The worst-kept secret in the industry is no longer a secret. Microsoft has just announced a livestream event for the Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remake that was first revealed in court documents during the Activision case, and in recent months has been confirmed by a half dozen reputable sources that it was on the way as a “shadow drop,” something Xbox has done in the past.
It’s just been announced that there will be a livestream tomorrow, April 22 at 11 AM ET, 8 AM PT on Twitch and YouTube about the project.
I’m saying this is also the likely release date, as it stands to reason the show would probably end with a big “and you can go play it now!” moment, given that behind the scenes of places like Steam, things are already spooling up, including a reportedly leaked file size of (a rather large) 120 GB.
If it’s not tomorrow, it’s certainly by the end of the week. It makes sense that a stream like this would exist, given that you’re not literally going to throw something like this onto console or PC stores without even a word. So, this stream will go through how it looks, plays and what changes have been made to modernize the game to some extent. Again, a numbere of these changes have already leaked ranging from blocking to archery to stamina.
This is a big deal, the game is not being remastered, but remade in Unreal Engine 5, and the shots we’ve seen (you guessed it, leaked, and from this time the studio working on the game itself, Virtuous) look rather incredible. If it also looks that good in motion, everyone is in for a treat.
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This obviously will spark a few conversations about the state of Bethesda’s Elder Scrolls VI, first announced in 2018 and currently with no set release date. But this is not Bethesda taking time off to work on this, this is Virtuous, the studio tasked with the remake.
Despite being a barely-promoted, almost entirely leaked shadow drop, this does seem like it has the potential to be a really big game this year, given how beloved Oblivion is and the fact that people are A) tired of pretending Elder Scrolls VI is right around the corner and B) perhaps finally tired of Skyrim and its many re-releases over the last decade. I expect this to be big starting tomorrow, or the next day. Or by Friday. But I think tomorrow.
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