4/5 ★ – Lord_Hazenberg's review of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered.

I missed the boat on Oblivion until this remaster, and man was this experience bittersweet. What happened to this Bethesda? How do you go from a wonderful mix of role playing & open world sandbox to chasing action game trends & losing your own identity in the process? I played this game on my Series X, and it took me around 30 hours to finish the main quest, some of the factions, & the shivering isles DLC. There were some pretty bad frame rate drops in the busier open world map portions, and I experienced 2 hard crashes. Oblivion still had some of that Daggerfall DNA instilled into it. Being able to ask any NPC about local rumors or quests, town guards having helpful dialogue, & having to sleep to level up. Skills were a welcome sight as Skyrim stupidly dropped those in favor of “pick health, stamina, or magic.” I played my usual Elder Scrolls character; female dark elf rogue. Having high sneak, illusion magic, & acrobatics was so much fun. Getting to ghost enemies or jump past normal level barriers felt like a reward for how I built my character. The Dark Brotherhood was tailor made for my setup & stealth shooting Arena opponents was hilarious, but sadly the Thieves Guild quest line bugged out & I couldn’t figure out a fix. The main story was fun. Todd Howard loves his “chosen one” protagonists, but Oblivion felt the least like that. You were still a normal person of this realm who could pull off the impossible instead of a reborn demigod or some other nonsense. I’m also glad this was simply an Unreal Engine 5 skin over regular Oblivion, so I could experience all of its quirks for better or worse. I’ve also missed Jeremy Soule’s soundtracks. I don’t know the details of his getting “me too’d,” but I do know he’s a much better composer than the other Bethesda regular Inon Zur. Perfect soundscapes for D&D games & high fantasy in general. TLDR; Oblivion has aged wonderfully in its near 20 years of existence. A great role playing game with a shiny new coat of paint over top of it. Hopefully this remaster’s success can wake Bethesda up from their past decade of mediocrity, but I know better than to dream like that. A must play for anyone with game pass, or I’ve already seen it on sale if you find a price you like.