Alright, in like, 3 different threads we've been talking about this series, and to be honest, it's getting hard to catch up. Please direct all TES love and hate to this thread.
Please?
Personally, I really enjoy Morrowind, because I like the fact that it's not levelled and even with a base damage you can hit for zero damage, which is realistic to real life.. of course.. there are many things about the game which aren't realistic.
I never got the chance to play Daggerfall and am quite interested in it.
I detest Oblivion, levelled enemies and loot is a curse. Also, by coincidence I find that many girls enjoy Oblivion and do not like Morrowind, where for males, if it is a decision between the two, typically they will pick Morrowind.
Anyway, I have brought many topics to the table, now please discuss!

I played TES1:Arena, way back when, and it still has some charm for me. In the first dungeon it is even possible to find amazing magical artifacts and so on, but it is really just a dungeon-crawler. However, the game was made with this in mind, so it works well.
In the second, Daggerfall, they made many advancements, and added a proper plot! It is truly an exceptional game, very "sandbox" if thats the word people use these days! ;)
By Morrowind, they had reduced the depth and variety somewhat, but gave us new 3D graphics, so I still reckon they did a respectable job, despite changing some of the lore to fit in the new story and so on.
Oblivion however, they made almost no forward steps, and a lot of backward steps. They have their reasons, and their reasons have made them plenty of money, but several things about it make me long for a return to what they did before.

I got into the series with Morrowind and spent an absolutely ridiculous amount of time playing that game during my college undergrad years. Like many I was fairly disappointed with how Oblivion turned out; I made it through the game once, but even with lots of mods it simply isn't able to hold my interest.
Although I'd like to go back and play Daggerfall at some point I currently don't really feel like shelling out $70+ for a used copy, then having to futz around with DOSBox to even get the thing to work. I'm hoping that the game makes it to GOG at some point.

i was never that fussed about oblivion or morrwind but when i finish (if) fallout 3 i'll replay those games

Well they released Arena as freeware when Oblivion came out, so there is a small hope that they might release Daggerfall as freeware when TES5 is done...

Never played Arena until Bethesda released it for free. I just could not get into it thanks to DOSbox nt wanting to run it smooth enough.
Daggerfall was the cost of many hours/days/months of my life. Just running through the country side, finding little towns with nearby dungeons that had good loot stocks.
Much of the game was cut back though, a number of skills do nothing, and factions exist that you can't join.
It's aged decently enough, if there was some way to increase the resolution on it, it would be better.
Morrowind: While the game is 'smaller' there is more focus and identity. Personally, I like both Daggerfalls random generator and Morrowinds placed-by-hand approach.
The setting, and increase in lore is what really made the game for me, it took a different approach to the usual fantasy game. I liked the Tribunal expansion, but could of skipped Bloodmoon.
I missed the ability to climb buildings though :)
Oblivion: Well, in short: Meh. Bland story, characters all look alike and SOUND alike, combat-leveling, all the other complaints people make.
The game is not bad, but when you've gone through the previous TES games, it just comes off poorly. The scenery looks pretty though, but due to the combination of small factors, I just could not be bothered by it.
I fear for TES5, and if they take the same route (or a simpler one) it will end up a bargin-bin buy. If that.
As for gender preferences on Morrowind/Oblivion: I've noticed a higher number of female gamers playing Oblivion, but I think it also has to do with gaming becoming less (at least in the public eyes), a hobby for the male nerd in the basement :)

I started out with Daggerfall in the whole TES series. That game was one of the games that was responsible for getting me into working on my own computer hardware. I had to upgrade my processor and memory just to play it without going into SlideShow Land. I never appreciated it fully until I played Oblivion. Oblivion was fun for a little while, much prettier than the previous installments but something was lacking. Maybe it was the AI that would get broken as soon as you had 100 in Sneak and a decent bow and the enemies would just stand there while you made them into a pincushion. Or maybe it was the bad horse controls or the fact that Bethesda took away the chance of being a werewolf in that game. I don't know but Oblivion felt to me like that real gorgeous woman you meet and you find out she is real boring because of a serious deficit in the brains department.
I wish Bethesda would seriously take a look in their past catalog and play some of their old games and see if they think anything is missing from their current offering. One would hope they will come to their senses one day.

It's been said before, but it's safer to take the dumbed down approach and make more money because it appeals to a broader spectrum of people. Bethesda has been taking that route for awhile now, because well...it sells.
Sad but true.
Money will be the life and death of (good) games.

I actually rather liked Oblivion. The only really bad thing about it is the main story. Rather dull.
They did a lot better with Shivering Isles.
The only place where I can say something was way too easy, and should have been much different, was the king of worms.
Though in the end, Morrowind is the better of the two.

Oblivion beats Morrowind in:
-Graphics (althougth a modded Morrowind can look better)
-Lockpicking
-Casting magic
-Mana (you don't have to sleep to regain it)
-Character creation (after going througth the character creation process for Morrowind the amount of times I have you realise how annoying it it)
-Enchanting and Spellmaking
-Ease of modification
-Vampires
-Freedom
Morrowind beats Oblivion in:
-Story
-Quality of expansions
-Craziness (ignoring the shivering isles expansion for Oblivion)
-Tamriel Rebuilt (a mod for Morrowind that aims to cover the whole continent on which the elder scrolls games are set)
-No levelled enemies and loot
To be honest, my experiences of Olivion are limited to short bursts at my friend's house and a gaming centre and I never finished Morrowind or it's expansion packs completely.

I like both Oblivion and Morrowind.
Morrowind's setting was the more interesting, which was a good thing because the NPCs stood around in a catatonic state for the entire game. Morrowind was better for stealth classes, where Oblivion is better for melee classes. I prefer the non-regenerating mana in Morrowind, though it is also true that to compensate, spells cost a fraction of the mana they do in Oblivion. Morrowind also had cliffracers, which were the worst of that island's bloodthirsty fauna; bull netches and kwama workers were the only animals that didn't attack anything that moved, which could get annoying.
Oblivion's combat is superior; you hit where you aim and you can actually block with your shield, whereas in Morrowind you only blocked when the game decided to do it for you. The NPCs move around and do more than stand in their shops 24/7. The leveled enemies and loot was a very bad decision, and Bethesda knows it; fortunately, Francesco and Oscuro have mods for that, and Bethesda doesn't intend to use that system again.
Basically, each game is of a piece with its setting. Vvardenfel is grotesque; Cyrodil is a more high medieval setting. Maybe the next one will be set in Akavir, and everyone can go ga-ga over the Japanese vibe.
Anyway, I enjoy both games. So does my wife by the way.

I love the series, and am busy playing Daggerfall for the umpteenth time at the moment.
Tamriel is one of my favourite fantasy worlds, so I just can't get enough. Daggerfall will probably remain my favourite, as I doubt they'll ever make something of its scope again for a long time. The best part is the endless quests you can go on, and the many guilds you can join. If every feature that was planned by Bethesda had been introduced, the game would have been truly mindblowing. Sadly it is quite bugged, and causes some frustration, though not enough to keep me away. I love the game.

I think the setting is quite an important factor, Oblivion after a while tries to be two things at once, telling you that Cyrodil is in grave danger, and yet everyone milling around normally, lots of gates appearing and yet no reason to remove them except for specific scripted ones. For a company that tells us it's all about the immersion, they failed in that respect.
I think I prefer the static NPCs of morrowind though, because although that isn't realistic, neither is the so-called "radiant-AI" which is just a series of scripts played out through the day. It's what you could term "uncanny valley" behaviour, because they initially appear to be going about their business as normal persons, but after a while you notice that some of them spend hours standing on the spot, or repeating the same conversations with the same people.
I agree with you on magic and combat, if oblivion hadn't had ridiculous scaling, I think the combat could have worked well, although combat is my least favourite aspect, which is why I prefer bioware/black isle/obsidian games in general.
Finally, one of the things I really liked about morrowind was that the Kwama workers or whatever wouldn't attack you on sight - I thought that this would be a great addition, to have peaceful or neutral animals or whatever, so that you don't think that every non-humanoid has to die (and most humanoids as well...). I always thought that there should be a level at which certain types of enemy would run rather than stand and fight against you when you've become super-human in late game.
Okay I think thats enough for now!

I loved Morrowind than Oblivion. Because Morrowind is more RPG than Oblivion, you are free to do everything no quest markers, no helps. But in Oblivion game is showing what you must to do. Also Morrowind has a soul. :D

I've played all of the Elder Scrolls based games on the PC.
The two original TES games are the best IMO. They were practically first person realtime roguelikes, with heavy emphasis on good character building and some mighty deep dungeons. Arena established everything, it was very hard and satisfying, while Daggerfall improved on every aspect, and as far as I see it has the very best stat/skill system of any RPG to date. Morrowind took a swing for the worse as far as gameplay went. While the game felt more personal it was to... brown.
The NPC's was stocky, always standing in place, constantly pacing in a small area, compared to Daggerfalls 750.000 NPC's, that was always walking around, and went indoors at night. Morrowinds quests was alright, and while the lore was severly butchered from DF, it still had fairly good story telling, and the way non-mainquest quests were presented was a lot better.
Oblivion improved a bit on the gameplay as far as I see it, and while the enviroment is a bit repetetive I still find it to be a bit more attractive, though boring compared to Morrowind. I also much more prefer the uncanny valley, than the mindless pacers. The storytellind and lore was further butchered, but I wasn't really surprised actually. I also liked the dungeons a lot more, those in Morrowind was short and boring, usually not having anything much interesting, and they were also few, compared to Oblivion's. Still doesn't beat Daggerfalls 3-4+ hours dungeons though.
The Elder Scrolls Legends: Battlespire is also good, though one of the hardest games I've ever played. Still haven't finished it, but regardless I would recommend it.
The Elder Scrolls Adventures: Redguard I've just barely touched, but from what I've played of it, it felt really good. Getting it running today can be a bit difficult. I purchased a application called Glidos for $10, and used that in combination with another application called VDos32, which got it running quite well, though I couldn't get the music working at all.
I love every game in the series, and I still play all of them from time to time. It's probably my favorite game series of all.
In case you didn't know, you can get the first Elder Scrolls, Arena, for free at the official website (www.elderscrolls.com), and I would highly recommend anyone who likes old-school RPG's to try it.