A fantastic game that will never die.
Morrowind was released in 2002, being the third in the Elder Scrolls series as well as the predecessor to the biggest game (literally) of 2006, Oblivion. As such, it was not as well-known, nor as highly reviewed as its younger brother. However, despite the improvements that Oblivion made, in my opinion, Morrowind will always remain the greatest game in the series, and one of the greatest of all time. This, folks, is a game that may never die.
Graphics: 8.5+/10
Sure, it was made in 2002, so don't expect any hi-res textures or any fancy current-gen shading in the vanilla game. Yet, despite the age of the graphics, they still hold up, and do so remarkably well, may I add.
First, character models. This is one part of Morrowind that hasn't aged terribly well. For it's time, the models were great, featuring 10 playable races as well as 2 non-playable races. Each of these races are wonderfully varied, especially between the human and the beast races. Nowadays, the facial and character designs, and the animations performed by said characters are outdated, so don't expect anything of the likes of Uncharted 2 coming in.
Second, the environments. Unlike the character models mentioned previously, the environments are, to this day, among the best I've ever seen. They may like the polish, the amazing shaders, or the vibrant HDTV-worthy scenery, but by all means, Morrowind still has some of the best world-centered designs I've ever seen. It is incredibly varied, ranging from island chains, to exotic swamps, to lava-filled caves. Heck, they even have houses made of what looks to be mushrooms. Seriously, mushrooms! Come on, when was the last time you've seen that in a mature game like this?
The colors used in the environments are also greatly utilized, nothing too flashy, yet so perfect and awesome. Just like the designs, the colors used for each specific section of the world map range from smooth, wooden palettes used for woods and swamps, to extremely red-intensive caves and shrines made for the worship of the Daedra, demonic deities worshipped by cults. Needless to say, even to this day, I still love it all.
All this is just in the base game itself! Add in the two official expansions, and the quality becomes so good its ridiculous. Tribunal has an awesome castle/city, with a sweet looking underground sewer dungeon. Bloodmoon has all the snowiness the original lacked.
Third, how computer friendly is it? Well, to put it bluntly, it isn't. Even with a decent 700$ computer purchased in 2008, I can't get great results above 800x600 resolution. The frame rate can also be pretty choppy, going wildly from 70 fps to 20 fps (though it helps minimize the shock of it by manually setting the limit to around 40). On the bright side, they included an option to set how much fog you want, as to reduce the slowdown.
Sound: 7.5+/10
This is, perhaps, Morrowind's weakest point. It suffers not from a lack of quality, as the effects and music chosen are great and fit the bill nicely. It isn't from a lack of originality, nor is it from a lack of sheer epicness. Its worse problem is a lack of variety and quantity. The sound effects do their job nicely, sounding exactly like you think they would in real life. A sword swooshes, a ball of lightning cast as a spell crackles, you know the drill.
The problem arises when you discuss the music and, if you care for such a thing, voiced lines. There are literally only a handful of exploration and battle themes, and for a game that promises hundreds of hours of gameplay, these will grow stagnant over time. The quality of them are perfect, with one of the main themes being the greatest I've ever heard in my life, but, come on, they could have put more in there. It wouldn't have killed them!
The second potential problem is voice acting. I would say over 98% of dialog is written. In fact, the only lines spoken are combat lines, greeting lines, and lines during movies (of which there are few movies). Now, personally, I don't care for spoken lines; I always just read the subtitles and skip the talking. In the case of Morrowind, it honestly makes the game feel more like an epic novel than a movie, as you have to read just about all the dialog spoken during the game. For others, though, this may be a bad thing, considering the developers had the potential to add more voiced lines. To each his own, though; it's up to you to make the call.
Gameplay: 9.5+/10
As all games should be, this is what Morrowind is all about. As the game box promised, there is over a hundred hours of gameplay in the vanilla game alone. The basic concept of Morrowind is simply one word: freedom. YOU make the character that YOU want to play as. YOU advance the story as YOU see fit, and so on and so forth.
First, character creation. In its day, as far as I could remember, this was rarely done. Most RPGs, especially the Japanese ones, had you playing as a cookie-cutter mold of some stereotyped character, whether it be a solemn, mute character, or an angst, spiky haired character. There was little choice in deciding who you wanted to play as. Morrowind takes this concept, throws it out the car window, and runs over it repeatedly until you can't even remember just what it was running over.
Of course, the first step is selecting a name. After this comes the next one. As I mentioned previously, you have 10 races to choose from. These range from the battle-hardened and tough, to the sweet-talkers, the mages, the stealth-oriented, the balanced, and even the beast races. Each race has its own strengths and weaknesses. Should you be a tough Orc, or a stealth Bosmer (wood elf). That's up for you to choose.
Next up to decide is the class you want to play as, and the skills you decide you want to have. You can have the computer decide for you, choose a pre-set skill-set, or choose the skills yourself. First-time players may find it easier to choose a pre-set class, but through the many replays that you'll be bound to take, you'll find it better to choose your own skills.
Speaking of skills, there are 27 to choose from, ranging from the weapon skills to the armor skills, all the way to sneaking and magic. There are 7 weapon types, 4 armor types, 8 magic types, and miscellaneous skills in between. When choosing your skills, you get 5 major skills (which level up fastest), 5 minor skills (which level up a little slower). The rest level up regularly. You also get a choice to set a primary skill type (which grants a bonus to skills that fall under that type) and two favored attributes (of which there are 7) to give a bonus to.
However, as varied as they may be, the skill system is Morrowind's weakness when it comes to gameplay. Several of the skills are flat-out useless over time. Take Unarmored, one of the Armor skills. When compared to the heavy, medium, and even light armors, it is virtually useless aside from role-playing. It provides almost no defense, and you'll be far better off getting light armor over it any day. Other skills follow the same trend, and over the course of gameplay, you can go to trainers and just train up the skills you didn't pick earlier and match them up to the rest, which almost makes skill selection pointless after a while.
Speaking of which, you level up skills by using them, not by merely gaining experience for all skills like in Japanese RPGs. This is a unique and, in my opinion, great system that matches the Morrowind universe perfectly.
The final choice is selecting a birth-sign, and just with skills, have some great and bad choices. These have varying perks, ranging from giving your player a once-a-day ability to granting you a permanent bonus to an attribute.
Once your character is made, you are free to explore the world as you see fit, and this is the key to Morrowind's ultimate success. You can follow the main story without deviating, but, come on, what's the fun in that? Why not go to the surrounding swamp and hunt some mudcrabs? Better yet, why not go spelunking in caves, looking for treasure? How about fulfilling some side quests? The world is yours, and yours alone. You alone dictate what happens. Heck, after a while, when your character is strong enough, you may even decide to eradicate the game world of all human life! The choice is yours!
This would be no small feat, however, as the world is huge compared to most free-roam games nowadays. It is set on a giant island called, coincidentally enough, Morrowind. Plenty of caves and Daedric shrines dot the island, just begging to be explored at the expense of your safety. Coupled with the awesome environments I mentioned before, it will take a good while to get bored with it. This is not even mentioning the regions added by the two official expansions, Tribunal and Bloodmoon. Truly, this game has a long life in it.
But this isn't to say the main quest is boring, not in the least. It's decently long, clocking in at around 20-40 hours, depending on skill, and has a pretty good story to boot. You are a prisoner, sent to the island for an unknown reason. To avoid spoilers, I'll only mention that it's pretty epic for a game built around freedom.
However, not everything is perfect about Morrowind's gameplay. I mentioned previously the skill system, and its tendency to be slightly broken, but that's not the only problem. The next one is the combat itself. To put it simply, it gets boring pretty quick, and this is one area that Oblivion trumps its older brother. The combat in Morrowind is like an FPS with swords, except you can miss, even if you clearly hit the opponent. It has a RPG feel in this way, as, unlike Oblivion, your chance to hit is decided by the weapon skill you are using. You attack by merely clicking the attack button. No complicated mechanics, no special gimmicks, all you do is click the attack button (hold it longer to do more damage.) Weapons are varied in the damage they do. Axes deal great damage if you hold back long enough, while short blades do more damage if you slash faster. Needless to say, it falls short to Oblivion's excellent combat system.
Magic is similar; you got a percentage to successfully cast a spell, and this is also based on your magic skill. If your skill is low enough, or the spell is complex enough, you may fail it outright, wasting magic power. Unlike in Oblivion, you must switch to bare hands to cast a spell, which is tedious and reduces its effectiveness.
Modding: 10/10
Remember when I said the game box promised a hundred hours of gameplay? Well, to be honest, they were kinda under-exaggerating it a wee bit. You see, if you are lucky enough to get the PC version, you have one of the most modifiable games ever released. Thousands of mods are released on the Internet, some basic and sublime, to outright total conversions of the game. I mean, it is so modifiable that Bethesda even included a construction set to make your own mods! How awesome is that?! Granted, it is really complicated to make a good mod, and I just don't have the patience to learn it, but hey, it's still awesome.
Did you notice how I put +'s next to all my scores I gave to each category? Well, since Morrowind is such a modifiable game, you can change the content however you please. Remember when I said the character models were outdated? Download a mod to make the faces and body look much better. Want to make the general graphics even better? Download a mod to get hi-resolution textures! There is even a mod to remove fog completely. If your computer can handle it, do it!
Remember the lack of music? All you need to fix that is an MP3 of your choosing. Just place that in the right folder and you'll get even more selections of music. Heck, you can even put your favorite rock song, or game music in there if you got it (just for the record, I endorse legality).
Then the gameplay also gets a significant boost. While most mods won't deal with the skill and combat problems, they definitely can add many quests and regions, and even have the capacity to change the game world completely. Adding new items and characters, even new races, can give you as much replayability as your mind can handle.
All this doesn't even mention the expansions made by Bethesda, Tribunal and Bloodmoon. Both add more stuff to do, more environments, and more items to collect. All in all, a great collection of expansions available, even to the XBox owners of the game.
So, in closing, I will say this; if you have any chance to get this game, do so. Yes, it's 8 years old. No, it doesn't diminish the fun. It only makes an awesome game even cheaper. Try for the PC version, but if you can't get that, then try to get it for the XBox system, as even without modification Morrowind is a fantastic game. Just make sure to get the GOTY edition for either platform.