Don't know if this is OT or not since criticizing TES may help the OP...
Anyway. Played Oblivion some years ago. It was fun. But a TERRIBLE RPG. Completely inconsequential and, after a few hours, repetitive. How can an RPG NOT respond to the player's decisions? I might as well "role play" NBA Jam and imagine conflicts in between matches.
About realism, it is absolutely necessary. Not real world realism, but a consistent, believable world. In Fallout people actually die from shooting them in the eyes (maybe not Fallout 3, another TES). In IE games a critical shot (ie to the head, etc) blows a person to shreds, so do traps (fail vs petrification? ).
In any case, people play games for different reasons. Some may be fun because we can fool around, flick fireballs and wave a sword like a feather duster. Others are fun because they provide challenges, strong narrative, etc. To each his own.
I play it because the inconsistencies do nothing to the main core of the game, which is exploration and roleplay. Making my own story. People are too nit picky, looking at the quality of the shading instead of the whole picture.
edit: That's actually the perfect analogy since even the graphics resemble this. Some people who look real close at objects in the game, like the trees and rocks say the game is ugly. Others that look at the surroundings from afar and as a whole say its fantastic. You have to look at Skyrim's whole picture or not at all.