The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remasteredincludes the best audio error from the original game. Shadow-dropped last weekto critical successand widespreadElder Scrollsfan delight,Oblivion Remasteredis faithful to a fault, even includingbugs and glitches from the original versionof the game. It’s become something of a sport for fans to go out hunting for quirks they remember from yesteryear, and they’ve succeeded in finding many of them.
One of the more interesting aspects of the remaster, though, is its choice to keep all ofOblivion’s voice acting - including an infamous blooper that made it into the original game. As shared to Reddit byAHailofDrams,Oblivion Remasteredcontains the same, infamously flubbed voice line as in the original game. The voice actor reads, “I heard that thieves broke into the Arcane University, the Imperial Legion Compound, and the Temple, all on the same night,” before pausing and saying, out of character, “Wait a minute, let me do that one again,” and repeating the line from the beginning.
Oblivion Remastered Leaves In The Original Games' Best Audio Bug
An Infamous Blooper
Originally voiced by LInda Kenyon, this mistake was in the original version ofOblivion, and was faithfully ported over into the remaster. It’s a somewhat generic “Rumors” voice line that’s spoken by many different elf NPCs throughout the Imperial City afterprogressing the Thieves Guild questlinepast a certain point.The line has become somewhat infamousin the years since; it’s often cited as an example ofOblivion’s pervasive jankiness.
While its inclusion in the original game was almost certainly a mistake,it was likely kept deliberately for the remaster. It’s become an iconic part of the game, and was basically guaranteed to be one of the first things players would look for in the remaster. Although developers at Virtuos decided to rerecord certain voice lines in their effort to modernizeOblivion, but that, along withthe Adoring Fan’s now-iconic"By Azura," clearly wasn’t one of them.
Our Take: It’s Great Devs Left This In As An Easter Egg In Oblivion Remastered
Oblivion Remastered Is Faithful
It’s all too easy to imagine a world in which theOblivionremaster was a complete overhaul. Re-recording every voice line, adding aneasy lockpicking mini-game, fixing the duplication glitch -these things would’ve givenOblivionRemasteredan extra coat of polish, and made it more accessibletoanyone who grew up withSkyrim.
But Virtuos decided not to do any of that, andthe remaster is so much better for it. I suspect that’s due to an awareness ofOblivion’s cultural legacy of imperfection - it contributed majorly to Bethesda’s reputation for buggy launches. But 18 years ago, players came to loveOblivionfor exactly what it is. It may have been buggy, crashed frequently, had stilted voice acting, and employed a clunky leveling system, but it was also a groundbreaking open-world RPG. Its flaws not only failed to spoil the experience, but came to define it by making it that much more fun.
This way, fans of the original game can revisit all the landmarks - even the bugs - that they came to love all those years ago, and new players can discover the joy ofOblivion’s chaotically rough edges. That passion for the original game shines through inThe Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered, and is part of what’s made it an instant success.
