PSP - Elder Scrolls Travels: Oblivion

Format
PSP
Publisher
Ubisoft
Developer
Bethesda Softworks
Country of origin
US
Release date
Spring 2007
Genre
RPG

Whispers of Elder Scrolls Travels : Oblivion

By David Rasmussen
5th Nov 06

You don’t need to have been a former resident of the planet Vulcan to know that grasping your thoughts about the concept of one of the biggest games (content wise) being shrunk down to PSP size is not going to be an easy task. Somehow it’s hard enough to believe it was ever on the Xbox (original), but now that word has come out that there is work for a 2007 release of Oblivion to the PSP the first thing we have to ask is… how the hell!

Considering that Sony is so hopped up about this game making a surprise appearance in the first gen of games for the overpriced bane to Sony’s existence (aka the PS3) (not even a copy of Elder Scrolls IV : Oblivion will make me drop 600 large on a PS3) should they be happy about Oblivion for the PSP? I mean how the heck did they take such a giganto game and smash it down to miniature size (short of using a sledgehammer and a gigantic mecha steam roller)?!? I wouldn’t mind it, yes, seeing how I won’t have to drop so much money on a PS3 to play it but still… is it humanly possible to do such a thing?

Well, if you picked up your copy of Playstation Magazine 110 (bright side being the first PSP sample I ever saw from this magazine was a copy of Killzone : Liberation, while the sucky side being that you better not have gotten this to try out Guitar Hero II because you would have needed to have owned Guitar Hero I and have it’s guitar controller in order to sample Guitar Hero II) you’ve seen this first look at Oblivion. Here’s the gist of it.

First off Bethesda (better known by some, me for instance, for their somewhat butchery of the Star Trek franchise in their attempts at video game versions of Trek) says honestly that there is no way in heck to take the enormous Oblivion and make it handheld. Then what?

To me it seems the answer is to retool the game. Know why quite a few developers have revisioned their games for the PSP, like how Gurreilla had taken Killzone : Liberation and changed it from 1st Person Shooter to Champions of Norrath style overhead 3rd Person Shooter? Seems to me this was done to insure the most content possible for the game. In order to, say, bring out Killzone : Liberation in the same way that the original came out you’d end up sacrificing content and game length in order to preserve the 1st Person Shooter content. That is exactly what Bethesda is gambling on with their version of Elder Scrolls. In order to keep the look and feel of the game true to the original they’re willing to sacrifice content and length of game for this trade-off. Will it work, however? Guess that depends on you mostly.

Ask yourself what is more important… the game being true to it’s origins and having the same high quality graphics and gameplay from the console versions, or a game that sacrifices said graphics and gameplay in order to preserve the long gameplay life and richness of content from the Elder Scrolls games.
Once you ask yourself that you’ll know whether or not Elder Scrolls Travels should be on your shortlist for purchase or not..

As for the shortness of content? Well from what little is written on this it seems the game is going to become a dungeon crawler, with a unique storyline made specifically for it and it alone. Promising 10 large levels to traipse through, and no open ended Grand Theft Auto style freeroaming gameplay, the game already has a feel of limited gameplay options and it’ll be months and months before we possibly see a DEMO version to chew on! That, as it seems to me, can’t be good for the game.

Add to that the promise that this game will have the gameplay aspects of a hack-n-slash slash button masher, as well as the promise of restricted settings and fear of inferior gaming may already have begun to set into your heart the minute you started reading this… right?

A few bright spots do shine through.
- The controls will be simplified to make grasping and emersion into this version of Obilivion a less painful experience. This may or may not be good considering your opinion of the control setup for the console versions, but I think it might be a good thing… however even the Playstation Magazine people had to admit that the alpha prototype of the game they had a chance to play featured a hard to grasp control systems that took awhile to get used to… a flaw I hope is ironed out in future versions of the game until it is flawless in the final version.

- Fundamential gameplay will maintain it’s ties to the original console versions. It might be shorter and stuff but it’ll be like playing a pocket version of Elder Scrolls on the major consoles (which should get the attention of die hard Elder Scrolls fans right off the bat).

- Most of the original skills from the console version of Obilvion are in this game, with only 3 seemingly removed for having nothing to do with the story (18 out of 21 promised in this game).

- A few screenshots I’ve seen shows a graphics rich world. That is to be expected since the game has sacrificed gameplay length and variety for the beautiful graphics, so it’d better be hot.

- At present the game developers are not even considering interconnectability with the PS3 version of Oblivion due to timing of release. Oblivion for the PS3 should be out by Christmas while this PSP version isn‘t going to be out until an unknown date sometime in 2007 or so. Of course Oblivion HAS to be out now for the PS3, most likely to “soften” the blow of Sony’s bad marketing decision to make the system a bitter pill to swallow at the cash register… wait, not enough softening for my taste!

It’s kinda like giving someone a goose down pillow and then telling them you’re going to hit them with large professional construction grade piledriver.

Gimme a copy of Elder Scrolls IV, Metal Gear Solid 4 AND something else fun in the 1st PS3 bundle and I can somewhat choke down the concept of the 600 buck poison pricetag… I won’t cough up the vital organ bleeding ransom of money, sure, but at least it won’t be an entirely horrible thing if there was that much gaming in the box for THAT much money -- ok, just gimme a PS3 already, Sony. Please.

Stay tuned… maybe sometime in 2007 I’ll have an update on this… sometime in 2007.

-- David Rasmussen 5th Nov 06

PSP Elder Scrolls Travels: Oblivion Images