You begin Oblivion incarcerated in a tiny cell in the Imperial City prison. What exactly were you guilty of? Pickpocketing? Bewitching merchants to get a discount? Disturbing public order by obsessively casting Bound Dagger in town in order to raise your Conjuration stat? No one seems to know and, oddly, no one seems to care.

The taunts of a fellow prisoner still ringing in your ears, you take stock of your situation. A thin mat on a hard stone bed. A jug and a cup, neither of which contains any Lipton Yellow Label. A battered stool and a small table. Some bones to remind you of your bleak future.

Ah, but what’s this? Three guards and an old man enter the cell. Wait, these are no mere prison guards; they’re Blades, members of that ancient and secretive order of knights sworn to protect … that old man … by the divines, is that the Emperor himself?
Continued…

Oblivion, like Morrowind before it, has a great modding community dedicated to altering and improving the game experience in a variety of ways. There are a great many mods to choose from. In fact, there might be too many. There’s more than one Oblivion mod specifically created to organise mods and there’s even an unofficial patch for the unofficial patch — yes, mods for mods — all of which must be carefully installed in a very specific manner to avoid sundering the ancient barriers between our world and the eldritch planes, resulting in a demonic invasion that will see the end of mankind, or more horrifically, game progress being lost in a crash to the desktop.

I was content playing the vanilla game for my first playthrough. Contrary to histrionic claims Oblivion was broken and needed mods to be functional, the game is actually perfectly playable without them. I finished the main storyline without any user-created content and was mostly satisfied with the experience. There are a couple of things the new player should be made aware of, however.
Continued…

Though Oblivion‘s general dreariness and drudgery may not promise it, there are stirring moments to be found in the game, something that may come as a shock to those so benumbed by their first few hours in the land of Cyrodiil that they gave up.

One of these moments sees the player accompanying a man as he walks through the town of Bruma past townsfolk chanting his name. The man was once unconvinced he was worthy of such adulation but comports himself now in a manner befitting his heroic bloodline. Once a priest seemingly more comfortable with books, he is now clad in the resplendent Imperial Dragon armour that is his birthright. Once a quiet and unassuming man, he now strides forward with the conviction to do what is required of him.

He leads the defense of a town that will soon be besieged, having seen firsthand the devastation his terrifying opponents have wrought elsewhere. No longer plagued with uncertainties, he stands before the pitifully few defenders assembled before him and his voice rings out loud and clear.

“Soldiers of Cyrodiil, the Empire will stand or fall by what we do here today. Will we let the Daedra do to Bruma what they did to Kvatch? Will we let them burn our homes, will we let them kill our families? No, we make our stand here today for the whole of Cyrodiil. We must hold fast until the Hero of Kvatch can destroy their great gate. We must kill whatever comes out of that gate. Soldiers of Cyrodiil, do you stand with me?”

As he makes his stand, the player must rush into that great gate to retrieve the key to victory before all is lost. It is a desperate race against time underneath a fiery red sky in a dread plane infested with demons. As the sands of the hourglass fall, so do the defenders on the other side of the gate. Some are familiar names, valiant warriors who have fought by the player’s side. Now, with their very lives, they will buy 13 precious minutes to save Bruma and Cyrodiil itself, trusting in the leadership of a man they barely know.

That is not his finest moment. That will come much later and the player will once again bear witness to it. It is the moment when even the divine acknowledge to all that this mortal is indeed worthy of the power and responsibility bestowed upon him, as it was bestowed upon his father and his forefathers before him. It is the moment for which he will be proclaimed the greatest of them all.

Moments like those inspire a wide grin, a raised clenched fist and a “Hell, yeah!” Unfortunately, Oblivion has far too few of these and they are found only as the main storyline moves towards conclusion. If there were one or two of these rousing moments in the first few hours of the game then perhaps the doubtful player could have been assured the game was indeed worthy of the time investment. As it stands, those moments will only be the rightful rewards for those who persevered.

Nine months after I purchased the game, after 122 saves and 50 hours of play time, I finally completed Oblivion‘s main storyline. This marks the first time I’ve actually completed the main quest of an Elder Scrolls game, having tried several times and failed with both Daggerfall and Morrowind.

There’s no denying Bethesda crafts expansive game worlds filled with extraordinary possibilities but playing its games can be very tedious. These games are not renowned for their great charm and vibrancy. Escape the drudgery of day-to-day existence to a fantasy world with more drudgery is the Bethesda philosophy.

The initial excitement over Oblivion’s game space possibilities wears off quickly once you’re mired in the mundane. It’s standing in the middle of town repeatedly casting the same spell to improve abilities, getting sucked into the office politics of guilds, running errands to make some coin, going here, killing this, going there, fetching that, engaging in leaden conversations with the unremittingly dull.

Finding all this wearisome and having completely lost my interest, I set the game aside a few weeks after getting it, resigned that this was another failed attempt at appreciating the Bethesda experience.

Months later, I returned. This time I changed my approach. No longer desperately looking for characters or storylines I could care about, I was simply content to experience life in Cyrodiil, exploring the game world and experimenting with the outstanding item and spell customisation options to vary my play style.

This time I stayed and I’m very glad I stuck with it because Oblivion’s main quest finished strongly. Remarkably, I found myself cheering on one of the characters — a first for me in a Bethesda game — and even more remarkably, I’m still playing the game after completing the main quest.
Continued…