Someone called it a failure and that was what my original post was about.
No they didn't. You brought up the 'f' word.
I said this which, though utterly lacking the word failure, for some reason seems to have greatly pushed your buttons
Oblivion was, in the minds of many long time fans of the series, one of the weakest yet
How many is 'many'? 6? 79? 344? 8,666? Who knows. It's vague and intentionally so, though you can definitely find more than a few people who fit this situation. See the poll here where Morrowind wins best ES game by a landslide for example.
Then there was this:
Eh, maybe for people who didn't play prior titles in the series… By and large, the majority of people who played Morrowind thought it the superior title.
(Note that 'people who played Morrowind thinking it is a superior title' is not the same thing as saying Oblivion was a commercial failure)
To which you replied this:
Well, I'm not really sure that's true. I don't think we have any kind of hard data on that either. Either way though it's not really what I said… the point is Oblivion is by far the most popular game in the series and by far the best selling, so when core RPG enthusiasts try to act like it was a failure of some kind it makes me chuckle.
Of the bolded parts the first claim is conjecture and hinges on one's definition of 'popular'. Does popular mean just strictly sales numbers or does it mean memorable and well loved? It's a bit of a matter of opinion I think.
The second claim, however, can be said to be fact and once again
NO ONE IS DISPUTING THE FACT THAT IT SOLD MORE COPIES. You seem to not be grasping this.
See also this reply to you:
Not so fast.
Second, when "RPG enthusiasts try to act like it was a failure of some kind", the "some kind" part is crucial - few people deny Oblivion was a financial success, but a lot more think it was a creative failure.
You further went on to say
YOU might not like it. I didn't really like it either. But it is by far the biggest and best TES game according to the vast majority of fans.
What does biggest mean? Takes up the most HD space? Then yes it's the biggest. In terms of landmass it's probably the smallest and doesn't come close to Daggerfall. In terms of playing hours? I'd argue it's not the biggest there either. Biggest in terms of sales? Well yes, but, well do I need to get a big lighted neon sign to reiterate to you that no one is disputing that?
To say it is the best according to the vast majority of fans is vague and subjective. If by fans you mean anyone who has ever bought an ES game, including the apparent majority who bought Oblivion on the XBox, I would argue you can't necessarily say all sales = a "fan". I would also argue the majority of Oblivion purchasers bought it on the Xbox and have probably never played an ES game in the past thus by default it is the best game in the series because they have no frame of reference to compare it to.