Elderscrolls: OBLIVION ... my new addiction

[GUNWOUNDS]

Unbelievable!... the game is fantastic.... the physics are astounding, the Radiant AI is amazing, the graphics are fabulous, and overall the game is phenomenal.   Its was what everyone wished Morrowind would have been.

Definately an instant classic and a must-have for any serious gamer's collection (especially if you love fantasy).  Yes i know i have an SLI system, and yes i know that it will not run on many people's computers... but trust me... if any game was worth upgrading for it is this one

The AI is fantastic... Archers working together with foot soldiers, recoil from hard hits, disarming moves, stealth attacks... its got everything.

Guns

[Timenn]

It is indeed great. I have been playing for the game for some days now.

Unless you have the latest technologies, you will probably have to play it on medium settings, but that still looks very good.

And the Planes of Oblivion... you really have to see for yourself...

[Mihail]

It really is great. I'm a level 2 Imperial male Bard born under the sign of the Warrior, and am currently in the Fighters Guild, the Thieves Guild, and the Dark Brotherhood. Don't read on unless you want to see a few minor spoilers for the Dark Brotherhood. Not enough to spoil everything, but I'm just giving you a choice. ;)[hide]I'm on Ocheeva's first contract, right after you finish taking contracts for the vampire. I got him to turn me into one, too. I have to kill some Elf named Faelian, and I have to do a bit of detective work to find him. It really is fun. :)[/hide] I haven't even thought of doing the main quest, there's so much to explore and do! What makes me a sad monkey, though, is the fact that when going into another large area(Such as from a house into Chorrol) the loading can take up to several minutes! And sometimes that game lags pretty bad.  :-[ And I don't have the money to upgrade my processor or video card. I've got the resolution set a lowest. :P And I've got a Geforce 6600. Does anyone have any tips on how I can get it to speed up? I don't care about the graphics, it's the quests and gameplay that interest me.  :) What level are you guys and where are you now, in the game?

[Dragoon Knight]

Will tell later.  Busy playing Oblivion. :P

[Nuvollari]

Good game but i like WoW better.

[Timenn]

I play a Breton, and my favorite weapons are a Bow and a Blade. Combine this with a good alchemy kill (poisons) and a Restoration skill and you are really powerful.

I only began on some major quest lines (main quest, guilds) but I have visited Oblivion 4 times now.

I found the game's loading times to be incredible fast, e.g. it takes me only half a minute from desktop to ingame.

I took some time tuning the game to an optimal performance/quality rate, but I think I'm there.

Some tips:

- You have an nvidia card, they have released a Beta driver which appears to optimize Oblivion. I recommend to download and install it, it improves performance.

www.nvidia.com/object/nzone_downloads_winxp_2k_32bit_84.25.html

- The big performance drains seem to be:

* Resolution, lower is better performance

* Anti-aliasing, setting that off means better performance

* Shadows, try switching alot of options concerning shadows off (especially the shadows on grass option) basic shadows seem to be doing ok with me.

* View Distance, sliding the bar one bit to the left disables the huge view distance but increases performance. I recommend changing this option last, the view distance is one of the best graphical aspects of Oblivion.

I noticed that such things as tree and grass distance barely affect your performance.

[Jack Leaf]

Good game but i like WoW better.

Oh seriously, are you telling us that you buy every new game just to say "WoW is way more better"? I can understand if you like the game, but there's no need to crusade about it in every single gaming thread.

--

I myself haven't tried Oblivion yet, but I think I soon will. I hope it doesn't turn out to be as bad as Moronwind.

[Mihail]

I play a Breton, and my favorite weapons are a Bow and a Blade. Combine this with a good alchemy kill (poisons) and a Restoration skill and you are really powerful.

I only began on some major quest lines (main quest, guilds) but I have visited Oblivion 4 times now.

I found the game's loading times to be incredible fast, e.g. it takes me only half a minute from desktop to ingame.

I took some time tuning the game to an optimal performance/quality rate, but I think I'm there.

Some tips:

- You have an nvidia card, they have released a Beta driver which appears to optimize Oblivion. I recommend to download and install it, it improves performance.

www.nvidia.com/object/nzone_downloads_winxp_2k_32bit_84.25.html

- The big performance drains seem to be:

* Resolution, lower is better performance

* Anti-aliasing, setting that off means better performance

* Shadows, try switching alot of options concerning shadows off (especially the shadows on grass option) basic shadows seem to be doing ok with me.

* View Distance, sliding the bar one bit to the left disables the huge view distance but increases performance. I recommend changing this option last, the view distance is one of the best graphical aspects of Oblivion.

I noticed that such things as tree and grass distance barely affect your performance.

Thank you, Timenn! Everything runs much more smoothly now. :)

[Megashrap]

Good game but i like WoW better.

Damn, stop with the "WoW" rules all. WoW is like minesweeper compared to these up-coming games.

[Davidu]

engine works, sound works, phisics work, TEXTURES DON'T WORK!!!  :'(

[Dante]

Settings maxed, game looks beautiful. And load times are rarely longer than two seconds. My god I love saying that. Load times are rarely longer than two seconds and I've got the settings maxed out! Mwa ha ha ha! In fact most of the time the load time is instantaneous.

Playing a dunmer, custom class. Mage-based, specialising in Destruction. I was going to balance it out with Mercantile, Blade and possibly Light armour, but I heard that you had to be very talented in all the magic skills to get into the Mage's Guild (turned out that was a lie). So instead I took on the skills that I usually forget about, namely Illusion, Alchemy and Restoration. I'm glad I've got them, and not including Conjuration was a mistake that I am rectifying now, but I'm now playing a character that is a bit too fragile for my liking. Will see what I can do about that prior to snapping shut a few more gates. Seems I can't turn around without finding another one these days.

[erjin999]

You guys wanna shout out some specs for computers you are running this on, like Dante for one, who seems to be doing fine with speed and gun, but guns has already mentioned his setup in another thread.

[Eihwaz]

Yes.. I started this game yesterday at my friend's house. I could only play it for a little while since I had to go home, but what I have seen so far of it was really awesome. Graphics are sweet, and I love being able to sneak around effectively. I plan on joining the good ol' Thieves guild as I did in Morrowind. The customization was pretty cool too. I am a Nord :D

[Megashrap]

Settings maxed, game looks beautiful. And load times are rarely longer than two seconds. My god I love saying that. Load times are rarely longer than two seconds and I've got the settings maxed out! Mwa ha ha ha! In fact most of the time the load time is instantaneous.

Dante, what are your PC specs?

[Mihail]

Dante, what are your PC specs?

He told me he ordered a new computer so he could play Oblivion. I think he had a Geforce 7700 video card, didn't you, Dante? I'm running it on a Geforce 6600(128 mb), 512 mb RAM, AMD Athlon 64 processor, 1.8 GHz.

Unfrotunately, this requires me to turn all settings down to low for it to run smoothly.  :-

[GUNWOUNDS]

I am running a dual 7800GTX SLI setup with 2gb of dual channel OCZ ram, and a +4000 939 socket amd processor.

This allows me to run Oblivion in 1600 x 1200 resolution with everything maxxed out, as well as activate 4x anisotrophic filtering and my cards have shader 3.0 so i can enable HDR in the oblivion options menu (replaces 4 x Alias)... which is high definition rendering which makes the lighting and textures seem ultra-realistic.  The sunlight looks like real sunlight and the reflection on my platemail looks like real-life steel.  I never thought i would be more blown away than when i was playing doom 3 or HL2... but oblivion makes both of those games seem like something from atari.

However if you are asking what is the minimum req for playing state of the art games nowadays i would say 1 gb of 3200 DDR ram with a AMD +3000 or higher, and a Nvidia 6800 (or Ati equivalent)

Guns

[Nuvollari]

LOLLLLL imo the minimum requirements is a P4 2.8 512 ram and a 6600 GT...

[Khan]

Still nukes me out of the water. I have kick ass ram though....

[GUNWOUNDS]

LOLLLLL imo the minimum requirements is a P4 2.8 512 ram and a 6600 GT...

Sorry but  512 ram doesnt cut it.... benchmark tests have proven that 1 gb is mandatory with 2gb being better in some cases ( and for god sake ram is cheap).  Shoot, winxp uses 256 mb RAM all by itself... so that would mean that you are only allocating 256 ram for your games.... what a joke.

Secondly the 2.8 is stretching it.. i would prefer to to have a 3.0 or higher or an AMD of +3000 or higher and the cost is only like 10-20 Bucks more.

And last of all... the 6600 just doesnt cut it... Many BF2 sites actually recommends a 6800 or 7800.  The 6600 is stretching it.... its toned down too much.  6600 is considered "budget" to where they start pulling out pipelines and stuff which greatly reduces performance.  You can definately play with a 6600 but you wont be able to start maxxing stuff out, or be able to play in higher resolutions, or have long draw distances, until you get to 6800 levels.

Some prices are :

CPU = $121.00 http://www.pricewatch.com/cpu/112969-1.htm

RAM = $76.50  http://www.ms4me.com/covase1gbkit.html

Graphics Card = $225.0  http://www.pricewatch.com/video_cards/169175-1.htm

SO you are looking at around $422 dollars to have the core basics for advanced gaming (assuming you have mobo and case).  Cheap !

Guns

[gunner154]

I am NOT touching this game anytime soon. Battlefield 2 doesn't give me a decent FPS on Low settings presently, and with a low budget, ah...

And screw WoW, please.

[Dante]

3Ghz Dual Core Processor (effectively 6Ghz)

2Gb RAM

2x GeForce 7800 GTX Graphics cards.

I forget about other things. Game is still goregous though. Bought myself a house in Skingrad. Nice town.

[Cyborg]

I bought the game some time ago. It's really nice.

I'm a vampire now. Eugh, that sunlight burns...

[Mihail]

Dante, it wouldn't have any to do with the Count of Skingrad being a [hide]vampire[/hide], would it? ;) Oh, what level are you? And about where are you in the main quest? I just shut the Oblivion gate near Bravil, where you have to get the other towns to send help to Bruma. By the way, are you doing any of the Guild quests? I completed the Dark Brotherhood ones and am now doing the Thieves Guild Missions.

I love exploring Ayleid ruins. So beatiful, not to mention you can make a pretty penny scavenging the(I've got about 6000 gold at the moment). Caves - meh. I don't like zombies and trolls and goblins and rats. Filthy plague carrying vermin. :P

To everyone: What is your main weapon that you're using? I currently have a Glass Shortsword, stolen(Of course:P) from the Mages Guild leader in some town...

Oh, and a note of caution: Don't become vampires. It isn't a good idea. Oh, sure, you can bite people's necks, but if you stay out in they daytime for 30 seconds, you're dead. Thankfully, I got a cure for it. But if you've been expelled from the Mages Guild for some reason or the other, tough luck  :P

Damn, I love this game! I think I'm going to go do some of those Daedra Lord Shrine quests now. :)

EDIT:Op! Cyborg beat me to it. So don't become vampires, kids, if you know what's good for you. :P

[Dante]

Feed regularly and vampirism isn't a problem. I go out in sunlight all the time.

[GUNWOUNDS]

3Ghz Dual Core Processor (effectively 6Ghz)

2Gb RAM

2x GeForce 7800 GTX Graphics cards.

I forget about other things. Game is still goregous though. Bought myself a house in Skingrad. Nice town.

Dante you're running SLI too? .. sweeet.  Then that means you're seeing what i'm seeing... and if you're seeing what i'm seeing then i know your happy  ;D

Btw....To all you BF2 guys out there.... It'll be awhile before i come back to BF.... because I am so addicted to this game.... i havent tried to close any oblivion gates yet... i have been dungeon crawling, leveling, making potions, and fighting in the gladiator arena tourny.  Also i have the difficulty slider maxxed out...  makes for one wicked and satisfying experience.  I have to use every tactic (poison on my sword, invisibility, stealth strikes, skillful blocks, etc) available to me to get past everything i encounter.... i plan on savoring this game for awhile... the main quest will be the last thing i finish... I'll probably do it half way but with elderscrolls i like to finish all the side stuff first before completing the end quest.  Keeps the suspense going.