Oblivion remastered : A Wasted Opportunity

[Azzazel]

Sincerely, I think Oblivion should have gotten a full remake, not some half‑assed remaster. At this point, refusing to add a handful of modern mechanics and sticking with the same cloned dungeons until you’re sick of them shows brutal laziness.

All the dungeons, Ayleid ruins, and Oblivion gates feel copy‑pasted, with just a few tilesets, turning exploration into a mind‑numbing slog. To make matters worse, every few steps you get hit with a loading screen that reveals pop‑in of textures and assets, completely breaking immersion.

In 2025, performance is a sick joke: stutters, FPS drops, and textures that take ages to load even on top‑tier PCs. The UI is still stuck in 2006, with clunky menus and no advanced inventory filters; subtitles stutter around, making it a pain to follow crucial dialogue.

The AI hasn’t changed an ounce: enemies chase in single‑file lines, ignoring the world around them, quests bug out, and NPCs get stuck in animation loops. Dual wielding? Hell no: you still can’t hold two weapons at once, as if that were forbidden this century. The enchantment system is a mess: it only lets you apply one effect per weapon or armor, and sometimes you can’t even enchant without the menu crashing.

And to top it off, there’s no voiceover in other languages—really? Other Bethesda releases go fully localized on day one; here we’re stuck with English subtitles because what’s the point of adding flavor, right? There’s also zero official mod support at launch, depriving the game of the customization that would have kept it alive for another twenty years.

In the end, this remaster leans on the nostalgia of those of us who lived the glory of Oblivion in 2006, but it fails to meet today’s expectations. It’s like watching your favorite childhood movie and realizing that modern works are far superior; nostalgia alone can’t save a product so lacking in ambition, resources, or vision. They’ve wasted the chance to make history again.

[SkySymphony]

Too lazy to read this nice pamphlet. But Nostalgia = Money most of the time and that's what they want and what they got.

[AmaiAmai]

Everyone that has the original thinks that the game was a wasted opportunity. Besides the modern gamer types, no one actually thinks this one is better because it's a buggy mess and runs terribly.

The overall experience is worse vs. the original (which could have been had for 5 USD DRM FREE).

If someone would seriously play this over the original just for graphics, then they aren't a real gamer.

[Uraael]

Once again expectations and entitlement running amok.

The game was never supposed to be any of the things you seem to think it should be. Unusually for any game, zero promises were made about what it would be. It's a 2006 game given new graphics and a smattering of QoL improvements, not a world-beating 2025 game, whatever you believe that to be.

It is still a broken mess, now compounded with a badly-tuned engine hybridised on top of the janky old one. Most Bethesda games are broken janky messes, but they sell and people like them for what they are and what they can be via modding. in many ways this release echoes the original release - that was also an epic performance hog that people could barely run. Everything old is new again.

Could they have done more? Of course they could have and in many ways it's a shame they didn't. But if you dropped $60 expecting gaming perfection then I don't know what to tell you, Bethesda's record of horrible jank goes back 30 years, and this game's hundreds of issues have been a known quantity for nearly 20.

[Vault Traveler]

In a perfect world yes, but we all are just dancers for Todd amusement.

[AmaiAmai]

Originally posted by Vault Traveler:

In a perfect world yes, but we all are just dancers for Todd amusement.

Todd being at the top of the grand cosmic dance or...?

[Vault Traveler]

Originally posted by AmaiAmai:

Originally posted by Vault Traveler:

In a perfect world yes, but we all are just dancers for Todd amusement.

Todd being at the top of the grand cosmic dance or...?

Who is on top of a lapdance?

[Azzazel]

Originally posted by Uraael:

Once again expectations and entitlement running amok.

The game was never supposed to be any of the things you seem to think it should be. Remaster /= Remake. That alone should have clued you in. Unusually for any game, zero promises were made about what it would be. It's a 2006 game given new graphics and a smattering of QoL improvements, not a world-beating 2025 game, whatever you believe that to be.

It is still a broken mess, now compounded with a badly-tuned engine hybridised on top of the janky old one. Most Bethesda games are broken janky messes, but they sell and people like them for what they are and what they can be via modding. in many ways this release echoes the original release - that was also an epic performance hog that people could barely run. Everything old is new again.

Could they have done more? Of course they could have and in many ways it's a shame they didn't. But if you dropped $60 expecting gaming perfection then I don't know what to tell you, Bethesda's record of horrible jank goes back 30 years, and this game's hundreds of issues have been a known quantity for nearly 20.

I know perfectly well that it's a remaster and not a remake—in fact, if you had read, I say it in the very first line. That's exactly why I didn't spend $60 on something I suspected would just be the same old game with the same old bugs but with a simple visual facelift. If they had made a remake, I would have definitely spent the money. But honestly, I think this is just a rip-off

[Encòde]

QQ

[LeftPaw]

Yes, not only remastered but they could have made it a modern day classic. Same Oblivion but a Oblivion made today. They could have pushed it way beyond a graphics update, way beyond and with very little effort.
Maybe seeing how well this game has sold they will give it more love with the next remaster. Even though it's a winner it could have been so much more, so yeah, a wasted opportunity.

[*ੈ✩‧₊˚༺☆Prinny☆]

Don't care.
Didn't ask.
Still voting it for GOTY.

[★REM★]

Originally posted by Azzazel:

I think, you think wrong. This is as we wanted it.

[MaxxGold]

I'm having a blast playing on Xbox PC Gamepass, which is free if you just click links for 5 minutes every day

[PurpuluDragon]

I agree, but at the same time... Would you trust Microsoft/bethesda/virtuos with a remake? Cause i don't.
At least this way, they keep the greatness of the first oblivion. Pretty sure they add problems already with just the superficial changes they did. And some of them even are controversials when honestly, they just had to not touch anything, change just the system for shelves and rack, optimize the game enough, and make better face. And that remaster would have been already a lot better.
But no, the superficial change are body type, female armor not looking female, leveling, and a few thing that mess with the stat of monsters.
Like, body type or M/F, no one care about that , but the armors ? Nothing mod won't fixe but still, wtf.
(And i know the body type/F/M fight is more than just a typo fight, etc... Which add it to "bad choice" instead of "idc choice" cause it's divisive).

Anyway, all that to say, i just don't trust the current western gaming industry, even with all recent events putting in light what sell and what doesn't, to make a good remake.

But i agree with you, this remaster could have been better. And would this remake have been made before 2015, i would have agree too.
Unfortunaly, that's not the world we live in currently and gaming is a mess cause some people just can't keep it in their pant and need constant virtue signaling to get away with it.

[Azzazel]

Originally posted by ★REM★:

Originally posted by Azzazel:

I think, you think wrong. This is as we wanted it.

we? who?, not me for sure if i wanted the same exact game i would play the original with mods

[Ire]

Originally posted by Uraael:

Most Bethesda games are broken janky messes, but they sell and people like them for what they are and what they can be via modding.

yes, except, starting with fo4 bethesda has been increasingly hostile towards the modding community. Trying to force paid mods, launching games without mod support, launching games that effectively cant be modded, and no workshop support on this one.

They forget the reason we still TALK about these games 10-20 years later is the fact that modders make these games live that long, depsite what a janky, unfinished, buggy mess they launch as.