Oblivion Redux

Well, it looks like somebody in the GA forums (Hi!) picked up my Oblivion posting and ran it as a discussion topic. Which is okay by itself, but instead of discussing the points that I made in my opinion, the thread mostly degenerated into a discussion about my motives for posting what I posted in the first place. After all I work for a gaming company that’s creating what seems to be a fantasy title!

Guys, I understand the need for internet drama as much as the next person. I’ve been following and enjoying it for the better part of my internet career. But please – if you want to report on this story, please do it without prejudice. In which case it would go something like this (Warning, attack of the commas!):

Matthias Worch, who happens to work for a game company, today, in his private blog, posted an opinion of the PC version of Oblivion, a game that he admittedly only played for an hour and that several of his friends and former coworkers at Bethesda contributed artwork to.

Because really, that’s all I was trying to do, and it’s what I have been doing for the last 10 years. By turning this into a public debate with an implied undercurrent of “console war” you’re now forcing me to make the disclaimer that this is a private blog and that the opinions offered here in no way represents the opinion of my employer, Factor 5. You’re also putting me in the difficult position of not being able to speak my mind in the future – even though this page here still amounts to a private blog that is mostly read by family and friends.

As I mentioned in the last post, I have great respect for Bethesda. My old company Legend was in the same geographical area and several of my friends work in the art department over there. I have played all games in the Elder Scrolls series religiously. As I said earlier, I also expect to play Oblivion religiously once I’ve had a chance to really get into it and get past the (mostly cosmetic) initial dislikes. All my friends have been sucked in!
But I did feel that I made valid, if subjective, observations of the first hour of gameplay (in which I bested the initial dungeon and ran around the world and city a bit). Please feel free to agree or disagree with them, that’s what I have my (rarely used) comments thingie for. But when doing so please do it without insinuating ulterior motives on my part. I was not comparing Oblivion to anything but its own predecessor, and comparisons to other games (especially the ones my company works on) are unfair and very much not in the intention of this blogger.

BTW, I liked this reply: “That guy can think whatever the heck he wants. I could not care less. *goes back to playing Oblivion*” Exactly!