The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered Review

No matter how it is looked at, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is one of the few video games released to date that can be described as magical. Launching at a time when the medium was about to blow up like it never managed to do before, the fourth entry in the series by Bethesda took everything its predecessor did right, and brought it up to eleven in such a way that no one who happened to get acquainted with Emperor Uriel Septim VII in the dungeons of the Imperial Prison could ever forget the journey through Cyrodiil to prevent the forces of Oblivion from ravaging Tamriel.

Though it is fondly remembered by all those who had the pleasure of experiencing it, the original Oblivion is not without issues. While revolutionary in many ways, some of the gameplay features felt somewhat clunky, even in 2006, and the usual smattering of Bethesda’s trademark bugs negatively impacted the experience, although they ultimately contributed to the game’s legendary and magical status.

Nineteen years later, Bethesda decided to bring back their magical role-playing game with The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered, and so far, the player response seems great, with four million players registered in the first four days. This remaster does an excellent job updating the classic role-playing game without removing any of the features that still make it unique to this day, for better or worse, starting with the massively enhanced visuals. Taking advantage of the latest version of Unreal Engine 5, Virtuos did an incredible job making Cyrodiil look gorgeous with new character models that do a much better job higlighting the physical differences between the different races, a new lighting system powered by UE5 Lumen, new highly-detailed environmental assets, new weather effects and spell animations.

Unsurprisingly, most new visual features and changes look incredible, but they have some downsides. For starters, as sadly expected in a game powered by Unreal Engine 5, there are performance issues on PC. The game runs pretty well in closed-off environments, but the performance leaves a lot to be desired in the open world. In two different benchmarking sessions, held in the sewers during The Path of Dawn quest to meet with the Sponsor to obtain the Mythic Dawn Commentaries 4 book, at 4K resolution, NVIDIA DLSS in Quality Mode, Frame Generation Hardware Lumen and every setting at high, the game ran at an average of 141 FPS, 24 1% low, with minimal stuttering that did not impact the experience a lot.

In the open world, however, things are quite different, as the game ran at an average of 107 FPS, 15 1% low with frequent stuttering. My system (i7-13700F, RTX 4080, 32 GB RAM) should be more than capable of handling Oblivion Remastered well, at least based on the system requirements, so it’s clear that more work is needed on the optimization front. During my first playthrough of the base game’s main quest, the game also crashed a few times, so the remaster suffers from some stability issues.

Besides the performance and stability issues, which will hopefully get addressed with post-launch updates, there’s one more reason why some may not particularly like a visual overhaul of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered. The original’s distinct bloom-heavy looks and soft and hazy lighting, which suited the game’s unique dreamlike nature, have been completely replaced with a more toned-down look and darker color grading that aligns with modern games. I didn’t mind the more grounded tone of the overhauled visuals too much, but there’s no denying that something has inevitably been lost in the remaster. This is ultimately a more subjective point of view, though, and it’s one easily remedied on PC with ReShade presets and the like.

The gameplay improvements featured in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered are sure to be more universally appreciated, as they increase the fun without taking away some of the game’s unique quirks.

The improved movement and combat animations make fighting enemies more satisfying, as hits have more weight and impact than the original. Third-person camera and controls, which allow players to move the character independently from the camera’s direction, have been vastly improved and are in line with Bethesda’s latest RPG offering, Starfield. This makes playing the game in third-person view more viable than ever. However, in my opinion, the first-person view is still the best way to play.

Another addition that massively improves the experience is the ability to sprint, which makes traversal faster and, in turn, the entire experience more enjoyable, although it comes with the side effect of making the game’s map feel slightly smaller. Other welcome changes are the interface overhaul which brings the game on par with its successor, Skyrim, some new menu shortcuts assigned to a controller’s dpad which make accessing fundamental menu features much smoother like inventory and map, a brand new character creator that allows players to go even crazier and create some of the most unnerving mosntrousities seen this side of Tamriel, an overhauled, and much better, leveling system, and toned down enemy scaling which makes the game slightly more approachable at all difficulty levels.

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered also features audio enhancements, such as new voicework across the game added on top of the old voicework. There are additional voiced lines from renowned actors like Sean Bean and Patrick Stewart, new environmental audio effects for NPC voices and sound to make the experience more immersive, new combat sound effects, and a higher quality soundtrack, which is highly welcome, considering how good it is even at a lower quality. These improvements, much like the gameplay enhancements and the inclusion of all downloadable content released for the original, including the excellent The Shivering Isles expansion, go a long way toward making The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered the definitive edition of the game, and the best way to experience this epic quest in 2025, though some newcomers will inevitably have trouble getting into the game if all they have experienced of the series is Skyrim.

Even with its new coat of paint and all gameplay enhancements, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered is still markedly a game from the early 2000s. Its gameplay mechanics powered by the the original game engine, the remaster still plays like it for the most part, with all its clunkiness almost intact, its smallish open world, compared to modern games, its weird NPCs, who still behave in their iconic comical way, like the iconic Highwayman taking gold from the player, only to comment how worthless it is once it is stolen back, its quirky combat system that often makes fighting enemies more frustrating than fun, and a general “randomness” to the entire experience that can feel very hard to get into, coming off from modern RPG or even just Skyrim. It’s this randomness, however, that makes Oblivion such a unique game.

Anything can happen in Cyrondiil. A grounded quest may turn into complete mayhem as it proceeds, and NPCs and other gameplay elements may interact unexpectedly and sometimes comically, with the same unpredictability of a dream, incentivizing experimentation like in the best immersive role-playing games on the market. It is not an experience for everyone, to be sure, but once it clicks, one becomes a fan of life, making it very easy to set aside the game’s undeniable shortcomings completely.

Though some of the changes and the performance issues will inevitably turn some players off, there’s no denying that the fourth entry in the series couldn’t have made its debut on modern gaming platforms better than it did with The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered. Updating the experience where required while keeping true to the original, Virtuos has developed an amazing remaster that does proper justice to one of the most beloved role-playing games ever released. PC players can also tweak it further to their liking thanks to the many mods already available on Nexus.

PC version tested. Review code provided by the publisher.

9.0

WCCFTECH RATING

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered