The Oblivion Remastered recreation is lastly right here and it appears to be like, properly, trendy. And by trendy I imply brown. The mud’s brown, the water’s brown, and the grass is brown. It’s all extraordinarily brown and I’m undecided the right way to really feel about that as somebody who was wowed by Bethesda’s shiny fantasy world 19 years in the past.
Evaluating screenshots between previous Oblivion and Oblivion Remastered make it fairly apparent: There’s a thick haze hanging over all the things that darkens each scene. The whole world appears to be like like a bonus degree in PowerWash Simulator ready to be blasted again to its authentic look.
When it comes to element, it actually appears to be like improved. Torches glow within the darkness, water shimmers within the daylight, and docks seem like precise wooden and never mossy stone. However the precise mossy stone is now charcoal for some motive. The unique recreation was a lot brighter, lightening up the grassy hills and timber, however Unreal Engine 5 has the remaster wanting burnt.
Inside sections in Oblivion Remastered are a bit higher. The wonderful intro to the sport the place you escape jail with Patrick Stewart is all suffocating stone corridors and the occasional beam of sunshine bleeding via the ceiling. It’s surprisingly near the chilly vibe of the unique. In reality, it could be an instance of what the improved lighting will get you when it’s not working with overcooked textures.
The pale character faces from the unique didn’t survive the remaster, which is generally an enchancment to me. In an ideal world, we’d get the weirdly smeared NPC mugs of the previous in 4K, however I’ll take the hyper-detailed wrinkles and pores if it means higher facial animations can exist. And don’t fear, once they open their mouths, they nonetheless sound simply as goofy as earlier than.
I simply can’t recover from how muddy the skin has turn into within the remaster. However I’m additionally the one that received’t forgive Virtuos for turning the stylistic Darkish Souls bonfire into a practical fireplace in Darkish Souls: Remastered. It’s additionally fully doable that Oblivion Remastered’s visuals coalesce the deeper you get into it and discover new areas. In the event that they don’t, I’m no less than comfortable that the unique Oblivion remains to be accessible every time I wish to return.