Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

[A Black Falcon]

There are about 1000 people, and just like in Majora's Mask, they all have their own schedules to keep! Wait till night, break into the weapons shop, rob the place blind, then the next day, sell it all back. Everyone seems to have their own story going on. I've stalked the same person for a whole in-game day and seen that person ride on horse back, pick some mushrooms, get in a conversation with a few people (and I picked up on some rumors), and finally, sell those mushrooms to some tradesman. Talking to the tradesman, he mentions he just got in some mushrooms from out of town.

That's an improvement at least, TES previously didn't have shops closing at night and stuff like that...

As for the conversation, interesting... so they're making more of an effort this time? You've always been able to hear a few things from people, but with the scale of the games (particularly the first two), things start to repeat early and often and you end up hearing the same or similar things over and over and over and over...

As for gameplay though, that doesn't affect my basic point: the feeling of "openness" is achieved by carefully limiting the player's options. A linear game feels "more constricting", but on each step of the way more unique, original, and varied challenges and gameplay can be shown because of the focus... TES just doesn't work that way. When you spend so much time on making a world, some things have to suffer...

And anyway, 'the people don't keep schedules' wasn't one of my major points... you get used to that kind of thing in videogames, it's not a big issue (in Morrowind). The thing about the conversation where people mention the others is interesting, though, and hints at at least SOME degree of improvement on that front, though I very highly doubt that it has true variety now...