ANYTHING NICE: Morrowind (Bethesda)
Above Vivec, the capital of Morrowind, hangs a moon the size of a mansion: a falling meteor arrested by the power of the city's living demigod, who's a benevolent monster of uncertain motives.
I heard about this floating moon halfway across the continent, and when I got to Vivec, I immediately went looking for it. It's the first time I'd engaged in actual tourism like that in a virtual world.
In a typically Morrowind elaboration, the rock is now a politican prison, and also a Damoclean threat that the demigod uses to remind people who's in charge. So you get all that backstory when you look up at it.
And of course, it's ultimately a quest endpoint, so that moment of pulling back your mouse to gawp at it becomes foreshadowing.
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'Anything Nice' is is a series of very short posts highlighting things I liked about the treatment of narrative in other people's games. It's a deliberately magpie, grab-bag approach. Some of these games I adore, some I don't even like, but I learnt from all of them.