is that it seems like a very console-centric interface. Morrowind had a very powerful and intuitive interface on the PC, where we could resize and move the windows as we saw fit, display a large amount of information, drag-and-drop, and just generally use the full power of the mouse/PC display. We don't NEED to have every items stats listed all the times. It's a terrible waste of space when we can rapidly flick the mouse to whatever item we want to get a roll-over.

Oblivion's interface looks like it was designed ground up for the console. Much less info is displayed at once, so that it can be displayed larger for those sitting back from the TV. It reminds me a bit of the KOTOR interface, which involved a lot of scrolling, moving between tabs, and such which is easy and intuitive with a game-pad and console, but awkward and frustrating on a PC.

I thought the icon based inventory of Morrowind was awsome and, in fact, one of the best RPG interfaces I'd seen. I could see my whole (or very nearly whole) inventory at once, instantly mouse over anything to see it's stats and info and then drag and drop it onto my character in an intuivtive, window-style, mouse based manner. I could flick my eyes left and see my stats change, check my map, resize things however I wanted. If I had a spell-heavy character I could make my spell list large, if I didn't I could shrinking it down to favor my stats and the map. Basically I could manage my whole character from a single screen, set up however I liked, rapidly and efficently.

It was a PC interface. And a good one, designed for maximum user power and information display.

Now it looks like it's going to be scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, click, tab to see stats, tab back, scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, scrolling ,scrolling ,scrolling ,scrolling, click click, tab to see map, tab to see spells, scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, click. Now it may be set up ideally for a gamepad, but using a KOTOR-style interface after being used to the power of Morrowind is going to feel like typing while wearing mittens. A big step back.

Who knows? Mabye when I get the game, I'll like it, but my first thought on seeing that inventory screen was: "Ugh. Oh, no. They wouldn't... They didn't... Aw, crap."

 

[Crichton]

Oh, and you can still bribe people.

This isn't good MSFD. I liked the exploration in morrowind enough to play it through to the "end", but the bribe button was probably the worst sin of a bad dialog system.

My Ork: Hi, I'd like to talk to you about X. (clicks X)

NPC: X? What do you think you're doing asking me about X? I fucking hate you ork! You don't know shit about X, back the fuck off!

My Ork: Ok, Ok. How about if I turn things over to mister jackson? (bribes 20 gold)

NPC: Well, I won't kill ya, but don't bring up X again.

My Ork: Well mister Jackson's friend Franklin is also here. (bribes 50 gold)

NPC: Well, I might be willing to tell you something about X if you made it worth my while.

My Ork: No Problem (bribes 20 gold)

NPC: WTF!?! Only 20! I fucking hate you ork, get out of my shop before I have my guards kill you and then drag your body over to X and kill you again!

My ork: Calm down! (bribes 200 gold)

NPC: Well hey friend, X? No problem, let me tell you about x....


And lets not even talk about getting 20,000 gold discounts out of shopkeepers by giving them a 500 gold gift *shakes head*. Bribes have to be circumstancial, you shouldn't be able to buy everyone and certainly not in as ham-fisted a manner. It's just too raw.

 

[jasondragon]

Man. How does MSFD come here and respond to comments. Half of the shit he has to read/listen to.

Glad you keep coming back MSFD

And yes I'm a TES Fanboy but also a TES Forum User Hater.

 

[Micmu]

Anyone noticed how that "unintrusive" GPS compass showed a location to elven ruin before it was even really visible?
Now, even previously excellent exploration ascpect of the series has been retardened. Great job!

 

[Fintilgin]

I'm not too worried about the compass. I'm sure a mod which makes the dungeon/other icons invisible will be out with days (if not hours) of the game's release. Some will probably have to be left in, like NPCs or certain quest ones, but I certainly don't want dungeons being pointed out to me.