God dammit, guys! Now I wanna play Oblivion again.

You have to give Oblivion credit for one thing: it's the only recent open-world RPG that really lets you customize your character.

In Gothic and Two Worlds, you can't even play as a girl!

As someone who is very neutral in the whole " OBLIVION SUCKS NO IT DOESN'T " debate...I'm looking forward to at least trying Skyrim. For the record, I've played the Gothic series (I+II, III w/community patch + Risen ), Witcher 1/2 , Two Worlds, Fallout 3 and...uh, Dragon Age Origins.

I got a copy of Oblivion when it first came out and was lucky to have a top-of-the-line gaming rig to run it on. I thought the graphics were pretty mind blowing ( the view when you first came out of the sewers/dungeons/whatever it was, anyone?) and the create your own character was fun. I liked being able to travel everywhere and explore... and I liked being able to go into houses and attempt to steal stuff. I think I spent more time running around being chased by guards and exploring the world while experiencing the changing weather than anything else. Oh, the soundtrack was awesome too.

How far did I actually get into the game? Well - I closed a few gates, got bored of the somewhat repetitive game-play and moved onto something else.

Four years later - I'm more than happy to give Skyrim a spin.

I used to love Oblivion, then I played Morrowind and hated Oblivion. I wish more companies made open-world games. Not just like GTA or super hero games where you can run around the city, but and actual world that you can meet people with character and watch their lives. Bethesda needs some competition, maybe then they'll step up their game.

Yeah the Elder Scrolls games are the only open world games that ever really made me feel like I was in this huge open world.

That's a shame about the steam hate. Magicka really is a good game single player, and becomes hysterical in multi.

I don't like oblivion because it is the latest installment in the series. Will refocus my hate once skyrim comes out.

I have to say, I still don't see why everyone loves Morrowind so much. I've kept on trying to play it, but every time I have to stop because it just fails. I never feel immersed, I don't find any reason to explore, because everything is so brown and ugly that I get no enjoyment from the exploration. I hate the combat, which is affected by the skill system, so I always feel constrained by what the first magic weapon I find is (a sword), since that's the only weapon that can hit the ghosts in the tomb just outside the starting town that early in the game.

Nice pictures.

you could also, goh, dnno, skip the first tomb and come back later. Open world & all.

I love this seriaes but have to be honest.Oblivion was not as good as Morrowind.Hope that Skyrim will be better.Looks nice,but we'll see about gameplay

Morrowind = fantastic, Oblivion = awful.

But...

This E3 gameplay footage of Skyrim intrigues me somewhat.

Any official word on PCs being able to become werewolves or vamps yet? About hand-to-hand combat?

I'll be more than happy to love Steam when they drop the DRM part of it.

I could, but it's there, and the tombs are the only interesting things I can find.

imo, skyrim looks slightly better than nicelly moded oblivion. And i can asure you, that nicely moded oblivion can eat a lot of pc recources..