I haven’t played that many fantasy action-ish RPGs lately, but I always thought that Gothic II was way more engaging than Oblivion or Morrowind. More compact world (which to me means less filler), also janky and just a hand full of voice actors, but a lot more personality IMO. Not a perfect game by any means though.

I’ve been meaning to play Kingdom Come 2 because it seems to be cut from a similar cloth, including giving NPCs things to do when you’re not around. For the exploration factor there’s some great RPGs without the action mechanics out there, I liked Wasteland 2 and Caves of Qod. My favorite has been Cyberpunk 2077 (2.0), but that’s probably too far removed from what TES is doing.