Travelling is easy, if you know how
The menu interface on Oblivion is initially over-whelming. However, you don’t have to have the brain of Stephen Hawking’s to navigate the seemingly mind-blowing list of options available.
By the time you progress to your second main mission you’ll be hopping in and out of the menu, mixing spells, changing weapons and equipping armour without even thinking about it. For the multitude of options available and the size of the menu system it’s extremely well laid out and easy to use. You’ll spend a great deal of time in the menu, so get used to it from the outset.
Click for larger imageFrom the inventory menu you can define hotkeys, which are crucial in any fight. You can assign a weapon, armour or spell to any slot on your d-pad. Press the direction of the item or spell you wish to use from your d-pad and then press the RB button to activate. It’s an easy way to switch between weapons and spells and prevents the user from having to hop into the menu every time they wish to change something.
Aside from these options you’ll also be able to view your progression, current quests and missions, and browse through the in-game map.
Click for larger imageThe map is clearly laid out, you can see all of the major landmarks and towns, and thanks to ‘fast travel’ you can hover over an area and warp there in a few seconds. This option is extremely welcome. It’s great to be able to have the freedom to travel for miles across the open countryside, but occasionally you’ll just want to get the job done.
In addition to the ‘fast travel’ option you can also place markers on the map. You’ll stumble across numerous shrines, caves, and other places of interest on your way to the next quest, and it’s easy to get side-tracked. Using the markers ensures that you can complete your current quest and then return to explore at a later date. Without these markers, you’d spend a lot of time wandering around.
Another fast way of travelling is on your horse, mentioned earlier. Luckily when you ‘fast travel’ to a location your horse comes with you and waits outside a city gate ready for its next long journey. The horses on the Xbox 360 version are often frustrating to handle. You’ll probably be more comfortable switching to third-person mode, due to the occasionally dodgy camera angles. On occasion the horse appears to gallop a few millimetres off the ground and you can sometimes glitch onto a wall or a rock. It’s also a shame that you can’t fight enemies whilst on horseback
