Originally Posted by Innateagle
Originally Posted by robertthebard
Originally Posted by Innateagle
Um, what? All you know, and all anyone knows, at the beginning of Oblivion is that the Emperor got axed. The Emperor, voice acted by Patrick Stewart, whom you met and talked to as to give weight and meaning to the world shattering event that by itself would have meant nothing to any new player. You learn about Mehrunes Dagon way later on, and the game eases you into that too. You're not just dropped into some random inn, given a quest and asked to read on some random book about some God you know nothing about, because that would suck.

Except that that's not exactly true, right? We not only know the King got whacked, we see who did it, and they're trying to whack us too. Subtext: We are drawn into a world shattering event, from people that we know nothing about. Nowhere did Oblivion pause the game and explain who the Mythic Dawn worships. I may be misremembering the name of the cult. What I am not misremembering is that they were worshippers of Mehrunes Dagon, and, as you point out, a new player would have no idea what that means, or who it is, and we don't get that information until much later.

So if a new player starting in Oblivion had gone to the forums complaining that they didn't understand why this cult they know nothing about was trying to kill them, what would the response be? I'm going to go out on a limb here and say it would be a lot different than what we're getting here, right?

That they're trying to kill them because they killed the Emperor, and the Emperor gave them 'the amulet of Kings'? think That's the hook, my dude, and by that point you need no more than that information for the story to make sense and move forward. The Emperor died infront of you to mysterious assassins serving a Prince of Darkness, and if you wanna learn more/avenge him/whatever you gotta bring the thingy to the place. Because he told you to do so, kingly as fuck, before dying.

Like, that's how any decent narrative works. Tell you what you need to know, when you need to know it. And in this here case, the game needs to tell you about Shar before it asks you what's your opinion of her. It's pretty clear cut.

I think Robert's brain is incapable of differentiating between information you need for the story to function for an audience versus information that isn't necessary for the audience to follow the story.

Did we need to know all oblivion gods to understand oblivion's intro? Nope. Who the assassins are? Nope. Where Cyrodil is or what is so special about the emperor? Nope.
It was pretty clear cut for what the player needed to do.
Survive and follow through the emperor's request. The story doesn't require the player to know everything.

The same is true about the Witcher 3.
Do I need to know what happened in the previous 2 games? No.
Do I need to know what happened in the books? No.
Do I need to know all the geopolitics? No.

I am a white haired cat eyed man who kills monsters. Is searching for his love interest and finds clues in the local village.
There is a war happening with southern black and gold clad germans-like people kicking red and white clad eastern european like country in some nearby village.
It just isn't necessary for me to know more and as the game progresses everyhing will be explained as it was necessary for me and other viewers to get context.

The problem with Shar is there is no context.
if the game and story setting was simpler with angels vs demons and Shadowheart being a demon worshipper that would make require less explanation because presumebly for the first 30 minutes I saw demons being evil and whoever that associates with them is not a cool person to hang out with.
But obviously that isn't the case here.

What is interesting is that this game is CONSTANTLY narrating things a denizen of Fearun would know anyway. So why not give a narration about Shar? It just doesn't make sense especially considering how integral Shar seems to be in the story.

Last edited by Eddiar; 02/11/21 10:30 PM.