- It contained things I consider a huge plus though, such as factions the player had to choose between and locations worth exploring.
- The scenery was far more varied than that of Oblivion, with as much variety as Gothic 3 (desert, snowy hills, dense forests, even a samurai city).
- The main quest was as bad as that of Oblivion, so they're pretty much on par there.
- The combat system was more interesting, though it was poorly balanced initially. Among other things it had decent dual-wield
- 3rd person view did not look as if the character was sliding on ice across any surface.
I'll easily live with some silly conversations and a few technical glitches for such a list of pros. Gothic 3 trumps that though having the same list, but more interesting characters, locations and significantly better balancing (for everything but 1H + shield initially, which was very poor and lead to the infamous stun-lock situations). G3 also had fantastic atmosphere, and the best music track I've ever witnessed in a game.
I guess it's all down to priority, but I've never said anything other than G3, TW and then Ob as far as the three big sand box games go. I think I even mentioned it in my TW "review/preview" thing/thread back in the days.