The box version came with a glossy fold out map. I just took a look at the thing and started walking. IIRC dungeon doors will show up on the map as little squares.
Part of the joy in MOrrowind was traveling and exploring everywhere and discovering little things.
I believe that on the “zoomed in map” you would be able to see points of interest if you were close enough… and perhaps also on the big one.
The good thing about the morrowind map was that it uncovered the detailed landscape as you traveled there… which helped if you wanted to, like in my case, explore – everywhere --.
Which also explains why I haven’t gotten far on the quest in the game despite having spend hundreds of hours in the game.
When you open the in-game menus, note the little square button in the frame of each window. If you click it, the window will stay visible after you exit the menus. Which means you can re-size your map window to more useful dimensions, and “pin” it - instantly giving you one of the best auto-maps you’ll have ever seen.
Using “distant lands” can make it a very great deal easier to spot stuff. Too much so, even.
Most of the less obvious points of interest have quests associated with them, and many have unique items and encounters. Which means it is very, very easy to invalidate/remove/fail quests in Morrowind, and there’s an even better chase you’ll only become aware of it if you replay the game.
Morrowind, entirely unlike the later games, is very good about giving directions to quest locations. So if you talk to everyone and read everything, you’ll end up with directions to most points of interest. And the rest tends to be very large and hard to miss.
Note that I strongly recommend the LGNPC mods, because most vanilla NPC dialogue feels pretty much like hitting “random page” in a wiki until you’ve seen all the topics. The most notable difference is that vanilla Morrowind dialogue is generally even less interesting than random wiki pages in a language you can’t understand.
Yeah this is one of the aspects you will find very different from the later TES games. No more following the arrow on your HUD.
The detail in your journal makes up for this, as in most cases (but not all), you get a near perfect description of where to look for your required quest point/location etc.
As Incendiary Lemon points out you can use the paper map to help in your game navigation. It also will make you good at real map reading to some small extent as you have to do the basics of orientating your paper map with your game world heading etc. Overall it’s a lot more immersive an experience of navigation than using the ‘sat-nav’ like approach of Oblivion and Skyrim, and as with real life the more you practice it the better at it you get. That is if your not only interested in just rushing from enemy to enemy to play whack-a-mole with.
For those occasions where you really are struggling to find target X, use the in game journal to filter for specific names, names of a person or place etc. That can bring up additional dialogues that might help you. Sometimes you will find no obvious help and your best effort gets you to a certain location on the map, and then you simply have to explore every nook and cranny to find the elusive target/entrance etc.
This can be fun and frustrating all at the same time, but once you have a good handle on the basic navigation method (use the paper map and the in game map together) these rare moments become a fun challenge of your skill and observation.
Just wanted to say thanks. I reinstalled Morrowind GotY ed. (with Tribunal and Bloodmoon) and some of the mods listed here. It is truly an improved experience in an already epic, Hall of Fame caliber game. I would wager some of you who had issues with the vanilla game when it was newer would be over to mod out some of your problem spots to the point where you could really enjoy it now.
This is the Morrowind Mod list that I use, based on some list I read somewhere a while ago. Not the latest and greatest in everything, but I love it as a “base” installation:
1-mge3.8.0b.7z
2-Morrowind_Patch_v1.6.4.zip
3-Morrowind_Code_Patch-19510-2-0.zip
4-mvp30rc1.rar
5-Texture_Fix_1.8.7z
6-Texture_Fix__Bloodmoon_1.1.7z
7-Bloodmoon_Landscape_Overhaul_1.0.7z
8-TR_Map2_AntediluvianSecrets.7z
9-TR_CensusAndExciseTravel-21156.zip
10-better_bodies_v2.2.exe
11-BetterClothesForTB.rar
12-19695_slofs_better_beasts_1.1.rar
13-Better_Heads_v2.0.7z
14-DunmerBetterHeadsMatchBetterBodies.zip
15-betterclothes_ver1.1.exe
16-BetterClothes_Patch.rar
17-SharpenedModelsWeaponsDDS.zip
18-Enhanced_Sky.7z
19-miscitemsreplacer.zip
20-weatheredsigns1.1_0606.zip
21-betterbooksv1.zip
22-Valitys_Bitter_Coast_Mod_4.7z
23-Valitys_Ascadian_Isles_Mod.7z
24-Grass_Standard.7z
25-TextPatchforMorrowindwithTribunal&Bloodmoon.zip
26-LadyD_Reduced_Commentary.rar
27-illuminated_windows.rar
28-SG_MW-ecology.zip
29-k_weather.zip
30-ase3inclupdates.rar
31-MorrowindFPSOptimizer.v1.96.zip
So why should you give a crap? Simple – this is a good, tested install, and I have all these files. Many moons ago, I put out a similar package via torrent, which made some people happy, others unhappy. Real PITA in any event. But if anyone has a decent file storage location or whatever and wants this collection (with the purpose of leaving it open for everyone), let me know.
I also just installed the overhaul and some other mods in the hope of not having broken anything. It does look really nice. I forgot how little hand holding there is compared to the later ones. I am so used of seeing the red hand indicating what would be stealing that my character died a swift death when I picked up something and the owners blasted away. Awesome! Let’s see if I will be able to “finish” it this time.
I am using Madds Leveling, is that still OK? I read about Galthias being totally overpowered.
Not sure on those two leveling mods ImaTarget, not ones i tried. Overall i think my concern was not so much how you leveled up in Morrowind so much as how quickly. So i think the various ‘balanced’ mods i used just slowed the whole process down to better suit the size of my game world and quest content etc.
Level 35 or so after two years of gaming (not all the time obviously!) seems quite nice, in fact it may even be a little two high considering the stage of the main quest i’m on, i might have to tweak some values to slow it down a little more.
@Scharmers, seems a nice lite mod effort, mostly graphical stuff so pretty much an improved visual vanilla build. Do you need to use any mod managers (like Testool or WryeMash) with it? I expect probably not as it is mostly graphical stuff?
I think in hindsight if i was to remove some important mods from my list it would be ‘Tempreature 1.13.esp’(and associated) as it is just too buggy sometimes, which you can sort out in game via the console, but it requires too much of that.
Also ‘Less Lore.esp’ as i suspect that is the cause of a small bug i’ve had where by some early quest options for a few of the factions would not show, and again i had to use console commands to trigger them.
It is true that the dialogue trees get massive in Morrowind, but in hindsight i don’t mind that as much as maybe missing a quest prompt here and there, and besides if you talk to most people in real life, they have quite a lot to say about any number of things, and as my build is a ‘realism’ build i think i prefer that in my NPC’s (the LGNPC mods are an essential for this).
Edit: there is this place now that ElricM’s is gone, to collect mods from etc:
Is the order you listed them in the same as the order they should be installed in?
I think that actually is the order I installed them, or close to it on my Steam copy. Definitely install the Overhaul first. Several days ago I abandoned the Better Running mod because I got the Boots of Blinding Speed.
I had Julan the companion installed but he disappeared on me (bug I guess) and I couldn’t find him and couldn’t continue the main quest until I deactivated the mod. So I wouldn’t recommend that one anymore.
I love the wolf companion though!
Wow. The Morrowind Overhaul has the most convoluted installation process I’ve ever witnessed.
LOL yeah it takes a bit to get through. It beats the crap out of manually installing and configuring the mods involved though. I don’t know how many hours of my life I lost to trying to figure out messed up load orders and mod conflicts.
Don’t have the answer off-hand but geez…maybe a gig? Under two? I mean I could probably dropbox this stuff under my [redacted] account but I’m not sure about the traffic concerns.
I just got a mint Morrowind Collector’s Edition for 10€ and a mint Planescape Torment Memorial Box for 20€.
I am very very happy, but I also feel dirty and guilty. There’s not a single copy of the Morrowind CE on German eBay or Amazon. There are three for sale on the American eBay, for around 300$. The guy I got them from has a whole bag of old RPGs for sale, all mint. I would take them all, but my wife would kill me.
An excellent fan-made Morrowind Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=5kkurXgkkfg
I’m still playing. I’m now level 23 and I’ve just become the Redoran and Hlaalu Hortator. Now off I go to those Telvanni scum!
I’ve played a bunch of the Elder Scrolls games, starting with the first one. I never thought they were great games and I doubt I ever ‘finished’ one until Skyrim. But, one thing Skyrim did do was give me a greater appreciation for the exploration in these games. I always thought the combat was pretty bad, including in Skyrim. In any case, is trying to play Morrowind + version 3 of the Morrowind Overhaul worth it for a guy like me? I’m sure I didn’t explore all Skyrim has to offer, but I did explore quite a bit, so if I played that again there would be a lot of content I already saw.
Sure. Like the name of the thread says, Morrowind is still an amazing game. The graphics hold up great too.
Don’t feel like you need to explore every ancestral tomb. Unlike Oblivion and Skyrim, there’s a fair amount of duplication there. They aren’t literally identical, but they do feel like it. Morrowind is a huuuge game but it doesn’t have a staggering amount of unique content like Oblivion/Skyrim.
Sure, the combat is maybe the weakest (especially if you select the option to always do the most damage) of them. But it is a very atmospheric setting and the storyline is decent. The overhaul will make it visually acceptable for sure.
Combat has always been weak in TES games, really. These games are about exploration, not combat.
Really when you think about it, aside from Dark Souls and the like, the mechanics of real-time combat are weak in the vast majority of RPGs.
I quite liked combat in Daggerfall, it was hard to master well, and it had an element of ‘truth’ about it (movement being very important to actual martial combat). Still it did take an effort to master and you really need a perfect mouse mat to avoid frustration. But yeah, you are right, you don’t play a TES for the combat, they offer much more than that.