Oblivion Remastered players are complaining about the game's auto-scaling system, and it feels like 2006 again

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Oblivion Remastered player shooting dino with magic

Summary

  • Oblivion Remastered reintroduces harsh level scaling, sparking discussions on the system's impact on gameplay.
  • Players are expressing dissatisfaction with auto-scaling in Oblivion, stating it flattens world dynamics.
  • Newcomers and veteran players alike dislike Oblivion's level scaling, creating division on the functionality.

It's the late 2000s. Oblivion has hit the scene. People are exploring the world, discussing the DLC, and stress-testing their systems with the game using an Nvidia GeForce GT440. While people really liked the game, the topic of the enemies' auto-scaling with the player (a system where enemies are always around the same level as the player) creates a lot of discourse. Some say it keeps the game always feeling deadly, while others say it makes leveling up feel useless. And then Skyrim came out, and people stopped talking about Oblivion's scaling system.

Flash forward to today, and people are exploring Cyrodiil through Oblivion Remastered, some for the first time. And while they've already discovered the struggles of vampirism in Oblivion, they're now realising just how aggressive the level scaling is. And now it feels like I'm back on the late 2000s internet, except with added back pain this time around.

Oblivion Remastered Logo with characters in front

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Oblivion Remastered re-introduces its severe level scaling to a new gaming generation

 Oblivion official reveal screenshot

Source: Bethesda Softworks

As spotted by the lovely folk at our sister site TheGamer, first-time Oblivion players going through the Remastered version are getting to the point of the game where they've gotten a few levels under their belt and they're realising that it's hard to encounter content that's too difficult for them because it all scales to your level. Now, in a thread on the Oblivion subreddit, people are airing their grievances.

It started with a thread by TehProfessor96 discussing the auto-scaling. I have to give props to them, as they do mention that they're replaying the original game and they're still not a fan of it, so they're definitely not a newcomer to this rodeo:

Picking up OG game again and I think I've discovered that auto-scaling is just the one feature that can totally ruin a game for me. And Oblivion isn't unique here, it severely hurt games like Breath of the Wild to realize the enemies autoscaled as well.

But with how well Oblivion's quests and some of its mechanics are made it's really just sucking out a huge amount of potential to have the game auto scale. The entire world feels more flat and sterile than it otherwise should because nothing will ever be too hard, nor will I ever really get stronger than most anything. And it makes the world and narrative FEEL way less intriguing because it's like the scenario designer's had their hands tied. They couldn't design a dungeon that was meant to be more challenging with an awesome reward at the end because no dungeon CAN be too challenging.

The thread attracted people both young and old, united under the banner of disliking the auto-scaling system. The newcomers want mods on console to edit it out, while the old guard roll their eyes as a take from 20 years ago rears its head once more. Some make a good point that a lot of Bethesda games have level scaling, but their systems are more elegantly implemented than Oblivion's, so you don't notice it as much. Maybe that's why more people are playing Skyrim than Oblivion Remastered?

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