The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind

This game for me is one of the most addicting singleplayer-games I have played. This installment of The Elder Scrolls has a particular fantasy-realm setting that will immediately draw you into the world from the minute you hear the epic theme-song. And the best part is: you can do whatever the hell you want. Want to explore dungeons and raid them for gold and treasures? Go ahead. Want to increase your magicka by learning new spells? Go ahead. Or do you want to follow quests in the main story line? Why not. The possibilities in this game even to this day are astounding, and the large environment is always fun to explore.

Unfortunately, this game does have a few flaws though, and a few of them have been addressed a lot by critics over the years. The game is hard to get into if you are not familiar with Roleplaying games (especially since the first-person perspective can fool you into thinking its a hack & slash type of game at first), but once you spent some time figuring out the game you will have everything under control. The fighting in this game is weird, although you get used to it. Depending on your character's progress, you will either hit or miss the enemy with your weapon even when you are standing right in front of him/her. Obviously "behind the scenes" the game 'rolls the dice' to see if you hit or miss, but its still weird. When you level up you will obviously hit much more though. Some people also complained about having to read so much, but I never had any problem with that.

The Elder Scrolls: Morrowind is a game that shows how epic RPG's should be. If you can look past the glitches and bugs then you have a classic game that can easily entertain you for weeks, months even.

Bloodmoon has a completely different feel and tone than Morrowind (or for you folks who worry about these kinds of things, the island of Vvardenfell in the Morrowind Province), which is extremely refreshing after hours spent in the tribal wastelands and swampy coasts. After the fanciful culture and creatures in Vvardenfell, Solstheim's real animals and realistic area and buildings hit closer to home. Home being this world we live in. Taking you character from a make believe world into something so real (and I'm not talking graphics) makes what you do seem more important and the enemies more menacing and the people deeper, even though they really aren't.

I won't give any spoilers, but take my word that even the bosses are better because they are their own characters. They aren't just a stronger version of the same things all around them. They have motives for what they do that you learn through the quests and encounters with them, and are not just told that they are smugglers that need to be killed or an outlaw that has killed a friend of your employer or an evil deadra. Morrowind only has one of these kinds of bosses, whereas Bloodmoon has many.

The new weapons and armor are truly awesome. Powerful weapons and armor can be found there. Relatively great armor can be bought without questing, and the weapons you quest for are some of the best in the game.

Quests are difficult and they aren't all just going out and killing someone or retrieving an item or escorting an NPC.

My favorite part of what Bloodmoon and Tribunal both offer that I am willing to tell you so as not to spoil anything is that you are able to participate in a few battles. Not all one on one or one on multiple, you can fight alongside many friends against a great many foes that you would not defeat alone. This is a truly great expansion that is worth more than it costs.

The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind is, quite simply, the best RPG ever! The story is so broad and the world is so open. My only gripe is that you can only wander throughout the island of Vvardenfell. I wish that Bethesda would release an expansion of the entire province of Morrowind, or even better, the entire continent of Tamriel. All that aside, this is still the best RPG ever! You start out on a ship. You have been a prisoner of the Imperials, but the Emperor has set you free, though you don't know why. After you give your race, sign, and class, there is absolutely nothing that you have to do. But, there is plenty that you can do. You can do whatever you want. There is a main quest, but there is no pressure to get started on it. You can join one or more of various factions and guilds. You can become a thief or an assassin. There is no end to what you can do. If you have the Bloodmoon and Tribunal expansion packs, there is even more for you to do. It is possible to play this game for weeks at a time and never run out of things to do. It's great fun. Everyone should own this on either the PC or the X-Box.

9.8/10

It's hard to name any RPGs that have even come close to Morrowind's immersiveness and expansiveness, save Daggerfall, the previous game in the Elder Scrolls series. Tom Hall's Anachronox comes close, but that game is really a mix of genres and hard to directly compare to Morrowind.

Like Anachronox, it's clear that a lot of love went into Morrowind. You can truly become lost in this game for hours and hours and even forget to eat or sleep. Hopefully Morrowind will achieve the sales it deserves, and we will see further continuations of the series. Looking back on Daggerfall, it's really amazing how far the game industry has come in 5 years.

I played this several years ago and for some reason stopped. Three years later and 6 years after its release, I've become an addict again.

Morrowind is a unique RPG experience that I have enjoyed more than any other. The story takes place on a human empire's furthest and most recent conquest - the island of Vvardenfell. The island is populated by Dark Elves, or Dunmer as they refer to themselves, as well as many original and unusual natural and unnatural flora and fauna.

The world seems enormous due to the rich layers of detail and the breadth of quests available. It is actually considerably smaller than either of the previous entries - Arena and Daggerfall. But it is much more interesting due to the detail. I have only played Daggerfall, and it was enjoyable to an extent, but it was just too cookie-cutter for my tastes. Every building and town looked the same, and the dungeons were a mess of weaving, 3D corridors that were extremely tedious to navigate, even with the minimap.

Although Morrowind scales the size of the world down a bit, that is the only thing about the game that is smaller. There are a number of "guilds" or other organizations that can be joined, each with their own ranking system and multitude of quests that take the character to the far corners of the island world. The environs are richly detailed, with varied terrain, numerous towns that are all unique in layout and architecture, fantastic environmental effects like sandstorms and rainfall, and a dramatic night sky filled with stars.

The best part of the game is that it is almost entirely open ended. You can play any type of character you wish, from a virtuous crusader to a dastardly villain. You like to steal things? There are valuables everywhere for the taking (but not without consequence). You prefer to be a noble warrior? There are a number of guilds and quests to suit your sense of right. How about a bloodthirsty barbarian? Got you covered. Maybe a mafia-like hit-man? You bet! Or maybe you are more of a pacifist that would prefer not to fight at all unless it's absolutely necessary? You'll be very busy here. Or just maybe - you'd like to be all of these rolled into one? Well guess what? You can! Now there are competing factions, and law to be upheld, so your decisions may not be without consequences. But with a little caution (and resorting back to saved games), you can be a very successful career criminal in this world. In fact, there are a number of illicit trades that you can become involved with, including slave trading, narcotics, murder for hire, and of course theft. There is even some implicit prostitution in several of the towns. This is not Grand Theft Auto, but the criminal underworld is just below the surface with many opportunities for those who are so inclined.

I stressed the criminal element here merely to demonstrate the game's depth. There is also much political intrigue that the character can become involved with. This makes for some very interesting game play with numerous side stories to be told. Now to solve the game, you must eventually become involved in the "main" quest. But there is so much else to do that you may very well forget about this for a long, long time. In fact, you can come back to it whenever you wish without penalty.

The game relies on a skills-based system for character advancement. You start with a set of skills, ranging from weapons and armors to speechcraft and mercantile. Each one improves with use only. There are no "experience points" for killing monsters. If it takes you two swings to kill a monster, then the skill for the weapon you used increases by two swings. With the skills trainers and opportunities to use these skills, they are increased fairly rapidly, resulting in level increases.

With all the glowing praise I have for the game, there is still room for some criticism. Although increasing one's skills and wealth early in the game is a challenge, as it progresses this becomes easy to the point of tedium. Some of the very valuable items that are supposed to be rare seem to appear with frequency. And the character eventually gets so much outstanding equipment that he/she becomes nigh invincible. Many would not consider this much of a flaw, but when the game fails to challenge it becomes less appealing. There is still an incredibly interesting story and quests to follow, but I feel that some of the game aspects should have been redesigned. It is truly a paradise for the power gamer, however. The combat is rather straight forward and simplistic, but this is not the main focus of the game as it is with so many others - in nearly all other RPG game titles the character must wade through and kill hordes of things just to level up and advance along in the game. You could technically advance to a high level in this game without killing a single thing (although that might become a bit tedious and boring). The only other problem, in a way, is that the game is of the "sandbox" variety, meaning that it never really ends. It is rather anti-climactic.

When all is said and done, however, this tops my list of the best RPG experiences of all time. Immersive, entertaining, with a phenomenal breadth of things to do, places to go, and people to see, this is an experience that any RPG fan would be loathe to miss out on. Do yourself a big favor and go get the Morrowind Game of the Year Edition as soon as you can. I have not played Oblivion yet, so it may even be better. But Morrowind must even then be highly enjoyable.