Game : The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

Good gravy, this game is _HUGE_. Where can I even begin?

I chose a dark elf thief/mage as my avatar. Being a dark elf meant that I got to summon an ancestral ghost once a day, and that I was mostly immune to fire. For my birth sign, I took the sign of the Mage, which granted me a bonus of 100 magic points at the expense of an increased sensitivity to magic. Since I was a thief/mage, I put all my skill points into agility, intelligence, speed, and wisdom. That being, I was a weakling who could barely carry his own armor, let alone lug around 20 freaking daedra hearts (2 feathers each!) just to make up for killing some stupid mages guild member. But that's okay, because being turned into a vampire had the side benefit of increased strength, never mind that it turned me into a nocturnal recluse who had trouble completing simple tasks because A) daylight would fry him to a crisp and B) because no one talks to a blood-starved husk of hideous skin anyway.

Ha ha ha. I hope you enjoyed that. I figure if I can spend 20 minutes per session arranging my character's inventory, you can handle just a sample. :)

Seriously though, this is the thing with this game. The ridiculous amount of detail in this game is both its blessing and its curse. It is an amazingly immersive world, filled with life, with countless stories, with tons of places to explore.. but sometimes, it all just got to be, well, too much. Because of this, I spent the last third of the game just trying to get through it, stubborn as I am, because while I enjoyed playing the game, I also wanted to move on to other things.

If anyone out there has played, I completed all four guild quest lines, the arena, the main storyline, and a shitload of the smaller stuff. Favorite item? Cowl of Nocturnal! Funniest item? Monkeypants!! (Find them in the general goods store in Bree; the stats are funny.)

This game is gorgeous. The flora, the textures (I hope you like normal maps), the skyscapes, the lighting, and the architecture are all top notch and will be memorable to me. If you are an RPG fan, do yourself a doggone favor and play this game. Yes, it will destroy your "normal" life. Yes, it may take freaking forever, through not if you just play the main story arc, but good luck with that. But despite all these things, I can say with confidense that Oblivion represents the culmination of all RPG history and is probably the best classic form RPG made to date. If you are a fantasy fan, play it. You'll have a blast!