Better Cities, how necessary is it?

[Reaverdude]

So I've spent about a month now modding Oblivion and about 5 minutes actually playing it....haha. I am currently torn on whether or not I should install better cities. I've read dozens of posts about how awesome it is and how some people can't play without it, I even watched a video tour of better cities on youtube. To be honest, I was impressed with what I saw, but didn't feel it was a "must have mod". I thought it made the cities look to cluttered and unrealistic of how a city would be, especially the Imperial City. I also saw some maps of places like the Arcane University for example, and it looks like the mod removes some of the purple fire props that are in the vanilla cities.

 

For some reason or another, maybe I just want to see what it looks like, I still want to install it. Anyone here that has Better Cities installed wanna convince me to install it. Is it a must have mod for you? Thanks for your input.

[chakaru11]

Morning ^^

 

If I remember correctly, a lot of the props and decorations in the Better Cities can be toggled on or off using an ingame menu right after you installed it. That way you can customize almost every town.

 

But in the end it depends on which version you download I guess. There are several "Light" versions out there that don't clutter the cities too much and reduce the insane FPS drop you can encounter visiting the cities.

 

I which I could tell you that I installed it and loved it, but I always used it in combination with Open Cities, which makes it a whole different experience. Even without Open cities the Better Cities are beautiful though, especially the many small corners and the attention to detail are great.

[documn]

It's not a must-have mod for me. I've tried it and it seemed like an ok alternative, though not necessarily better and it definitely ate up my FPS, which I did not like.

[SavageArtistry]

I tried it and it was nice, but the version I tried has an integrated "Gold Horse Courier" mod that doesn't function correctly and that turned me off to it - that and the fact I encountered some areas where the ground was floating in the air. It may have been a conflict with something else I was using, but I didn't feel like troubleshooting it when there were other factors that bugged me about it anyway.

[David Brasher]

Better Cities is not necessary. Many people play Oblivion for the dungeon-crawling and quests, and Better Cities is just something to look at. The lag from mods like that can make it so the game is not worth the candle. But if your computer is a hot-rod and you like the changes that were made, then you should use Better Cities.

[Megatarius]

I use it and will never go back. And I experience lag.

 

It does make the cities more cluttered, but not unrealistically. These are medieval cities we're talking about. They should be bigger, but that's all right. Some of the cities, especially Bravil and Leyawinn, are so much better it's ridiculous. (Leyawinn no longer landlocks the Niben and the rest of the non-ocean water. :rolleyes: ) The cluttering is actually necessary. It brings life and realism to the cities.

 

 

It's also not just for show. Other stuff is added. For instance, Chorrol and IC Market now have public bath-houses, which are a god-send when you use mods like Bloody Mess, which lower your Personality to 0 really fast if you walk into town covered in blood. (Unfortunately, you don't make people run in fear from you, but it's better than nothing.) Most of the cities have some kind of water near-by. Bruma is still dry as bone, so if you're bloody up there, too bad. Chorrol did not, and they added it. IC Market just needed one in particular because it's IC Market.

 

The only part of IC that is cluttered is the Market. The rest of them are still pretty clean, but they have the building redone a bit, the Tower itself looks cooler, and there's a big library, with a small quest inside, and a huge relief map of the land. This is mostly cosmetic, but that's okay. Cosmetic changes are also important in the long run. They subtly affect the way you think about the game. The cities have personality now. Sure they always had their own archetechure, but they didn't feel like real places, with history and worn with use. Even Bravil is clean. I was once bug-testing a mod problem. I disabled Better Cities and loaded the game. Bravil was super strait and orderly. It was boring. It looked like something somebody threw together in a day. Better Cities is a labor of time and love. It makes the game much more memorable.

 

Better Cities adds new NPC's as well. (No voices.) It adds new stores, with new items. There's a shop in IC Market that lets you enchant any weapon for a hefty (and non-refundable) fee. There's a real tunnel between the IC Waterfront and the Temple District. Different neighborhoods in places like Bruma and Leyawiin look different. You can tell what's poor and what's not. You can see the sagging ramshackle parts of town for what they are.

 

And the University purple lights you were worried about? Fear not. I'm pretty sure they're still there. I certainly have them in my game. If they're different than vanilla, it's not in any way that gets rid of them entirely.

 

The cities that are by water all have harbors now. Leyawiin has a nice harbor, complete with a way for the river to get through, Bethesda!! :wallbash: , and Anvil's harbor is much bigger. Bravil, too, has a harbor now. The best thing about these new harbors is, you can go into any shipping office, and book passage to other places around the game world. Sure you can just fast travel, but come on. Really now. This is way cooler.

 

 

Of course you can just choose to not use it. No mod is truly necessary. A case can be made for not using it. Better frame rate, simplistic design if you're not interested in extraneous stuff, and better frame rate. Honestly, screw frame rate (within reason anyway). It will not slow down your game to the point of unplayability. If your computer truly can't handle it, that's a different story. You may want to forgo it then. But really, that's the only excuse I see not to get this mod. Unless you're really not into immersion....

[Reaverdude]

I use it and will never go back. And I experience lag.

 

It does make the cities more cluttered, but not unrealistically. These are medieval cities we're talking about. They should be bigger, but that's all right. Some of the cities, especially Bravil and Leyawinn, are so much better it's ridiculous. (Leyawinn no longer landlocks the Niben and the rest of the non-ocean water. :rolleyes: ) The cluttering is actually necessary. It brings life and realism to the cities.

 

 

It's also not just for show. Other stuff is added. For instance, Chorrol and IC Market now have public bath-houses, which are a god-send when you use mods like Bloody Mess, which lower your Personality to 0 really fast if you walk into town covered in blood. (Unfortunately, you don't make people run in fear from you, but it's better than nothing.) Most of the cities have some kind of water near-by. Bruma is still dry as bone, so if you're bloody up there, too bad. Chorrol did not, and they added it. IC Market just needed one in particular because it's IC Market.

 

The only part of IC that is cluttered is the Market. The rest of them are still pretty clean, but they have the building redone a bit, the Tower itself looks cooler, and there's a big library, with a small quest inside, and a huge relief map of the land. This is mostly cosmetic, but that's okay. Cosmetic changes are also important in the long run. They subtly affect the way you think about the game. The cities have personality now. Sure they always had their own archetechure, but they didn't feel like real places, with history and worn with use. Even Bravil is clean. I was once bug-testing a mod problem. I disabled Better Cities and loaded the game. Bravil was super strait and orderly. It was boring. It looked like something somebody threw together in a day. Better Cities is a labor of time and love. It makes the game much more memorable.

 

Better Cities adds new NPC's as well. (No voices.) It adds new stores, with new items. There's a shop in IC Market that lets you enchant any weapon for a hefty (and non-refundable) fee. There's a real tunnel between the IC Waterfront and the Temple District. Different neighborhoods in places like Bruma and Leyawiin look different. You can tell what's poor and what's not. You can see the sagging ramshackle parts of town for what they are.

 

And the University purple lights you were worried about? Fear not. I'm pretty sure they're still there. I certainly have them in my game. If they're different than vanilla, it's not in any way that gets rid of them entirely.

 

The cities that are by water all have harbors now. Leyawiin has a nice harbor, complete with a way for the river to get through, Bethesda!! :wallbash: , and Anvil's harbor is much bigger. Bravil, too, has a harbor now. The best thing about these new harbors is, you can go into any shipping office, and book passage to other places around the game world. Sure you can just fast travel, but come on. Really now. This is way cooler.

 

 

Of course you can just choose to not use it. No mod is truly necessary. A case can be made for not using it. Better frame rate, simplistic design if you're not interested in extraneous stuff, and better frame rate. Honestly, screw frame rate (within reason anyway). It will not slow down your game to the point of unplayability. If your computer truly can't handle it, that's a different story. You may want to forgo it then. But really, that's the only excuse I see not to get this mod. Unless you're really not into immersion....

 

 

Wow, thanks for the input. After that I'm at least going to give it a try. Thank you very much.

[Megatarius]

Anytime. :thumbsup: