Can someone explain the ending of Oblivion to me?

[Mamon]

It`s like Helton said, many of the characters of the game are actually misinformed. Mankar was taking drugs when he said Mundus is part of Oblivion.

 

[Herbert West]

It`s like Helton said, many of the characters of the game are actually misinformed. Mankar was taking drugs when he said Mundus is part of Oblivion.

Or maybe he forgot to take them when he uttered that? Think about the endless possibilities. These are not contradictions, it's DEPTH!!11

 

[Helton]

Or maybe he forgot to take them when he uttered that? Think about the endless possibilities. These are not contradictions, it's DEPTH!!11

MK wrote Mankar Camoran so yes the apparent contradiction was intentional and not a fumble by the development team. It is an interesting viewpoint but it didn't hold so much water when examined.

Characters can contradict eachother, they're fallible, just like in the real world. That's how ES lore has worked since at least Morrowind. Accounts are accounts and are not necessarily the whole-truth. Just look at all the different stories about The Battle at Red Mountain. By most accounts the Nords weren't even there, yet the Nords knew intimate details of what happened and thought they played an integral role. Who knows?

It is depth.

 

[Herbert West]

MK wrote Mankar Camoran so yes the apparent contradiction was intentional and not a fumble by the development team. It is an interesting viewpoint but it didn't hold so much water when examined.

Characters can contradict eachother, they're fallible, just like in the real world. That's how ES lore has worked since at least Morrowind. Accounts are accounts and are not necessarily the whole-truth. Just look at all the different stories about The Battle at Red Mountain. By most accounts the Nords weren't even there, yet the Nords knew intimate details of what happened and thought they played an integral role. Who knows?

It is depth.

That was enlightening. It makes TES lore resemble more the real ancient history. I was thinking that the aforementioned thing resulted from some inconsistency.

 

[Zomg]

Wow, we really did get hell of TES refugees.

 

[DraQ]

Or maybe he forgot to take them when he uttered that? Think about the endless possibilities. These are not contradictions, it's DEPTH!!11

MK wrote Mankar Camoran so yes the apparent contradiction was intentional and not a fumble by the development team. It is an interesting viewpoint but it didn't hold so much water when examined.

Either that or he gained too much altitude on creativity enchancers. :wink:

And I agree that the fact that all the lore is in character in TES gives it great potential, still, even given that, Oblivion was a disgrace.

You can't really get anything better than spectacular crash'n'burn when trying to explain why the whole province was turned into LoTR theme park, can you?

 

[Claw]

Characters can contradict eachother, they're fallible, just like in the real world. That's how ES lore has worked since at least Morrowind. Accounts are accounts and are not necessarily the whole-truth.

(...)

It is depth.

According to Douglas Godall, it is negligence. Ken Rolston created different, contradicting accounts of the history without any notion or interest in which one was correct.

It's only depth if somone made an effort to create a consistent, true lore. If a bunch of contradictory accounts are all there is, there is no depth.

 

[Herbert West]

Hm, the notion of multiple, uncertain accounts seems good, if applied to events of ancient TES history. It's like myth within a myth, if you like. If used for relatively recent events, it does smell of inconsistency.

 

[Xi]

Characters can contradict eachother, they're fallible, just like in the real world. That's how ES lore has worked since at least Morrowind. Accounts are accounts and are not necessarily the whole-truth.

(...)

It is depth.

According to Douglas Godall, it is negligence. Ken Rolston created different, contradicting accounts of the history without any notion or interest in which one was correct.

It's only depth if somone made an effort to create a consistent, true lore. If a bunch of contradictory accounts are all there is, there is no depth.

History works much in the same way though. There are numerous, conflicting accounts, relative to the eyes of the beholder. However, it is a shame that a Designer would blatantly decide to say "Fuck all the old lore." It's seriously the only thing the franchise has going for it at this point. Why shoot yourself in the foot? Oh that's right, he retired - to later start working for a different unknown company. /shrug

Edit: I always felt that Main Quests in TES were better suited to the guild conflicts. It seems like whoever is laying down the framework for the game stories is just a fucking moron. Though, it could be a lack of execution on game itself. Oblivion's MQ is just utter trash. It's blatantly stupid compared to what they could have done with the lore. They turn Daedra into Demons, which was the worst thing they could have done. It's all so contrived now. Moving forward is going to be difficult. The games aren't going to recapture the unique lore of TES 2 or even 3, I liked 3 - even if it was also vague and laughable mostly, but OB simply lacks any type of soul. There's practically no interaction between any of the different political groups, and previous lore is just butchered with newer 21st century explanations. Fucking asshole mainstream morons!

 

[Helton]

Oblivion was a disgrace.

Goes without saying.

You can't really get anything better than spectacular crash'n'burn when trying to explain why the whole province was turned into LoTR theme park, can you?

Oh, I agree. There was no way to pull that off as classy, but I guess you can't blame him for trying. And it was a horribly boring story. The whole game was boring. That's the real vice in my mind. Not that they changed shit, but that they changed it for the worse and without good reason.

According to Douglas Godall, it is negligence. Ken Rolston created different, contradicting accounts of the history without any notion or interest in which one was correct.

It's only depth if somone made an effort to create a consistent, true lore. If a bunch of contradictory accounts are all there is, there is no depth.

I don't necessarily agree or disagree with Goodall's sentiments on principle: I could see it being executed poorly -- but I think it worked. Should the truth be known and the mystery manufactured or should it genuinely be a mystery? As it stands: My interpretation is as good as anyone's, no one can come in and just say "You're wrong, because I know the super-secret truth the writer told me!" They have to argue the merits and cite their sources.

How familiar are you with TES Lore? I might be willing to blow the dust off my old tomes and argue it with you but not if you're just disagreeing off of hear-say.

 

[Hazelnut]

I don't know if there's a book I missed and didn't read or quite what but at the end, having gotten Martin to the Imperial City and all hell having broken loose, I ran past a giant thing which decided to invade (after having run past everything else), Martin turned into a Dragon and that was it...

What the fuck? Did someone force you to play through the game at gunpoint or something?

 

[BLOBERT]

From my impression in that interview, Goodall stated it was Ken's intention to have different accounts of the history, but he didn't give a shit which was true.

 

[hakuroshi]

Ken approached this as a game designer, not a world creator. It was a good thing that there was no completely true account. The point was to create a mystery and allow player to make his own conclusions without a "right" answer. In fact it probably was a good decision for a developer to not know the truth himself. And Ken was not an original creator anyway.

 

[DraQ]

Ken approached this as a game designer, not a world creator. It was a good thing that there was no completely true account. The point was to create a mystery and allow player to make his own conclusions without a "right" answer. In fact it probably was a good decision for a developer to not know the truth himself. And Ken was not an original creator anyway.

Agreed. I don't see why creator should know which account is a true one. If the in-game and in-lore evidence doesn't allow for a definite conclusion, creator's knowledge is irrelevant. If it does, creator has botched the job at making conflicting, but equally believeable accounts.

 

[Nael]

I don't know if there's a book I missed and didn't read or quite what but at the end, having gotten Martin to the Imperial City and all hell having broken loose, I ran past a giant thing which decided to invade (after having run past everything else), Martin turned into a Dragon and that was it...

What the fuck? Did someone force you to play through the game at gunpoint or something?

You can seriously beat the MQ in about an hour or two if that's all you concentrate on. Level scaling ftw!

 

[Zomg]

Agreed. I don't see why creator should know which account is a true one. If the in-game and in-lore evidence doesn't allow for a definite conclusion, creator's knowledge is irrelevant. If it does, creator has botched the job at making conflicting, but equally believeable accounts.

That's a pretty funny apology coming from people that executed some of the longest sustained nerdouts in human history trying to glean the real story behind the Morrowind fake-mysteries.

 

[DraQ]

You can seriously beat the MQ in about an hour or two if that's all you concentrate on. Level scaling ftw!

It's even easier this way.

Seriously, it feels as if you're putting your your effort into making everyone around more powerful, not your character.

(I'm waiting for "In soviet Oblivion..." joke, don't disappoint me)

 

[Herbert West]

Seriously, it feels as if you're putting your your effort into making everyone around more powerful, not your character.

That's the best way to put it I've ever seen.

 

[JarlFrank]

You can seriously beat the MQ in about an hour or two if that's all you concentrate on. Level scaling ftw!

It's even easier this way.

Seriously, it feels as if you're putting your your effort into making everyone around more powerful, not your character.

(I'm waiting for "In soviet Oblivion..." joke, don't disappoint me)

In Soviet Oblivion, enemies are levelled up by you!!

 

[DarkUnderlord]

I don't know if there's a book I missed and didn't read or quite what but at the end, having gotten Martin to the Imperial City and all hell having broken loose, I ran past a giant thing which decided to invade (after having run past everything else), Martin turned into a Dragon and that was it...

What the fuck? Did someone force you to play through the game at gunpoint or something?

Boredom. Believe me, when you've shutdown something like 12 Oblivion Gates in a row, after that, you just want to get through the thing as quickly as possible. Well, that and a shitty PC that meant everytime I tried to horsey travel somewhere, it was jerking every 10 seconds and looked like shit as the scenery popped in to view around me and if I turned off "distant terrain" it was like playing Gorillas in the Mist where I couldn't even see one foot in front of me without the path disappearing off into deep fog.

And hey, I'm not the one who created a quest compass and fast travel. At least in Morrowind, I could enjoy the shiney the armour and the nice scenery as I travelled at warp five overhead with my enchanted items out the wazoo, the ring of Levitation I'd made meself and the Boots of Blinding Speed which made you fly at superman speed.

In my defense, you also HAVE to run past everything at the end. The guy even says so. One does not just WALK into the Temple of the One.

Seriously, it feels as if you're putting your your effort into making everyone around more powerful, not your character.

That's the best way to put it I've ever seen.

There's an easy solution to that. It's called the difficulty slider. About the time you realise that every time you get stronger, your enemies get about twice the number of hitpoints they had before and so whacking shit takes longer and longer, is about the time I realised I could slide that down. Not all that far mind you as the thing seems to be "balanced" on a knife edge. Even just half a centi-metre down and suddenly, enemies fall before you in a few blows. It made it all much more tolerable for me and beats having to go "SHIELDS UP" and stand there as you wait for it to attack you and get staggered, so that you can attack back. The number of times before doing that where I'd ended up in some sort of "Who can block the longest?" contest with a Marsh Monster (or whatever they are) was enough for me.

 

[DraQ]

There's an easy solution to that. It's called the difficulty slider.

Et tu, Codex?


Anyway, the effects of difficulty slider in different positions are as follows:

1. All the way to the left - your character has approximate durability of a dreadnought, the enemy durability of a wet paper bag.

2. All the way to the right - the enemy has approximate durability of a dreadnought, your character durability of a wet paper bag.

3. Somewhere in the middle - both you, and the enemy have approcimate durability of a heavily armoured battle tank, rather than a human being.

 

[DarkUnderlord]

I don't think it's even "all the way" to the left or right, even just a smidge one way or the other and I've found monsters variate wildly between "epic twenty minute battles of endurance where you're sucking down potions like there's no tomorrow and blocking like a Roman Legion" to "a pathetic 5 second battle where you whack him once and he's dead".

I found sliding it just a half-centimetre to the left meant battles became more interesting for me because I still had to block and time my attacks but I didn't have to do it for twenty minutes over and over again just to take out a mudcrab with the Umbra Sword. Instead, mudcrabs died in one hit like they should and the tougher stuff like Daedra took a decent number of good blows amid some well-timed blocks... Mind you this was at level 10 but I figured if stuff was only taking longer to kill as I levelled up, it wouldn't get any better. In fact I found levelling to be a completely pointless exercise as too often, I noticied a distinct difference between pre-levelled up monsters and post-levelled up monsters. For a monster to suddenly go from 5 or 6 hits to kill to 8 or 10 hits to kill just because you slept for a night is ridiculous.

Plus I really, really detest the concept of "use skills to level up" as it's implemented in Oblivion. There's no incentive to finish quests because you don't gain anything from them (ignoring the more interesting quests and keeping in mind the quests in Oblivion are, for the most part, poorly written Fed-Ex exercises). Any "rewards" you do get, like the weapons, are mostly useless or no better than what you already have and the cash "rewards" were completely worthless (I had some bloke approach me on behalf of the Countess of Burma who gave me a "stipend" of 25 gold coin so that I would be interested in talking to the Countess... when I had about 50,000 gold already. When talking to the Countess my only option was "I'm here because of the money". Yes, 25 coin. Wow. That's a lot. Sign me up today. "Yes, I thought that would attract your attention" was her reply, no really). If I got some xp, maybe I'd tolerate more of the mundane crap but towards the end, I got to the point where if it didn't interest me or I felt like I was being railed down with no real options again, I didn't do it.

I think just overall, Oblivion had so much worthless crap in it. Even sneaking about, breaking into people's houses and stealing was only interesting for about 3 houses which is about as long as it takes you to realise that nobody actually has anything that's worth stealing. If I could break in and steal a few thousand gold from some rich snob, it'd be worth it but 5 coin and some Velvet Pants which are worth 25 coin isn't worth the time.