I know there’s great love for Oblivion (I never played it when it was new), and of course Skyrim is the gold standard for new fans (I played the shit out of that and it was my first entry into the elder scrolls back when it came out 14 years ago…) but I really feel like this shadow drop of a half assed remake is just priming everyone to lower their expectations for the likely dumpster fire that is The Elder Scrolls VI.
I know its old hat nonsense of a complaint but whatever Bethesda used to be it stopped being that 20 years ago and we’re all just stuck thinking they’ll put out some new masterpiece when in reality all the talent they had back in the day has likely left for other jobs and they are now just a shitty company among countless other shitty companies putting profit over anything else and stifling anyone who might actually have good ideas on how to make good games (how unsurprising).
I think Bethesda has definitely fallen off in recent years, but I am a bit confused by the point this post is getting at. We learned at launch that Oblivion is a remaster, not a remake, and it’s just the original game running under the hood with a new coat of paint and some minor tweaks. And it’s a pretty high-effort remaster at that.
I just think it’s a bad example to use of how the company isn’t getting better, when the point of the remaster was to change as little of the core game as possible. It’s as good now as it was back then but it’s still a 19-year-old game.
Starfield is what should be killing everyone’s expectations of Elder Scrolls 6.
The remaster was also made externally, so whatever the point being made here is, it’s weird twice over.
Man the negativity. I’m so sick of gamers negativity. It’s not even a new game, it’s a remaster. you knew what the product was going to be. It’s oblivion. We all knew it was oblivion. If you don’t like oblivion, why did you buy it?!
I swear to God if they changed it too much I’d be commenting here on a post about how they had no respect for the original. Then we wonder why “they never listen to gamers”. Because we bitch and moan about everything.
100% agree. Pleasing Gamers™ is a Kafka trap.
It’s not even much of a remaster. They just slapped a coat of paint on it.
The Gamebryo/Creation Engine is still there running the game, it just uses Unreal 5 for the graphical elements. And they updated some of the levelling to work more like Skyrim, because the Oblivion system sucked in comparison.
It’s still the same 20 year old Oblivion under the hood.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but calling it a remaster is a bit disingenuous.
What do you think “remaster” actually mean?
More than a coat of paint. They didn’t actually port the game to Unreal 5, they just used it to make the graphics look better. The modding community could have done this years ago if that’s all they wanted to do. Skyblivion is more of a remaster than this official one.
With all of the resources of the original development and sources, I expect more than the modding community is capable of.
Emm, no. If you build something from the ground up it’s called remake.(Demon Souls, the Resident Evil series) Remastered is taking the old game and put on a fresh paint of coat and give it some modern QOL so it’s much more accessible today.
Skyblivion is closer to remake than remaster.
Also i feels like you misunderstand why people like this game.
Just musing on the fact that Bethesda doesn’t care about making games and instead just cashes in on nostalgia. I also think their finance bros realized their upcoming big IP drop is going to be an objective POS and wanted to prime people’s expectations by re-releasing a 20 year old game with some lipstick on it.
It would be neat if they hired some people who actually had innovative ideas about gameplay, visuals and stories to maybe make a neat new game within an existing or new IP, but they haven’t done that in literal decades so I think its pretty reasonable to not be incredibly excited about anything they are putting out or planning to put out in the future.
There‘s no Oblivion remake. Go to the Steam Page and carefully read word for word what it is you‘re talking about.
I play Fantasy Critic with some friends. We allow remakes in our league but not remasters. This one counts as a remake for purposes of this site, with a flag on it to note that it was contentious. This game definitely blurs some lines on some definitions.
They literally ssid they kept the mechanics running on the original engine so the game retains its “bethesda charm” and upon playing it, it became immediately obvious that Todd 100℅ believes what was charming about their games is the jank and bugginess. 🤦♂️
I really hate the fact that Morrowind was such a landmark, amazing, beautiful game in nearly every way (for the time) and they have managed to regress on every single front from that in every single game they have made after.
I agree with Todd in the sense that the jankyness is part of Oblivion’s charm. However, I believe that the jankyness only works in a game from 2007, which has weird graphics and an overall surreal vibe. The jankyness is not charming in the dark fantasy of Skyrim nor in the hyper-realistic remake/remaster (whatever people call it).
whatever Bethesda used to be it stopped being that 20 years ago
I agree with the general sentiment, but 20 is a bit of a stretch given that it misses Fallout 3, NV, 4, the original release of Oblivion, and Skyrim. Twenty years ago was the start of their golden era, in my book.
They didn’t make NV anyway. And also, Morrowind was the best thing they ever made. After that, it’s been all downhill.
Played Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim as they came out. Love the series. But it also felt like Skyrim lost something (not that it stopped me from sinking a stupid amount of hours into the game or playing it about twice a year.) And you know, my expectations for the next TES aren’t super high. But the thing is, it’s not what Bethesda is going to do with it that really gets me excited. It’s the hope that modding will continue to be heavily supported and what the community will do with the game. I have far more faith in modders than I do in Bethesda. The new TES not being packaged with modding support, to me, that would be the deathknell of TES.
half assed remake
which is exactly why they called it a remaster. it was never their intention to remake the game.
Personally I think most of the stuff that went wrong with Starfield were design choices related to space travel and many many planets, which won’t be an issue with TES of Fallout going forward. So if they stay in their lane I don’t see any reason why they can’t keep churning out decent titles in those series, even if they maybe don’t reach the same heights.
You think this is a half assed remake? To me this feels like a significant upgrade (and not just to graphics) while maintaining the core experience and I’m kinda shocked at how good it is.
I see a lot of people downplaying the remaster as a fresh coat of ue5 paint. I’m playing the game, having disliked the original, and I’m loving it. I’m kind of impressed with what they did with the game, basically remaking the world elements in ue5 and leaving the gameplay as it was with minor tweaks. Fresh coat of paint feels more like rip out the drywall and do it again. Just leave the structure alone. Like, the electrical and plumbing is still there and feels the same but it looks completely different.
Games like this dont come very often, so if anything, this remaster and BG3 should raise the bar on what we should expect from a new TES game.
It is literally not a remake, and how is it half assed? I have a low to mid range PC and the game runs smooth as hell, and it’s gorgeous.
I have no idea what’s your complaint are though, and it’s not a remake, it’s a remaster that is significantly better than a lot of other remaster have to offer. They could’ve gave us widescreen support, some lighting change, some new horse armour and call it a day, but they somehow able to snap an UE5 rendering on top of gamebryo, some modern QOL, new character models, modern lipsync, while retaining the charm that spawned an entire genre of meme.
There’s a reason Witcher 1 isn’t getting a remastered but a remake. Gamer these day is so jaded and just can’t seems to satisfied with anything, that a witcher 1 remastered will get hated forever.
All I wanted from the remake was character models that didn’t look like cartoons and a leveling system that didn’t punish suboptimal builds, and by God that’s what they delivered.
People keep clamoring for a Morrowind remake, and I disagree. It’s perfect the way it is. Oblivion NEEDED this.
It’s a remaster. What’s the problem?
You don’t seem to know what a remaster is. Most importantly, it’s not a remake and the two terms are not interchangeable.
I stopped paying attention to Bethesda when they released that Creator’s Club (or whatever it was called) bullshit for FO4. That shit broke all the fucking mods I had, then they had the audacity to request $20 for a mod that was already freely available. I lost any respect I had for then in that moment.
I’m not giving them another dime…doesn’t mean I won’t still play their games though.
