It will take a while to notice the difference, as the introductory/tutorial-esque chapter of this fantasy adventure has the main character walk through boring castle halls, dimly lit rat-infested caverns, and dirty sewers that no amount of improved textures and upgraded lighting effects can really fix. Once the hero or heroine takes a step outside it will be hard not to admire the beautification of the lands of Cyrodiil. It takes bravery to try and improve one of the most modded video games in existence, as some amongst the thousands of those can lead to a result that puts even modern RPGs to shame, yet Bethesda gave it a shot (via Virtuos), and made something that truly looks great. Shadow dropped in the form of a simple release trailer, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered is here, so get ready to lose all sense of time. 
There are some gameplay tweaks and changes here and there, but for now make sure to remember that this is above all a visual upgrade. Thankfully, it’s a very, very good one. That boring boxy gate that leads to a dungeon? It’s now a nice stone arch, surrounded by foliage, with the metal bars being more intricately designed. The dungeon itself? Less a collection of similar corridors with flat walls and more like an actual dilapidated dungeon, with cracks in the ceiling letting bright rays come through. The outside world is no longer a boring golf course with about three shades of green, but a natural looking landscape; more and higher mountains have been added to the map; the sky and the day/night cycle is magnificent; and, finally, one can even see a part of Skyrim if they climb high enough!
Everything looks better, everything is more detailed, and everything makes it hard to go back to the original Oblivion. Apart from the characters. The fourth Elder Scrolls (and, as a consequence, the likes of Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas) has always been the butt of the joke due to the character faces ranging from okay-ish, to somewhat weird, to laughably bad. While they have been overhauled, it’s hard to wipe out the strong DNA of the 2006 instalment. The good news is that the brand-new lip-syncing is a big improvement, and the addition of more voice actors decreases the feeling of living in a world of clones. The animation of almost everything is better too, especially when it comes to combat as foes now react to attacks and fall more naturally, although melee fighting still feels like the hero is flailing pool noodles due to a noticeable lack of weight to almost everything. Bethesda should pay a little more attention to the recent work of their little employee by the name of id Software…
Oblivion Remastered is a looker. A decently optimised looker? Well, that is a question this critic can’t answer, as his two available systems aren’t really capable of testing this at the highest settings possible. On the first potato-powered rig, the frame rate essentially reached single digits but everything still looked pretty good. On the second fairly beefy one, there were some dips here and there, mostly out in the open. Know that this is fairly CPU-intensive – probably more than it needs to be as it is running on Unreal 5 juice, which isn’t exactly the best engine for open-world titles. Note that the official specs mention the need to use an SSD, which sadly was full in this case, so the whopping 110+ GB at hand had to be sent to the HDD. Surprisingly, this never became an issue, with few if any loading screens lasting more than 10 seconds or so.
Concerning the game itself, Oblivion’s greatest strength has always been its immersive nature, the freedom it offers, and its moment-to-moment exploration, with the reward not really being the shiny thing that was found inside this hidden ancient fort or underwater cave, but all the steps that lead to that. It can at times be so absorbing that it will be easy to forget that a hellish invasion is underway. The remaster doesn’t interfere with this core experience. Unfortunately, this was never really the fantastic RPG that many once said it was. For starters, it many times feels like a downgrade compared to The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, as there’s little actual role-playing, with many choices being illusory, and player agency often overridden. This has always been a sandbox first and an RPG a distant second. As for the story (and this particular province of Tamriel), while good, it leans a bit more towards generic and oversimplified, undermining the deep lore behind the franchise’s awesome universe.
Beyond the audio-visual upgrade, there are many little changes here and there, with stuff like a slightly improved sneak detection UI, empty container notifiers, and the ability to fast travel to all major cities right out of the gate… You are still advised to simply walk and smell the flowers, though. These, as well as other changes, are minor. A more important one is that the terrible leveling-up system of the original has been reworked. Major and minor skills still level-up through use, but players are no longer asked to just increase the major skills tied to a class, and now points can be allocated across a variety of stats. This makes it so that you longer have to fear “accidentally” making everything ten times harder for your avatar. In conclusion, a fine remaster of an age-old classic that’s not for everyone, with some gameplay improvements thrown in as well. That’s it? No. Some things could definitely be done to improve the package.
Enemy AI is still only a bit smarter than the demons of 1993’s Doom, and the weird laws of Tamriel still apply, thus a whole army will chase you for stealing a spoon by mistake. Sure, this isn’t a remake, but it could do with a couple of fixes. Case in point: bugs. These have almost been left intact. Some are minor, like subtitles forgetting to occasionally appear. Some are immersion breaking yet hilarious, and part of that special Oblivion charm, like when an enemy is sent to the stratosphere after a hit, or a duplicate of a main character stands right beside them during cut-scenes. Then there are quest related bugs that are harder to accept. Without going into detail, they are fairly frequent (for a 100+ trek, that is) and don’t just appear in late-game scenarios, but even in early mainline missions. In other words, a fine remaster, sure, but 20 years is enough time to do some repairs, especially with a price tag such as this.
