Returning to The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion after nearly 20 years evokes a deep sense of relief due to its simplicity compared to modern open-world games. The article emphasizes Oblivion's significance in shaping the genre, noting its encouragement of exploration and dynamic NPCs that contribute to a lived-in feel. While recognizing the evolution of open-world designs, especially with the checklist approach from Ubisoft titles, the author reflects on how few recent games capture the same essence of exploration and player agency that Oblivion embodied.
Jumping back into The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion nearly 20 years later, I had a sensation I'd never experienced playing a game before - a surprising sense of relief when I opened the world map.
Oblivion, and Morrowind before it, helped shape the very idea of what open worlds actually mean in games.
It wasn't the first time we'd seen its ideas, but the way Oblivion created dynamic NPCs and a world that felt lived-in was remarkable.
Around the same time as Oblivion, we also started to see the Ubisoft style of open world, introduced in games like Far Cry and Assassin's Creed.
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