I'm going to compare The Elder Scrolls Oblivion and Skyrim with Kingdome Come Deliverance.

SPOILERS AHEAD (spoling TES IV, TES V and some minor stuff of KCD)

I will start off with one of the most important aspects in a video game in my opinion – music.

This is where KCD fails compared to The Elder Scrolls (it does not fail in general; the music in KCD is mediocre). The music of Oblivion is emotional, but not well defined. Oblivion's music won't force a mood onto you, unless you are in combat. It's actually legendary. Do you remember this music, when you just roam the forests? This room for interpretation lets the music fit almost always. Just turn up the Oblivion OST – Atmospheres and tell me that you don’t feel the nostalgia. :D That's something Kingdom Come Deliverance screwed up - the music does not leave much room for interpretation. Heck - I don't want spy-movie music in a game in the first place, but especially not when I am picking herbs in a monastery or forest. Skyrim's music is less versatile, but it still has the same atmosphere/tone and room for interpretation and in my opinion the best thing in Skyrim is actually the music.

Scale, design and roaming

Speaking of herbs and forests - the forests of Bohemia in KC:D are believable. It just looks like you would expect a forest to look like. Oblivion also has forests like these, even though they don't look nearly as good - but Oblivion was released 15 years ago. Skyrim has a claustrophobic world, everything had to be filled with stuff - there is no actual nature. As soon as you leave a town you will see the next town. And what are those towns? Capital cities? The big mighty imperial city built on nine isles? The capital city of Skyrim, Solitude is a castle. It’s just a castle. It is smaller than a village. If you make everybody talk about “the big city” make it big or leave it out completely. KCD is not messing lore up and stays true to the setting. Staying true to the setting is essential for an immersive experience and why would you bother to create a setting in the first place to just ignore it? Just start both games and start walking around in the wild - what are you enjoying more? My answer is clear. But TES has this unique design, where you can interact with anything, which makes the world feel more real, because the world doesn’t feel as staged.KCD has much less objects to interact with, thus feeling less real when standing in front of a book shelf for example. In Skyrim and Oblivion you would be able to interact with every single book, in KCD you can just look and appreciate (the detail on minor things is astonishing in KCD). In terms of sound Skyrim and KCD are both awesome, but of course Skyrim has more powerful fantasy-like sounds. Oblivion is okay in terms of sound, but not as good as KCD and TES V. You have to eat, drink and sleep. In Oblivion at least you had to sleep to level up, but Skyrim aims for a faster pace, thus implemented no survival system and therefore missed an opportunity to enhance immersion.

Progression #1 - Difficulty

But Oblivion has this unforgiveable RPG sin - levelled enemies. You would always need two hits for the same rat, effectively eradicating any feel of progression. Skyrim had levelled enemies too, but only certain enemies were scaling, so there would always be a challenge, but you wouldn't see five bandits in deadric armor running around. Skyrim is handholding and you can't fail. There is just one occurrence where you fail in the main story - and that's on purpose. The only way to fail a quest is not through dialog, but only by dying. And no problem you can quicksave every 30 seconds - so there is no punishment or consequence. Oblivion is just too easy. The best moments are non –scripted, e.g.: Fighting a bear in the Rift at Level 5 and barley (pun intended) survive. And KCD on the other hand has real consequences. End up in jail? Oops, it burns. You're dead. In the tutorial. That's just awesome. If you pick a wrong dialog option it can mean, that you have to do two additional in game hours of work to get the very same information. Once I was thrown into jail for failing a speech test against some noble. I was glad to see some realistic power abuse happening there. Progression #2 - Reputation Your reputation will drop for acting rude or criminal in Oblivion and KCD, not so in Skyrim. You can be a master thief and mass murderer and people won't talk in the slightest about it. No newspaper article, no rumors, no chatter. Nothing. In Oblivion people will talk about your actions and there is a newspaper occasionally describing some 'accidents' or murder. In KCD people will talk about your actions as well and sometimes even refuse to talk with you, if you don't bribe. Consequence. Also people would recognize you as the Hero of Kvatch in Oblivion and you will receive a little present after finishing the main quest line (not going to say what - just in case), while you will only have a crowd half-heartedly cheering. And then that's just it. You just saved the world and no one will recognize it, there is no consequence. Also if you finish the thieves’ guild quest-line - the members will treat you like crap, just like when you came in. Just let that sink in…

Quests If you wait too long with an urgent quest it will fail or progress without you. This is revolutionary. The world does not revolve around you in KCD. You are a peasant are treated as such, which is awesome. In Skyrim and Oblivion on the other hand even very urgent quests will just wait for the mighty hero to come and let Akatosh make the time go by again. You are being consistently treated the same in Skyrim, while you actual feel how you are becoming better and better in KCD. Just beautiful.

The quests of Skyrim are generic, not bad - just generic. I remember this one: I went into a house, grabbed a mace of Molag Bal and got locked in with a priest. Molag Bal ordered the priest to kill me and me to kill him in order to escape. I used the spell "Calm" to initiate a conversation with the priest on how to proceed. But it wouldn't let me talk with him, so I had to kill him without changing a single word with him in order to continue playing the game. Oblivion’s quests offered not any more freedom to be honest, but they were versatile and not generic. Remember the troll painting? Or the quest, where you simulate an apocalypse for some Khajiits? Oblivion has some very good story writing. So has KCD, but it offers so much more freedom in its main quests. You can use your sheer appearance, bribe, brute force, stealthy murder, theft, speechcraft and even some other nice creative ways to achieve the same goal. It is just amazing and allows much for roleplaying – without being too easy or sandbox-like in the process. See, you have to force the RPG on Skyrim to call it an RPG, but KCD lets you roleplay properly with those choices. Sadly this is only partly true: You can’t tell the guards about the millers wanting to steal from your lord or fellow citizens, you don’t have any option but “yes” in the quest “A woman scorned” (this quest could have been totally amazing, but oh well…) btw. - yes it is stuck in your journal - and so on. However the main quests in KCD really outshine the railroaded quests of The Elder Scrolls.