Natural Environments is an attempt to enhance the original appearance of Oblivion's weather and water components. The mod also removes several minor annoyances found in the original product, such as opaque water surfaces, muddy underwater vision, visibly pixelated cloud textures, and nonsensical meteoric conditions. Most of the changes are cosmetic and should not affect the game’s performance noticeably.
Natural Enviroments - by Max Tael
We are proud to announce Oblivion Portals first mod review for our readers! This week we review ( test might be a more fitting word in this case ) Max Taels mod Natural Environments. As you could read above Natural Environemnts offer's a different weather system along with new water effects and gives you a different atmosphere compared to the original version of Oblivion. Natural Environments also includes new sky textures.
Let's get this going!
Now we'll take a look at some comparsion screenshots to really see the difference between the original version of Oblivion, and Oblivion with Natural Environments installed.
Here we can clearly see the difference! The sky has a darker tone and the world looks less bleak with NE installed. Also note the incredible water, with NE the water looks less plastic and the opacity of it is much more realistic.
What an improvement! Bad weater has never been this beautifull before! As you can see NE makes the world slightly darker during rainy days, but in return you get rid of the ugly grey tones. The view distance is also improved and you can clearly see the horizon.
And I who already thought that Skingrad was a bit too foggy and grey! In this case NE makes it even worse.
Stunningly beautiful! Tamriel feels much warmer and cozy with NE installed. Note that NE only replaces the sky textures, all the other textures are the original ones. It's the new and improved weather system that adds the more vibrant colours to the world.
The HDR doesn't seem to be that very intense with NE installed. The sky is a lot darker and the water reflections of the sun is not as impressive, but in return the water reflections with NE are far more realistic, less plastic!
What a difference! NE's sunsets are darker, and in this case more orange. Less fantasy and more realism in my opinion.
Definitely better. The greytones has been reduced and the horizon is much more visible. With NE the night's are dark instead of grey, wich is a big plus!
The forests are a bit darker, especially the green tones. Somehow this makes the forests feel a bit more dense and cozy!
I had a hard time rating this mod, the reason? Well, Natural Environments isn't really one mod, it's three mods! The thing that make's Natural Environments such an excellent mod is that the player can choose wich features he/she wants! Natural Environments has two ESP files, one for the new weather system, and one for the new water effects. You can also choose if you want to use the new sky textures by simply add, or not add them to your textures folder! I recommend this mod to everyone who want's to spice up Oblivion's atmosphere with something new and different!
Pros
+ Improved water effects, such as opacity and reflections.
+ The player can choose wich fatures he/she want's to use.
+ Better view distance during rainy weather and night-time by reducing the greytones in exterior cells.
+ Usage of vibrant colours wich makes Tamriel a more warm and beautiful place!
+ Three mods in one!
Cons
I think it's up to the readers to decide what's bad, because as I said, it's all about personal taste.
There we go! Oblivion Portal's first mod review/test! If you have any suggestions, opinions or questions email me or use the comment section.
If you have a candidate for the next weeks Mod of the Week, email me or use the comment section.
Graphics settings used:
Eveything where set to maximum exept for exterior shadows who where completely turned off. HDR was enabled.
Other modifications used in this test:
Landscape LOD Texture Replacement by Shaja.
Note: Monitor settings such as gamma or brightness have a big impact on Natural Environments. A lot of people might not see a big difference between the original version of Oblivion, and Oblivion with Natural Environments installed and/or in the screenshots used in the review/test. The result totally depends on what kind of a monitor you have, and how it's configured.
