The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind GOTY Edition

My dad received a copy of this game with some computer thing he bought when I was about nine years old. Unsure what it was about, he passed it off to me, and I henceforth spent probably over a week of cumulative game time exploring the world of Morrowind. Let me be honest. A lot of my opinions on this game are softened by nostalgia. The graphics are awful. The sound design is lacking. There's one voice actor per race/gender combination, and some of them are quite mediocre. The NPCs speak like walking encyclopedias and are never quite as immersive as Oblivion's or Skyrim's, and that's saying something as even those are quite shallow in comparison to Bioware NPCs. Criticism aside, let me say that the world design is phenomenal. There is nothing like Morrowind except Morrowind. Imagine a marriage of Dune and medieval fantasy with some anthropomorphic lizard and cat people thrown in, as well as a beautiful slurry of conflicting mythology, philosophy, surrealism, Roman Imperial influences, and some hands-down fantastic worldbuilding. Unlike Oblivion and Skyrim, which both go to great lengths to protect you from your own stupidity, Morrowind chucks all that and lets you do what you want. Want to charge into a late game area at level one and get slaughtered? Go ahead, nothing will stop you. Nothing scales to your level here. Want to murder a vital main quest NPC? Sure. Never touch the Main Quest? Go ahead. Go on a killing spree and reduce Balmora to a population of one? Hell yeah! The storytelling is fantastic. The dialogue is shit, yeah, but the plot makes up for it. You're presented with a story that allows you to have your own impressions and opinions. Are you the Chosen One? Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe you know that you aren't but you're saying you are anyway. You are handed a neatly deconstructed pile of tropes and told to create something for yourself out of them. If you're the kind of nerd who likes reading lots of fictional documents, then welcome home, outlander.

This game is god tier from it's writting to it's world design and so much more. This game truly represents a time when Bethesda actually cared about the product they were creating and not just how much money said product will make. I can't reccomend this game enough and IMO Morrowind is the ultimate Elder Scrolls experience as frankly Skyrim can't even remotely compare. The saying "They don't make em like they used to." is 100% the case here. I mean Caius Cosades' amazing abs alone is enough to make this game a 10/10, haha seriously though this game is great and a lot of modern titles are pathetic excuses in comparison BC nowadays devs lack the passion they once had and games like this show that fleeting passion in spades. Skyrim is okay, Oblivion is good but Morrowind is a masterpiece! For the kiddos out there, please look past the graphics and admittedly dated combat BC the full experience is unlike anything Bethesda has created since and unfortunately I doubt we will ever see anything like it ever again.

There are a lot of MMORPG games out there struggling to be as good as this single player gem. The character customisation is brilliant, you can simply make a character exactly how you want: want to be good at everything, np. The game world is huge and fun to explore, no matter how many dungeons you find you will want more. The gear crafting and spell crafting are easy to use, the alchemy might take a little while to get used to but the pots you can make can be awesome. Yet all this runs seamlessly on the PC with keyboard and mouse. Unlike Skyrim it wasn't built around a game controller giving what I feel is a better experience. If you started Elder Scrolls with Oblivion or Skyrim imagine them with a lot, lot bigger world and a lot more character depth and skills. As for the story, I finished it a few times when the game came out, it is interesting the first few time, but after that a new game is just a mad run into the wilds exploring and slaying. Play the great houses against each other, join the guilds, own a home, pick up as many quests as you want (or don't want) and/or just kill everything. In short if you're looking for a better version of Oblivion, Skyrim or even ESO this is it, just the amount of starting skills and vatness of the wilds blows the first two away and the fact you can have whatever combination of skills you want makes it better than its MMO big brother. (Biggest downfall of ESO for me is the rigid class/skill choices). Along with BG/BG2 this game is a must for any serious fantasy RPG gamer.

It's not often a game just tosses you out on your own with little instruction and no sense of urgency to do some "super important main quest", at least not in rpgs. Of all the RPG games I've played, this one is hands down the best. Morrowind provides the player with all the tools they need to succeed, and it does so in a subtle and natural way. For example, people often have trouble finding their way around, but if you talk to Sellus Gravius about how to get to Balmora (your first "quest") he tells you to speak with a scout. Once you learn that there are scouts that can tell you where things are, you start to look around for them. In talking to other people, you learn about trainers, but they aren't always called trainers. In some rumors they are referred to as some "guy or gal who knows a lot about something you might want to learn about". Then you start hearing rumors about lost items, strange groups of "pilgrims" in certain regions, and suddenly you find yourself lost in a world full of wonderful little surprises. Morrowind was made with time and hand crafted. The creators showed just how much they loved this project by how many little details they put in. Nothing was randomly generated, even the landscape was hand crafted and textured. It's a game that has been made with care and attention to detail, and it shows. Sure the graphics aren't the best in the eyes of some, and the combat can be difficult to get into if you don't understand it or how it works, but the game itself is full of things to do, places to explore, books to read, and you are encouraged to come up with new and creative ways to play. Make crazy pointless spells, learn all the melee fighting techniques, be a stealthy orc with a massive hammer and a knack for magic! Push the boundaries of the world! Serve gods, or destroy them and all those who love them. The adventure, the main adventure, is yours to make, and yours to have! -Gabe the N'wah

First the bad: it's not aged well. There are reasons for the way the gameplay is but at the end of the day combat is frustrating. There's little voice acting, NPCs don't really have routines and just kind of stand in place all day doing nothing. But despite this, Morrowind is by far the most intoxicating game I have played, and that's because of two things: 1) the lovingly crafted, enchantingly alien world, story and lore and 2) it doesn't hold your hand, and will crush you like an insect. I'll talk about these in turn: 1) Vvardenfell is like no other game world out there I can think of. It somehow mixes standard fantasy tropes and almost psychedelic, exotic elements to make a world that feels original without feeling like it's trying too hard. It hits that perfect balance that makes it feel real - not an experience crafted for the player but just something that exists. It's also kind of dark - there's open racism, xenophobia, slavery, censorship, class-divides, crime, and starting off everyone treats you like what you are - a recently released convict and foreigner with little to offer anyone - and this makes earning your place in the world such a rewarding experience. When people start to like you, it feels like home, and you really grow a fond attachment to certain places. 2) There's no quest markers, not much fast-travel, little NPC-levelling, and you can end up completely screwed in a fight if you didn't prepare. You have to find places using vague directions given to you by an NPC, meaning you WILL get lost. Basically the consequences of your actions are up to you, and it's empowering. If you're creative enough, you can almost break the game with powerful item/skill/alchemy combinations, but it feels good because you earned it. Real adventures have hardship, struggle and times when you don't think you can make it. I wish I had more space to write. If you can see past its flaws and enjoy it for what it's supposed to be, this game will reward you.