This is yet another issue that was modded out over a decade ago. You can even toggle markers on and off at will in case you're actually lost.
yes you can do it ofc but there's not much point since there's that much to find in the wilderness other than random dungeons and a rare deadric shrine, the game was designed from the ground up with fast travel in mind.
No kidding. They weren't going to design dungeons that require a mechanic that they had just cut.
Yeah but who the fuck is playing vanilla Oblivion in 2024, or any vanilla TES game for that matter? Better cities, unique landscapes and either of the overhauls fill the game out immensely. I don't get why people dwell on these non-issues. Don't like fast travel? Don't use it. Don't like eating a million pies for health? Then don't? Or in lieu of discipline, apply yourself and get rid of them.
i agree. oblivions radiant ai, despite being the undisputed king of unintentional comedy in video games to this day, was actually ambitious and it is the soul of the game. as nasty as oblivion is i wouldnt call it a soulless game, unlike something like skyrim or starfield. and thats something.
If the question is "Why do people hate Oblivion so much when it was released", then it is reasonable to give an answer that doesn't involve the mods. I played Morrowind without any mods and I had great time with it. Would I mod it now? Probably. But it doesn't change the fact that the core of the game didn't have to be "fixed by mods" back in the day.
"Don't like it? Don't use it" argument (if you can even call it that) doesn't make it any less of a bad design though.
This is what I would actually point to as the main reason why people dislike Oblivion(even if they are not consciously aware of it). Underneath all the trash people can feel there is still a solid core of game that Bethesda simply refused to make.
It a retarded way of thinking. The game is entirely built around you fast traveling all around the place. Pretty much every major questline expects you to zigzag across a map that does not feature any other transportation options besides on foot. Saying that you do not have to use fast travel in Oblivion is like me saying that you do not have to shoot guns in Halo because you can melee guys.
I didn't play Oblivion at launch and since I am the sort that would be spending hours prior picking through mods for any of these games regardless, I'd rather do it for the one that benefits from it most. I'm also not a guy who would gamble his enjoyment on any vanilla TES game this far out from launch and I reckon I'm not alone. I happen to like Oblivion's generic fantasy aesthetic and many of its quests, the cities etc. I like the gloominess of Cyrodiil when its raining combined with some of the music. None of the other games give me that same forlorn feeling. Knowing that such a feeling can be found there, I don't recommend newcomers disregard the game in current year when the lion's share of issues have been fixed and most of the features Morrowind fans bemoan the lack of can be in Oblivion if you really want them to be.
This is only an issue if you're doing every major questline. I start any given Oblivion character by getting off a boat in either Leyawin, Anvil or the Imperial City. From there, I wander around, explore, dungeon dive and do whatever sidequests that strike me as something my character would do and end when I get bored or run out of such things. If I cross the map, by foot or by horse, three or four times, that's no big deal. There's plenty of ways to go that aren't just the main roads and plenty to see along them. If I get tired of manual travel, I go to a port and buy passage to some other city that's nearer to the goal.
I guess that explains it. Most people who hate Oblivion hate it, because they compare it to Morrowind. If Oblivion would be your first game (even on the release day), then without any frame of reference it is probably not that bad of an experience. And if you play it modded... Well, it would probably come to you as a surprise that some people may "hate Oblivion so much".
Oblivion was not my first TES game, I just don't have any deep attachment to the other games. The mega dungeons of Daggerfall are gone from Morrowind.... free shrugs. No more cart! Oh no... The only thing that comes as a surprise is that people are still holding the game as anathema nearly 20 years later when most of the issues that they complained about are irrelevant now. If the argument is "don't play this game because you have to mod it for it to be playable in 2024", that's every TES to some degree in a nutshell.
It is not though. As I said before - I was able to play Morrowind without any mods. My brother recently replayed Morrowind, also without any mods. I am able to play Diablo 1 without mods, too. If game is good enough, then modding is a possibility, not a necessity.
For you two sure, you're more enamored by it than I am. Minimally, I would have to find a bunch of visual mods to fix resolution, terrain distance pop-in, search for essential general bugfixes and so on. It would take me just as long to get the list together as it would Oblivion or Skyrim. Vanilla Diablo I can agree, but not TES in 2024.
This and another comment with similar sentiment are what my posts were aimed at. No attachment to the game, avoidance because of issues that are now irrelevant. There's no point fretting over the ghosts of '06 when you're going to be assembling mod lists to play any of these games regardless.
The problem with the was that they dialed it back too much from how it originally was.
This is only a problem if you do one quest at a time.. Instead try doing multiple quests in parallel and plan ahead where you need to go to complete them most efficiently. Think of planning your route as another gameplay element, same as Morrowind's multi-modal travel network also adds gameplay because you need to think at least a little bit compared to just clicking your destination.
It's definitely better than KOTOR.
That is only really viable if both already intimately familiar with the game and want to do everything. If however you are playing for the first time or want to roleplay(a.k.a you are not going to let your pals from the fighters guild wait for you a month or two) then its out of the question.
If you want to roleplay then shouldn't that involve traveling times? If the fighters guide wants you to fetch something from the other end of the province then it only makes sense that it might take a while. You don't have to be autistic about it and collect literally every quest and optimize the shit out of your planning - just wait until you have a couple of things to do in/around a town before you spend time walking there and then see what you can get done along the way while also doing some more quests you find in that town before you return. Fighters guild doesn't pay enough for everything to be an emergency where you do their shit and nothing else after all.
Oblivion was my first TES game. Well, I lasted for about 15 hours in Arena before regretting the purchase.
