Oblivion features warring goblins as one quest designer thought turning a side quest’s gimmick into a whole thing “wouldn’t be a lot more work,” but looking back he’s not sure if that was “actually true”

Regardless of whether you spent countless hours exploring Oblivion in 2006, it’s possible that you may have overlooked an obscure feature – one where various goblin tribes could wage war over their sacred totem staffs. This unique aspect was supported by a complex system built upon a single quest within the RPG, which might not have been immediately apparent to many players.

In the game, there are seven primary goblin clans, each possessing a unique sacred staff known as their totem. If a player unintentionally joins a clan that isn’t their own, it will certainly cause distress – the original inhabitants will actively search for the lost tribe and may engage in conflicts with rival clans to reclaim it. This dynamic is showcased in the Goblin Trouble quest, the side mission that led to the establishment of this entire system.

In an interview with Eurogamer, Kurt Kuhlmann, who designed the goblin wars for Oblivion, shared his thought process: “As I needed a scripted mechanism to move goblins from one dungeon to periodically attack goblins in another, I reasoned it wouldn’t be much additional effort to make this system dynamic, allowing it to function with any goblin tribe if the player were to take their totem.

In the process of setting it up, the system encountered some challenges, primarily focusing on finding a solution to let the goblins exit the dungeon when typically those areas aren’t loaded unless players are nearby. Now, Kuhlmann isn’t exactly sure how he managed to resolve this issue, but he recalls: “I can’t specifically recall how I fixed it, but it seems I did! Likely with some under-the-hood manipulations from a designer’s perspective.

It seems Kuhlmann now questions the accuracy of the statement about minimal extra work, but it undeniably contributed to exciting, spontaneous gameplay. His enthusiasm for such aspects is evident, as he also mentions that he seized every chance to incorporate elements of ‘managed disorder’ in more recent Bethesda games.

In the original Oblivion, there weren’t many events comparable to the goblin wars. The designers wished they could have delved deeper into such conflicts, but unfortunately, the team was short on time – they actually had too much work piled up. Moreover, the tools for creating that type of content in Oblivion were quite basic.

The current situation seems strikingly similar to what Nate Purkeypile, a previous Bethesda developer, shared with PC Gamer. He stated in an interview that much of Skyrim’s excellent content was due to the developers having substantial autonomy to experiment, even if these ideas were not part of the original plan or schedule. It was this creative freedom that resulted in the introduction of Blackreach and werewolves in the 2011 RPG. Interestingly, Blackreach was added because they simply decided to create it independently and include it later on.

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2025-04-28 16:39