Oblivion still has plenty of life (if only because of its fantastic modding community). Its attraction is not so much the vanilla quests, but the opportunity it presents for free-form roleplaying; and through the overhauls available (some professional-quality), gameplay can be custom-tailored to anyone's whim. The story can be anything you want it to be--about all that's required from the player is imagination. Sadly enough, too few recent games measure up to that; NWN2 being the only one that has managed to lure me away for a time.

 

Fighter's stronghold is a decent plug-in, something Bethesda had worked up but had never released. As is, it's better than Frostcrag Spire but not as good at Knights of the Nine. But it's still more of the same--a little boring--and I think Beth knew that. IMO, it's a gift to the modders, to see what could be made of it.

That seems to be a developing trend in gaming. It takes the talents of modders to breathe life into otherwise mediocre games. If it was not for modders there would have been no NWN2 because NWN1 by itself (without SoU or HoTU and all that came after) was pretty bad. Vanilla Oblivion is pretty meh, but throw in a few of the top mods (like Oscuros) and you have a really good game. I wont even mention a certain Star Wars game we all know about that is seriously depending on a mod team to secure it a better place in gaming history.

 

I guess that's just what it's come to.

The only thing "developing" about this is that modding is easier. Crappy games have been around forever and if people could have modded many of the ones in the past into something good, they likely would have.

Edited October 26, 200718 yr by Tale

The only thing "developing" about this is that modding is easier. Crappy games have been around forever and if people could have modded many of the ones in the past into something good, they likely would have.

True enough but I can think of one exception. Mater of Orion 3. All the mods that were made did nothing to improve a game that one poster said was "more difficult than doing your taxes, and less fun to boot". I guess you just can't polish a turd.

The plug-in is now $1.89, so this topic should be closed...

The plug-in is now $1.89, so this topic should be closed...

 

I concur with my learned friend.