The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind GOTY Edition

A lot of this game is janky and dated (it looked dated when it released...), and there is an entire spectrum of opinions on whether this game is laughably bad or the best RPG ever made. I say, if you are an RPG or fantasy fan, you MUST try this game. I love it and I could spend hundreds of hours exploring the single island in this game. You honestly might dislike it, but I think the game is worth the price for the amount of effort that went into it. Future Elder Scrolls games simplified things, and we might never see a game comparable to Morrowind ever again.

Yes, it's old. Graphics are dated, you have to read a lot, gameplay is antiquated(I personally don't mind it), and there's balance issues - to name some of the bigger issues people have with it. However, no game before or after offers the depth of gameplay and immerson that Morrowind does. No game has matched the mysterious, eerie tone that this game exudes. From giant mushrooms that people live in, to a city made of of ziggurats emerging from the see - each one a town of its own, this game is amazing. Not to sound like a Todd Howard broken record, but this is truly a game where you can go where you want and do what you want. If you can get over the antiquated veneer of this game, it's an absolute gem of gems.

In 50 years time, Morrowind and Daggerfall will be the 2 games that stand out from the Elder Scrolls series. The lore took tired Eurocentric high fantasy cliches and created an entirely new cosmology, but one that is still close enough so we can recognise pieces from our own history or current events. You could actually forego all the battles and quests and just spend 100s of hours reading all the lore books in Vivec City or talking to the NPCs. The world isn't built for you, so it feels real. Are you the chosen one or not? You decide. Ignore the main quest and use the game as your playground if you like or become the Nerevarine. But NPCs won't treat you like the chosen one and humour your superiority complex like in Oblivion,Skyrim. You have to actually prove that you're worthy. There's also hardly any moral guideline here. Do you want to free slaves or support slavery? Do you want to become a vampire and sneak around at night, drinking blood? Are you pro-Tamrielic Empire or sympathising with Dunmer separatists? Both the world and NPCs will react realistically to your actions. No simple good/evil fairy tale stuff. The world as such is also very beautiful. Unlike Oblivion and Skyrim that abandoned a lot of established lore and are in many ways pandering to fans of classic boring Euro-Middle-Age fantasy, the island of Vvardenfell has an amazingly varied topography, flora and fauna. Monsters look weird. The various Dunmer houses have different architecture, culture, different levels of acceptance of you as an outsider. The game is a classic CRPG through and through, but modern enough so that you can build a character that's basically easy mode. While the graphics are definitely dated now, they were cutting edge when they came out and can be souped up with various mods. The battles are sadly less dynamic than Oblivion, Skyrim, but there's no unrealistic level scaling as in those. There's very few games that I love going back to. This is one of them.

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I can't say much about the game that hasn't already been said in countless other reviews, so I'll relate how my experience with the game went. I have vague memories of starting the game, wandering around Seyda Neen, and not really understanding what a "silt strider" is, so I decided to walk to Balmora. I was very nervous and spent a lot of time deciding whether to peek inside Adanumuran or not. The caldera gave me creepy vibes and I sped through it as best I could, and then.... Then I reached Balmora and thought it was super impressive, and spent a lot of time wandering around and getting to know the NPCs. I also have memories of going to Vivec city for the first time and being overwhelmed by its size and layout, wandering like a tourist and trying to figure out how the city was interconnected. When I first got the game, in the mid-2000s, I still had access only to the family PC, and my time on it was limited. To make the most of my time, I got into the Construction Set pretty early in my playthrough and created a simple home for myself, with a bunch of storage, and set the entrance to be a ghostly door outside of Clagius Clanier's shop, since that was near to the entrance of the Mages Guild. Some of my other notable memories are building up Raven Rock on Solstheim (I loved that quest chain) and finally walking up to Ghostgate. All of these memories are dear to me, but they make me worried, because I doubt I will have the same experience if I tried to play the game again after all these years (and many other games played). So, for now, I keep my existing memories close, and keep the installation of the game ready, for some day, I shall return again.... to Morrowind.