Compare this title to Morrowind, where you spent more time doing the sub-quests than engaging in the story, and you feel like your in some kind of old fashioned console RPG of following A to B to C to D religiously.
Even the missions themselves follow a set formula. One mission for example is to free a kidnapped son by paying the ransom off. However, I thought I?d be smart to look for where they were holding him captive and rescue him, rather than go to the arranged meeting place and pay them. I found the house and killed the sole guard, yet nothing happened. The captive was scared of me and wouldn?t talk to me! The ONLY way of doing that mission is to pay the captors? yawn.​