This is my first Bethesda game.
I'm reading a lot here, compairing it to Bethesda's Oblivion, and I'm wondering if I'm missing out not having played it.

Graphics as good? I haven't checked but after work I will.

off to the oblivion section then

and google some screenshots

Yes, Oblivion is totally worth a try.

Definitly. Its a bit more complex than Skyrim, but not by much, really. Graphics are good as well, and a lot more vibrant and colorful. Quests are more unique and fun in Oblivion imo. The world itself isn't as interesting as Skyrims but it is still worth playing.

Skyrim was my first Elder Scrolls game as well, and your experience is in no way affected by not having played Oblivion
However, I'd highly recommend you do. I've bought it, and it's a fantastic game, definitely worth a try. The graphics aren't AS good, but they're still quite good.

graphics are ok but nothing compared to skyrim...oblivion is worth a play if you really like this style of game but its always hard to go backwards. I tried to play morrowind after playing oblivion and thought wow the gameplay and graphics svck so i couldnt get into it

I think Oblivion is well worth playing. Graphics are the least interesting part of video games for me (so I may not be a good person to answer this) but I'd say Oblivion's graphics are on a par with Skyrim.

Oblivion has a few features that Skyrim doesn't have, and vice versa. Here is a web page listing some of the differences: http://www.uesp.net/wiki/General:Differences_Between_Morrowind,_Oblivion,_and_Skyrim

Each game is a separate adventure, you're not missing out on anything related to they story in this game.
Though the overall history and lore is worth playing Oblivion and possibly Morrowind too, depending on how far back you want to reach.

graphics dont got [censored] to do with a good game, and btw Morrowind was a great game that you should check out too

Actually, they do. Some people - such as myself - cant play games with graphics below a certain standard - this is part of the reason I won't download Arena. I'm fine with Oblivion's graphics, but graphics in a game such as Arena make it ery hard for me to enjoy the game and roleplay. Just a personal opinion.

The leap between Oblivion and Skyrim wasn't as big as between Morrowind and Oblivion (and Daggerfall and Morrowind).

I had trouble going back to Morrowind after Oblivion, but I can still play Oblivion after Skyrim. Still a great game. If you LOVE that game, as well, you should try Morrowind as well.

I don't agree that Oblivion is "more complex" than Skyrim. I don't find it to be so, anyway. But it works a bit differently. There are attributes, and different skills. It has things Skyrim doesn't have, for instance all characters have different disposition towards you, depending on which factions you're a part off (sounds cooler than it actually is, as changing one's disposition is really easy, same in Morrowind) and Spellcrafting. But it doesn't have smithing or enchanting in the same way as in Skyrim, even though they "exist" but in extremely limited form.

Oblivion has a somewhat living world, as well, but you won't find many "Random Encounters" outside the city. There's the occasional scripted thief, but they're always at the same spot.

But the world itself is great. I love the Imperial City, which beats anything Skyrim has to offer. It's a great city for sneaky characters as well, considering there's a vast sewage system running along the city for thiefs and assassins to use to get to-and-fro.

Morrowind is even older, and has a beautiful world and is hella fun to explore. But it's got extremely dated gameplay mechanics. Sneaking is useless, and spellcasting isn't so great either. But if you like exploring, give it a try.

Yes, play Morrowind and Oblivion if you can. Daggerfall is a great game it's worth playing too.

Skyrim is a complete opposite game from anything in the TES series, Oblivion included. The difference are so much that it doesn't matter if you played previous TES games, nothing learned there would help you with Skyrim.

Saying all that, if you want to know what a REAL RPG is I would suggest you play Daggerfall and Morrowind. If you truly like RPG's, you enjoy those.

The OP was not asking about Rpg ...his first concern i think its about graphic from what i read..suggest to him Daggerfall would be like suggest to a vegetarian to eat meat

apart from joke Gary_P i think you've to specify what you like more about a game other than graphics; and doin' a search on the net and the Oblivion forum first would help too -like someone else have already said.

In my opinion Oblivion was a masterpiece,complementary to Skyrim and even to Morrowind of which its was supposed to be the "improvement" (like Skyrim its supposed to be towards Oblivion) each of the games have his strenghts and weakness.

in fact the improvement is evident only in gameplay (debatable even this for someone) graphics and world design after all - so if you like this aspects playin' Oblivion and Morrowind after Skyrim could be a disappointment perhaps.

p.s. I suggest you to play even Shivering Isles,the expansion of Oblivion.

I'm an edge case, I played Daggerfall and Skyrim more than Morrowind and Skyrim. They're all good, but I was late to the party on Morrowind, and never got into Oblivion. Daggerfall was before my time, but when it went free I couldn't resist installing it on my laptop and playing it on the go. Oblivion's graphics are quite a step backward from Skyrim, so if that's important to you I'd advise skipping it.

I think oblivion is better than skyrim.

For me, Oblivion is a better game.

- Better character development
- Much better factions
- Less hand-holding
- Much more charm in general (little things like the UI make a big difference to me)


There's really not a lot Skyrim does better besides graphics, animations, etc. Dungeons are slightly better I guess, though still far too linear.

In terms of the main questline, i'd say both games aren't particularly great... though i'd lean towards Oblivion as personally, I really liked the idea of someone else being the chosen one (Martin Septim) instead of my character. I think that's a much better approach for a game where the player is given so much freedom over who their character is.


Dragons and Oblivion gates are equally tedious, overhyped, and disappointing.

I am actually hopelessly lost in a Daggerfall dungeon at the moment, don't get that these days. Anyway, yes try Oblivion, the graphics are fine for romping around in a brightly coloured fairy tale world, only real problems are the ubiquitous scaling, and the odd attribute levelling, which makes a mockery of any non-custom class.

Graphically, the order is (on Xbox/Xbox360):
1) Skyrim
2) Oblivion
3) Morrowind
(cannot comment on anything prior to MW - never played)

However, this should be a natural progression. If there is a 2+ gap bewtween games in a series, you should see graphic improvements from game to game barring playstyle changes. See Halo, Mass Effect, etc for examples.

As far as story goes, I do not believe it's necessary to play Oblivion to understand the story in Skyrim. I cannot think of any specific example within Skyrim where you need to know what happened in DF, MW, or O. You may miss out on some inside jokes, but nothing in the Quests requires or is enhanced by previous game knowledge. Most of what makes Tamriel interesting can be read about in the various books throughout the game. That being said, definitely play Oblivion when you get a chance. It was very enjoyable game. And definitely make sure to get the Shivering Isles DLC. Personally I cannot recommend MW. I played it on the original Xbox and just could never get into the game. Either it was a bad port to the Xbox, or I was running into bugs, but I just could not enjoy the game. Strange though, when the 360 came out, I immediately bought Oblivion for it and thoroughly enjoyed playing it despite some initial game ending bugs (which were eventually fixed). Now that I am playing on a PC, I may go back and try MW again on the PC and see what happens.

Definitely worth getting. The factions are amazing in Oblivion. In Skyrim, they were merely short side-quests. In Oblivion, they actual feel like factions.

I warn you, if you play oblivion then fighting dragons will seem like crap in comparison to closing gates, serving astrid will be maddening compared to serving Lucien Lachance, and the nightingales will seem like amateurs in comparison to the Gray Fox...

He he, was mainly a dungeon crawler back in the Oblivion days so all i can say is that the dungeons
after some lvl's get's pretty static and very, very boring. I would recommend doing the thieves
and dark brotherhood guild questline. Was my favorite (and only if i remember right) factions i tried in that game.

in all fairness i love oblivion and skyrim. also morrowind, havent played the others... heres MY points to whats good about each obviously not everyone shares the same views...

oblivions main quest for me was better.
quests in general were better.
more magic.
spell creation.
more variety in enemys.
factions.

skyrim better graphics.
better animations.
better armor design.
races look better.
dungeons better designed.
werewolves (although could do with improvement, so could vampires but thats both games)...
level scaling improved.
perks are better than the way oblivion leveled up.

my only 2 downsides what i hated with ob was
1. levelscalin after around level 20 it got stupid bandits n all sorts were running round in full daedric gear etc. i hated it.

2. vampires. i loved playin a vampire i created a character to be the ultimate vampie in cyrodil. spent about a hour in character creation gettin him spot on. ventured out got vampireism then aged about 50 years n my character looked [censored].

Totally agree about Vamps looking terrible in OB, but in Sky they look awesome

Yeah they do. There are some games that I used to play for hundreds of hours (San Andreas) that I couldn't get into when I tried recently because I just couldn't go back to those graphics.