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Entirely incorrect. The point of Skinner boxes is that after the initial sometimes full boxes, the box can be always empty and the pidgeon will keep opening them anyway.
The logic is immersion and not being able to randomly move anywhere you want at anytime you want, and it also provide an incentive to find the stronghold index.
There's also the fact to consider that only some settlements (and not even all major ones, there are a few fishing villages with 4 shacks that get fast travel, while medium settlements don't have it) have fast travel in mw, whereas in later games you can teleport to/from the middle of the wilderness. Intervention spells in mw will let you teleport from wilderness, but you may not have them for the first few hours (unless you go to creeper and break the games economy with the stolen platter), and even then you have to decide which spell to use to get to where you want fastest/easiest.
MWs various methods of fast travel adds to the game. Vic can disagree, and that's fine (although it shows him to be a decliner), but claiming they're objectively bad is moronic.
How fucking delusional are you ? It's place on the middle of a closet, so a perfectly normal place for it to be. Would you prefer for it to be put on a pedestal after the boss in a linear dungeon ?
Well Morrowind is like Skyrim in many ways, broken like Skyrim, boring like Skyrim, need tons of mods to be enjoyable like Skyrim, streamlined like Skyrim, whack-a-mole game like Skyrim...
The Skinner box criticism is valid with Oblivion and Skyrim (also Daggerfall!) where loot is levelled and random, but doesn't really apply to Morrowind's handplaced loot. Most of the dungeons are worthless to rummage through, so the average playthrough is far more focused on finishing quests and advancing through factions. The Skinner box only works if the box has a treat each time - in Morrowind, the box is often empty.
All Elder Scrolls and Fallout games from Morrowind upwards follow the same main gameplay loop, hence they also are shit. Loot doesn't have to be random for skinner's box to take effect, because whether loot in a dungeon is random, or it is randomly placed (in weird places) has the same effect on a first playthrough.
No, because you have soul gems, reagents, collectibles, and the OP gear I have been talking about. Also, I don't know about you but even if I have enough gold, I'm not gonna let valuables rot in a dungeon, they're much safer in my house
The logic is immersion and not being able to randomly move anywhere you want at anytime you want, and it also provide an incentive to find the stronghold index.
you can absolutely move randomly whereever you want thanks to Intervention and Mark/Recall. Funny that you should mention the Propylon indexes, as you have to pixel hunt for quite a few of them, and I don't see how a teleport in the middle of the Ashlands in the late game is useful, the aforementioned fast travel spells are plenty, my point is the ease of the fast travel system, not lack thereof. I agree, it's more immersive, but it's also more annoying.
Morrowind (and the elder scrolls series) is a highly popular game with mass appeal, that alone makes it shit as mass appeal directly conflicts with quality.
And imo a large part to its success is the gambling aspect of hooking people in with random loot. The witcher series has at least good writing, take the loot away from morrowind and what do you have? A bunch of broken systems and a shit ton of cliff racers chasing you around the map. Static NPCs with wikipedia style dialogue. The lore and setting are its only strength, but you can only look for so long at giant mushrooms.
I liked Morrowind because it felt like anything could be done in the game world, then I liked it because it was abstruse, strange, fun, broken, and interesting. Now I like it because I can see the good in it post edgelord criticism. I’m grateful I played it when I did, and hope more stuff like it gets created.
I have learned from posting in this thread that it is impossible to have a factual discussion with morrowind fanboys, they see the game through rose tinted glasses and the game has no faults.
1) To learn one has to have the capacity to learn first. I doubt yours and I am going to point out why.
2) In order to have a "factual discussion" you need to use fact. Instead you're trying to push around your OPINION (based on an interpretation of the in-game mechanic) as fact.
3) You have no idea what a fanboy is if you think all people who disagree with your opinion in this thread are fanboys. This is classic "Who is not with me is against me!" mentality. Except people who you claim "see the game throgh rose tinted glasses and the game has no faults" admit the game is... very flawed. So you're not only trying to sell your opinions as fact - you go as far as to straight up make false claims obvious to anyone who is reading the discussion.
Let me repeat myself once again: are you really this stupid or a weak troll?
The main point was my concern that the excessive and hidden loot is used to psychologically manipulate players and get them hooked on gameplay. The response to that was that I should just ignore the loot, even though the game clearly wants you to find all of said loot. [...] The intent of the developers is plain as day, it's the appliction of Skinner's Box to hook teens and young adults into the gameplay loop.
No, it doesn't. You aren't expected to find all the loot or visit every dungeon in the game with a single character. This defeats the point of having the ability to make different characters with different skillsets. Claiming the game was made with the skinner box idea in mind is off by ~20 years. Yes, now everyone is trying to make skinner boxes, because people pay real money for extra packs, but this wasn't the case back then. So, uh, nice try better luck next time?
It doesn't, however, tell you to strip bare any dungeon you come across. There is a difference coming somewhere for a very specific item and having the freedom to loot whatever you want. You can loot houses in the game, you know. But it doesn't mean you HAVE to. It's up to you. You remind me of the people who complain about weight limit but don't stop to think about prioritizing what to take and what to leave behind.
I'm not even going to go into the other broken systems (disposition, taunt (you can kill every NPC with taunt and nobody will give a shit, I killed the Duke of Vvardenfell while his royal guard just stood there), the above discussed lack of use for money (basically only use is training, which is another broken system)).
Hold on, did you say that "morrowind fanboys [...] see the game through rose tinted glasses and the game has no faults"? Yet there are people in this thread, who disagreed with you (making them fanboys, obviously) and they discuss mods to tweak the in-game systems (implying they aren't perfect)?
Many other people have voiced the same criticism that I have, even Bethesda was aware and fixed most of the broken systems in the follow up Elder Scrolls games. Yet, to the fanboys the obvious improvements are decline. (Fast travel with 1 click instead with 5, how is making an action easier for the player and save him time which would otherwise be spent navigating a menue decline? No logic behind the arguments)
Bethesda didn't fix the broken systems. Bethesda straight up removed them. Now you don't have to travel anymore - you teleport. You can, theoretically, walk on foot or ride but why bother when you can just click to be where you have to be? Yes, it is saving time, but it also means you skip all potential exploration and encounters, you also don't navigate the land anymore. This is what Codex calls Decline™.
Why do you think Skyrim has no Levitate or Slow Fall? Because there is no need for them now. As a result mages got weaker, because they offered options non-magical characters didn't have (unless they invested in a proper skill). And that is just the tip of the iceberg. You say how broken Morrowind is? How Skyrim or Oblivion improved upon Morrowind? Watch this guy's quick retrospectives on all Elder Scrolls games and then come back:
Morrowind:
Oblivion:
Skyrim:
I know you won't. Because I know you're here to troll.
Spoiler alert: Oblivion and Skyrim end up being broken even more than Morrowind.
Oblivion and Skyrim have a superior system because you can just click on a map? That's precisely what makes them so inferior. Morrowind's fast travel system is an actual game mechanic that the player needs to engage with. The player needs to learn the Silt Strider and boat routes to travel efficiently (that is, without wasting money) and also needs to learn how those two system interconnect, since some settlements are ONLY able to be travelled to by boat and others by Silt Strider. In addition to that, a big part of Mark and Recall is the decision-making attached to WHERE the player puts their Mark down. Is it their home? Their quest giver? Or is it some other point on the map that allows them to use Divine and Almsivi Intervention to travel around the island in the least possible steps? It's all well and good to stick your Mark down in front of Caius Cosades while you do the first part of the Main Quest, but Balmora is really easy to access by Silt Strider, so you're only saving yourself a small amount of gold and time walking from the strider port. One of the more interesting places to put down a Mark is actually in the Molag Amur region, where Divine Intervention takes you to Sadrith Mora, and Almsivi to Molag Mar. A Divine Intervention from Molag Mar then allows you to chain travel over to Ebonheart.
It's so much more in-depth and interesting than Oblivion and Skyrim's system, that to claim the latter are superior means you actually dislike video games or that you're being deliberately obtuse.
Learn the meaning of the words before you use them. There is plenty of logic in this one post, nevermind other ones.
You keep harping about kids and young people, probably to make yourself look like a wise, experienced old(er) man, but it's you who is presenting the logic of a child in all of your posts ("My opinion is a fact, therefore I am right and everyone else is a fanboy!", "I am saying something, therefore it is the truth, nevermind that I contradict myself or something someone else says!").
Why would you need to take loot away from Morrowind? Should other RPGs take loot away, too?
As for your question - Morrowind has an interesting world to explore. I mean the actual places that are NOT dungeons. Sure going into the wild and exploring dungeons is a big part of Morrowind (or... any RPG), but Morrowind actually gives you this impression of civilization being, you know, civilization by giving you stuff to do in cities and their surrounding areas.
Also, the map is BIG, meaning you have a plenty of places to go to, too. Civilized places (as I mentioned above), but also dungeons and surfice locations with different aesthetic/biomes each. Having an open world on this scale without too many seams was really something back then and it is still impressive today.
Another big thing is classless system and learn-by-doing mechanic. It was a breath of fresh air compared to the classic "get a set amount of XP and then level up a skill of your choice". This tied together with wide application of magic. Some of this was very straightforward (combat), but spells such as Levitate or Water Walking were pure joy to use when traversing the map. Or you could use magic to open locks, instead of being forced to lockpick them. Or to enchant your items by creating custom effects. It was by no means perfect, but it was pretty cool to have these options in the game.
why all morrowind fanboys start their posts with an insult, I've had it at this point it's like arguing with wamen. Why should I bother reading the rest of your "morrowind player trying to explain why their game isn't shit" post when you insult me in the first line.
Just move on, this thread is about why morrowind is a bad RPG if you are not a fanboy why do you feel the need to come to this thread every time and defend it so hard and getting all emotional over my critique of the game. Nobody but the fanboys cares about this tread.
Pro tip: You look like a gay retard when half your post count is complaining about Morrowind fanboys. This isn't r/ElderScrolls, and nobody bends a knee to that shit here.
Hold on, did you say that "morrowind fanboys [...] see the game through rose tinted glasses and the game has no faults"? Yet there are people in this thread, who disagreed with you (making them fanboys, obviously) and they discuss mods to tweak the in-game systems (implying they aren't perfect)?
No, I was more talking about you and Sarathiour who are the fanboys here, leading with insults and providing little in logical arguments, funposter, Jaedar and others acknowledged my criticism, and gave their opinion on things, which I can acknowledge too, they didn't launch into an angry tirade blatantly dismissing all of my criticism and hurling insults.
Other open world action RPGs do it much better than the elder scrolls series because they don't abuse skinner's box to hook players with loot. Gothic and Witcher have hidden loot but it's not excessive like in elder scrolls.
Which is an improvement in some cases. Take the disposition system for example, in Morrowind you can just tip people 10g a few times and they love you, it adds nothing to the game past the early stage. They won't tell you information or won't cooperate on a quest? Just tip them a few times and they come around. Besthesda tried to improve on that in Oblivion, but they course over corrected and came up with that stupid disposition minigame. In Skyrim they decided to remove it completely, which was an improvement over Morrowind's broken, useless disposition system. Same with taunt and the other things I have mentioned multiple times in this thread.
As for your question - Morrowind has an interesting world to explore. I mean the actual places that are NOT dungeons. Sure going into the wild and exploring dungeons is a big part of Morrowind (or... any RPG)
I agree, I had a lot of fun exploring the game, in the early and mid game. But once the powerbloat started to set in dungeons started to become loot pinhatas. which intensified the gambling effect. Additionally, the map is just littered with dungeons and they don't get marked on the overworld like in Skyrim, so whenever you encounter a new dungeon in the wild that is not a kwama egg mine, you feel compelled to run it or risk missing out on potential awesome loot.
All of my best gear comes from a random dungeon that I found while just exploring the map. If I wouldn't have entered that one random dungeon and found Chrysamere or that one underwater grotto near Vivec to find the dragonbone cuirass, I would've missed out on awesome loot. Even though most dungeons do not have anything good in them, and there are just so many dungeons everywhere. This is the very definition of skinner's box and just bad, bad game development practice. Not to mention all the smaller loot hidden in chests and barrels (fargoth's ring anyone?). Unless of course you're fine ignoring all the dungeons and just look at the fauna and flora, but then I wonder what do you do in the game besides playing it like a walking simulator?
Have you played Morrowind recently? Or are you arguing from nostalgia when you played it as a kid and were amazed by the world?
Now you don't have to travel anymore - you teleport. You can, theoretically, walk on foot or ride but why bother when you can just click to be where you have to be? Yes, it is saving time, but it also means you skip all potential exploration and encounters
You are purposefully ignoring and misinterpreting my criticism on most of my points to push your agenda. I told you in my very last post to you that in my opinion morrowind's fast travel system is on par, if not even more extensive than other elder scrolls games, you have Intervention, Mark/Recall, Boats, Siltstriders, Mages Guide, Propylon index, and you can break fast travel even more with alchemy/enchanting. When I talk about saving time, I mean saving time clicking on a map once to fast travel there, and not clicking on a menu 5 times to travel from Balmora to the next city, to then run up to the boat adjacent to the siltstrider and then fast travel again and again to then be at the distination. The time you spend navigating through menues is what is saved.
I said this now probably 3 times in this thread and yet here you are, not even reading, or understanding my criticism and blindly raging. You are the very definition of a fanboy.
I just don't see the skinner box argument. Most of the great loot is directly tied to quests, either as rewards or found inside a related dungeon. Sometimes it's not attached in any way to a quest, but a clue to its location might be found while talking to npcs. Some are in the possession of an npc. And sure, some can be found in random tomb #278. I don't take this to mean I should then swipe the country clean of every cave, tomb or ruin on the off chance I miss something, because I don't believe a game this massive intends for me to see all it has to offer in one playthrough.
If unique loot was randomly placed then you might have a stronger argument. Such as it is, I don't find it to be strong evidence of a skinner box design and more a reflection on how you like to play the game, which is neither wrong nor right, and as such shouldn't be presented as factual of the design ethos of the game.
Yeah, for me I want to see all in one playthrough, except for what is locked out, like the other great houses. If you play Morrowind with a completionist mindset, I think the skinner box argument becomes quite apparent, at least it did to me and I got burned out on the game, still have to finish the DLCs tho. Trying to clear all dungeons becomes really tedious as there are just so many of them and various notes and quest items are placed on the floor, on tables, etc. plus the epic loot ofc that I mentioned, means you have to be really thorough when going through a dungeon.
If unique loot was randomly placed then you might have a stronger argument. Such as it is, I don't find it to be strong evidence of a skinner box design and more a reflection on how you like to play the game, which is neither wrong nor right, and as such shouldn't be presented as factual of the design ethos of the game.
I guess that's true and depends on the playstyle. I was more interested in exploration than the quests so I might have missed the clues to the loot I found. I know there is a mention to the helmet up in Sheogorath, not sure if hearing that rumor spawns the helmet, because I actually cleared that dungeon before hearing the rumour and didn't see the chest, then only after hearing the rumor and talking with the spawned NPCs outside was the chest there for me.
Yeah, for me I want to see all in one playthrough, except for what is locked out, like the other great houses. If you play Morrowind with a completionist mindset, I think the skinner box argument becomes quite apparent, at least it did to me and I got burned out on the game, still have to finish the DLCs tho.
I hate to use "you're playing it wrong" as an argument, but you are clearly and obviously playing the game incorrectly. There's a reason that you pick a CLASS and factions have SKILL RESTRICTIONS. You're supposed to do maybe two or three factions per playthrough in addition to the main quest, based on the character class that you've chosen. Morrowind is built to be replayed. It's not like Oblivion or Skyrim.
Funny and ironic, coming from someone who calls people "blind morrowind fanboys" who are not "intelectually capable" (merely for having a different opinion!). Don't make a Surprised_Pikachu_Face.jpg when you get exactly the response you deserve.
Here is a crazy idea - how about you show same amount of respect that you demand of others? Also, I don't really care if you "bother reading" - either you come here to discuss something or not. The "insults" are only there, because you threw the first stone. If anything, this makes it sound like you lack good arguments to respond, so you're doing a tactical retreat instead.
this thread is about why morrowind is a bad RPG if you are not a fanboy why do you feel the need to come to this thread every time and defend it so hard and getting all emotional over my critique of the game.
1) Is Morrowind a bad RPG though? Especially in the context of Oblivion or Skyrim? Just because the title of this thread is trying to claim that Morrowind is a bad RPG doesn't mean it is true or that one has to agree with that claim.
2) My response is more about you acting like an absolute retard, less about "defending it so hard" (fun fact: I am not even trying all that hard). It is fine to criticize games for their flaws, but one has to be accurate when doing so. Your "critique" boils down to whinning about "blind fanboys", when all people do are sensibly responding to your opinions and having a different take than yours. That's it. People having different opinions than you? IMPOSSIBRU!
Other open world action RPGs do it much better than the elder scrolls series because they don't abuse skinner's box to hook players with loot. Gothic and Witcher have hidden loot but it's not excessive like in elder scrolls.
Uh... So we're talking about "hidden loot" specifically? I thought your complaint was about "checking every corner of every dungeon"? Calling loot "hidden" only because it is lying somewhere in an unexplored dungeon is not what the word implies. In addition, it is not like searching places is hard in Morrowind, barring the actual secret stuff.
That's Creative Assembly's way of doing things. And no, removing something is not improving it - it is removing it. If you want to improve something you change the system or propose an alternative to it.
You do, not I. Which is why I said it is a "you" problem. If you're a gambling addict, then you shouldn't gamble. I am not a gambling addict, nor do I enter the dungeon just for loot. Loot is a nice side bonus to checking out the place out of curiosity.
Even though most dungeons do not have anything good in them, and there are just so many dungeons everywhere. This is the very definition of skinner's box and just bad, bad game development practice.
I will repeat: the world is big, so it stands to reason it has lot of stuff in it. The alternative is making a smaller world or an empty world. The development practice of a skinner's box wasn't around at the time of making of Morrowind. It only arrived relatively recently (and to the extent that even the governments took notice of it).
When I talk about saving time, I mean saving time clicking on a map once to fast travel there, and not clicking on a menu 5 times to travel from Balmora to the next city, to then run up to the boat adjacent to the siltstrider and then fast travel again and again to then be at the distination. The time you spend navigating through menues is what is saved.
Except... you can't fast travel everywhere in Morrowind. In Oblivion and Skyrim you can go to any place on the map you've been, even when it's a complete wasteland. Also, Morrowind makes you - as I said - navigate the world and make use of its systems, which comes from the knowledge. As a result you have to be more conscious when travelling. This makes going into desolate places feel like a journey, especially when you don't know all about Morrowind's travel network.
Yeah, for me I want to see all in one playthrough, except for what is locked out, like the other great houses. If you play Morrowind with a completionist mindset, I think the skinner box argument becomes quite apparent, at least it did to me and I got burned out on the game, still have to finish the DLCs tho.
I hate to use "you're playing it wrong" as an argument, but you are clearly and obviously playing the game incorrectly. There's a reason that you pick a CLASS and factions have SKILL RESTRICTIONS. You're supposed to do maybe two or three factions per playthrough in addition to the main quest, based on the character class that you've chosen. Morrowind is built to be replayed. It's not like Oblivion or Skyrim.
I only did 2 factions, fighters guild and house redoran, but doing the main quest sends you around most of the map, and you encounter a dungeon every few minutes.
So when you play morrowind you just go from point A to point B ignoring what yo encounter along the way? This seems to go pretty much against the design philosophy of an open world game designed to be explored, maybe you're
playing it wrong or you played it so much that you already know where all the loot is.
Funny and ironic, coming from someone who calls people "blind morrowind fanboys" who are not "intelectually capable" (merely for having a different opinion!). Don't make a Surprised_Pikachu_Face.jpg when you get exactly the response you deserve.
Here is a crazy idea - how about you show same amount of respect that you demand of others? Also, I don't really care if you "bother reading" - either you come here to discuss something or not. The "insults" are only there, because you threw the first stone. If anything, this makes it sound like you lack good arguments to respond, so you're doing a tactical retreat instead.
this thread is about why morrowind is a bad RPG if you are not a fanboy why do you feel the need to come to this thread every time and defend it so hard and getting all emotional over my critique of the game.
1) Is Morrowind a bad RPG though? Especially in the context of Oblivion or Skyrim? Just because the title of this thread is trying to claim that Morrowind is a bad RPG doesn't mean it is true or that one has to agree with that claim.
2) My response is more about you acting like an absolute retard, less about "defending it so hard" (fun fact: I am not even trying all that hard). It is fine to criticize games for their flaws, but one has to be accurate when doing so. Your "critique" boils down to whinning about "blind fanboys", when all people do are sensibly responding to your opinions and having a different take than yours. That's it. People having different opinions than you? IMPOSSIBRU!
Other open world action RPGs do it much better than the elder scrolls series because they don't abuse skinner's box to hook players with loot. Gothic and Witcher have hidden loot but it's not excessive like in elder scrolls.
Uh... So we're talking about "hidden loot" specifically? I thought your complaint was about "checking every corner of every dungeon"? Calling loot "hidden" only because it is lying somewhere in an unexplored dungeon is not what the word implies. In addition, it is not like searching places is hard in Morrowind, barring the actual secret stuff.
That's Creative Assembly's way of doing things. And no, removing something is not improving it - it is removing it. If you want to improve something you change the system or propose an alternative to it.
You do, not I. Which is why I said it is a "you" problem. If you're a gambling addict, then you shouldn't gamble. I am not a gambling addict, nor do I enter the dungeon just for loot. Loot is a nice side bonus to checking out the place out of curiosity.
Even though most dungeons do not have anything good in them, and there are just so many dungeons everywhere. This is the very definition of skinner's box and just bad, bad game development practice.
I will repeat: the world is big, so it stands to reason it has lot of stuff in it. The alternative is making a smaller world or an empty world. The development practice of a skinner's box wasn't around at the time of making of Morrowind. It only arrived relatively recently (and to the extent that even the governments took notice of it).
When I talk about saving time, I mean saving time clicking on a map once to fast travel there, and not clicking on a menu 5 times to travel from Balmora to the next city, to then run up to the boat adjacent to the siltstrider and then fast travel again and again to then be at the distination. The time you spend navigating through menues is what is saved.
Except... you can't fast travel everywhere in Morrowind. In Oblivion and Skyrim you can go to any place on the map you've been, even when it's a complete wasteland. Also, Morrowind makes you - as I said - navigate the world and make use of its systems, which comes from the knowledge. As a result you have to be more conscious when travelling. This makes going into desolate places feel like a journey, especially when you don't know all about Morrowind's travel network.
As for your question - Morrowind has an interesting world to explore. I mean the actual places that are NOT dungeons. Sure going into the wild and exploring dungeons is a big part of Morrowind (or... any RPG)
I've actually played Oblivion twice before playing Skyrim. I've played vanilla Skyrim the day it was released, binge played it in fact since I was sick. Afterwards I've played heavily modded Skyrim two more times which made me question how did I play vanilla Skyrim in the first place since it's mind numbingly shallow and brain dead. I've blamed it on me being 19 year old and not having a fully developed brain yet. Then I've played Morrowind for the first time ever in 2014, lightly modded (mostly graphics, balance and minor QoL changes), and I enjoyed it far more than both Oblivion and Skyrim. Mostly because of the dungeon exploration, the RPG elements, the spellmaking and itemization (at least Oblivion still has some of these). The world/towns are also objectively better than Oblivion and Skyrim. It also made me realize that no matter how much I try to fix Skyrim through mods, it will never be a successful venture.
What I'm wondering though is why are you even trying to make this argument, when you're probably going to dismiss examples like me as people lying to you in order to prove a point, which you will predictably do.
What I'm wondering though is why are you even trying to make this argument, when you're probably going to dismiss examples like me as people lying to you in order to prove a point, which you will predictably do.
That's why I haven't bothered to make any specific argument in regards to the game or refute anything being said, I'm just making fun of hypocritical utterances and weird schizo statements.
