By Alec Meer on June 17th, 2009 at 3:49 pm.
Gaming diaries: all the rage, eh? Buoyed by the splendidosity of the likes of Roburky’s Sims 3 chronicles and Tom Francis’ Galactic Civilizations II bible, I’m embarking on something I’ve had brewing for a while – a diary of my (mis)adventures in Morrowind. I’ve always maintained it’s a far better game than its sequel Oblivion (which was also pretty good), and now’s my chance to prove it. I’ll commence with the diaries proper in a few days, but ahead of that I thought I’d share the setup.
I’m running the Morrowind: Game of the Year edition, which includes the two expansions Tribunal and Bloodmoon. This means I should bump into a werewolf at some point, excitingly. On top of that, I’ve installed a bunch of mods, mostly for the sake of prettiness – I don’t want to change the eventual experience too much, but I have zero problems with messing with the lore.
They are:
Better Bodies – which, primarily, adds joints to the game’s otherwise rigid torsos, and some nicer textures for people whose clothes you’ve nicked. There’s a choice of whether to leave them totally nude or with some tasteful underwear. I’ve gone for the latter, because I’m afraid of sex.
Better Heads – Those blurry porridge-faces get a bit of sprucing up. Also applies to the player models, not that you get to see your own face outside of the tutorial (I don’t think?)
Morrowind Comes Alive – This is a good’un. It throws in a crapton of wandering NPCs into the world, so it’s not the underpopulated robo-land it is out of the box.
The Wilderness Mod – Similar to the above, but with angry animals. This means I’m probably going to get attacked by a tiger eventually.
Giants Ultimate – Introduces a load of mythic-esque foes to Morrowind, including dragons, golems and, er, mechanical wasps. More stuff to hit, basically.
Real Signposts – Crisp signpost textures get me hard.
And the Morrowind Visual Pack, an omni-mod of high resolution textures that smarten things up no end. I remember trying this (or something like it) a few years ago, and my poor PC fell over in panic. It’s entirely untroubled now, bless it.
So, before I get going on this in earnest, any others you lot reckon are a must-have?
Oh, and my character is a Water Nymph (a new race one of the mods seems to have thrown in) with, for some reason, the face of a flea. He is called Loaf, and is stabby and a bit thiefy. He can also walk on water.
17/06/2009 at 15:53 Bob says:
Just seeing that picture makes me want to reinstall it! Great game. The goty edition is now on Steam for people who don’t know
17/06/2009 at 15:54 Theoban says:
If you’re going to use Giants you may want to use the optional mod that allows you to remove some creatures. The flying face ones in particular are so rubbishly textured that they’re a screaming eyesore in the middle of Vvardenfell
Dragons are good though, and that it adds bandits and such.
17/06/2009 at 15:56 Waste_Manager says:
I agree, Morrowind is better than oblivion, apart from those pesky cliff racers. Is there a mod to take them out because they are annoying as…umm…pencils that keep snapping when you try to sharpen them.
17/06/2009 at 15:57 rigley says:
I’ve heard that the Morrowind Graphics Extender is a must: http://sourceforge.net/projects/morrgraphext/
It allows for infinite draw distance, widescreen resolutions and things of that nature.
But I couldn’t get it to agree with Windows 7 RC when I tried to install it last night, which makes me a sad panda.
17/06/2009 at 15:59 Bob says:
@Waste_Manager Yeah there is one, I remember using it ages back
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Mods.Detail&id=5266
Not sure if thast the one I used through
17/06/2009 at 16:01 AndrewC says:
Does this include the ‘infinite draw distance’ mod? That made my mouth water just a little bit, whatever its exact name. Actually just hearing the music would tempt me into another few hundred hours.
Stop Alec! Stop before it’s too late!
17/06/2009 at 16:01 Brulleks says:
I’ve just recently started replaying with the Morrowind merged mods megapack. Some people aren’t keen on it as it adds some very non-canon content but, get this – I’d been playing as a Dremora for a few days, then stumbled upon the aoption to abandon the central Blades missions entirely, and go and work for Dagoth Ur and the sixth House Cult instead. Now that’s role-playing.
For me the joy of Morrowind was all about getting lost in a huge alien world, so not knowing what this mystery compilation of mods is going to throw at me next is a bonus rather than a detriment.
Also using the Graphics Extender to get some lovely new visuals and decent view distance. Recommend that wholeheartedly, though it can take a bit of waiting for it to process everything.
17/06/2009 at 16:02 AndrewC says:
Ah, there we go: Rigley’s ‘graphic extender’.
17/06/2009 at 16:04 Brulleks says:
Gah – where’s the edit function gone. I should clarify that I meant the initial joy of Morrowind was that sense of anticipation for what was round the next corner, and that would have been lost on a second play-through, so the megapack resurrects that sense, despite its sometimes jarring inconsistencies within the gameworld.
17/06/2009 at 16:09 Chris says:
I’m glad to find I’m not alone in thinking Morrowind was the better game… it just seemed far more involving, more like a unique world with its own creatures (silt striders, flying jellyfish, etc) and very different cultures (I still love the sand village place, with the crab-shell shaped houses) rather than Oblivion’s pretty generic fantasy world… Oblivion was far better technically, but I think the story, world and art direction in Morrowind was far superior… remake anyone?
17/06/2009 at 16:10 robrob says:
Looking forward to this. Gosh I love Morrowind.
17/06/2009 at 16:11 Fragman says:
Yeah, the MGE is great.
Reinstalled Morrowind a while ago, found an epic web page for mods n stuff.
The thing that screams “better then Oblivion” happened to me within 5 minutes of playing.
Was walking around, heard a huge scream.
Then a wizard dropped out of the sky and died in front of me. Took a good minute to collect my thoughts, the first of which was “AWESOME”
17/06/2009 at 16:12 Smileyfax says:
There’s a Red Skies mod on one of the big mod sites (Planet Elder Scrolls? Elder Scrolls Nexus?) It turns the daytime sky into a nice shade of red, really amping up the alien feel of Vvardenfell island.
(I was really disappointed when Oblivion had a bunch of generic fantasy crap and plain ol’ Earth style animals).
17/06/2009 at 16:13 Petethegoat says:
Yes, definitely need the graphics extender if you want to see more than 5 yards.
The book jackets mods are very handy if you have a large collection of books and want to be able to see the titles easily, and it just looks pretty.
Also worth a shout is The Lighting Mod which improves the lighting a lot, and last, but by no means least, the Tamriel Rebuilt mod, which adds much of the Morrowind mainland, very cool if you get bored of Vvardenfell.
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Mods.Detail&id=608 – The Lighting Mod
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=mods.Detail&id=5133 – Tamriel Rebuilt Map 1
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Mods.Detail&id=7040 – Tamriel Rebuilt Map 2
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Mods.Detail&id=4054 – Book Jackets Morrowind
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Mods.Detail&id=4055 – Book Jackets Tribunal
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Mods.Detail&id=4056 – Book Jackets Bloodmoon
All come highly recommended! I am looking forward to this!
17/06/2009 at 16:14 Rinox says:
Have fun Alec. I don’t necessarily believe Morrowind to be a better game than Oblivion, but it is most definitely a better RPG.
I remember being awed at the red sand storms within the Veil. And how you character would shield his or her eyes from it in 3rd person view.
Oh and Bloodmoon is a wonderful expansion. The outdoors areas are so convincingly unforgiving that you’ll feel genuinely at ease inside a warm Barbarian hall lined with hunting trophies and smelling of mead.
17/06/2009 at 16:18 Ian says:
If you’re wanting to prove it’s better than Oblivion would you not be better served keeping it in vanilla form?
Not that I much care, I’ve barely played Morrowind and so have no real opinion about it in comparison to Oblivion, and I’m a sucker for these diary things so I’ll undoubtedly enjoy it a lot anyway. Especially after the blast that was your Worst Ninja series. :)
17/06/2009 at 16:18 Waste_Manager says:
I need to re-buy this I think. Had it on the xbox originally (I know, I know) and only got the crappy mastertronic re-release on PC that doesn’t have the expansions.
It was practically the only game I played for a good 2 years and haven’t touched it since I ended up wandering around aimlessly looking for something to do because I had done everything else.
Looks to be around £6.75 everywhere but has anyone seen it cheaper?
17/06/2009 at 16:20 kalidanthepalidan says:
I thought Morrowind was far superior. I’ve played through it twice and loved every minute of it. I started Oblivion and quit after about 10 hours. The world in Oblivion is far too generic a fantasy land for my tastes. Morrowind’s world was truly unique and a joy to explore.
17/06/2009 at 16:20 Nelson says:
Hey Alec,
Could you post lots o’ screenies with your diary? I’m really interested in seeing how purty you made Morrowind.
p.s. There aren’t enough reviews of post-patch, post-mod games. I’m glad you’re doing this!
17/06/2009 at 16:21 Vinraith says:
It’s criminal not to run “Morrowind Advanced,” an “extra critters and quests” mod written by one of the originol developers that adds some nice higher level nasties, some loot to go with them, and a couple of BIG new dungeons all quite seamlessly. Creature Pack 1.1 is another nice subtle critter pack, to ensure you’ve got lots of variety in your killables.
Other than that you’ve done pretty well (though I’m not a fan of Giants, personally, too many rubbish critters). However, You really need a balance mod in there. I always used to run “Super Adventurer’s Mod” but that might be a little… drastic for what you’re trying to do. Maybe Wakim’s Game Improvements? Some of the default rules in Morrowind are… less than optimal and need a tweak.
That should about do it. I adore Morrowind, it’s eaten more of my life than any other RPG I’ve ever played, so I look forward to following this. Hell, it may inspire me to start a new play-through of my own, I never have made it to the end of Tribunal and Bloodmoon…
17/06/2009 at 16:23 jalf says:
I don’t necessarily believe Oblivion was a game at all. Some kind of “look what a big world we can make”-masturbation from Bethesda, but unfortunately, they forgot to put the game bits in.
17/06/2009 at 16:29 Freudian Trip says:
Could people link some of these mods? I never played Morrowind but dug Oblivion and Fallout so I’m working my way backwards.
17/06/2009 at 16:29 rei says:
The inclusion of dragons is highly controversial from a lore point of view!
17/06/2009 at 16:30 Babs says:
I’m about 90% certain you can see your face by holding down a key (Tab?) and rotating the camera.
17/06/2009 at 16:31 Vinraith says:
@Freudian
A Google search will get you where you need to go. Most of my old TES links are dead because my favorite old MW mod archives appear to have disappeared.
17/06/2009 at 16:33 Meat Circus says:
I foresee substantial usage of “AND IN THE GAME”-style retortery.
Can’t wait.
17/06/2009 at 16:34 Rinox says:
@ Jalf
Wasn’t Morrowind bigger than Oblivion? ;-)
Still, I dunno. I had fun in Oblivion. I had fun in Morrowind. It was just a different kind of fun. Once I’d gotten over the initial disappointment at the watered down character development system compared to Morrowind’s (which in its turn was a watered down version of Daggerfall’s), I enjoyed myself a lot. But it was more because of the action than of the depth of the game.
I wish someone would make an Elder Scrolls game with Daggerfall’s character creation tool. That thing was Godlike. “Takes damage on holy ground” must be one of the coolest disadvantages ever…and pretty rough if you were dragging yourself half-dead into a temple to get cured of some freaky disease. :-D
17/06/2009 at 16:34 cullnean says:
sorry fellas,
But the dark brotherhood quests win it for me.
and my evil steed Doris, which i kept a spare change of clothes and weapons in!
17/06/2009 at 16:36 Pags says:
Weirdly, I also started replaying Morrowind recently; I am a herbalist Breton named Yurt who, despite his otherwise good-nature, is on the run from the law for letting his inner kleptomaniac out. He was simply too weak to go adventuring and earn himself any money, but couldn’t resist his desire for alchemy, so was forced to steal. Only he’s such a big, bumbling oaf that it’s impossible not to notice him attempting to creep around unseen, and naturally attracted the attention of the owner of the mortar & pestle. Soon he was fleeing the city.
17/06/2009 at 16:38 oceanclub says:
“Looks to be around £6.75 everywhere but has anyone seen it cheaper?”
Well, the Game of the Year edition is on Steam at the moment; it’s €22 along with Oblivion and _all_ its DLC. If I didn’t have both already, I’d definitely get them, and I’m _still_ tempted to buy the package just for Steamy convenience sake.
P.
17/06/2009 at 16:39 Captain Bland says:
I think Better Heads suffers from being too shiny and smooth for the game’s art style. I think the original (ugly) heads are far more characterful. And I think the current version of Morrowind Comes Alive is bundled with a ‘Harder Baddies’ mod, which ruined game balance for me. Other than that, I’m looking forward to this. Morrowind was my first fantasy RPG, and I re-visit it often.
17/06/2009 at 16:41 Alec Meer says:
Just a note for anyone planning on linking to a whole bunch of mods: our spam filter eats posts containing more than 2 or 3 links. We can recover ‘em, but probably best to split ‘em across multiple posts or something.
17/06/2009 at 16:43 AndrewC says:
Oh noes! Can we all just get along with the Oblivion Vs Morrowind thing? Let’s just say they had very different focuses within the ‘sandbox RPG’ genre, and contained their own joys. Please?
Alec, you are such a stirrer.
17/06/2009 at 16:47 Alec Meer says:
Unintentional stupidity on my part, I assure you. Yes, please let’s leave ye olde Oblivion-bashing alone folks.
17/06/2009 at 16:48 Moorkh says:
If I may use this opportunity to pimp the Tamriel Rebuilt mod, which extends the game by the huge rest of the Province of Morrowind.
http://www.tamriel-rebuilt.org/
17/06/2009 at 16:56 Castle says:
“Harder Baddies” mod, eh? I think that’s something that would have really enhanced my first playthrough several years back. I remember my character was heavily into weapon crafting, and eventually made a sword that was capable of absolutely demolishing everything in the game (I don’t remember there being a very high cap in terms of the power of crafted weapons). Anyway, it sort of ruined the last third or fourth of the game for me, with everything dying after a whack or two..
17/06/2009 at 16:59 Real Horrorshow says:
When I didn’t have an internet connection for 8 months, I played Morrowind so much that part of my left hand went numb. It was kind of scary.
17/06/2009 at 17:05 Vinraith says:
@Castle
Morrowind’s relatively flat difficulty curve ensures that no matter what you do, the late game is a complete push-over. Fortunately, about 40% of the mods out there are designed specifically around making the game harder. Some rebalance the rules and reduce the power of spells and skills (or at least slow their progression), some add new enemies that are more powerful, some add new areas balanced against a high level character’s capabilities. The expansions are a little better about difficulty, but to get the most out of the game (well, to get the most out of ANY Bethesday RPG really) you need to have a look at the mod community and customize a bit. It’s the principle strength of these titles.
17/06/2009 at 17:12 jonfitt says:
My gripe with both games is to do with their infinite expandability!
The annoying thing is that the games both do really benefit from/need mods to make them prettier or better or often to fix flaws in the original, but because by definition they’re all produced by people with different ideas and desires there’s never a definite set.
I could experiment, but I rarely have time to play long RPGs more than once. What I want is someone with a “grand design” (like the game creators) to say install these mods and the game will be the best it can be.
Perhaps I’ll use Alec’s set. He’s quite grand.
17/06/2009 at 17:14 Uglycat says:
I’ve been reading, but can anyone definitely say whether general modding will knacker the steam version? I hear that some mods alter the .exe but nobody seems to actually confirm or refute this and it will make a big difference whether I buy it (for the second time:E) on steam or not.
That’s for Morrowind but I’ll take Oblivion as well.
17/06/2009 at 17:16 Azradesh says:
Has any one else noticed that Morrowind and Oblivion are entirely devoid of children, toilets bath rooms/bath houses?
17/06/2009 at 17:17 CakeAddict says:
A morrowind.. I might have spend more time into that game then any MMO.
The game itself is amazing and then the overwhelming amounts of mods, dear god.
I can’t really recommend any mod besides perhaps a fancy house (there are some really amazing ones out there).
And yes morrowind is better then Oblivion imo there is just much more to do in morrowind.
Anyway, looking forward to it.
17/06/2009 at 17:20 Alec Meer says:
Uglycat – all the mods I mention above work with my Steam version just fine (bar manually having to change the install path when they ask me where to stick themselves)
17/06/2009 at 17:21 Serondal says:
There are pretty good mods out there that add REALLY well done children to the game.
17/06/2009 at 17:22 Jayteh says:
@ Azradesh
Thats pretty obvious, no toilets because its a video game (what would have them add?) and kids because of the sand-box type game play where kids could be killed etc. Fallout 3 did this a bit differently by just making the kids invulnerable.
I have never played Morrowind with all these mods, might give it a go. Looking forward to the diaries as well.
17/06/2009 at 17:23 Driadan says:
There seemed to be some coop/multiplayer mod for morrowind but I can find it anywhere. Does anyone know where can it be found?
17/06/2009 at 17:25 RLacey says:
I was just about to reinstall this game, since I’m messing around with stuff on my Eee PC. Of course, that means that I’m about to start downgrading all the textures…
17/06/2009 at 17:28 Turin Turambar says:
Try to search the OO morrowind dvd 2.0
OO = Octopus Overlords, the pc forum
17/06/2009 at 17:29 Azradesh says:
@ Jayteh
Sure toilets would have no use in the game, but it’s a game that tries to be a fully realised world, so it’s a little odd. Does no one in the Elder Scrolls games crap? Do they all appear fully formed as adults? It’s just something that I’ve always found odd. Also most rpgs have these things.
17/06/2009 at 17:31 Vinraith says:
@Azradesh
“Also most rpgs have these things.”
Really? Name a few fantasy RPG’s that include bathrooms, I can’t think of any.
17/06/2009 at 17:43 solipsistnation says:
Oh hell. Please don’t make me want to buy more games. I have this on CD. Heck, I have it, my wife has it, and we have a spare copy floating around that came with a video card or something. My disk space is getting low! But STEAM? I would buy it again if it’s on Steam just to not have to find the CD again! Eesh.
Oh well.
17/06/2009 at 17:45 Joel says:
Rigley mentioned problems installing a mod in Windows 7 RC, is that typical for Morrowind mods? I would love to join the fun!
17/06/2009 at 17:46 Azradesh says:
Baldur’s Gate, Planespace: Torment…..and my mind has gone blank lol. I didn’t specify fantasy though, so add to that all the Fallout games. OH Arcanum….I think…it’s been a while since I played that one. Oh and Neverwinter Nights 1+2. Most of these games don’t have bathrooms in houses though as they have fantasy or post apocolyptic settings, which means you’re out of luck unless you’re rich. :) They all have children though.
17/06/2009 at 17:46 Tim says:
As someone who has done it, you could spend days putting together all the “great” mods out there. Just play with what you’ve got!
That is, unless you’ve got a screaming new video card, then run distant land with MGE so I can drool over it. Can’t even add 2 cells with my 4850. :(
17/06/2009 at 17:47 Azradesh says:
And Baldur’s Gate 2 of course.
17/06/2009 at 17:48 Adventurous Putty says:
Hm. I’m glad you’re doing this — Morrowind is one of the finest roleplaying experiences I’ve ever had — but I have mixed feelings about your using GIANTS. I mean, sure, it’s your obligation, but I think the continuity and depth of the game’s lore across both its in-game world and its literature was one of the coolest things about Morrowind.
But, then, being part of an Elder Scrolls lore community, I’m somewhat biased. Carry on!
17/06/2009 at 17:48 Adventurous Putty says:
erm, “your obligation” as in “your right”. Dunno why I wrote that. Stupid no-edit-button.
17/06/2009 at 17:49 KindredPhantom says:
Oh Morrowind what good memories of wandering the land doing what i want to whomever i want, then being chased Benny Hill style by the local wildlife.
Shame i lost everything in a hdd crash and could never get back into it..
17/06/2009 at 17:52 mysterylobster says:
@Vinraith
“Really? Name a few fantasy RPG’s that include bathrooms, I can’t think of any.”
Arx Fatalis did. If I remember right, the goblins actually used them.
17/06/2009 at 17:55 Nick says:
Remember to mod OUT cliff racers. Fuckers.
17/06/2009 at 17:55 zax says:
today i bought morrowind off of steam and i tried to install the Graphics Extender mod but it does not seem to work at all, i read on the support page for the mod that you must run the morrowind.exe and not launch the game through its launcher, i did this but it brings up the game launcher anyways and the mod does not work. Another mod i have tried is the better bodies mod but when loading into the game it gives me several errors that texture files could not be loaded (or something to that effect) and when in game all the npc’s have really trippy colours all around them. So is Morrowind GOTY off of steam able to use mods at all? and has anyone got the Graphics extender to work properly
17/06/2009 at 17:58 Serondal says:
Shadow Warrior had toliets AND children and children using toliets! That shot you! I know it’s not a fantasy RPG But still it is FPS and includes swords, which morrowind is an fPS with swords :P
“OHHH, you skink laddy!” “You washa wangs back or wang washa your back!? AWAHAHAHA!” “OH , horny bunny rabbits!”
17/06/2009 at 18:00 Vinraith says:
The cliff racer hate always amuses me. Any of a thousand mods (including the wilderness one Alec’s using) makes them placid and non-combative, such that they’re just scenery. I kind of missed flying critters in Oblivion, it was one more way in which the world felt flatter than Morrowind’s.
17/06/2009 at 18:10 Serondal says:
I first played Morrowind on X-Box, those cliff racers were a plauge!
I miss thrown weapons from morrowind in oblivion as well, though I liked the combat and arrows much better.
17/06/2009 at 18:12 Clovis says:
Re: kids in sandbox games
Not a sandbox game, but I played something called “Mines of Titan” years ago. You slowly built up a party of adventurers in a futuristic turn-based RPG. Anyway, one of the locations you could go to was really peaceful and it was full of old people and children. This made it a fantastic training ground for new members of your group. I’d spend hours beating Grandma and little Jimmy with a baseball bat, shooting them with simple laser guns, or throwing molotov cocktails act them. I felt sad when I could no longer get an acceptable XP return from this. These actions never had a terrible effect on the characters.
So, apparently Bethesda doesn’t want gamers doing that.
17/06/2009 at 18:14 Clovis says:
Hey, I haven’t played Oblivion/Morrowind since playing Mount and Blade. I’m thinking that I’d hate the combat if I went back to it now. I hope someone could make a Oblivion sized RPG with super awesome horseback swashbucklery.
17/06/2009 at 18:17 Rabid Oyster says:
Ack! put that picture away, I have too much to do right now, and you’re making me want to go back and play that thing. Probably my favorite gaming experience ever, outside of the Half-Life universe. I was so disappointed by Oblivion’s lack of variety. The WORLD in Morrowind is so rich and varied, from the harsh desert, to the wet swamps, to the funky mushroom houses. Mmm, I miss it…
17/06/2009 at 18:18 EyeMessiah says:
Fucking cliff racers.
17/06/2009 at 18:21 OutOfExile says:
Morrowind was definently one of my favorite games, the hours I poured into it…Oblivion was a bit disapointing compared to it. I’ve got a Morrowind GOTY disk sitting right next to me, I tried to get into it again after my Steam games stopped working. Spent abut 4 hours downloading mods, went into the game and about 10 minutes in I got stuck and autosaved by accident…
17/06/2009 at 18:22 viper34j says:
You know why I love this game? Candles. After beating the game I went around the world collecting all the candles I could find. I ended up with a house so full of candles that I looked like some kind of Brittney Spears cult worshiper.
17/06/2009 at 18:32 Dave says:
@Vinraith:
The text MMO GemStone III had a bathhouse with a rather important toilet in it. Though I understand an event happened sometime in the last couple of years or so that destroyed that particular building.
My memory of Oblivion involves a lot of theft, and then a lot of flying around, invisible, bombing the crap out of cities.
17/06/2009 at 18:34 Uglycat says:
Thanks Alex :)
17/06/2009 at 18:37 GRIMDARK says:
I put so many hours into Morrowind but I ended up not even finishing the game. Part of me wants to go back and play it again, but I have barely enough time as is before I blow it playing the same parts allover again
Plus, all the mods for Morrowind and Oblivion are such a pain in the ass. That’s the big hurdle for me. Because the mods are too good NOT to use, but they are such a pain to install and setup that you don’t want to use them. It’s a bit of a catch-22
17/06/2009 at 18:39 moraviapils says:
I would beware of the “Morrowind Comes Alive” mod if you’re planning on being a sneaky thief. It adds so many NPCs all over the place that it makes it hard to steal anything. Even if you’re not planning on relieving the populace of Vvardenfell of their valuables, you can’t run through any of the NPCs. This becomes very annoying after getting jammed between an NPC and the doorjamb for the nth time.
I do appreciate what the modder is/was trying to accomplish. I did like the (added by the mod) random thugs that would attack me, only to be slaughtered by the guards while I watched. That’s probably the closest I’ll ever get to being an emperor at the arena (thumbs down for the thug). However, the amusement caused by random acts of violence doesn’t justify turning every interior cell into an exercise of frustration.
17/06/2009 at 18:39 Vinraith says:
So for bathrooms in fantasy RPG’s so far we have Arx Fatalis and two obscure games I’ve never heard of. Neither the Baldur’s Gate games nor the Neverwinter games had bathrooms that I can recall, nor has any other fantasy RPG I can recall having played. It’s just not a normal design priority in these settings, for whatever reason.
17/06/2009 at 18:40 Subject 706 says:
I can for the life of me NOT understand why Bethesda went so utterly generic with Oblivion. Had it had half the uniqeness of Morrowinds world, I’d been willing to forgive some of its other glaring faults.
17/06/2009 at 18:46 Lewis says:
I remember playing Morrowind on release and being absolutely stunned at how far gaming had come. I couldn’t believe it wasn’t heralded by an instant classic by all concerned. I still believe it should have been. Wonderously more adventurous, enthralling and arresting than Oblivion.
17/06/2009 at 18:56 Quinnbeast says:
“Fucking cliff racers.”
TEAM
17/06/2009 at 19:04 mysterylobster says:
I really enjoyed the Ascadian Rose Cottage house mod, but I can’t find a working link anywhere.
17/06/2009 at 19:10 superking208 says:
I saw that guy named Ian up there and thought ‘that’s odd, why is Psychopomp posting under a different account?’, but then I saw him say that he’s barely played Morrowind. Oh, never mind.
obligatory FUCKING CLIFF RACERS
17/06/2009 at 19:13 Warduke says:
Alec, I’m really glad to see this. I bought Morrowind and the expansions off of ebay a year ago but have never gotten around to playing. It’s great to see the mods listed and all since that’s how I’d want to play it too. I’m anxious to read your upcoming adventures.
17/06/2009 at 19:27 TCM says:
I actually enjoy playing Oblivion more than I enjoy Morrowind, but I enjoy them for different reasons.
Or something like that. >_>
17/06/2009 at 19:29 Matzerath says:
Morrowind, when properly patched, is a truly amazing game. I would also suggest the Morrowind Graphics Extender; the sense of awe it adds is essential, as ‘awe’ is superior to ‘fog.’
Also, please use some discretion, and remember that if you unexpectedly die in real life, and some relative loads your saved game to see what you had been up to near the end, it is best not to leave Vvardenfell littered with naked, murdered NPCs. Especially with Better Bodies installed.
17/06/2009 at 19:31 abhishek says:
I just bought the deluxe bundle pack from Steam and I was planning on giving Oblivion a whirl first. I’ve played it before but I really wanted to give those Dark Brotherhood quests another go (the party quest is one of the best I’ve ever played). This article is tempting me to now go with Morrowind first… I guess I’ll get around to it once I’ve had my fill of the Sims 3, which I just got today.
17/06/2009 at 20:00 a says:
I’ve always thought Morrowind was crap, but maybe RPS will make it laughy.
17/06/2009 at 20:05 Bob says:
@Brulleks Have you got a link to the mega mod pack your using? Sounds interesting
17/06/2009 at 20:07 Funky Badger says:
My 2 favourite bits in Morrowind:
1) Mountainering around one of the villages I mange to climb-jump a bit higher than expected, then fell off the mountain, somehow surviving and landed on the open balcony at the top of a big house. I wandered around inside and found lots of nifty treasure to steal, and a scroll of Mana-Rape, and eventually an irate Telvanni master wizard. Fisticuffs were had and soon I was looting his corpse. It was much gametime later when the Telvanni who I’d later joined sent me ona mission to get the votes of their hermit-like masters before I could be made their champion. Felt like a bit of a fool when I turned up at the house and worked out I killed the guy 15 levels earlier. A perfectly broken mission. I mean, I could hardle go back and tell them I’d killed their guy…
2) Boots of Mighty Jumping. Ring of Water Walking. Sea. Slight Error of Judgement. SPLAT. Dead Adventurer.
17/06/2009 at 20:11 jackflash says:
I definitely agree that Morrowind is a far better game than Oblivion.
17/06/2009 at 20:12 Mischa says:
I loved how ‘real’ Morrowind felt, how it was a world in which I just happened to live, instead of a world purposely built for me.
I got a quest to get some bonedust, which, I was told, can be collected from crypts. So I entered the nearest crypt, expecting to find the bonedust as usual at the bottom level, in the middle of the map, guarded by the ‘boss’ of that crypt. But no! Right next to the entrance there was some bonedust. As there may be, in ‘real life’.
That, and the whole business with the dwarfs. I always felt that I only discovered a very small part of their tale, but that if I searched long enough, everything would be explained.
Unfortunately, I did not search long enough, but I liked that I was not spoon-fed their history.
17/06/2009 at 20:19 Sunjammer says:
I think Morrowind had a more interesting world, but it was also completely dead, and fairly uncomfortable to walk around in. The basic gameplay of Oblivion is mechanically better, and that made the experience easier for me to swallow.
But i got my share out of Morrowind. I bought it, played it for hours and hours and came away satisfied. But you can’t PAY me to go back to it. Same goes for Oblivion for that matter.
17/06/2009 at 20:19 Nero says:
Ahh, I remember my short run with Morrowind. I stepped of the boat (or whatever) and explored the town, went to path looking at all the pretty big mushrooms, suddenly a worm came jumping at me and as I had no weapons I ran, and ran and ran. After being chased by it for 10 minutes I stopped and tried to smack it, but failed and was killed. That was all.
17/06/2009 at 20:19 Azradesh says:
@ Vinraith
Yes the Baldur’s Gate and Neverwinter Nights games do. Not every house true, but there isn’t a single toilet or bath in the whole of Morrowind or Oblivion. These game have so much detail, but they left this out.
I also point you to fps games, it seems to be pretty standard to have toilets in these games.
17/06/2009 at 20:21 matte_k says:
Bloody love Morrowind, damn thing almost made me fail my degree course :D If I was to list all the things about it I like, this would be a huuuuuge post, so i’ll just settle for the whole of the Bloodmoon expansion, the weirdness of Sotha Sil’s home city, and Sadrith Mora for the most interesting building design i’ve seen in a long time. Also, the great variety of skills and weapons (spears, anyone? Love Dragoon style characters). One of my earliest PC gaming memories was gathering herbs by candlelight at night for a Mages Guild quest, stopping to rest and watching the sun rise. Only when it got light did I realise I was standing on the shore of Lake Amaya, and the view was unbelievably good…
Looking forward to your diary Alec, should be fun!
17/06/2009 at 20:23 Psychopomp says:
Removing cliff racers is as simple as loading up Morrowind in it’s own editor, and deleting the lot of them.
17/06/2009 at 20:23 Chis says:
Morrowind is worth buying entirely for two things:
1) It has some near Ultima-quality dungeon crawling, making up for the truly lackluster writing.
2) The Underground. Which is probably one of the best mods created for a game, full stop. Such a shame the “sequel” came out unfinished and un-completeable. I always wanted to explore the treehouse locales…
17/06/2009 at 20:24 morte says:
ooh, didn’t realise it was on steam. Sold! I’ve played all of about 10mins of Morrowind (demo perhaps, cant remember), but it ate my PC alive. Not anymore.
17/06/2009 at 20:27 Tei says:
“Morrowind Comes Alive” looks like a bad idea, since there are quest that are started just metting a npc in a random area. If you put NPC everywhere, you will skip these missions.
–
I just booted the game again, with the infinite landscape.. on my “godlike” character. WOA.. the game on today computers *fly*. I remenber playng it for like 6 years, and getting angry at the loong load time of the zones, but now feel like a seamless game, almost zero loadtimes. and the rafters… for some reason I don’t remenber having problems with then, other than at low level, but because I have forget how to play, even how to shot, are a anoyance now, for my godlike character. My character was equiped with amazing stuff, and with amazing spells, like one to jump 255 for 2 seconds, the one I use for fast travel. I can jump vivac in one hop :-)
The architecture graphics are awesome, to this day (with the defaults) but the characters are kinda lowpoly for toda standards, but he… Is morrowind!, everything has flavour!.
I am tempted to create a new installation, and start the game from scratch, with lots of mods.. but I am not that guy, I would probably rush trough the game, and not play like I played it eons ago.
17/06/2009 at 20:41 Vinraith says:
@Azradesh
I believe your memory is faulty. I’m playing NWN2 as we speak and haven’t seen a toilet that I can recall. In fact, as I’ve said, I can’t recall ever seeing a toilet in a fantasy-setting game (RPG OR FPS) that I’ve played (and I’ve played the NWN and BG games a LOT). I’ll concede Arx Fatalis and the others mentioned earlier in the thread as I’ve not played them.
17/06/2009 at 20:42 DigitalSignalX says:
Damn you RPS, DAMN YOU for adding yet another game to the ever growing list of must buy/replay. My only memories of Morrowind was “big” and joining guilds just to steal everything in their guild halls.
17/06/2009 at 20:44 Azradesh says:
http://www.gamesover.com/baldur2/Baldurs%20gate%202.htm
Do a page search for the word toilet.
17/06/2009 at 20:46 Azradesh says:
@ Vinraith
You may be right about NW2, altough it may have one in the castle.
17/06/2009 at 20:49 Vinraith says:
@Azradesh
So there’s one in the whole game? OK, I’ll concede I didn’t notice that. I think if anything that furthers my original point, which is that toilets are exceedingly rare in games with fantasy settings. Presumably everyone is either going outside or magicking their excrement away…
17/06/2009 at 20:52 Uglycat says:
*Alec (damnit)
17/06/2009 at 20:53 undead dolphin hacker says:
-Oblivion’s combat is responsive and satisfying. Morrowind’s combat makes you think there’s a clipping problem (until you realize that your weapon passing through an enemy doesn’t necessarily mean you hit it).
-Oblivion holds your hand too much. Morrowind doesn’t hold your hand enough. What a godawful journal system, even after Tribunal, or whichever one “overhauled” it.
-Morrowind has an alien setting and wikipedia NPCs. Oblivion has a generic fantasy setting and NPCs that at least have a little character.
-Magic sucks in both games (outside of utility spells) unless you really know the ins and outs of exploiting the system.
-The leveling system sucks and makes no sense in both games. You basically have to choose skills that are the exact opposite of what you want your character to do if you don’t want to be horribly gimped a few levels into the game.
-Leveled monsters and encounters in Oblivion were a terrible, terrible idea. Bandits in full Daedric, lawl. In Morrowind, you had no f-ing clue how difficult something was going to be until you fought the thing 5-10 times. Hope you bound quicksave to move forward.
-Fallout 3 is better than Oblivion and Morrowind, largely because most of Bethesda’s bad design habits were negated due to having to stick to a different ruleset.
17/06/2009 at 21:16 catmorbid says:
Every single time I intend on playing just one of Bethsda’s latest RPG’s, I stumble upon the exactly same horrible problem: The vanilla version is basically awful load of crap, and in order to make it good to play, I have to install a ton of mods. After I’m done with that, I notice I took me about half the day to get them all working, and there’s still the occasional crash due to incompatibility, and very soon I realize I’ve become frustrated and won’t touch the game in about six months.
17/06/2009 at 21:29 Funky Badger says:
undead dolphin: I don’t understand your criticism of the levelling system.
17/06/2009 at 21:48 Gianandrea Manfredi says:
“Every single time I intend on playing just one of Bethsda’s latest RPG’s, I stumble upon the exactly same horrible problem: The vanilla version is basically awful load of crap, and in order to make it good to play, I have to install a ton of mods.
I know the feeling, thoough I maintain that the complete blandness of Oblivion makes it unmoddable to any decent standard. Morrowind on the other hand modded was a good time back in the day.
17/06/2009 at 21:50 Clovis says:
@Funky Badger: The leveled mobs in Oblivion made the levelling system annoying. If you focused on your main path you would level too quickly and be surrounded by monstrous enemies. You had to game the levelling system a bit to have it work out right. But once you figure that out you will quickly be overpowered.
I like it when parts of the map are just more dangerous than other parts instead.
17/06/2009 at 21:51 Nobody Important says:
By the time I had a computer that could run Morrowind, I realized that the disc I had bought was bad and that it was scratched up too bad to play.
17/06/2009 at 21:59 Fenchurch says:
I don’t know how this mod will work with all the mods you have on top:
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Mods.Detail&id=1187
And this one:
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Mods.Detail&id=1297
But I made these years ago so that the potions and scrolls would have unique icons. They were well liked at the time, I hope they help!
:3
17/06/2009 at 21:59 Dr Gonzo says:
Oh please don’t play it with added monsters and whatnot. I love the diary articles and I love Morrowind, but please do vanilla Morrowind!
The mods that improve graphics are fine but I think if you start adding mods with different creatures and lore then your not really playing Morrowind.
That was what made the game so amazing to me personally, a crazy-weird world to explore. Changing the world changes the game, you’ve effectively removed why Morrowind was more interesting than Oblivion IMO.
17/06/2009 at 22:01 Someone says:
I always played it with Redds Heads, and another couple of mods which replaced all of the textures for potions and scrolls. They made flicking through the inventory so much easier.
17/06/2009 at 22:08 Azradesh says:
@Vinraith
“So there’s one in the whole game? OK, I’ll concede I didn’t notice that. I think if anything that furthers my original point, which is that toilets are exceedingly rare in games with fantasy settings. Presumably everyone is either going outside or magicking their excrement away…”
lol Must be. That was just the only refence to a toilet on the net I could find, I’m pretty sure there were more though, just like a whole cut in some wood or stone over a pit. There weren’t many though.
17/06/2009 at 22:12 AndrewC says:
People wee up against walls in Gothic.
17/06/2009 at 22:16 Taillefer says:
So few toilets, yet so many sewers! Odd.
And Thief has toilets.
Now I’m off to look for mods and play Morrowind, grr.
17/06/2009 at 22:20 Unlucky Irish says:
I played Oblivion a lot longer than Morrowind but latter has had a greater effect on me. Maybe it’s because of Morrowind unique setting or the fact that it was one of the first PC game I played but it always inspires a sense of wanderlust in me; something that Oblivion, whilst good in my opinion, never achieved.
@Quinnbeast: Sigh, I miss Consolvania, was really into there forums. Shame they basically self destructed in series 3…
17/06/2009 at 22:33 Petrushka says:
Anyone who plays with Better Bodies and Better Clothes should also make sure to get the Better Beast Bodies mod: without it, there are lots of clipping issues with Argonian/Khajiit bodies and the better clothes.
17/06/2009 at 22:35 Grawl says:
Someone at Something Awful made a 1.5 GB pack that features a truckload of mods that are configured to not conflict. I’m not sure if I can direct link to it, but if you have access to Something Awful and to the archive the topic is here – http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=2867558&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=1
Here is a list of the mods included – http://esfiesta.sa.kikaimegami.com/MMMMList.txt
17/06/2009 at 22:39 KBKarma says:
Fucking cliff racers. Yes, they’re handy. But the bastards have funny hit-boxes, so they occasionally sunk into rocks, taking with them both whatever bolts I’d fired AND the plumes, the ONLY reason I’d shoot them apart from hatred.
Morrowind… That takes me back. I stopped playing it due to so many horrible crashes. And the fact that a quest-centric NPC never turned up in the Vivec Arena so I could fight him. And the fact that, every time I loaded the game, I’d find myself ankle-deep in a swamp, miles away from the nearest habitation, with no idea what I was doing there and no clue what quests I had remaining. Seriously, the game needs a better quest log. Oblivion’s was nice, though the auto-guidance was vaguely annoying.
I enjoyed Morrowind much more than Oblivion. This is because, in Morrowind, I could play an Assassin with a moderate Short Blade skill and an exceptional Marksman skill, whereas Oblivion punished you for not having a Blade skill above 50%. Oh, and even if you did, the enemies had levelled in the meantime and were ready to pound your body into the ground before you could say “AAAAARGH, DAEDRA!”
Since my copy is the Mastertronic copy, sans Bloodmoon and Tribunal, I think I’ll grab this off Steam while it’s cheap, and grab Plants vs Zombies at the same time.
And good luck, Alec. I’d have recommended a vanilla game, but it’s your call.
17/06/2009 at 22:47 sinister agent says:
I agree with undead dolphin hacker. Both games were utter crap, but the right mods helped unlock the vast potential they so narrowly missed.
17/06/2009 at 22:50 sinister agent says:
Damn, the edit function has gone again. Humph, I say. Humph!
Anyway, I suspect I’ll enjoy reading about someone playing morrowind a lot more than actually playing it. The idea of these games always seems more fun than the reality, so the extra bit of fun added by good narration will be welcome.
17/06/2009 at 23:04 Ashurbanipal says:
I played vanilla Morrowind (with expansions) more than any other game I’ve ever owned. It’s scary when you look at your save games file and see you’ve racked up a few hundred hours, and there’s still things to do and see.
Also, a fabulous world, one of the few fantasy settings that I love. Silt Striders, mushroom towers, hermaphroditic gods who write mystic babble. Some of the more fascinating stuff you had to go searching for in the books, but it was very much worth it.
17/06/2009 at 23:24 leeder_krenon says:
ESSENTIAL: ANTI CLIFF RACER MOD.
17/06/2009 at 23:31 Serondal says:
I recall my friend getting a giants mod and a nude mod and installing them both at the same time. What results is him walking around near ghost gate when a giant comes after him. OF course the giant is nude and his big harry what you call it is hanging RIGHT in his face and in effect he kills the giant by hacking at it over and over again. Good example of mods interacting in whats not previously expected.
Pixelated textured wang BAD
17/06/2009 at 23:39 undead dolphin hacker says:
Morrowind (vanilla) was crap from release up until just before its last expansion. After both expansions and all the intermittent patches it became a nice RPG but remained a rather bad game.
Oblivion (vanilla) was fun at release. Knights of the Nine was vapid and Shivering Isles had potential but ultimately unsatisfying. Something about it felt like Bethesda was pulling its punches… probably because it had to keep the Teen rating.
Oblivion was a worse RPG but a vastly better game than Morrowind. I never installed a single mod for Oblivion and enjoyed it.
Every year or so I install Morrowind and search out dozens of mods to make the game part better. No matter what I do, within an hour I’ve uninstalled and shelved it again. Wikipedia NPCs, colorschemes taken right out of Quake, bizarre unresponsive combat, and the absolutely terribad decision to have literally every player action in the game have something to do with Fatigue and Luck. Arguably the whole Fatigue fiasco is the worst thing about Morrowind and the major source of all my hate for it.
And the environment design sucks. Giant gray-green mushrooms? Giant gray crab shells? Giant gray-brown trees? Man, that’s alien alright! Alice in Grayscale Crustacean Wonderland.
So yeah sinister agent, I agree that Morrowind is utter crap. I can’t say the same about Oblivion, though I will say I think it’s overrated (though not nearly as embarrassingly as Morrowind is).
17/06/2009 at 23:40 The Apologist says:
The diary sounds officially like fun. Yay!
17/06/2009 at 23:41 Chis says:
Not enough love for The Underground here!
17/06/2009 at 23:45 Dr Gonzo says:
You sir, are a fool. But I believe this argument has been done a few times too many on the internets.
17/06/2009 at 23:46 Dr Gonzo says:
argh edit! I meant @undeaddolphin hacker
18/06/2009 at 00:03 Unlucky Irish says:
@undead dolphin hacker: Could you explain what you mean when you say it was a good “RPG” but a bad “Game”? I just find the statement a bit strange as RPG, of course, stands for Role Playing GAME. Thus a good RPG must be a good game an your distinction between the two is a tad redundant. It’s like saying “It was a good Horror movie but a bad film”, which just doesn’t make any sense.
Perhaps what you were trying to say was that you found the Role Playing mechanics of the game solid but that they got in the way of your enjoyment of the game? Not trolling, just wanted to clarify.
18/06/2009 at 00:07 Moonracer says:
I’m a big fan of the mods (I’m sure there are more than one) which make cliff racers passive beasts. This makes it so they don’t attack you constantly, but you still see creatures in the sky and can always hunt them with a crossbow if you need their parts for alchemy.
18/06/2009 at 00:29 malkav11 says:
I never modded Morrowind except for a tiny mod of my own design to make the scamp merchant (or whatever species of daedra that was) have a lot more money. Otherwise it was an enormous pain in the rear selling high end loot. I still had hundreds of hours of fun with it and never once felt it needed modding to be better. Oblivion has some very nice improvements, particularly with the engine, but be darned if it wasn’t less fun even with a slew of mods fixing most of the poor design decisions.
These days I confess to being curious how well a modded-to-the-gills Morrowind would play, but I have never had any idea what to add. I might go with the Something Awful modpack, but I’m usually leery of great big compilations like that because my experience is that mods are not always respectful of the existing experience and I don’t know what all the modpack creator liked.
In particular, I have my serious doubts about quest mods. I’ve tried a few for Oblivion and…-shudders, unable to speak-
18/06/2009 at 00:41 jarvoll says:
I, too, bought Morrowind based on love for (modded, of course) Oblivion. I went through the tutorial, picked up a few quests, and… got pwned by a little rat. I swung and swung at that bloody thing with my short sword, thinking myself protected by my medium armour, but I was not, apparently. A check on the interwebs confirmed that it wan not just me: the combat system is mega-janky. Though I still have the game, I have not since returned to Vvardenfell.
Still, who knows? Perhaps this diary will convince me to give it another go.
Yes, the tying-the-world’s-level-to-your-character’s-level was STUPID for Oblivion; seemed like an Invisible-War-like dumbing down for console morons. Luckily, that (and almost everything else) is summarily fixed by a few of the 160 mods I currently have installed. I really love Bethesda for making games that, though pretty bad out of the box, at least have the spirit right, and can be modded to be AMAZING open-world experiences. I bought Fallout 3 on day 1 not because I have any particular love for FO1 or 2, but because I anticipated another Morroblivion. Turned out it was actually heaps better out of the box…. pleasant surprise.
18/06/2009 at 00:48 Serondal says:
I personally really REALLY REALLY LOVED Shivering Isles expansion pack. I was a little let down by the end but more so because it was over and not becasue it was bad, though I did kill the end boss in 3 hits O.o which was kind of lame.
I got a lot of play out of Giskard’s quest mods and also had a mod that made the Wizard’s keep have a dragon landing pad for my . . . dragon mod which gave me a F@##@ dragon to fly around on . . . Oblivion is awesome.
18/06/2009 at 00:53 dan says:
Love Morrowind so much. When I got it I played so hard it was unbelievable.
I had about four houses, all stuffed to the gills with swords, spears, armour, books, potions, and jewels. I had so many things that I lost Azura’s Star soul gem. Seriously, put it down somewhere and then forgot where it was.
Bethesda really ought to have remade Morrowind instead of Oblivion, but included horsies. I didn’t enjoy the levelling in Oblivion. I never felt as if I was any stronger. The Morrowind levelling though, that was aces. “Use a sword? Wow you’re better at it!” straight away.
One thing I didn’t like about either is that if a beastie spots you they keep on following you FOREVER. It was annoying in Morrowind with the Cliff Racers, but horrible in Oblivion when nearly everything that chased you would end up slaughtering you or your horse.
18/06/2009 at 00:59 Aorawn says:
Do NOT use, Giants, it emphasizes quanitity over quality. Many of the models are uglier and more unattractive than those found in the original game, if you can believe it. Creatures is a much better alternative, search for it on PES.
18/06/2009 at 01:14 grum says:
If I purchase this game from Steam (as it is available in the GOTY edition for a cheap price), will I be able to install all of these mods?
18/06/2009 at 01:15 paganite says:
Daggerfall was better than Morrowind or Oblivion.
Every Eldar Scrolls game Bethesda makes is one step back from the greatness that was Daggerfall.
Nothing compares to getting near the bottom of a dungeon and realising that the disease you contracted will kill you before you can get out of the dungeon and find a healer.
THE AGONY!
18/06/2009 at 01:24 Martin K says:
Daggerfall. Oh, God. I remember now. I remember it all. So that’s where my childhood went. Dawn to dusk, day in, day out, spent playing fucking Daggerfall.
18/06/2009 at 01:51 Rinox says:
So that’s where my childhood went.
Into one of Daggerfall’s endless randomly generated dungeons? ;-) Man, I felt like a God once I mastered the teleport spell…without that, you could quite literally die in a dungeon because you couldn’t find a way out anymore.
Daggerfall was so ambitious, perhaps a little bit too much for its time. But what an eye-opener it was, being able to loan from banks, deal in real estate, travel around several provinces, etc etc. One of the more impressive things about it was that it didn’t hold your hand.
At the Mages’ Guild of a big city there was a daedra summoner who would, at a price, summon a Daedra Prince provided you had rank with the guild and were summoning on the right date. Thing is, no one would tell you these dates. You had to go to the guild’s library or buy the book in a store and read up on the correct dates (which was a good idea since summoning cost a lot of money and could get you into trouble if performed on the wrong day).
Or how you would ‘wake up’ in a dungeon on a marble slab after succumbing to vampirism, having lost all your guild affiliations and rep. Loved the haunted dreams vid of the girl crying tears of blood too, which you’d see once you contracted the disease.
Anyway, I’ll stop now. Sleep defeats nostalgia.
18/06/2009 at 02:05 Taillefer says:
The dungeons in Daggerfall became too much for me in the end. I came close, but never did get through the main quest.
My character eventually became a vampire. Utterly powerful, but no longer able to travel during the day. So I’d always arrive in towns at night, with all the shops closed. And had fun climbing on the buildings and leaping from roof to roof, using the awesome roof-apex-super-jump-bug.
@Chis
Thanks for the link to The Underground. Sounds intriguing.
18/06/2009 at 02:21 Kinsley says:
This will be good. Morrowind is one of my favourite games, and I know it inside out.
I have one suggestion. The Bloodmoon and Tribunal addons interfere with the original game in ways that are a total pain in the bum (assassins attack you while you’re trying to sleep, and the only thing anyone wants to talk about is catching a boat in Khuul that will take you to Solstheim). I disable those two addons until I actually want to play them. But better heads and better bodies are definitely worth having, right from the start.
18/06/2009 at 02:24 Breaker Morant's ghost says:
Does anyone have a non-SA link for the Merged Mega Modpack? I’d love to play Morrowind again, but the thought of tracking down and installing a bunch of individual mods that may or may not conflict and then messing around with load orders etc makes me want to forget the whole thing (I’ve wasted too many hours of my life doing that exact thing in the past).
18/06/2009 at 02:26 Wisq says:
I loved the insanity of the alchemy exploit in Morrowind. Briefly:
1. Smart people make better potions.
2. Potions can make you smarter.
3. Go to step 1.
Before you know it, you’re an insane superhuman who can do just about anything, anywhere, anytime. It’s effectively a cheat without the cheat code.
It’s also a bit annoying, because it’s a perfectly logical application of the abilities the game gives you, yet you really shouldn’t do it because it’s so totally game-breaking. The only illogic is why nobody in the fictional world has discovered this and started a potions arms race. ;)
18/06/2009 at 02:45 Matzerath says:
I would also suggest doing an article about the Morrowind mod community in general — this would be at least as long, epic, and terrifying a journey as playing the game itself.
I mean REALLY. Someone made a mod where you can get it on with any of the NPC characters (long as you’re smooth enough), impregnate the female ones (visible pregnancy) and eventually HAVE A CHILD with them! Good God! Sheer fetishy creepiness aside, that’s quite a technical achievement to add pregnancy to a game! And did I mention creepy?
18/06/2009 at 03:03 Eschatos says:
Nice, I stopped playing at around level 10 after I got tired of the precise leveling needed to get a good character.
18/06/2009 at 03:04 Jazmeister says:
I liked Oblivion.
I liked Morrowind.
I liked Invisible War.
18/06/2009 at 03:17 undead dolphin hacker says:
Ok.
Sure.
Everything was set up for Morrowind to be super duper. On paper it looks great.
Wandering around aimlessly can be great. Designing a character can be great. Imagining a role, whether it’s your character’s motivations, the guilds/houses you choose to join, or just his/her combat style is great.
I guess the best way of putting this is, the Morrowind strategy guide is an incredible read. You get to see the intricate detail of the world. You get to see the guild setups, the politicking, the storyline. You get to see how the game won’t stop you from breaking the main storyline, and how, hidden in some miserable cave, you can fix it again.
But eventually it’s time to play the thing. And, unmodded, you quickly learn a few things:
-Your character idea is pointless because everyone eventually melts into a jack-2of-all-trades, unless you’re extremely careful. Plus you can join multiple guilds and be guild master of them all, so outside of the Houses, your character can only be unique by you as a player restricting yourself.
-For every cool dungeon there are twenty-five pointless three-room tombs with a skeleton and a ghost and some randomized loot, or caves with some kwamas and a rat, or underwater grottos with three slaughterfish. This does not add character or verisimilitude to the world. It makes it seem artificial and tiny. “Look, a secret grotto ten meters from the hidden tomb I just explored! And there’s a mysterious cave on that cliff over there!”
-Certain fundamentals of the game are anti-fun. Fatigue is the main culprit. The terrible journal is another.
-The world is full of pointless NPCs that all have literally the exact same thing to say as everyone else in their region. This doesn’t make the world feel alive. It makes it feel fake.
-Sooner or later you’re going to end up breaking the game, for better or for worse and whether you intend to or not. Typically if you’re not intending to, you’re gimping your character without even realizing it and will have a rough time of it later.
Essentially, if you “play” Morrowind as a world, and not a game, I can see where it’d be enjoyable. If you’re one of those people that has 20 days /played in World of Warcraft and are only level 44, then Morrowind’s your game.
Once the aimless wandering period comes to and end and you as a player decide to do quests or actually formulate a solid goal, the seams begin to show, and sooner or later they rip right out.
Morrowind is a great RPG because if you “play” it from your character’s perspective it turns into an immersive, rewarding experience.
Morrowind is a bad game because if you “play” it from your own perspective, you instantly see how fake everything is, how broken the mechanics are, how un-fun combat is, and how miserable attempting to actually follow a plot thread can be.
18/06/2009 at 03:37 TCM says:
@udh:
Yeah, sounds about right to me.
I definitely enjoyed Morrowind before I realized that I was creating stories and characters that were utterly self-pleasing and self-serving in nature, as it was impossible to share the experience with anyone else (bar posting LPs and such, something I’ve always detested, and never been able to do with any skill), and difficult to enjoy as a game for the same reason I find MMOs to be difficult to enjoy. Oblivion’s a lot more fun and relaxing to play, even if the “roleplay” elements aren’t as strong. As for my Roleplay fix…That’s what the magic of the internet is for.
18/06/2009 at 04:03 Antistar says:
@Alec Meer:
I’m very excited to see what your time in Morrowind will be like. A few (hopefully) helpful things:
Morrowind 2009
Morrowind 2009 is an excellent and popular guide to a kind of ‘baseline’ prettified version of the game, including some info on the Morrowind Graphics Extender, which I also can’t recommend enough for the infinite view distance, widescreen, possibility of bloom and HDR, etc.
You CAN see your character’s face again in the game. The key you have bound to toggle between first and third person? Hold it down and move the mouse to rotate the camera around your character. Combined with the ‘tm’ console command to toggle the HUD on and off (‘tm’ for ‘toggle menus’), this works well for taking screenshots.
Just putting this out there; I almost wasn’t going to link this, but what the hell… There are a lot of Morrowind journals out there. I actually wrote one myself a while back – though it leans strongly towards serial fiction:
Frost in Morrowind
Yep. Morrowind fan-fiction. I am a huge dork.
18/06/2009 at 04:26 Jonathan says:
Kinsley, that’s a great point about the missions getting dorked at the beginning of the game. It’s a good word of warning to people starting the GOTY edition: just follow the basic game path for a few hours, until you meet your contact Caius. If you go exploring too far you’ll trigger events that you can’t handle. I somehow triggered the Assassin attack right at the start of the game, when I had no health or skill. It was awful, and the only way I was able to finish was by glitching the assassins in stuck points in the environment. And yeah, people constantly prodding you to go to Solstheim was a glitch too, considering all the enemies on the island are leveled based on your character finishing the main quest. Does anyone remember the stupid fistfight with Glass Thor (whatever his name was) on Solstheim? You had to beat the guy to progress, but you had to have hand-to-hand combat up to 50 or something stupid to knock him down. WHo the hell went through the game fighting enemies bare-handed? I remember spending like two hours spamming hand combat just to pass that part. That has to be one of the worst moments ever in game scripting.
Really the best way to play Morrowind is to get the regular edition, and pick up the separate Bloodmoon expansion to play after completing the main quest. Tribunal was skippable garbage.
And MGE rocks, but it basically doubles (or triples) the hardware requirements.
18/06/2009 at 05:04 Hank says:
Imagine staying up 44 hours straight, playing Morrowind for about 2/3 of the time, in part because you’re hooked on min/maxing your character. That was me, and I found a way to work around it:
Galsiah’s Character Development 1.08 (linked here at Telesphoros’ List o’Mods: http://www.mwmythicmods.com/telesphoros.htm#6)
GCD takes leveling out of your hands, so you can enjoy wandering, fighting, stealing, alchemicalizing, etc. all without thinking about when you should stop swinging that axe and switch to a dagger. Now I don’t have to keep a notepad on the desk.
18/06/2009 at 05:16 Antistar says:
Oh, also – briefly on the Morrowind vs Oblivion thing (sorry, but I think this is interesting):
I was fortunate enough to attend the Game Developer’s Conference in San Francisco last year, and while there I sat in on a talk by Ken Rolston (Lead Designer on Morrowind and Oblivion) and Mark Nelson (Senior Designer on Morrowind and Oblivion, Lead Designer on Shivering Isles). They touched on this, saying that they thought going with the generic fantasy setting in Oblivion (as opposed to the more interesting ‘alien’ setting in Morrowind) had been the right decision, since Oblivion sold more copies than Morrowind. However – at the same time, artistically they hated themselves for it.
So there you go; (paraphrased) from the horse’s mouth, and all that.
18/06/2009 at 05:34 Jonathan says:
“They touched on this, saying that they thought going with the generic fantasy setting in Oblivion (as opposed to the more interesting ‘alien’ setting in Morrowind) had been the right decision, since Oblivion sold more copies than Morrowind.”
Well that’s sad. I wonder if they considered that Oblivion sold better because people were remembering Morrowind, and expected that from Oblivion? Or that the 360 ran Oblivion so much better than the Xbox ran Morrowind, and Morrowind wasn’t available on PS2? By their logic each successive version of TES will be more generic and bland and will sell better and better…I hope they realize trends don’t continue indefinitely.
18/06/2009 at 05:35 Martin K says:
@Rinox: I was…*does some basic arithmetic*…Holy Jesus, I was something like eight or nine when I got my hands on Daggerfall, in late ’96 or early ’97, and I’m pretty sure everything between then and age ten was occupied by my becoming inordinately, (vaguely creepily) obsessed with and attached to my characters, personalising them extensively and mourning their subsequent, sometimes tragicomic, often horrible deaths.
From memory, a great many of them died horrible deaths, although I did once nearly complete the main quest with a bad-ass Assassin who lost all his guild status on being turned into a vampire (not that I cared, I thought being turned into a vampire was so damn cool).
I also thought the character generator was brilliance incarnate, and in retrospect (considering the number of character-deaths involved), Daggerfall was my NetHack, since I never managed to get into ASCII games successfully (thus, Roguelikes were off-limits through sheer disdain).
It wasn’t strictly procedural, from memory, but there was a fair element of randomisation that sufficed when it came to achieving an equivalent air of living in a personalised universe. Ambition, baby, Bethesda was doing it right, even in ’96.
Daggerfall, a short lull, and then Deus Ex. Christ. I woke up sometime in 2003 and discovered I was 15, and wept.
A tangent: I sometimes wonder if the attention span of a child, when it comes to video games, is actually only capable of being either:
A) Mind-bogglingly short.
OR
B) Nigh-eternal.
Either you throw the controller/keyboard/virtual reality headset down in disgust within four minutes, or you forget to eat or sleep or come out of your room and your parents, in turn, forget they ever had a child, since it’s been six months since they last saw your scrawny bowl-cut-adorned hide out in the open.
18/06/2009 at 05:40 amesace says:
arrrrgh, i just got oblivion on steam but i didn’t see the deluxe edition with all the DLC. even if it’s mostly rubbish, it’s 3 dollars extra and not having it is killing me!
18/06/2009 at 05:57 psyk says:
No children because you could kill them if you wanted and thats bad apparently. fallout 2 was the worst damn invisible kids stealing my stuff thank god for the patch that put them in.
18/06/2009 at 08:01 Lars Westergren says:
I second the comments by Rei and others that while some mods that include more critters make for a more varied gaming experience, they also removed some of the unique flavor of the game.
The original Morrowind critters felt integrated in the world and it’s ecology. Even small animals had lots or lore around them… appearing the children’s tales, in history books, in texts of religious sermons, etc. The dark elves had societies named after them, and items made from their teeth and bones, and even houses constructed from giant shells, and so on.
But then some of the mods just plopped generic D&D style dragons in there, with no history and explanation other than “Kill them and get their treasure hoards”. Fresh.
18/06/2009 at 09:45 Craymen Edge says:
Is there a good mod for the conversation system in Morrowind?
I don’t think I could ever go back and use that existing one again, where every NPC has the reams and reams of the same pointless text and converation topics that you have to try and find the pertinent ones from.
18/06/2009 at 09:54 Rinox says:
@ Martin K
Don’t weep over all those hours man – see it as the formative years. ;-) And yeah, those differences in attention span between then and now are pretty much enormous. If I had Fallout 3 when I was a kid, I would have literally played the disk to death. Sure of that. Which is pretty much what I did with the first Fallouts, anyway.
I hear ya on creating the most insane/cool and, thanks to the ungodly character creation, unique characters. One of my favorite characters was a completely useless character with all sorts of critical weaknesses and forbidden weapons/clothing, but he had one thing going for him: his luck was maxed out. He’d catch these insanse lucky breaks of finding a daedric daikatana on some random street thug’s corpse, or opening the lock of the finest armor shop of the Daggerfall capital with a non-existing lockpicking skill.
Oh and being a vampire was pretty cool indeed. Did you know that you could glitch yourself back to the top of any guild or temple after losing your affiliations in vampire death? Because the game reset your ranks with the guild but not your ‘rep’, you could just re-join a guild, perform a task/quest, travel for two weeks, come back in and get immediately promoted. Rinse and repeat all the way to Archmage, Patriarch or Spymaster.
‘Twas a good thing, because I hated loitering outside the guilds until they opened in the morning. As Archmage you could come and go when you went, heh.
18/06/2009 at 10:39 Spenot says:
Don’t use Giants, it’s one of the worst mods. Sure, at first it looks good, as it introduces a huge amount of likeable creatures, but in reality, most of them are very poorly done. There are better mods, although their names don’t spring to mind right now. Giants also completely destroyed one of my playthroughs, as I entered a cave filled with liches, who drained all my strength away (it went into negative), leaving me standing still, without being able to move, even without all my items. There was something bugged about an earlier save, so I couldn’t reload either.
18/06/2009 at 11:04 Melf_Himself says:
I agree completely with undead dolphin hacker. I dropped Morrowind after maybe 6 hours play…. I like me my RPG’s, but I much prefer gameplay factors over immersion factors.
18/06/2009 at 11:07 Cathartis says:
I still play, mod for and love Morrowind, much more than I did with Oblivion. The atmosphere of the world felt really beautiful, unique and alien compared to Oblivion, which was boring fantasy generica.
I always played as a magic-user because of how liberating many of the spells made travelling around the islands. Being able to fly with levitate, walk on water and teleport at will to the closest temple, imperial cult shrine or to a previously marked location made travel around Vvardenfell much more quick and painless.
The only mods I bother with are the various unofficial patch mods, better bodies and Tamriel Rebuilt… I dislike having anything that messes with the (very deep and awesome) lore of the gameworld.
18/06/2009 at 12:03 juv3nal says:
Is there a good mod for the conversation system in Morrowind?
LGNPC is a conversation overhaul project. I don’t know how complete it is or if the quality holds up, but the one that inspired all the rest (Seyda Neen, by a different modder) is excellent.
18/06/2009 at 12:27 dan says:
Regarding Children in Morrowind, there is at least one mod I’ve read about that adds them. 330 of them apparently.
I’m so tempted to reinstall it, but to start a new quest, or find my old “beaten-everything-and-all-powerful” saves?
18/06/2009 at 12:59 Andy says:
I wonder, whats the difference between “Morrowind Visual Pack” and “Morrowind Graphics Extender”? Can I use them both at once?
18/06/2009 at 13:05 Corbain says:
Please for the love of god, read through this rtuly excellent modding guide to bring Morrowind into 2009 kicking and screaming.
It’s a crystal clear thorugh description of how to take vanilla Morrowind and turn it into something altogether more fantastic. Well illustrated with screenshots, and lots of handy tips for extra mods, all linked to download sources.
http://morrowind2009.wordpress.com/
18/06/2009 at 13:35 Ninja Dodo says:
It would appear the Graphics Extender does not work with the Steam version of Morrowind. I’ve had it work fine with the CD version in the past.
18/06/2009 at 14:44 dhex says:
it pains me greatly that for years now i’ve been unable to get daggerfall to run with any stability within win xp.
18/06/2009 at 15:02 Spenot says:
@ dhex: Have you tried reading up on it? I seem to remember that at one point I found a patch to make it work under XP, but I can’t recall where.
But here are a few guides that may be helpful:
http://www.bethsoft.com/bgsforums/index.php?showtopic=479044
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Daggerfall:Running_under_Windows
You could even try setting up a virtual machine for it.
18/06/2009 at 15:17 oceanclub says:
“It’s a crystal clear thorugh description of how to take vanilla Morrowind and turn it into something altogether more fantastic. Well illustrated with screenshots, and lots of handy tips for extra mods, all linked to download sources. ”
He says the guide is not for use with ATI cards – does that mean the main points will still work, but ATI card owners need to figure out the exact steps, or that the various mods he recommends are not compatible with ATI cards?
P.
18/06/2009 at 16:05 dhex says:
spenot: yeah, that first link you posted almost gets me out of the starting dungeon.
almost.
it’s just a very crashtastic experience under dosbox, sadly.
18/06/2009 at 17:23 EvaUnit02 says:
If I purchase this game from Steam (as it is available in the GOTY edition for a cheap price), will I be able to install all of these mods?
The pundits on the steampowered.com forum seem to reckon that a lot of mods don’t work with the Steam release.
http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=898428
http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=897879
18/06/2009 at 18:52 Bioptic says:
If anyone still wants a moddable Morrowind GOTY cheaper than the Steam price, Amazon to the rescue!
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Morrowind-Elder-Scrolls-Game-Year/dp/B0000WZQDE/
18/06/2009 at 18:58 Ninja Dodo says:
Something of a correction to my previous comment: I can get an older version (303) of the Graphics Extender to work on the Steam version, but custom shaders seem to have problems. All the HDRI and bloom effects I’ve tried just show a washed out white screen.
Realsignpost gives an error on loading but seems to otherwise work fine (if you pick “Yes, continue”).
No problems with other mods so far (BookJackets, Better Heads/Bodies, The Lighting Mod, plugin manager)
18/06/2009 at 19:39 sinister agent says:
It’s interesting hearing people criticise Oblivion for being generic fantasy stuff. It’s true, but the key thing is, it’s generic fantasy stuff, but with good controls, lots to do, some fun items and sometimes good combat. That immediately elevates it above the other ninety billion RPGs that are generic fantasy stuff with horrible everything.
Almost every RPG I’ve ever played is a horrible unplayable mess AND utterly generic tolkien-ripping crap. Obliv and Morrowind are just exceptions to each one respectively. Given the choice, I prefer Obliv’s playable generic guff to Morrowind’s original, but unplayable guff. However, I think a good diary of a game would suit Morrowind far more than Obliv simply because the game world is more interesting.
18/06/2009 at 20:05 Uglycat says:
Don’t forget the official plugins:
http://www.elderscrolls.com/downloads/updates_plugins.htm
18/06/2009 at 20:46 Tei says:
I have tried to build a “morrowind 2009″, but is way hard, and I only have the cd’s for morrowind and tribunal, bloodmoon is nowhere, damn cd’s. Installing and uninstalling mods is a pain, even these that are just a single file, … probably something to do once, and not touch again to avoid breaking it. And what make really angry the game, is to remove mods, the savegames end on a half-broken state. Also all these enhancements (like best bodies) seems uncompatible with my spanish unofficial total traduction. Ugh. I think I stay with my basic and ugly old morrowind :-/
tl:dr version:
man, this thing is hard.
18/06/2009 at 22:56 MetalCircus says:
Cannot wait for this diary. And you’ve also made me want to play this game again. I know what i’m going to do after my last exam tomorrow. MORROWIND!
18/06/2009 at 23:01 Serondal says:
I really think Beth could make a ton of quick cash but upgarding Morrowind to play in Oblivion. Everything they need is already there. The story the scripts ect everything is the same in the world builder it wouldn’t take THAT long to make morrowind’s world to work in Oblivion compared to making a totally new game. I think a lot of people would like to be able to visit Morrowind FROM Oblivion’s main world.
It wouldn’t even have to have the quests from the origonal game, just be visitable and maybe have some of the generic side quests to complete or maybe even totally new quests for the hero from Oblivion to complete that are related to the character from Morrowind leaving. Release it as an expansion to Oblivon and boom tons of money to turn around and make TES V :P
18/06/2009 at 23:24 drewski says:
I know Bethesda get a lot of hate around here, and they can’t animate to save their lives (playing Fallout 3 and switched to 3rd person to admire some new armour and nearly lost my shit when I started sidestepping) but every single RPG they’ve ever made has had something good about it.
Daggerfall was the first truly epic RPG world, IMO. The randomly generated dungeons and giant empire to explore might not have been for everyone I suppose but they worked for me. Then Morrowind, which was the game that made me go “yep, I’m living in the future and it’s pretty damn cool” and with mods is still my favourite non-Torment RPG ever. Oblivion’s a great game, although RPG-lite in many ways, but the Dark Brotherhood quests are as good as any I’ve played.
And then Fallout 3, which is just grand. Level caps, though. Grr.
Looking forward to this diary loads – so many memories of Morrowind, will be fascinating to see what Alec gets up to that I didn’t.
18/06/2009 at 23:30 Serondal says:
Doesn’t forget Red guard a very good action RPG which Morrowind’s engine is based off of.
18/06/2009 at 23:31 Serondal says:
Er, don’t O.o Jesus I’m tired. I can’t wait for father’s day! I get treated better on father’s day then I do on Christmas.
19/06/2009 at 02:42 Kinsley says:
I’m a bit surprised by the people who found this a hard game to play. Aside from general bugginess, it’s easy enough if you get off to a good start. Some tips:
1) That trade house place you start the game in — apart from the first room, it’s completely empty. Rob those suckers blind and sell the loot in town. Not only will that get you enough money to get you some kit, it will also get you your first weapon (a dagger) and your first lock-pick.
2) Do some levelling up before you start in earnest. You can just hang out in the swamp around Seyda Neyn for a bit — there’s plenty of low level beasties to kill (mudcrabs, kwamas, slaughterfish) and a couple of missions you can stumble across. When I’m starting a new character, I get to level 2 before I head off to Balmora.
3) Forget about min-maxing and all that crap about smart levelling. By the time you get to level 20, you’ll be powerful enough to do anything, regardless of how you got there.
4) Keep away from Red Mountain and out of caverns at the start of the game. You’re not yet powerful enough to deal what you’ll find there. If you go someplace where you’re being instantly cut down by the baddies, instead of getting all frustrated and stuff, just leave and come back later when you’ve levelled up a bit.
5) Keep out of tombs until you’ve got silver or magic weapons. Ordinary weapons will just pass straight through the ghosts.
There’s a ton of things you can exploit as well, but those are best discovered on your own.
19/06/2009 at 04:40 malkav11 says:
The problem with Daggerfall, as far as I’m concerned, is that while it had a few good ideas that were jettisoned in later Elder Scrolls games (character creation, for example), and certainly grand ambition, the incredibly cookie-cutter random generation of the world meant that it was entirely soulless and bland. There may have been many many miles of game world to explore, but there was no reason whatsoever to explore it. And little game balance, either – the random generation didn’t really seem to care if you could handle things.
Morrowind is less sprawling (though still huge), but it rewards every side trip, every poke through the bushes, or seems like it does anyway. Oblivion was a step back in that regard, along with others.
I hope Shivering Isles represents the future trend of Elder Scrolls titles better than Oblivion’s Cyrodiil.
19/06/2009 at 05:10 JDC says:
I logged hundreds of hours in Morrowind, going so far as to reclaim and furnish the old Dwemer ruins in the volcanic caldera on Dagon Fel (the ones occupied by the strangely high-level band of orcs). One mod gave me a furniture store in Balmora; another provided various hire-able, upgradable vendors who I had to escort there through a dozen monotonous boat rides and clipping errors. It was worth it to have a SECRET VOLCANO LAIR with all the amenities of a city. What else was I going to do with all that gold?
I’m going to agree with everyone so far who says that GIANTS is a terrible mod. The monsters it adds are tremendously overlevelled and water down the game’s interesting cosmology (so rare in fantasy games!) with generic fantasy tripe and models ripped from games with different art styles.
19/06/2009 at 05:11 JDC says:
Seriously, man, don’t use Giants.
19/06/2009 at 06:22 yxxxx says:
If your into your game diarys you may want to check this website out
http://www.sekritforum.com/storybook/
19/06/2009 at 06:47 solipsistnation says:
Oh hey. There’s a mod so you can play Ludo in Morrowind.
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Mods.Detail&id=7575
How exciting.
19/06/2009 at 07:31 Rinox says:
Ludo in Morrowind?! There is no
GodVivec.19/06/2009 at 07:37 DoomMunky says:
Holy crap, I just reinstalled Morrowind for the first time in 4 years and MANOMAN is it a trip to come back! I’m really looking forward to this diary, Mr. Meer!
19/06/2009 at 07:54 Count Zero says:
What I loved most about Morrowind was the lore of the game, with the books and all the detail that was put into building the world. The best parts of it felt alien, from the architecture to the monsters and the overall design of the world. What I want to get at, if you use mods that add monsters and things (like Giants, Wilderness, etc) you will make the game a lot less interesting, and definitely loose some of what made it unique in the first place. Meeting a dragon would make for a fun diary entry for us to read, but you would be playing something else, not Morrowind…
19/06/2009 at 11:45 Tei says:
Is shocking how litte information, articles, etc.. are made about Morrowind. It seems people only talk about morrowind in Oblivium threads (we know that discussion, and how boring is). Is like Oblivium is a popular sport (like soccer), so TV dedicated half the programation to it. While Morrowind is something like a secret book that only a small handful of people has red, and rarely comment about it.
19/06/2009 at 14:09 RobertM80 says:
I think Morrowind is a bit of a puzzler, if you pick the game up now knowing what to expect and don’t have the patience to figure it out, you might throw the game down in defiance and say “No! Bad game! Bad!”. But spend some time in it and peel back the layers and you see despite the tragic combat in the game, its got a lot going for it and the mods just add to it. I recently found a mod that made the second city you visit, Balmora, into a HUGE city rather than the small city your used to. Whilst not adding anything plotwise, it just makes the city seem more important and more alive.
I think the reason people love Morrowind so much is that modding behind it, people take what Bethesda created and expand on it, correct what they feel are errors and make the whole greater than the sum of it parts.
19/06/2009 at 15:33 Eddie says:
Oh wow, this brings me back to the days of the dreaded Fargoth, heh, heh. I have wanted to go back and play Morrowind for a while with all the visual enhancing mods and Combat Enhanced. A mod that introduces bloody combat and combos that I “remember” being superior to Oblivion’s combat. I’m definitely going to check in later and see how this goes Alec!
19/06/2009 at 16:11 Joe says:
Looking forward to this! But please go easy on the mods. Monster mods are unnecessary, and they’re generally intended for high-level characters who won’t find the vanilla monsters challenging. However, if you’re playing a magic user or other unarmoured character, you might want some of these:
http://www.xs4all.nl/~dleijen/morrowind.html
20/06/2009 at 01:29 malkav11 says:
I’m sure mods can enhance the Morrowind experience immeasurably, and yet I for one don’t love it because of the mods – I never used any when I played the game – I love it because it’s an awesome feat of world construction.
20/06/2009 at 09:58 Kommissar Nicko says:
It’s probably been said, but really,
“Why walk when you can ride, outlander?”
20/06/2009 at 18:07 Demon Beaver says:
Hey Alec,
IIRC you’re running Windows 7. Are you playing Morrowind on it? Cause for me it started hitching like mad ever since installing it on that OS…
Looking forward to the gaming diary, I think I know this game by heart, enjoyment is assured!
22/06/2009 at 07:00 Kinsley says:
“Kinsley, that’s a great point about the missions getting dorked at the beginning of the game. It’s a good word of warning to people starting the GOTY edition: just follow the basic game path for a few hours, until you meet your contact Caius. If you go exploring too far you’ll trigger events that you can’t handle. I somehow triggered the Assassin attack right at the start of the game, when I had no health or skill.”
The assassin attacking you in the night is the introduction to the Tribunal expansion. What sucks way more than getting killed is the way those guys completely break the game balance. When you reload and kill the guy, you discover he’s wearing a lot of expensive armour that’s better than anything else you can find early in the game.
The next time an assassin turns up, you’ll greet him with open arms, like a sudden windfall in the night. Pretty soon, you’ll be a low level character with 10s of thousands of gold pieces, and all the merchants in Vvardenfell kind of look a bit like assassins. That’s the point where you say, “this blows donkeys” and delete your save game.
So yeah, deactivate Tribunal and Bloodmoon until you actually want to play them.
22/06/2009 at 18:34 Jujo says:
http://www.hiredgoons.net/MWFiles/IlluminatedOrder/index2.htm
Is one of my personal favorite mods: They do a great job of adding to the lore, the quests are fun (though the rewards can be a bit overbalanced) and there’s some fun tricks they do that I’d prefer to see again.
Plus, you know, you can become a lich.
26/06/2009 at 03:13 Gus, the lovable chimney-sweep says:
“So yeah, deactivate Tribunal and Bloodmoon until you actually want to play them.”
Do you need either of those enabled to run Morrowind Graphics Extender?
06/07/2009 at 19:39 Steam_Rules says:
Fuck. Yes. I must have GOTY.
26/07/2009 at 23:53 Wildstar says:
Thanks for the suggestions. I’ve been playing Fallout 3 this year. I played Oblivion during 2006. I haven’t played Morrowind since 2003…I’ve been curious to try it again, so I installed the game along with your suggested mods. It’s a completely better game from what I remember, which is quite a feat. Bethesda and people who play the games have much to thank for the modding community.
06/02/2010 at 21:06 Liz aka Arnie McFigface says:
I have Windows 7 and am level 65 in Morrowind. I just smashed the heart and am ready to start playing Tribunal. However, I cannot get an assassin to appear. I’ve slept around a lot but cannot get him to appear. I’ve gotten tons of scribs to appear, enough to start a scrib zoo with, but no assassins. I’m wondering if there is a glitch with Windows 7 that is stopping me from getting an assassin to appear. (There was another glitch that kept causing the alchemy process not to work and my AldRuhn silt strider host vanished about 10 levels ago, so wondering if this is another glitch.) Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!