Preview Oblivion preview & shitstorm at Wired Blog

[Gwendo]

Here is an amusing comment from MSFD:

Yeah, he gave a 200+ hour game about 2.5 hours and wrote it off. You be the judge.

As you can see, being constantly exposed to that cesspool of stupidity has affected his reading comprehension skill.

So, in the other 197,5 hours, there won't be those graphic and performance issues?

 

[Killzig]

SURPRISE, IT RUNS LIKE SHIT! OH NOEZ.

 

[Section8]

Yeah, I don't quite get the mentality that says "You should judge a game by the sum of the minor good bits that make it up, and not by a problem that will be everpresent."

In any case, it's going to be interesting shortly after release, when all the optimists are brought crashing down.

 

[Jason]

I doubt it. The optimists are still probably going to find enough good things in it to justify their enthusiasm and the haters will do the same with the bad things. It's going to be Morrowind Part 2.

 

[Zomg]

I look forward to the inexplicable wierdo that will come to the Codex, who is obsessively in love with Morrowind yet hates Oblivion with a smouldering insanity. What will his crazy arguments be? Who knows? Stay tuned.

 

[obediah]

It will be nice to see a shitstorm that will be unleashed when Oblivion is finally released. Even if the game is not bad in itself, too high expectations will guarantee it.
Days until shitstorm: 26

I'm interested about this myself. I've seen PC fanbois smacked in the face with reality many times, and they usually just either go *poof*, or flip-flop and go on with their lives. I'm hoping that console fanboi rage will be much more interetaining.

EDIT: wow I actually switched words two and a half syllables into typing interesting. I was going to clean it up, but I figured preserving it might help the people in white suits that are diagnosing me in a few years.

 

[Spazmo]

I doubt it. The optimists are still probably going to find enough good things in it to justify their enthusiasm and the haters will do the same with the bad things. It's going to be Morrowind Part 2.

Well, lots of people around here (myself included) liked ToEE a lot in spite of bugginess and poor performance and so on. Probably someone somewhere will find something to like in Oblivion--and it'll almost certainly sell enough copies that it won't matter if people actually like it.

 

[dongle]

I look forward to the inexplicable wierdo that will come to the Codex, who is obsessively in love with Morrowind yet hates Oblivion with a smouldering insanity.

You lookin' at me?

 

[EvoG]

Here is an amusing comment from MSFD:

Yeah, he gave a 200+ hour game about 2.5 hours and wrote it off. You be the judge.

As you can see, being constantly exposed to that cesspool of stupidity has affected his reading comprehension skill.

So, in the other 197,5 hours, there won't be those graphic and performance issues?

Ha, amen to that sister. I just "asked" the same thing to Killzig when he cut and pasted what MSFD wrote. :D

I mean really, unless there's a clear bias/complete lack of objectivity, take the criticism like an adult. Every game on the earth has some form of graphics glitches, and pop ups and LOD radius's are nothing new, so I have a hard time believing the previewer was pulling it out of his ass JUST to piss on the game arbitrarily. And if not like an adult, at least consider the fact that not everyone likes everything everyone else does, no matter HOW hard you worked on it, so dont make yourself out to appear desperately defensive, again unless you sincerely believe the previewer had an agenda.

 

[Pr()ZaC]

Here is an amusing comment from MSFD:

Yeah, he gave a 200+ hour game about 2.5 hours and wrote it off. You be the judge.

As you can see, being constantly exposed to that cesspool of stupidity has affected his reading comprehension skill.

So, in the other 197,5 hours, there won't be those graphic and performance issues?

Ha, amen to that sister. I just "asked" the same thing to Killzig when he cut and pasted what MSFD wrote. :D

I mean really, unless there's a clear bias/complete lack of objectivity, take the criticism like an adult. Every game on the earth has some form of graphics glitches, and pop ups and LOD radius's are nothing new, so I have a hard time believing the previewer was pulling it out of his ass JUST to piss on the game arbitrarily. And if not like an adult, at least consider the fact that not everyone likes everything everyone else does, no matter HOW hard you worked on it, so dont make yourself out to appear desperately defensive, again unless you sincerely believe the previewer had an agenda.

Ahhh, reading 6 pages of enraged comments was pure bliss.
About your comment, the guy tested the game on a XBOX360OMGWTFBBQLOOKATTHEGRAPHICSMOM! for chrissake! I would be surprised to see such a bad lod and object popups on that console. At least we know he wasn't a TES fanboi, and as we saw earlier, if you're NOT a TES fanboi and you found the game not being as fun/engaging as the hype machine said, you're covered with a steaming pile of fresh turds.

 

[EvoG]

Hehe. Well just to compare the two, I have to stress again that the 360 is a VERY fast machine. There aren't two different engines, one for the 360 and one for the PC, so there's a good chance with a BLISTERNIGLY fast PC, you could at the very least hack the radius falloff of the deco-LOD (grass fade in...check out Farcry or as early as UT2k4).

My point is that I dont see there being a huge difference between the performance of the two. People are under the misrepresentation that the 360 is somehow slower than a PC...yes its slower than a VERY FAST PC, but only marginally for the next year or so, but it is far superior to the average PC that the average PC gamer is going to have today. What I think is most interesting is the "next-gen" comment, and what we were promised with next-gen. Thing is, as I've said before, its not the hammer, its the carpenter.

There was a 17 minute Ghost Recon 3 video on Xboxyde that Ubisoft asked they remove, and being fortunate enough to have seen it, tells a completely different story about next-gen console gameplay and graphics. Yes it most definitely had pop-up, but it was infrequent and seemed to be due to a delay with the frustrum culling (meaning objects popped up as the camera turned, not as the character walked linearly toward distance objects, which would be distance culling). Draw distance was outstanding and the area was absolutely huge(tactical nerds are going to soil erode their shorts). This felt like next-gen. Gears of War most definitely feels like next-gen. Dead Rising looks next-gen. These games are all on the 360 so consider that its not just the hardware. How many PC games ran shitty on high-end PC's that didn't even justify the terrible framerates? Great games and performance are a marriage of talent AND hardware, not just exclusive to the hardware.

 

[aweigh]

Hehe. Well just to compare the two, I have to stress again that the 360 is a VERY fast machine. There aren't two different engines, one for the 360 and one for the PC, so there's a good chance with a BLISTERNIGLY fast PC, you could at the very least hack the radius falloff of the deco-LOD (grass fade in...check out Farcry or as early as UT2k4).

My point is that I dont see there being a huge difference between the performance of the two. People are under the misrepresentation that the 360 is somehow slower than a PC...yes its slower than a VERY FAST PC, but only marginally for the next year or so, but it is far superior to the average PC that the average PC gamer is going to have today. What I think is most interesting is the "next-gen" comment, and what we were promised with next-gen. Thing is, as I've said before, its not the hammer, its the carpenter.

There was a 17 minute Ghost Recon 3 video on Xboxyde that Ubisoft asked they remove, and being fortunate enough to have seen it, tells a completely different story about next-gen console gameplay and graphics. Yes it most definitely had pop-up, but it was infrequent and seemed to be due to a delay with the frustrum culling (meaning objects popped up as the camera turned, not as the character walked linearly toward distance objects, which would be distance culling). Draw distance was outstanding and the area was absolutely huge(tactical nerds are going to soil erode their shorts). This felt like next-gen. Gears of War most definitely feels like next-gen. Dead Rising looks next-gen. These games are all on the 360 so consider that its not just the hardware. How many PC games ran shitty on high-end PC's that didn't even justify the terrible framerates? Great games and performance are a marriage of talent AND hardware, not just exclusive to the hardware.

Like DX:IW which I think to this day still holds the candle for worst performance-to-graphics ratio and Bloodlines, which has several areas which just become slideshows regardless of what kind of rig you've got...

 

[Stella Brando]

The mind-numbing thing about this is the fact that these kids are elitists. To them, there's two groups: the hardcore leets who can handle the jandal of Oblivion, and the ignorant masses who simply can't face such an immersive RPG masterpiece. If you let your mind really dwell on that, it feels like you're on acid.

 

[EvoG]

Oh, just to be clear, pop-ups and draw distance issues are in every game; what I failed to note that this isn't new or even really a big deal. The odds of this diminishing the experience are next to none.

What I'm reacting to is the anger toward that previewer and the strawman attacks on his credibility. The graphical glitches he mentions are never refuted by Bethsoft, even when many of the TES members asked the exact same thing Gwendo and I asked. Instead he's simply derided for how little of the quests he's seen and story he learned of. M'kay.

Its the maturity of the whole issue, or lack-thereof, especially by the people who should know better. Jesus the reason I detest PR people is their disingenuous nature. This isn't endearing in the least. Just dont say anything at that point. If the graphics have issues, big deal, but dont go and try to turn it around against the previewer and his "ignorance" just to sway your audience against a false-negative at the expense of someone else. Thats just tasteless.

The graphics will be fine and the game will be fine, just dont lose sight of being professional about the good AND the bad.

 

[Kamaz]

Yeah, I really like such arguments. First, if you criticize the game, they say:

"the game is not released yet! let's judge it when its released!"

then, when its fucking relased and you say it sucks, they say:

Yeah, he gave a 200+ hour game about 2.5 hours and wrote it off. You be the judge.

Come on!

 

[EvoG]

Interestingly, a guy by the username of GamerAndy, who was a part of this media preview blitz, is very frank and forthcoming to all questions TES members are asking him, and he's more or less confirming what the Wired fellow blogged, yet no uproar.

Ah well go figure. Go ahead and read all of his posts(GamerAndy; you can skip the TES member questions as her quotes them), as they're surprisingly honest and interesting.

 

[Zomg]

Thus endeth wide net press invites to game previews. Only get the ones who play ball.

 

[Antiphon]

<snip> I'm hoping that console fanboi rage will be much more interetaining.

EDIT: wow I actually switched words two and a half syllables into typing interesting. I was going to clean it up, but I figured preserving it might help the people in white suits that are diagnosing me in a few years.

ROFLOL! I don't why, but I can't stop laughing. I'm glad you didn't fix it. I assume you started to type "interesting" then switched to "entertaining." Apparently you've invented a new word "interetaing" that is a cross between interesting and entertaining with a hint of constipation.

I'm having one of those "can't stop giggling" moments. Somehow your new word seems so fitting here.

 

[kris]

GamerAndy about being in prison because of stealing:

I kept the lockpicks

!

 

[Rendelius]

Well, I think to get the picture of what to expect from Oblivion it certainly pays to read all the previews and listen to the podcasts out there. The bias of the previewers is averaged then, and you can draw your own conclusions using them as a pretty solid foundation.

What I got from these previews now is that:

I found it interesting that all those previewers had different stories to tell about what they encountered in the gameworld in those four hours. It seems to me that they were chasing off in different directions, and having read what they saw in regards to quests and NPC interaction tells me that you should really be able to have a pretty unique experience when you play the game. So, the freedom that always was part of TES games is still in.

Loading times: Very contradicting reports here. A few found them annoying, a few touched that issue and said that they didn't think it was a problem. A part of the previewers didn't find it worth mentioning. I believe that this issue will be more of a problem on the XBox 360 due to the smaller system memeory.

Graphics: Most of the reviewers found them truly next gen. This is where the game was most hyped, and frankly, I expected more reserved comments on graphics. I think that we still can assume that they are the best so far regarding the series and RPGs in general. Regarding the grass popup - if you have played the SpeedTree demos, this shouldn't come as a surprise. There ARE limits to what GPUs can handle.

The only negative point mentioned in a couple of previews was that distant objects only had low rez textures. Popups: only two previews out of 20 mentioned them, but they seem to be there (but much less than in the pupup-plagued E3 version)

RAI and voice acting: Noone said the voice acting was bad, instead a couple of previewers stated that they were top notch (NGR podcast). What I have learned about NPC behaviour makes me look forward to the game even more - their activities should be credible and making the world less static.

Most people I have talked to who had the chance to play a preview version of the game told me that they think that it will be a beautiful and interesting game, and that they are looking forward to it. I have no reason to believe that they are dumb and don't know what they say .

I hope that when the european press tour starts, I will have the chance to see the game myself. If so, I will report . As a summary, I have to say that the previews, at least to me, sounded overwhelmingly positive. The two more sceptical ones - well, for me the one at gamepro is more credible than the one at the wired blog, this guy didn't get his facts straight (like Oblivion being first person only), so I would take it with a grain of salt.

But generally I have noticed that people tend to pick the lines that reassure them in their existing opinion (yeah, I fall victim to this as well, but at least I know it *g*).

I think in one month we all know for sure if we like it or not .

 

[kris]

Well Rednelius, basically you said the same as so many others. The game is presented well (graphics, voiceacting, NPC mover around), but what about the GAME?

 

[DarkUnderlord]

well, for me the one at gamepro is more credible than the one at the wired blog, this guy didn't get his facts straight (like Oblivion being first person only), so I would take it with a grain of salt.

So when you're in 3rd person mode on the back of a horse it doesn't chug like a bitch? I agree he got his facts wrong (even the 6 vs 16 square miles thing) but I don't think his experience with the graphics (which is the Wired Blog's only complaint) is changed by any of that. How big the world is all depends on whatever number you remember from that press conference where that guy said the world is HUUUUGGEE and 3rd person mode means he couldn't figure out a button on the control pad. Chugging graphics on the X-Box (which should be capable of showing Oblivion in all its glory) isn't a good sign.

Sadly, if drawing beautiful graphics on-screen makes the game chug down to 2 frames per second, it starts to seriously affect gameplay. I have to say that's the only thing I'm concerned about now with Oblivion too. That Bethesda have tried to raise the bar too high. After all, there is a reason Universities still use super-computers to render highly detailed 3d models. The rest of Oblivion sounds like it's Morrowind + 1 though with the quality of the quests disappointingly on about the same par as Morrowind. Quests and how well-written the dialogue are pretty much the only things we still haevn't gotten a lot of information on (beyond the 3 mages guild ones, which sound incredibly lame).

 

[Rendelius]

Well Rednelius, basically you said the same as so many others. The game is presented well (graphics, voiceacting, NPC mover around), but what about the GAME?

No, not really. I am not saying that. My impressions from the previews was that the GAME is fun, and that's why I mentioned the different game stories of the previewers in the first place.

Of course fun with a game is a very subjective thing, and the only way to judge that is if the gameplay mechanics could stand in your way. Look at Gothic, for example. A truly great game, but a lot of people didn't like it because the controls were out of the ordinary.

BTW, one of the best previews I have seen so far is the one at GamerAndy.com - he viewed Oblivion from the standpoint of a stealth loving player. He also mentions the pop ins as something he didn't like, but says that load times didn't really bother him too much. It's a good read, and I will listen to his podcast as well.

 

[Rendelius]

Sadly, if drawing beautiful graphics on-screen makes the game chug down to 2 frames per second, it starts to seriously affect gameplay. I have to say that's the only thing I'm concerned about now with Oblivion too. That Bethesda have tried to raise the bar too high. After all, there is a reason Universities still use super-computers to render highly detailed 3d models. The rest of Oblivion sounds like it's Morrowind + 1 though with the quality of the quests disappointingly on about the same par as Morrowind. Quests and how well-written the dialogue are pretty much the only things we still haevn't gotten a lot of information on (beyond the 3 mages guild ones, which sound incredibly lame).

I would agree, but I would also like to add that framerate issues aren't brought up in the previews at all. They mention a certain stutter once the new cell is loaded, and the most outstanding framerate issue I have heard of was a scene in a harbor, but even then the author stated that the drop in the framerate was far from making the game unplayable in that scene.

What bothers me more is that GamerAndy states the character animantion in 3rd person view looks awful, much worse than the animations of the NPCs (they are said to be high class). Seems like the old sidestep issue is still there :-(

And regarding the quests: I suggest you listen to the NGR podcast, in there he details the quests he has done, and those sound interesting to me, especially like they are woven into the greater picture.

 

[bryce777]

I look forward to the inexplicable wierdo that will come to the Codex, who is obsessively in love with Morrowind yet hates Oblivion with a smouldering insanity. What will his crazy arguments be? Who knows? Stay tuned.

Such a good point. This is one of the most puzzling things that happens here....