Above is a beautiful image of the sunlight in the Oblivion Remaster. While I have some issues with the graphic style, the remaster is a remarkable achievement and brings Oblivion out of the shadows of Skyrim’s dominance in the memory of gamers.
However, Oblivion Remaster’s success is not just about the game alone but also about its contemporary titles. While Oblivion Remaster is an uplift of an old game, it is having a true effect on the market and other games. More specifically, one of those games is Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon. With its release this week on May 23rd, 2025, it will be interesting to see whether Oblivion managed to increase interest in RPGs of this type. Oblivion and Tainted Grail are quite similar with one another though they have differences. However, the similarities are stronger and I hope to see how Tainted Grail performs after its release.
The Imperial City is one of my favorite places in Oblivion. When the Remastered Oblivion was released in April, I went straight into the city, trying to see what had been changed by the people renovating the game. I was happy to see that the Imperial City got a much needed change in its style and I was taking screenshots everywhere I was walking in the metropolis of the Septim Empire.
There was another aspect of the city that I enjoyed from the original game. This was the sewers of the Imperial City, which Bethesda had put so much effort into. In comparison to most games, Bethesda seems to remember that cities have infrastructure and have an inner life beneath their streets.
While the Imperial City Sewers may seem like a boring place, I think it makes a big impression on me. That Bethesda would spend their time putting effort into the Imperial City sewers, and give it a sense of verticality and not just make them into linear areas, is a great way of giving more depth into the Imperial City as a character.
When one thinks about cities in Video games, they tend to revolving more around the player and do not seem like livable places. However, in Bethesda’s games, they have managed to build cities that seem inviting to the player without revolving around them.
The sewers are a city onto themselves and that is saying something about the design of the Imperial City. When one enters through the gates of the sewers, one is treated to underground world where sewage and all various creatures and bandits are coexisting with one another in the bowels of the empire.
Some people say that the game starting in a sewer hurts the game; I actually say that it improves the moment when you exit the sewers and see the Elven ruins in front of you. It shows great contrasts in the colors and the mood there. You go from a place of confinement into a place filled with the possibility of adventure. It that feeeling which makes us want to explore the world and not follow the main quest.
Bethesda is really great at getting us to care about such environments and Oblivion Remastered could give us a taste of what’s to come with The Elder Scrolls VI.
This is what was missing in a game such as Skyrim. The cities in that game were simply too small and I felt like even the big cities were lacking an inner nature. The sewers of the Imperial City seem to imply a history beyond the player. There is infrastructure which keeps cities running and Bethesda manages to simulate it.
The sewers beckon to the player like an underground realm of Hades. It is remarkable how the developers made such an effort at bringing to life a place that people do not go to. It is important to understand how the nooks and cranies aspect of Bethesda’s games is what makes them special as role playing games.
Their environments is their strength. When I go into any Bethesda game, I notice how they tell great stories through the cities and environments in those games.
Oblivion Remastered gave me what I wanted to have in a game. I did not want a linear experience that was on rails. I want a living, breathing world full of possiblities.
Bethesda knows how to scratch that itch that no other developer can. That is why the Elder Scrolls series is a truly special among gamers.
The Oblivion Remastered Edition has been censoring women. While these changes are small, it is clear that Bethesda Softworks is still going through the process of ”cleaning up” its games. If you compare the screenshot of my character on the left and the screenshot of a drawn woman in Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon, it is clear that there are two trends happening here.
Having Intimacy in Bethesda Games
Originally, Oblivion was rated ”T” by the ESRB in America. However, after mods in 2006 were taking the clothes off the female characters, the game was re-rated as “M” or mature. The same thing happened to other popular games such as GTA: San Andreas. The video game industry was much bigger than it had been in the 1990s but it was still under the cover. Many people were not paying attention to it.
However, it was clear that the transition of themes relating to relationships between characters began to change between Fallout 3 and Fallout 4, where there is a clear shift in how Bethesda approached the issue of player choice and how they could interact with characters of the opposite or same sex.
Fallout 3 had many brutal and sensous characters. However, Fallout 4 was a strange game that did not repersent a progression of the mythos but more of a regression. The sequel was more about domesticity stolen than anything else. The game starts in the Pre-War suburbs of Boston and the all the beauty of domesticity and family life are broken by atomic bombs being dropped on America. Fallout 4 however refuses to allow the player to be anything but a mother or father searching for their son.
This trend meant that Bethesda did not want to make attractive women characters anymore. Any hint of any intimacy in the games was taken out and instead it was hidden behind violence and better shooting mechanics.
The charm that made the Bethesda games simply unique was taken away from the games.
What Tainted Grail can bring some beauty back into games
While this is only a small section of the game, having the image of a woman that is beautiful in a game is enough to garner some outrage in some circles. However, among gamers who think with the heads, are going to be okay with it. That is what matters here. They shouldn’t be trying to appeal to people who have no interest in playing video games. In my previous article on Tainted Grail, I say that it has the potential with becoming the next Skyrim. With the genre being so stagnant, it is clear that there is something needed in order to get to be needed to revigoriate it.
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