[HN Gopher] Bethesda Thinks Fan Remaster of Oblivion Is 'Very Sp...
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Bethesda Thinks Fan Remaster of Oblivion Is 'Very Special' and
Supports It
Author : hn_acker
Score : 88 points
Date : 2025-05-03 15:34 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (kotaku.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (kotaku.com)
| tmpz22 wrote:
| Bethesda knows support for the official remake would go down the
| toilet if they did anything but praise for the unofficial remake.
| Its hard to take Bethesda on good faith on this.
| Wobbles42 wrote:
| I am inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt. They may
| or may not be doing the right thing for the wrong reasons, but
| at least they ARE doing the right thing. That decision was made
| by a set of humans, and likely at least some of them are well
| meaning.
|
| In any case the corporate entity as a whole is not conscious. A
| strictly behavioralist approach is appropriate there. If it
| does the good thing it gets the carrot, if it does the bad
| thing it gets the stick. We can't win it's heart and mind
| because it has neither, so we have to settle for keeping it's
| behavior in line.
| voidfunc wrote:
| It's a lesson more companies should learn (looking at you
| Nintendo), the revenue hit from a fan-made IP clone is likely
| negligible. People want the official stuff usually as well.
| The PR hit from attacking creator fans is way worse.
| chii wrote:
| while i do give them benefit of the doubt, the support for
| the skybilvion fan remake is in effect a way to sell and
| market an old game (skyrim's sale has been on the decline but
| for these fan projects).
|
| The moment such a project might affect sales in some way
| (that i am unable to imagine right now, but is possible
| surely), they will backpedal and find ways to take it down.
| happytoexplain wrote:
| I know businesses often bring it upon themselves, but this
| "fucked if they do, fucked if they don't" attitude needs to be
| carefully applied. It leaves no room for anything, really, and
| it's exhausting.
| washadjeffmad wrote:
| It's not unwarranted. With the recent popularity of remakes
| and rereleases, there's been tension between fans, their
| multi-year/decade labor of love projects, and the studios
| hoping to remonetize dated franchises.
|
| A friend and old-school RuneScape player told me he was
| quitting over this: https://www.ibtimes.com/runescape-devs-
| backtrack-hd-mod-ban-...
|
| Bethesda signaling their blessing might not have happened if
| others hadn't made such spectacular messes of their own
| relaunches.
| crop_rotation wrote:
| Yes nobody is doing good deeds to stab themselves. Not sure
| what your point is here?
| formerly_proven wrote:
| Regardless, the remaster appears to have been rushed out due to
| increasing leaks, no? It's hard to believe that with the
| technical issues the release was actually intended to land in
| April 2025, instead of fixing issues until March 2026 and
| releasing it as an anniversary remaster.
| VTimofeenko wrote:
| It's an Elder Scrolls game. Technical issues are part of the
| product spec.
| formerly_proven wrote:
| True! On the other hand, performance appears to be quite bad
| and there seem to be tons of very obvious visual glitches
| with transparent objects, foliage etc.
|
| It using the UE5 renderer of course means the usual
| reservations of that engine also apply - it will most likely
| never run smoothly, as Unreal Engine games invariably have
| more or less severe stuttering.
| lupusreal wrote:
| In some ways, the bugs are part of the charm. Sometimes
| anyway. Having to run esoteric commands to fix broken quests
| in a years old game isn't so endearing.
| no_wizard wrote:
| Bethesda is notorious for buggy software releases. They could
| spend 10 years on something and it would likely have tons of
| bugs still.
| thatguy0900 wrote:
| This one does feel extra infuriating though, since it still
| has bugs that were fixed by fan made bug fixing mods from the
| original game. It doesn't really even feel like they try to
| fix bugs
| chme wrote:
| This is also not surprising for BGS as was demonstrated
| with the multiple Skyrim re-releases, which didn't fix all
| issues patched by the unofficial patches, and even
| introduced more.
|
| See the change log here: https://www.afkmods.com/Unofficial
| %20Skyrim%20Special%20Edit...
|
| Only a very small amount of the issues fixed there where
| integrated into the official patch releases.
| lelandfe wrote:
| Keeping the VO flubs in is so good though, especially now
| with the automatic lip syncing https://youtu.be/AWgPq6ocd5c
| tjpnz wrote:
| Bethesda farmed the remaster out to another studio and the
| issues are mostly performance related. They chose to utilize
| Unreal Engine 5 for the graphics[0] which means you get all
| the stuttering and uneven frame times present in most games
| using it.
|
| 0: I recall reading somewhere that the game uses a really old
| version of Bethesda's proprietary engine too - but only for
| physics.
| detaro wrote:
| It's a pattern a few remasters have used: Run the entire
| old engine for the game logic, but bolt a more modern
| engine on top for the rendering. So it's not just physics
| but pretty much all gameplay logic thats done by the old
| code. Which is also why mods that don't touch graphics were
| apparently easy to port to the remaster, but changing
| models etc needs adapting to the new system.
| iLoveOncall wrote:
| How can you leak a 20 years old game?
| accrual wrote:
| GP is referencing how rumors of the remaster were spreading a
| few days before the official announcement. There were some
| early topics on Reddit at least.
|
| Personally I doubt the "leaks" have anything to do with the
| release date. The game worked fine on day one for me. Yes
| there are some bugs, but none serious and none that made me
| think "this was rushed".
| ReptileMan wrote:
| Bethesda never releases games. They release mod sdks. Beta
| versions.
|
| The only good fallout after the first two is the one they
| weren't involved with. And it was the mods for skyrim that made
| the game.
| AIPedant wrote:
| My controversial opinion is that Fallout 2 is by far the
| worst mainline Fallout game: it was obviously written by
| sexist 90s teenagers, the humor is plain awful, and most of
| the game is incredibly tedious, especially the dungeons. It's
| also by far the buggiest Fallout. I think people give it
| points for ambition + a desire to take Bethesda down a peg,
| without actually playing it. Alternatively, they last played
| when they themselves were 90s teenagers so they're looking
| through 30 years of rose-tinted glasses, and never noticed
| how misogynistic the script is.
|
| Speaking as a grownup who got about halfway through a few
| years ago, Fallout 2 sucks.
| AIPedant wrote:
| I think the remaster may have been an experiment with Unreal
| Engine on top of Bethesda's scripting / etc. I love Starfield,
| it is my favorite BGS game by a wide margin, but Creation
| Engine 2 is very difficult to work with - the Creation Kit is
| intolerably slow, I imagine BGS rank and file got very
| frustrated. Creation also lags with fancy lighting / fog
| effects, and might not ever support PS5[1], so I can see why
| Bethesda would explore the option for the next Elder Scrolls.
|
| I don't care for Oblivion but I hear the remaster crashes a
| lot, whereas I've had 3 crashes in 400 hours of Starfield. Two
| of those crashes were BSODs that Microsoft was responsible for.
| Maybe the Oblivion remaster's instability indicates they will
| stick with Creation 2 in TESVI: I was skeptical that UE memory
| management was a good fit for BGS games' complex global state.
| My suspicion is that Creation 2 uses multithreaded scripting,
| and Starfield on release had some odd bugs suggesting dangling
| threads (e.g. NPCs which stayed stuck on "busy" and couldn't be
| interacted with). But in recent updates they've hammered a lot
| of that stuff out.
|
| [1] Obviously Microsoft has a strong incentive for console
| exclusivity but the other side of this is that BGS games always
| sucked on PlayStation. Morrowind was also PC/XBox only, and
| Bethesda's roots are in PC development.
| i80and wrote:
| Anecdotally, playing Oblivion Remaster made me nostalgic for
| Creation. I have a beefy card and ample RAM, but it just runs
| like crap and I don't think it looks _that_ much better than
| e.g. Starfield or Fallout 76
| jemmyw wrote:
| Bethesda doesn't think anything. Some people in leadership there
| think this. It would be very nice if they codeified what
| "support" means and the circumstances around it into company
| policy so that fans know what is what while that policy is in
| place (and who to blame if the policy is abandoned).
| PoignardAzur wrote:
| I mean, when you reach the point where they advertise the mod
| in dev spotlights videos, I think it's fair to say there's some
| institutional support, even if it's not codified.
| viraptor wrote:
| Sure, but that means in a few years another manager can
| remove it and sue the creators. It doesn't matter who the
| current guy approves of, long term.
| Lammy wrote:
| > Bethesda doesn't think anything.
|
| It even kind of irks me when people talk about "Bethesda" when
| it's really "Microsoft Corporation presents Microsoft Gaming
| presents Zenimax Media presents Bethesda Softworks presents
| Bethesda Game Studios".
|
| Not picking on you in particular since the same thing happens
| with iD Software, Github, NPM, and many many more. I feel like
| there's a collective lack of straightforward language to
| discuss the influence of this kind of corporate structure.
| Falling back to the singular-subsidiary name with the rest
| unspoken is probably exactly what they want.
| jemmyw wrote:
| I wouldn't know who Bethesda was owned by without going and
| looking it up. I personally don't think this kind of
| corporate structure should be allowed, too much controlled by
| too few.
| sushid wrote:
| What would you allow? Just one level deep? Two? All you'd
| be doing is incentivizing the creation of more proxies and
| more legal fees/inefficiencies to go along with it.
| KeepFlying wrote:
| The number of levels isnt the issue, it's the size and
| scope of control of the market.
|
| The rest is on journalists to be sure to mention
| "Microsoft owned Bethesda" more often.
| jemmyw wrote:
| Not sure. I certainly think there should have been anti
| trust interest in Microsoft buying GitHub. If only we had
| good agencies with subject matter experts who can't be
| bought off by the companies.
| Ey7NFZ3P0nzAe wrote:
| I think one solution would be to always have the parent
| company iname n the children company. This way you don't
| have github by "Github by microsoft". But any links in
| between should appear if a separate legal entity.
|
| 1. It makes it clear how few powerful people are owning
| everything.
|
| 2. It makes it obvious there's something wrong when you
| see that the 30 different bottles you can buy in front of
| you are all from coca colla
|
| 3. It makes it very obvious that there's something fishy
| about "chocolate chips by a france by b luxembourg by c
| switzerland by d ireland by big conglomerate by mondelez
| international"
| Sophira wrote:
| I think using the term "by" like that at all is going to
| lead to serious confusion.
|
| As we all know, GitHub is not "by" Microsoft (as in,
| written by them). It's under their control now, and sure,
| they've made a lot of changes, but the actual code was
| written before Microsoft purchased them.
| rowanG077 wrote:
| I don't see how it matters how, when or by whom the code
| was written.
| Ey7NFZ3P0nzAe wrote:
| I meant it more in the sense of, as you said, "controlled
| by".
|
| But really it could be anything else including new
| symbols.
|
| You see, whatever you use would become instantly SO
| ABUNDANT that this symbol would get a whole new meaning.
| astrange wrote:
| > 1. It makes it clear how few powerful people are owning
| everything.
|
| You own Microsoft. It's a public company.
| olddustytrail wrote:
| I would only allow one level: all companies must be owned
| by a person or persons named.
|
| I would also have it that any contract controlling that
| person's interest is nullified so if you're trying to use
| a proxy to get around the law you'd have to be very sure
| you trust them because they are the legal owner.
| astrange wrote:
| Why do you want to ban social wealth funds?
|
| (Also, any form of equity investing that isn't a tax
| nightmare. You'd have to love doing K1s.)
| cultofmetatron wrote:
| at the very least, it shows that bethseda leadership are not in
| the habit of alienating their fans.
| tedunangst wrote:
| I think people understand how metonymy works.
| npteljes wrote:
| Even if they do, I very highly doubt that they successfully
| process it emotionally too. I especially dislike when news
| conflates leaders with nations. I think it just adds
| unnecessary emotions to the mix. Which, of course, is good
| for the news source, so I doubt I'll ever see a decline in
| this phenomenon.
| npteljes wrote:
| I hate the same about how media presents news regarding to
| nations. Russia attacks instead of Putin's army attacks,
| Brussels denies instead of EU officials deny, etc. It irks me
| so much, especially in a world where we pretend to do away with
| racism. Because what these headlines end up reinforce are just
| stereotypes. Which just keeps the people in their bubbles,
| wasting the chance of them learning something new about the
| world.
| TiredOfLife wrote:
| It's Russia and russians that is attacking not Putin. Even
| Russian oposition fully supports war
| studentik wrote:
| What opposition? Take a stopwatch, stand by the subway with
| an blank sheet of paper and count seconds before you are
| arrested.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jd7Zs9K46Vc
| jemmyw wrote:
| Do you mean the Russian opposition who are actually opposed
| to Putin and persecuted out of the country / existence, or
| the opposition Putin allows to exist to make elections
| appear legitimate? One of those doesn't support the war,
| and one of those isn't really an opposition.
| TiredOfLife wrote:
| They are opposed to Putin not war.
| watwut wrote:
| Yes, those support the war. Their claim is that they
| would be better at winning it then Putin.
|
| There were few Russian individuals against the war, it
| does exist. But they are exception regardless of the camp
| they are in.
| esperent wrote:
| If the policy can be abandoned it has no meaning anyway beyond
| being a marketing stunt.
| rendaw wrote:
| It feels pretty likely that it's not even company leadership?
| Lead dev is not company leadership, and someone higher up next
| week could decide they don't like it and sic lawyers on the
| project.
| neuroelectron wrote:
| This is a bit different situation than Nintendo and it's not fair
| to compare the two. The mod requires the base game where Nintendo
| software is hardware coupled. Furthermore, Bethesda has monetized
| mods directly (the Creation Club).
| jimbob45 wrote:
| Let's call a spade a spade. Nintendo litigates worse than any
| other company and they never drop prices. I can look the other
| way because they're otherwise very good to their customers but
| they do have genuine faults.
| nothercastle wrote:
| And they are really letting their franchises go stale
| recently. Pokemon is especially bad.
| crop_rotation wrote:
| They do make amazing games though, for all the ones that
| they make. BOTW and TOTK are just so so special games to me
| (and I hope many others), and I have learnt by experience
| that almost no Nintendo game gets released half baked or
| lacking their best efforts.
| jimbob45 wrote:
| In fairness, Pokemon is perhaps the worst case in game
| design difficulty. You have an audience insisting on 3D
| characters and animations for 400+ (or however many now)
| Pokemon, each necessitating ~6 animations for unique
| attacks, 5+ status effects, idling/reaction animations, and
| ideally some trainer interaction.
|
| I understand why Nintendo has tried to use a lo-fi
| artstyle, make games with only subsets of the total
| bestiary, and generally limit development. Hell, I even
| understand why Palworld gave up on unique attack animations
| and just went with guns.
| comex wrote:
| 1000+, though the last two generations have included only
| a subset.
| nothercastle wrote:
| Honestly at this point they could go back to 151 and just
| do a good job filling them out and go from there. But all
| 3d games suffer from not being able to hand craft such a
| large 3d world but Pokemon is absolutely terrible at it.
| The Games look like they could have ran in the ps2 mid
| generation.
| astrange wrote:
| I personally loved how Scarlet/Violet was set in "Spain"
| but they were constantly giving up and just making it
| Japan. Like the school has a Japanese nurse's office and
| one of the bosses is an overworked salaryman.
| goosedragons wrote:
| Pokemon is it's own weird situation. It's not solely owned
| by Nintendo, but co-owned and managed with Game Freak and
| Creatures Inc by The Pokemon Company. It's not just a game
| but a media empire. They have to coordinate between the
| game, anime and TCG. It's not quite the same as Zelda or
| Mario where they have complete control and don't have to
| worry about messing with dozens of other product launches
| if the game needs a delay.
|
| I wouldn't agree that their other franchises are stale
| right now either. Certainly not compared to Ubi's,
| Microsoft's, etc.
| stevenwoo wrote:
| Game Freak's _latest_ Nintendo offerings are subpar
| compared to somewhat open world offerings from the Wii
| generation like Xenoblade Chronicles and Breath of the
| Wild. They are just milking the Pokemon player base.
| stephenitis wrote:
| I agree their latest games always feel 2 generations
| behind and woefully lacking in content filled worlds
| goosedragons wrote:
| IDK, personally I had more fun with Scarlet/Violet and
| Legends Arceus than Xenoblade Chronicles (30 hours too
| long IMO). Technically they are both flawed but the game
| play is fun and they have made a lot of changes from past
| entries.
| mattl wrote:
| While Pokemon is owned by the Pokemon Company, the
| trademarks to all the Pokemon characters are owned by
| Nintendo.
|
| https://www.pokemon.com/us/legal/information
| stevenwoo wrote:
| The digital game key with Switch 2 feels bad from a the
| perspective of people who keep their consoles forever.
| aucisson_masque wrote:
| > I can look the other way because they're otherwise very
| good to their customers
|
| I thought their customer support sucks ? In France they got a
| law suit because they refused to replace the joystick of
| their latest portable gaming machine when they had an insane
| rate of failure.
| chii wrote:
| Nintendo doesn't litigate if they believe the community
| project won't impact their sales/profits.
|
| For example, wii homebrew is not taken down by nintendo, even
| if there has been a recent "discovery" that the wii homebrew
| had relied on decompiled nintendo SDKs.
|
| Nintendo's litigious intention always has been profit driven
| (and this includes vaguely IP related issues, such as
| palworld's game mechanics - which i think is frivilous but
| apparently not according to the courts).
| nottorp wrote:
| So you have to gamble on your project not affecting
| Nintendo's unpublished plans.
| smus wrote:
| Nintendo sent cease and desists to streamed super smash
| Brothers melee tournaments during covid. Buncha free
| advertising to their IP by a group of their most passionate
| fans
| astrange wrote:
| Japanese companies don't like surprises or things they
| can't control, and often care about this more than money.
| They don't /want/ free advertising and have mixed
| feelings about passionate fans.
|
| ...Especially adult passionate fans of children's media.
| lcnPylGDnU4H9OF wrote:
| > and this includes vaguely IP related issues, such as
| palworld's game mechanics - which i think is frivilous but
| apparently not according to the courts
|
| Do you happen to have a link handy to an opinion document?
| It seems weird that Palworld's "mechanics" would put them
| under fire but somehow development teams behind Tem Tem and
| Nexomon (and Cassette Beasts and Abomi Nation and ...) get
| away with selling games that are primarily about capturing
| and/or befriending different monster species and pitting
| them in fights against other monsters.
| astrange wrote:
| Pokemon didn't invent that, it's an actual Japanese
| children's hobby. Although they do it with stag beetles.
| You can see the realistic version in Boku no Natsuyasumi.
|
| A funny thing about Nintendo games I've always noticed is
| how completely disconnected the fans are from the people
| making it. Like, people argue about Zelda games' lore and
| timelines and such, but Nintendo cares about this so
| little that BotW and TotK have the same plot even though
| one is a direct sequel.
|
| I'd guess that zero of those "Zelda T-shirt and cargo
| shorts" people work at Nintendo and that almost none of
| their employees have had video game-themed weddings.
| (Well, the US office is in Seattle so that one's
| definitely possible.)
| mschuster91 wrote:
| Better than Rockstar, eh? Like, these fools had had people
| remaster their engine and assets for all the GTA games for
| decades, and instead of leveraging that they go, get a ton of
| mods taken down and then release a "remaster" done with barely-
| supervised AI slop.
| Manfred wrote:
| People in the comments act like they have been to a family party
| and are now nitpicking every detail of the party, speculating
| that granddad might not let uncle celebrate their birthday next
| year, exclaiming that auntie had much better cake, and discussing
| the clip their niece posted to Facebook of the dirty basement.
|
| It's fine to be skeptical about the intentions of big family, but
| it's also fine to enjoy the cake once in a while.
| eGP9jDq_nw wrote:
| https://archive.ph/swWEA
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