Morrowind vs Neverwinter nights

[NecroLord]

Morrowind.
Arguably the most interesting and aesthetically unique Elder Scrolls game. Lots of fun, complete freedom in how you approach and interact with the game world.
NWN is alright though.

 

[JarlFrank]

I'd rather compare Neverwinter Nights to other party-based cRPGs

Literally any party-based cRPG: You can have more than one party member at a time. You can control your party members.
NWN: You can only have one party member at a time and he or she is retarded with no ability to mitigate it.

This is one major reason I can't stand playing NWN. Super slow combat (one action every 6 secs lmao) and no companion control makes for an endlessly boring slog.

 

[barricade]

swordflight

 

[Vic]

just like to point out that this thread is more of a popularity poll than a legit which game is better poll. Which is not surprising as Morrowind was released for PC and consoles

 

[Harthwain]

not permanent but you get a lot of them during quests like that khajit who has moon sugar up her butt.

They are not companions. They are temporary NPCs. Not NPCs designed for the purpose of being in your party.

It might the be the case that every CRPG with action-based combat is real-time, but there are a vast number of real-time CRPGs that do not have action-based combat; real-time necessarily requires a bit of dependence on the player's physical abilities but this can be quite minimal, while still permitting the usual RPG mechanics based on randomness and the character's abilities. There is a vast difference between combat in actual action-based CRPGs, such as Demon's/Dark Souls and Dragon's Dogma, and real-time CRPGs in other subgenres, such as Dungeon Master, Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss, Final Fantasy VI, or The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind.

True. I should've said real-time, instead of action.

 

[JarlFrank]

swordflight

Yeah Swordflight would be really, really good if it had been made for a game that isn't terrible to play.

 

[Laz Sundays]

Nwn was the last DnD game I tolerated and it castrated DnD ruleset the most.

Play Knights of the Chalice 2.

But MOOOM it's ugly.

..can I go for Solasta instead?

 

[0sacred]

NWN.

Character building in all TES games sucked. Arena did it best by just leaving it out.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

This is one major reason I can't stand playing NWN. Super slow combat (one action every 6 secs lmao) and no companion control makes for an endlessly boring slog.

If only Bioware had implemented Gygaxian one-minute combat rounds for Baldur's Gate, it would have saved CRPGs from the baleful influence of the Infinity Engine and its successors.

 

[Eirinjas]

morrowind fans usually need to tell lies about their game

Nah no lies, you are just a beggar of poor taste

Morrowind is OBJECTIVELY a great game, behold

- Bethesda's only game produced without help of autogenerating algorithms (terrain, vegetation, etc.)
- instead everything is hand-placed. you literally have toothpicks and countless manually placed statics which make the world seem real
- their only game with deep folklore (instead of going with generic Nordic/European BS)
- no level scaling
- no respawning enemies
- their only game with distinctive/original art direction (not prettier or uglier, just distinctive)
- their last PC game (not a console port like Oblivion/Skyrim)
- great toolset
- cohesive authentic world due to having actual educated artists (before there were videogame courses) on board like MK and Rolston

So yeah, every few years there is some simpleton guy who doesn't get Morrowind. So he is fuming with rage and frustration. Its actually similar in film circles where people dont get Tarkovsky or Kurosawa

- Bethesda's only game produced without help of autogenerating algorithms (terrain, vegetation, etc.)

I don't care enough about these games to find out but aren't oblivion and skyrim hand made aswell(I've never played skyrim)


- their only game with deep folklore (instead of going with generic Nordic/European BS)

True, but noric/european BS is interesting to most people, you aren't from europe though so I don't expect you to feel the same

- no level scaling

https://elderscrolls.fandom.com/wiki/Leveled_Creatures_(Morrowind) ??? What's that then?

- no respawning enemies

https://help.bethesda.net/#en/answer/17610

- their last PC game (not a console port like Oblivion/Skyrim)

wow youre dumb, my friend

the fact Morrowind had a console release isnt the same as being a console port

you can clearly see the UI was designed for mouse and keyboard

Plus it's absolutely not optimized for Xbox. Whereas with a good PC at the time, the game would run relatively smooth, the performance on Xbox was atrocious. Development for Xbox probably wouldn't have begun until some time Jan 2001 after the release of the Xbox was first announced whereas Morrowind began development as a PC game just after Daggerfall's release. The Xbox wasn't even a whisper in anyone's ears until 1999 and it's questionable as to whether or not Bethesda would have even had access to it's hardware at the time. I would suspect based on Bethesda's reputation that the entire year since getting the go-ahead from Microsoft to develop for the Xbox was spent on trying to get the game to work on the system. That's why I'd favor the idea that Morrowind for Xbox was an Xbox port, not developed for Xbox.

Bullshit. The XBOX version plays astoundingly better than the PC version. No surprise there, because it was designed for the console according to this press release from Bethesda themselves:


May 5, 2001 (Rockville, MD) -- Bethesda Softworks Inc., a ZeniMax Media company, today announced that it is developing The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind for the Xbox video game system from Microsoft. Morrowind is the next title in Bethesda's epic, award-winning RPG series and a game destined to redefine the genre by presenting one of the most detailed virtual worlds ever created. Morrowind is being created to utilize the awesome graphics capabilities of the Xbox and is scheduled to be among the first wave of launch titles on the system.

Morrowind is an epic, open-ended single-player game where you create and play any kind of character you can imagine. Your actions define your character, and your gameplay changes and evolves in response to your actions. Confront the assassins' guild, and they take out a contract on you. Impress them, and they try to recruit you instead. No two sagas are the same in the world of Morrowind. The end result is the most open-ended RPG possible - one with an infinite number of possible paths through the game.

"We've been working with Microsoft since we first heard about Xbox," said Todd Howard, project leader for Morrowind. "They've done a great job on Xbox. It's the fastest system we've seen and it's easy to develop for. Morrowind is going to be something really unique, and we finally have a system that can do it justice."

With Morrowind, the unparalleled Elder Scrolls character system is coupled with an exponential increase in the world's richness of detail and level of visual splendor. Utilizing the graphic power of Xbox, Morrowind will feature hyper-realistic textures and polygon counts, real-time shadows, vast landscapes, skeletal based animation, and a dynamic weather system.

"When Bethesda showed us Morrowind last year, we were tremendously impressed," said J Allard, General Manager, Xbox Platform. "We believe this will be the only RPG of its kind on any future-generation video game systems."

 

[Beans00]

Damn, Eirinjas just fucking destroyed luj1. I destroyed him earlier but he feared my post too much to respond to me properly, like how yugoslavia feared nato.
You know morrowind fans, if you like morrowind thats fine, but you don't need to tell lies about the game .


JarlFrank is a big morrowind fan and him and I are friends on steam, and on discord too. Occasionally we discuss games and have spirited debates about morrowind(or other games). Thats ok because JarlFrank doesn't need to tell lies about morrowind like luj1 does. hehe.

 

[Mr. Magniloquent]

Disagreements on NWN stem from whether or not people used it as intended. Anyone who played it online, utilize the DM feature, or play custom modules generally approves. Those who played the OC and only that have a low opinion of it. NWN OC wasn't bad, it was just mediocre. That it came out on the tail end of the age of incline for RPGs made the comparison harsh. Shadows of Undrentide was a really good module, and Hordes of the Underdark was also very well received. Morrowind is a mixed bag. It's unique art and setting and freeform everything appeals to a certain type of player. It's changes from Daggerfall are also divisive, depending on whether you think it was streamlined and dumbed down, or refined.

I go with NWN. It's more versatile due to the excellent toolset. The DM function is extremely powerful and can be used to wonderful effect by practiced hands. When you use NWN as a virtual tabletop, it's one of the best PC games ever made.

 

[MerchantKing]

morrowind fans usually need to tell lies about their game

Nah no lies, you are just a beggar of poor taste

Morrowind is OBJECTIVELY a great game, behold

- Bethesda's only game produced without help of autogenerating algorithms (terrain, vegetation, etc.)
- instead everything is hand-placed. you literally have toothpicks and countless manually placed statics which make the world seem real
- their only game with deep folklore (instead of going with generic Nordic/European BS)
- no level scaling
- no respawning enemies
- their only game with distinctive/original art direction (not prettier or uglier, just distinctive)
- their last PC game (not a console port like Oblivion/Skyrim)
- great toolset
- cohesive authentic world due to having actual educated artists (before there were videogame courses) on board like MK and Rolston

So yeah, every few years there is some simpleton guy who doesn't get Morrowind. So he is fuming with rage and frustration. Its actually similar in film circles where people dont get Tarkovsky or Kurosawa

- Bethesda's only game produced without help of autogenerating algorithms (terrain, vegetation, etc.)

I don't care enough about these games to find out but aren't oblivion and skyrim hand made aswell(I've never played skyrim)


- their only game with deep folklore (instead of going with generic Nordic/European BS)

True, but noric/european BS is interesting to most people, you aren't from europe though so I don't expect you to feel the same

- no level scaling

https://elderscrolls.fandom.com/wiki/Leveled_Creatures_(Morrowind) ??? What's that then?

- no respawning enemies

https://help.bethesda.net/#en/answer/17610

- their last PC game (not a console port like Oblivion/Skyrim)

wow youre dumb, my friend

the fact Morrowind had a console release isnt the same as being a console port

you can clearly see the UI was designed for mouse and keyboard

Plus it's absolutely not optimized for Xbox. Whereas with a good PC at the time, the game would run relatively smooth, the performance on Xbox was atrocious. Development for Xbox probably wouldn't have begun until some time Jan 2001 after the release of the Xbox was first announced whereas Morrowind began development as a PC game just after Daggerfall's release. The Xbox wasn't even a whisper in anyone's ears until 1999 and it's questionable as to whether or not Bethesda would have even had access to it's hardware at the time. I would suspect based on Bethesda's reputation that the entire year since getting the go-ahead from Microsoft to develop for the Xbox was spent on trying to get the game to work on the system. That's why I'd favor the idea that Morrowind for Xbox was an Xbox port, not developed for Xbox.

Bullshit. The XBOX version plays astoundingly better than the PC version. No surprise there, because it was designed for the console according to this press release from Bethesda themselves:


May 5, 2001 (Rockville, MD) -- Bethesda Softworks Inc., a ZeniMax Media company, today announced that it is developing The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind for the Xbox video game system from Microsoft. Morrowind is the next title in Bethesda's epic, award-winning RPG series and a game destined to redefine the genre by presenting one of the most detailed virtual worlds ever created. Morrowind is being created to utilize the awesome graphics capabilities of the Xbox and is scheduled to be among the first wave of launch titles on the system.

Morrowind is an epic, open-ended single-player game where you create and play any kind of character you can imagine. Your actions define your character, and your gameplay changes and evolves in response to your actions. Confront the assassins' guild, and they take out a contract on you. Impress them, and they try to recruit you instead. No two sagas are the same in the world of Morrowind. The end result is the most open-ended RPG possible - one with an infinite number of possible paths through the game.

"We've been working with Microsoft since we first heard about Xbox," said Todd Howard, project leader for Morrowind. "They've done a great job on Xbox. It's the fastest system we've seen and it's easy to develop for. Morrowind is going to be something really unique, and we finally have a system that can do it justice."

With Morrowind, the unparalleled Elder Scrolls character system is coupled with an exponential increase in the world's richness of detail and level of visual splendor. Utilizing the graphic power of Xbox, Morrowind will feature hyper-realistic textures and polygon counts, real-time shadows, vast landscapes, skeletal based animation, and a dynamic weather system.

"When Bethesda showed us Morrowind last year, we were tremendously impressed," said J Allard, General Manager, Xbox Platform. "We believe this will be the only RPG of its kind on any future-generation video game systems."

You're drawing a lot of conclusions from a bunch of nothing and hype from the marketing department as Bethesda is sucking up to Microsoft. Every time a console comes out, there's always "performance" being used to sell that console (yes, this article is nothing but marketing for the Xbox and nothing substantial has been provided). If it's not for improved performance over other consoles or a previous model, there's no reason to buy a console other than games released on it.

Like the last decade or two, PC has always been much more powerful than consoles. The only thing that held it back was cost. Whereas consoles had always used outdated cpus/gpus configured in a clever way to perform like a high end computer did five years prior to its development while being cheaper than an average PC. It did not compete with average gaming pcs you could build around the time.

One article that exists for no purpose other than marketing hype is not an argument much like other forms of propaganda are not valid for arguments.

"We've been working with Microsoft since we first heard about Xbox," said Todd Howard, project leader for Morrowind. "They've done a great job on Xbox. It's the fastest system we've seen and it's easy to develop for. Morrowind is going to be something really unique, and we finally have a system that can do it justice."

When did they get the license to develop for Xbox? December 31, 2000? January 31, 2001? etc? It certainly wouldn't have been before Comdex 1999 when PS2 was first announced. The development of the Xbox in the first place would not have even happened until that point since that was what prompted the development of Xbox. Microsoft saw it as a threat to PC so they went to develop it. So being optimistic about the first working models that Bethesda may have had access to would have been in 2000, at least a year after Morrowind had been in development. That's if they had inside knowledge of Xbox's development. If not, then they would have first heard about it in March 10, 2000 and then the earliest they would have began developing for Xbox is sometime in that month. By that point, there would have been at least a year and a half of only PC development.

However, Todd Howard states "We got approached by Microsoft to do an Xbox version, which I was leery of at the time, but it worked out incredibly well. That actually became the dominant platform it was on." When they were approached is never provided and could have been any time between March 2000 and when an Xbox release for Morrowind was announced on May 5, 2001.

Spoiler

On top of that, the PC version was already announced by Bethesda to be released in late 2001 as far back as May 2000. They thought they would be finished at the end of 2001 at that time implying that they already developed enough that they though they only needed another year or so of development to finish it up. It was only delayed until its eventual release date to it's released date in May 2002 because they believed the PC release needed more testing. There was no mention of a delay until around October 2001

https://web.archive.org/web/20070317231954/http://elderscrolls.com/news/press_101201.htm


Any Xbox development at that time would have been in it infancy if at all. No mention of any release for the Xbox until one year later

https://web.archive.org/web/20020406220606/http://pc.ign.com/articles/080/080618p1.html
https://web.archive.org/web/2007101...mespy.com/View.php?view=Articles.Detail&id=27
https://web.archive.org/web/2003101...ngs.com/itemrankings/fullnews.asp?newsid=1570
https://www.gamespot.com/articles/morrowind-editor-qanda/1100-2585018/
https://www.gamespot.com/articles/elder-scrolls-iii-morrowind/1100-2567858/


Either they didn't begin development for the Xbox until after they first announced the release of Morrowind or they absolutely weren't certain they could get it ready for the Xbox in time.

These facts are contrary to the idea that it was developed for Xbox.

said Todd Howard

Ah yes. Todd the Liar.

Spoiler

 

[Harthwain]

Bullshit. The XBOX version plays astoundingly better than the PC version.

Morrowind was designed as a PC game first. Erik Parker, the programmer, said pretty it much: "Originally, we were going to be a PC-only title, but Todd wanted really, really badly to get Morrowind on the Xbox". You can compare PC version to Xbox and the number of shortcomings that appears on the console should be proof enough to show which version was the original one. Below I provided a timestamped video that lists the advantages of PC versus console version of the game:



It's Oblivion that became a true console game first and a PC game second.

So saying "The XBOX version plays astoundingly better than the PC version" is objectively not true. You should treat whatever Todd says with a big grain of salt (Remeber Oblivion!). Press release materials are even less trustworthy source when it comes to being factual, because they are focused on pumping up hype.

 

[ind33d]

Bullshit. The XBOX version plays astoundingly better than the PC version.

Morrowind was designed as a PC game first. Erik Parker, the programmer, said pretty it much: "Originally, we were going to be a PC-only title, but Todd wanted really, really badly to get Morrowind on the Xbox". You can compare PC version to Xbox and the number of shortcomings that appears on the console should be proof enough to show which version was the original one. Below I provided a timestamped video that lists the advantages of PC versus console version of the game:



It's Oblivion that became a true console game first and a PC game second.

So saying "The XBOX version plays astoundingly better than the PC version" is objectively not true. You should treat whatever Todd says with a big grain of salt (Remeber Oblivion!). Press release materials are even less trustworthy source when it comes to being factual, because they are focused on pumping up hype.

elder scrolls and nu fallout do objectively play better on a controller. any game that needs you to run straight forward for hundreds of hours feels more comfortable with analogue controls. i played Fallout 76 on a steam controller with gyro and compared to mouse and keyboard it feels like a completely different game

 

[Harthwain]

elder scrolls and nu fallout do objectively play better on a controller. any game that needs you to run straight forward for hundreds of hours feels more comfortable with analogue controls. i played Fallout 76 on a steam controller with gyro and compared to mouse and keyboard it feels like a completely different game

Check out the timestamped video.

Besides that, I never found Morrowind to be bad to play on PC (quite the opposite). I played [PROTOTYPE] on both PC and with gamepad and it was one of those games that plays equally well on both. Death Stranding plays very comfortable with keyboard as well. So saying "it is better on a controller, because with keyboard you have to keep pressing W button" is a bit of WTF argument from my perspective.

 

[NecroLord]

Console plebs.
Gigachads use keyboards.
nu Fallout was designed with consoles in mind, hence the decline (many other factors as well, like turning a beloved Grimdark postapocalyptic setting into a stupid, low IQ one).
When Morrowind was released, the PC had priority. XBox was secondary.

 

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

Morrowind. No contest. The world is far more unique and interesting.

Can't say I care much for the gameplay of either, but in terms of story content, Morrowind was better.

It was a disappointment for me as a Daggerfall fan, but then so was NWN as a BG fan.

 

[Eirinjas]

I'd love to hear more about how Neverwinter Night's six second rounds for combat makes it a terrible game.

 

[Zanthia]

elder scrolls and nu fallout do objectively play better on a controller. any game that needs you to run straight forward for hundreds of hours feels more comfortable with analogue controls.

That's just because you use controllers all the time. I'm pretty sure it's less effort to press w than to hold a stick forward, but it might not feel like it if your hands are less used to it.

a beloved Grimdark postapocalyptic setting

Fallout isn't grimdark. I never understand where people are coming from with that description. Tonally it's like any other RPG where you travel around helping villagers and vanquishing evil. With the cut Junktown endings it would have been different (and worse, so I'm glad they cut them).

 

[JarlFrank]

elder scrolls and nu fallout do objectively play better on a controller

Not a single game in the world plays objectively better on a controller. Not one.

 

[Ryzer]

elder scrolls and nu fallout do objectively play better on a controller

Not a single game in the world plays objectively better on a controller. Not one.

Disagree.

Souls games play better with a controller.

Nioh games too.

 

[JarlFrank]

Controllers are such clunky pieces of shit that even Dark Souls despite its trash-tier M&KB responsiveness plays better on M&KB.

 

[Ryzer]

Controllers are such clunky pieces of shit that even Dark Souls despite its trash-tier M&KB responsiveness plays better on M&KB.

Disagree.

Gamecube controller was pretty good.

 

[Vic]

Mouse is the best imo