As far as pc vs x360 I would say they are very similar:
360:
achievements
nothing to install
get to play on a big hdtv and sit on a couch
future content over live
hdr with 2xaa
inventory system built with control pad in mind
longer and eventually annoying load times
some framerate issues
no mods
harder to aim ranged attacks with control pad (it hasn’t been too bad though)
pc:
fast save/load (this is a big advantage IMO)
superior (IMO) keyboard mouse controls for ranged combat
can run at crazy resolutions if you have the machine
lots of tweaking through the ini
easy to cheat/experiment with console commands
future mods
no hdr with AA (and no hdr support at all with ati unless you have an 1X00 card. Sheesh and I got my x800xl just last year and it’s “out of date”)
inventory system a bit clunky with mouse
no achievments!
? stability issues
? will future live content be available for the pc for free
If you have a really powerful pc then go with pc otherwise go with x360. for me it was the combination of achievements and getting to play on a hdtv sitting on the couch that sold me on the x360 version.
I found a repeatable freeze/lock bug. If I go to this shrine (near azura’s shrine), activate it to get a magical set of weapons for a period of time, mount my horse (it says something about not being able to unequip the weapon), ride off into the next load it will lock hard. I was able to duplicate this. It was easy to work around but still a pretty bad bug. That was about the only issue I had over 12 hrs of straight play.
thats a great summary of pros and cons. Except I’m totally sure the xbox live content will NOT be free to pc users. But who cares? PC users already have tons of nice mods (I’m drooling over some crazy effect arrows right now, havent installed pc version.)
Steve: the official forus, when working, have a forum for mods. If the search was working, searching for [RELZ] would get you all the threads with mods released in them. Otherwise, hit up some of the MW mod sites, most or all should be carrying the oblivion stuff. I really do miss some of the MW mods I used. (climbing, children, random quests / npcs)
In WoW, the other day I asked in guild chat who was playing Oblivion and several people replied saying that they were planning on getting a pirated version soon.
not very hlepful, but last time I re-built my dvd of MW mods, elricm’s something or other was useful, as well as telesphoros list o mods (which links all over the damn place, google for telesphoros list and pick some mods, you’ll find the major MW mod sites easily. I always used his list really, since the mods are all over the place)
That’s depressing, since it’s obvious they have the money for games. And Oblivion is totally worth spending money on, at least if you’re big into that whole “time spent playing/dollar” type equation.
The 360 is the best choice unless you’re really into the mod thing. I just can’t be bothered to spend all the extra tweaking/futzing time on the PC when I can just pop the disc in and play on a console.
Totally true. I spent probably 2 weeks off and on last time I updated my MW install before I could play. Good lord though, it is almost enough to pull me away from oblivion to go back and play MW. You can literally fix every niggle you personally have with the game, and add all kinds of things you’d not even think of.
This is why I got both, I really got the 360 version because I thought my pc wouldnt run it well, but it started to sound like it’d be ok, lus mods started flowing that addressed things I wanted changed ALREADY, so I grabbed it as well.
So, I’m still playing on 360, waiting for a nice amount of mods to come out, thenI’ll do my 3rd or 4th playthrough on the pc with a collection of mods installed. Also it give me something to do during slow times at work- I can read the mod forums and make note of upcoming interesting things.
If you ever want a simple & easy install to see what kind of cool things can come out of the mod community, grab better bodies, visual pack XT, and balmora expanded, and then just go explore balmora. balmora ghetto or something like that is also good and works fine w/ balmora expanded.
I can’t wait for some time to pass so large scale stuff like that can come out for oblivion. A video card than can run it at 100fps or so would be nice as well, so here’s to 2-3 years from now :D
I bought the PC version and it beat my computer into abject submission before the intro movie even got a chance to play. I worked on the issue in my spare time for several days, to no avail. $60 down the tubes.
Several days later a friend and I split the cost of a 360. We went straight to his place from the store, plugged it in, turned it on, flopped on the couch, and lost six hours in Cyrodiil via the full glory of a 9’-wide digital projection and surround sound.
The TES/mod issue tugs at me a bit, until I remember that I never downloaded that many mods for Morrowind, and never had the time to learn how to use the editor myself. It takes time and effort to research, download, and install mods, or try to work out hardware conflicts and driver issues, and the last thing I need is frustration and hassle in the pursuit of simple entertainment.
it’s the most immersive and atmospheric RPG I’ve ever played. The world is huge, and I’m sure I’ll never explore all of the content. I’ve hardly noticed that I’m using a controller instead of a keyboard and mouse. The 360 has hit the spot perfectly.
I have the PC version, and my roommate has the 360 version. Just watching his load transitions annoys me. However, the PC version loads transitions so fast that I often don’t get to read the tips. There’s a really handy one that pops up sometimes, telling you which mage guild sells which school of spells, but damned if I could tell you what it said. I also think the PC hotkey system is superior to the D-pad, and ranged combat is much easier with a mouse; since Elder Scrolls has always tactically favored casters over melee, I think this is a win for the PC. Assuming you have at least an X1800 or 6800GT. And a gig of RAM. And a 3.0GHz P4 or 3000+ Athlon XP. If not, consider the Xbox version.
For what it’s worth, I’ve had precisely one CTD in over 25 hours of play time. Well, it often crashes when I’m quitting to the desktop, but that doesn’t affect gameplay or game data.
See, to me TES games don’t require swift and accurate aim. Thus I could care less about having a mouse for archery/spell purposes. Normally I really don’t like playing FPS-style games with a gamepad, but this simply doesn’t bother me with Oblivion.
I do wish I had a keyboard for hotkey purposes, though. Not a huge issue for me, since I only have three weapons assigned and, as a fighter, I can’t imagine wanting to have more than five slots open for spells. But there’s something about the simplicity of just hitting a key that beats out holding down Y then pressing the d-pad.
Having said that, I love the game on the 360. I’ll probably buy the PC version after a few price drops to take advantage of mods/patches, not to mention by the time I buy a new PC, I should be able to afford one that could run this game at maxed-out settings so that it might look even spiffier than it currently does on the 360. But unless you simply hate the TES style of RPG, I can’t imagine that you wouldn’t want to get your hands on whatever version you possibly can.
Daggerfall and Morrowind are not nearly as bad as Oblivion in this regard. Mobs jump around like meth addicts making aiming almost impossibe even with a mouse. It’s seriously annoying how hard it is to tag stuff with spells or arrows, I found it unworkable on the 360, which is why I only play a warrior on the 360. With that said buying and selling is much easier on the 360. Having to click on yes/no everytime I want to sell something (and twice if it’s just two items) is incredibly annoying. The 360 just has A/B buttons thank god.
Between mods and the non existant load times I definately prefer the PC version, which also looks a ton better if you have a fast enough machine. Saving and loading are also instantaneous on my machine.
