Around the summer of 2016, I was newly unemployed and dealing with post-concussion syndrome as well as a myriad of other unexplained physical problems.
A friend gifted me an older game from a series I'd barely heard of after I expressed frustration that many of my more modern computer games with flashier effects were triggering migraines and my newfound health problems were preventing me from engaging in my offline activities as much as I'd like. The game? Oblivion.
The atmosphere drew me in, the outdated graphics and movement style made it refreshingly playable for someone recently concussed, and Oblivion's style of letting you do whatever you want quickly led to me ignoring the main quest in favor of exploring the big shiny city that I'd had such an enticing glimpse of in the intro movie. Big mistake.
Again. I was recently concussed. The Imperial City has regions that mostly all look identical. I got lost immediately. What's worse, I'd totally missed the part of the tutorial that let me know fast travel existed in this game so I didn't even realize I had a map at the time. Also the whole brain thing meant I was practically in tears over getting lost in a 2006 video game.
This was when Oblivion's unique radiant AI did something incredible.
A guard stopped next to me and asked, "Are you lost?" I assumed I was hallucinating at this point but I interacted with the guard and was astonished and delighted when he had an option to ask him for directions.
To some, Oblivion is a janky mess of a game. To me, it's where I learned that sometimes all you need is to be able to ask Wes Johnson for directions. His voice was so warm and reassuring that I calmed back down and was able to reorient myself in a huge overwhelming space and continue on. That was far from the last time I'd be calmed by Wes's voice in a video game, but it was certainly the first.
And for all that he's most famous for playing the zany kooks and terrifying villains, when I think of a Wes Johnson character, my first thought is always of that helpful guard that kept a young kid grounded in an uncertain time in their life.



















