Not Everyone Loved Oblivion Remastered's Shadow Drop

I, also, suspect the reason for the shadow drop was just because Bethesda knew the game ran like complete garbage(at least on PC) and they wanted the game out before any reviews could drop. Bethesda have always had a difficult relationship with reviewers and were famous for release day embargo drops and sending out codes to “Select sources”.

The competition that actually leads to better products needs to be ruthless. Best example WWF vs WCW

Eh, I think Shadow Drops are fine, and I think the Oblivion Remaster would have covered over any game it launched near, and with the amount of games that launch every day, there will always be conflicts in release dates.

As a side note, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 wasn't as affected by Oblivion because it's an actually great game. Post Trauma, however, has a number of issues, so perhaps that is a reason for the lacklustre launch, not just blaming your game's poor sales on another game.

The comments on X are awful. Not even grasping the point being made, just berating the dev and OP. Makes me more grateful that I don't use X have the far more well-rounded Push Square community to engage with.

It's just business and that's it end of story. Bethesda did what they did to maximise their sales and generate excitement.

Until this article I had never heard of Post Trauma. So yeah they didn't lose a sale from me due to the Oblivion shadow drop as they were never on my radar to begin with.

In the immortal words of Jeremy Clarkson:

Oh no!

Anyway…

@RiverGenie same here I've never heard of it. If a games on somebody's radar and they are planning to buy it then this shouldn't impact indie devs..maybe advertise your game more.

I don't think a shadow drop like this will hurt anyone. People are just trying hard to look around and find problems these days.

If you make a good game, it's going to make rounds and people will find it, buy, play and enjoy it. Regardless of whether it's indie or AAA or whatever else.

Folks gotta focus on making good games. Marketing sure affects a project's success but sometimes you gotta let the project speak for itself. In case of Expedition 33, it clearly is working out.

I hope they can still fine tune the game and patch it, that the re-release will be a success. The indie survival horror scene is fantastic at the moment and I wish this team all the best, as well that expedition 33 will continue to sell well. These games have more personality than anything Bethesda's ever made, even if they're considered mainstays in the RPG genre.

I definitely went w Oblivion over Clair Obscur. I'm not a fan of the series, but I had to see what this two engines nonsense was about. Especially with something as broken as Oblivion on a good day. That's a purchase that cannibalizes another (RPG!!!) in the immediate future, sure, but I'll be grabbing CO down the line anyway. I'm not going to take any videogames economics lessons too seriously when studios get closed down regardless of their success though. We've been given a catch 22 in that regard. No way devs don't get that.

I would think some of the frustration comes from choosing a launch week that suits your game based on whatever else is projected to release, and then watching a surprise drop suck up a lot of people’s gaming budget.

@ChrisDeku That makes a lot of sense. I love the game, but it doesn't run well on PS5 and critics will definitely deck some points in their review scores for it.

@Northern_munkey I mean just checking Push Square it had one article about it prior to this one & generated 6 whole comments.

So yeah I don't think Oblivion is the reason Post Trauma isn't doing well.

Yeah, about that, I'm also a developer and my take on this is basically: while his points are valid, when planning a release date you MUST take into consideration any kind of surprise that might happen on that day.

Even if Oblivion wasn't shadow dropping, it could have been a game that was supposed to release the next week but got brought forward to that day instead. It doesn't happen very often but it does happen.

Also, my brother in christ I've never heard of your game before the whole complaining happened, if anything Oblivion helped you more than your marketing strategy.

@ChrisDeku One of my favorite stories from the Gerstmann era of Giant Bomb was Bethesda telling them they'd get review copies the day of or day before release, and their response was "Okay. We aren't going to preview your games." Seemed to work too, lol.

@Xeno_Aura great games are not guaranteed to sell.

Okay, say Oblivion didn't come out this week. You still released against Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, which is doing extremely well. So why do the devs think that the people currently playing the Remaster are the same people who were going to play their game?

If this were Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, I could understand more since they are both RPGs (a different kind of RPG, but still RPGs), while this is a horror game.

On the bright side though, their complaining has led to me learning about their game, not going to buy it since it doesn't interest me, but I'm sure some people will so there's some marketing for you.

@Bentleyma doesn't work that way. It's not just the price. If you already have a huge backlog, it's more likely than not that you'll only buy one game instead of multiple.

People complain how this generation is just remasters and remakes but then given the option they choose a remaster over a brand new IP. Mind blowing

@KillerBoy On a PlayStation site, I think you have to see the difference between remasters of Until Dawn and Oblivion, and why people would be excited for one and not the other. That shouldn’t blow anyone’s mind.

I, personally, bought and actually beat Post Trauma and have no intention to buy Oblivion any time soon. Post Trauma has issues though, especially the PC version.

@AinsleyE this dev is just using Oblivion’s release to act as free advertising for their game. Show of hands, who actually knew that Post Trauma existed before this article or one of the other countless articles on different sites echoing the dev’s statement on Twitter? Push Square had one article about the game, which also states that Post Trauma was originally supposed to release on March 31st. If the dev released the game when originally planned it would have came and went without a word. The oblivion shadow drop is the only thing keeping the game relevant

@KillerBoy Sure but "people" aren't just one hypocritical person. Some people say something is bad, other people do the thing the other group of people think is bad. It's like saying "people say stealing is bad but people still steal". Also there's a difference between a classic but antiquated game getting a remake or remaster and a recent game that's basically getting a res or FPS boost for £60.

I never even heard of the game and you can’t really blame that on the shadow drop itself. You should be promoting your game months in advance. I read gaming sites daily so the fact that I haven’t even heard of it at all says something.

I can see where their frustration is coming from. Working on a game for ages, finally coming up to the launch date only to have to go up against a juggernaut franchise out of nowhere like Elder Scrolls. Basically your game all of a sudden has to completely knock it out of the park just to stand a chance like Expedition 33 thankfully did.

No doubt it's a difficult market. Money is of course a problem but time is a bigger luxury for customers. By the time most folks finish something like an Oblivion these devs could have already shut down for lack of funds.

I feel for them but there isn't much to be done. Bethesda/Microsoft is a business too at the end of the day and they have choose to do whatever they need to do to ensure their success.

Yeah when it happened I did feel a bit sorry for Clair Obscur seeing as that deserves all the success it gets.

Good to hear it’s doing well but probably got overshadowed a certain amount regardless.

I find the video they made very entitled and in extremely bad taste.
I wouldnt buy the game just based on that.

@naruball Not saying they are, but Post Trauma is not a "great game", so the publisher essentially blaming another company for releasing a game at the same time as them for their game's poor performance is just silly, they should probably look more inward for the reason it didn't sell so well and not blame others.

@KillerBoy People buy what they're interested in. Even if the Oblivion remaster didn't exist, there's a very small chance those people would've bought this game instead.

Case in point: Clair Obscur is a new IP and seems to be doing really well. So, many were given the choice and did in fact go for a new IP over a remaster.

It was a bit rough releasing Oblivion with Expedition 33 but it goes to show how well built Clair Obscur is to stand beside such a massive release and still do so well. As much as I love indies I don't know that Twitter/X are the best places to advertise your game, they get the numbers but they also get the drama. There are a lot of other platforms like Twitch (to actually showcase your product) or even offer a demo on the various storefronts. Time was every game had a demo and you didn't need a subscription to play them.

Indies don't have a big marketing budget, but so many platforms are free, it sounds like a cop out. It's baffling how it's never been easier to promote a game but some companies don't even try, they expect they will release something and buyers with automatically snatch it up. You have to grind to advertise, complaining isn't the way. There are countless things they could have done to get the game out there.

I've seen the argument a few times on different forums and when I do go to check out their game I can hardly find a mention of it anywhere. It's not a good look for them when so many indie developers are almost brought to tears when they thank people for buying their game and making their dream possible.

Bethesda remains one of the worst developers.

It’s analogous to the mom-and-pop stores working to build a customer base in a community and then Wal-Mart comes to town and sets up shop next door.

@ChrisDeku
I think it runs like garbage on consoles too, at least based on what I have read / heard / viewed - oh, there are the people saying it runs fine with no issues*, but this always happens when games have technical issues - you get the apologists, fanboys, and people who can't see framerate issues commenting (I have nothing against people who can't see framerate issues, but unless people know they can, they should not be commenting that any game runs well).

I was up for this remaster/remake, if only for nostalgia purposes, but the Shadow drop (and UE5 use) were massive red flags.
Games releasing in this state should not be allowed, but releasing a game in a poor state without the availability of critical evaluation (reviews/testing), whether that be shadow drops or launch day embargos, could be just plain deceitful. Sony should do a Cyberpunk and offer refunds - whether people take them is their business.

• Edit: to clarify, I am not talking about those that say they can see the issues, but don't care.

Bethesda had to shadow drop oblivion. If it had been a normal release schedule it would've been ridiculed and mocked online for poor graphics and jank. Overpowering the nostalgia rampage sweeping people with this shadow drop. The shadow drop and excitement of old fans created tonnes of fomo.

This is no ordinary (sometimes lazy) modern remaster of a game barely 5 years old to coincide with some series, sequel or movie to generate hype.

And it's incredibly indicative of the nature of people on the internet trying to hate on it just for the sake of hate.

Is expedition 33 better? Yes. Is that proving true with sales? Yes. Do I think Oblivion is rudely reducing sales of this fantastic new IP? No.

A lot of the vocal minority online of gamers are a lot more flexible with their purchases than they like to pretend online. And a lot of the 'I'll wait for a sale' group either do not manage to wait for a sale or simply never purchase. As has been proved several times with past games and further show how people won't purchase even with sale outside of initial Zeitgeist with things like the late port of ff7 to pc and it's corresponding sales numbers on pc

I'm enjoying myself with Post Trauma. It's the usual indie survival horror with jank and all but this was always going to be more of a niche release than Oblivion.

As mentioned before on here, this just gives some free advertising to a indie game which wouldn't get much time of the day usually

E33 wasn't really impacted by this. Post Trauma doesn't seem to be that good and sales wise i don't think it was ever going to set the world a light.

@heavyartillery56 yes, because The Demon on WCW worked so well.. and David Flair 🤪 😅

Boo hoo?

I miss shadow drops and Oblivion Remaster was a great one. Idk why it's Bethesda's problem that their game shadow dropping might overshadow other game(s).

Im glad this publisher ( that i have never heard of) has put on their adult pants and learned to problem solve. It is ludicrous to expect a growing, and seemingly exponentially, crowded market to pause competition and sales. Business don't work like that. Imagine if ford asked gm not to release a truck model series just because it would hurt fords launch. You cant half swim with sharks. Either you embrace, adapt to the market, and survive, or you don't. No amount of begging, wishing, or whining changes that. If this is the attitude that indie developers have adopted, then the future of gaming looks pretty bleak.

@Kierant202 very well stated. I don't think expedition 33 is for me, but had i been interested in it , oblivion remaster would not have stopped me from getting both.

@Rich33 i could not disagree with you more. That some elitist pc BS that sours casual players to the gaming community. First off you make an assumptions that anybody who doesn't have an fps issue is lying, a fanboy, or cant see the framerate. Secondly you think that Developers should have to abide by some review process/ marketing rules before they can be ALLOWED to release. Usually unimportant people with nothing constructive to offer make these type of statements. I will help you out and go one step further- Just because you bought a pc, console, or game does not mean you own the gaming community, publishers, or marketing strategies.

@Leetware1
"First off you make an assumptions that anybody who doesn't have an fps issue is lying, a fanboy, or cant see the framerate." - There aren't many other credible options here (bear in mind, and maybe to clarify, in my original comment I was not talking about / including those that say they can see issues, but dont care - just those that say it runs fine with no issues).
Various reputable critics including DF (PC version only so far), Pushsquare, and others, have been critical of the Framerate. There is a problem here - whether console turns out to be as big a problem as PC, we will have to wait for DFs console analysis, but their expert opinion of PC was "Dire" I believe.

"Secondly you think that Developers should have to abide by some review process/ marketing rules before they can be ALLOWED to release" - Yes, all games (over a low price tag so as not to include indie games that aren't often reviewed) should only launch after being made available for critical evaluation and testing.
One of the biggest issues facing gaming is the release of poorly running / optimised / bug ridden games, with a "we will fix it later" attitude - a problem magnified if games are releasing without being made available to a proper evaluation / review (though im not saying EVERY game released without review availability is always poor). If games are releasing like this, then Sony should offer refunds to those that opt for them.

@Leetware1 Its elitist to expect games to come out not broken and actually run well? Hmm interesting stance.

Only takes like a half scroll of the Twitter comment section to remember why I don't use it and how much a cesspool it is.

Bottom line, it was absolutely a dick move to shadow drop this for two reasons. One, the things mentioned in the article, but secondly because bgs and virtuous Knew this game ran like hot garbage, which would suggest this shadow drop was likely intentional to cover up that fact that would come through in reviews, so they could still gobble up the full price for what is clearly a technical mess, and still left with most of the originals shortcomings unaddressed.

Remember too, microsft/Bethesda knew that ex 33 had a gamepass deal and such the release date, so the fact that they knowingly shadow dropped on gamepass as well, is just really bizarre. I'd be pissed as Sandstorm having signed that GP deal and then had that happen from an entity owned by the GP platform holder....

A lot of folks would have waited with its asking price, had they known how poor the performance was, and how little of the original game was modernized or fixed. Nostalgia aside, Feels like an AI led effort for the most part aside from some minor adjustments. The difficulty settings are broken and the level scaling still essentially ruins the entire loot and progression loop.

Glad I am privledged enough to support Clair obscure as well and regret paying fp for oblivion. However others can't afford to drop that much for both in such a proximity to one another. Ex33 deserves the asking price for their effort.

@DennisReynolds not at all. The elitist part is the attitude that if people don't have the same problem, don't care about it/ don’t see it as a problem, or have a differing opinion automatically is a fanboy or is lying. But you know that. Implying my reply was something else/ different issue is pretty dishonest. Also and again a governing body getting to choose what games release and when is a power grab by weak people. Not only does it take choice away from the gamers (and market) it relies on subjective opinions. Its the same as “fact checkers”. People who dont like facts so they manipulate the language or argument to fit their objectives. I, like many players, play video games to get away from politics like that. Why would anybody want that garbage in videogames?

@RiverGenie I’ve been waiting for it personally but I’m big into the survival horror scene online. It’s a pretty good game.

If you have a good game, it will make itself noticed.
No one owes you attention.

@Cornpop76 Indeed. There were positives and negatives. But, currently, the internet has become so negative that I appreciated not being bombarded with videos and posts on social network telling me to be angry. I do find this discorse hurt some games that deserved better such as Dragon age veilguard. Youtubers have way too much power if they are allowed to start the narrative and they will farm negativity.
I am perfectly fine with shadow drops if it curtails negativity.

On the other hand, yes, it hid the performance issues that while not insane, are there and can be distracting.
If only companies were trustworthy, I would be happy with just shadow drops. But we know they will use it to mask a turd soon enough.

@KundaliniRising333 I always hoped a remake/remaster of oblivion would happen and when this was announced I was really stoked but it dropped in next to no time after the initial rumour circulated which set alarm bells ringing in my head..then I saw the asking price and read about the bad performance etc,etc,etc so yeah I agree with you that this shadow drop was a way of making sure a lot of people bought it before reviews kicked it in the balls..very shoddy.

No one owes them a thing. If their game is good then it will stand on its own. If it's not then it won't.

@Amnesiac Totally, i get where this guy's point is coming from.

Hadn't heard of Post Trama, so guess making drama and moaning gets more publicity than whatever they were doing before. Microsoft love shadow drops, they have done it for years for gamepass. So I would say they'll be doing multiplatform drops like this more often.

I get their frustration. Hard to compete with Oblivion

@Northern_munkey I don't disagree that the shadow drop hid performance issues but even if it had stable 60fps this graphic level would've been slaughtered in the internet.

I blame Bethesda less due the performance than epic quite frankly. UE5 is a joke considering the level of push to make it almost a universal engine that the smaller studios like virtuos would obviously default to

Oblivion is cool, and I'm glad for fans, but it was never really for me. Way too big and expensive. But I've had Clair Obscur pre-ordered and have been loving it. I always didn't like the idea of shadow drops from consumer standpoints because, if it was something I really wanted, I typically don't have the money to just drop on it suddenly. I'm an adult and prefer to plan it out in advance for a new release. The indie developer issue is a good point too. I'm glad they have a good spirit about it, but that does suck.

Don't know what either of these games are, too busy playing Clair Obscur

@Kierant202 in the right hands ue5 is an excellent engine. Its the same as any engine in regards that if the devs don't understand how to utilise it properly it has issues.

@Northern_munkey UE5 is pushed so hard on all new developers that it is literally taught on university courses. The problem is that UE5's many user friendly interfaces also scale together poorly when over relied on instead of more intimate coding by individual developers. This in itself then breeds more sloppily optimised games as it saves time and money pleasing shareholders and encouraging developers to continue cutting themselves kinds of corners.

Granted this mostly applies to the open world games as default UE5 settings tend to steer towards visual flair first and then require more developer knowledge for the performance side. I.e. games like hell blade 2 which isn't large open world, expedition 33 which is a small team of developers not pushed to release fast and actually taking their time to learn the engine in depth

Look at recent games in UE5 silent hill 2 remake, nightingale, immortals of aveum, lords of the fallen, avowed, even oblivion remaster

Then look at developer teams leaning on teaching their Devs actually how to use engines because they aren't just encouraged to learn the basics of the cheapest to teach engine out there

Alan wake, kingdom come deliverance 2 spring toind immediately.

The industry is pivoting en masse to UE5 so speed up production times, lower production cost, and make it easier to cycle Devs in ***** conditions because ALL Devs are graduating with basic UE5 knowledge. Just another symptom of gamings issues and an underlying cause for so much terrible optimisation and performance. All boosted by the fact UE5 has the good graphics base looks needed to get pre-orders in from trailers looking pretty on top

@Xeno_Aura or it's all just an effort to attract some attention to their game.

@Apollo2212 yup. Cuz we know how well that worked for Puppeteer.

@Kierant202 all I'm taking from this explanation is pretty much what I said without a huge narrative. It's not ue5's problem if devs don't have the time to get to grips with it or can't be bothered. On a hardware level of course more powerful pc's will be able to utilise its potential. Let's agree to disagree because I have to get to work..👍

@Northern_munkey it's not on the developers though. They aren't the top of the food chain. They aren't the ones making the engine decision. That's on the publishers that want faster, cheaper turnover, that's on the shareholders pushing for the cheapest employee turnover rates incentivising shared skillets being taught to new developers, that's on the audiences wanting games faster and prettier with no increase to the price of games. The developers are ultimately the LAST people to be blamed.

@Kierant202 okay so we are in agreement that ue5 isn't the problem per se and it's devs being pushed by publishers or whichever way you want to spin this? You've started by stating that ue5 is a joke and now you've shifted the emphasis away from the engine which is designed to be a universal engine which obviously will have less than desirable effects on lesser powered tech to placing the blame on the publishers. I understand your point of view and I respect it (I don't think you are wrong) but I'm off for a busy day at work and I'll probably not have time to reply to you in a timely fashion..have a good day buddy 👍

@Northern_munkey I'm laying a portion of the blame of publisher's and audience expectations. I'm taking none away from Epic. They released press statements 2 months ago admitting UE5 had stutter issues largely because of shaders (which is almost always worse on pc than consoles), and digital foundry even posted a video on that subject where they said insiders in development studios were telling them that some aspects of UE5 weren't even working as they were told they should forcing developers to have to call in specialists to fix things and we still end up with these stuttery messes.

Now epic promise it will 'eventually be better'. Epic know that UE5 isn't really ready for the flawless AAA development they are promising these companies but they are downplaying it as much as possible on their end so people on the internet can blame rushed, underpaid developers instead.

When such a substantial amount of UE5 AAA games suffer this badly among a wide variety of developers then the common denominator isn't the devs. Go look at shader comp issues in UE5. Even Fortnite is a stutter fest with it at times.

UE5 as it is right now is a joke. It is not up to the standard epic claimed it was and developers and gamers are paying the price while they use us as testers.

Tangoworks died after a shadowdrop, you would have thought lessons had been learned. Given Bethesda's pedigree a shadow drop from them screams broken, near unplayable mess alarm bells.

@AgentMantis 1. Tango haven't "died." It still exists and is making Hi-Fi Rush 2
2. Reason for Microsoft ditching Tango has nothing to do with Hi-Fi Rush shadowdrop lol. It was because Tango was only Xbox studio in Japan and they didn't have groundwork laid to properly support the studio. Which doesn't mean that thing they have done to studio wasn't ***** and dumb obviously.

But to the topic. Microsoft will obviously going to do what is best for their bottom line. And considering how many games they have slated for this month and next month (South of Midnight, Indy and Forza for PS5, Towerborne, DOOM: TGA), it wasn't easy to find a suitable space. And with how many games are coming out every day there will always be "victims."

Shadowdrop for this game went as well as you can imagine. 200k CCU on Steam with 82% positive reviews are pretty much proof of that. And I would be not surprised if remaster of F3 would be done in same way. It's no brainer, because you had no marketing spend and game reached 4 mil. players in few days.

Shadow drop is 1000000% better than years of stupid trailers, reveals, teasers etc.

Try it next time, smaller studios.

@themightyant I have no doubt's Expedition 33 dev team knew about shadowdrop. They had graphic for social media prepared at the same moment Oblivion was released. And since game was heavily marketed by Xbox (including it being in Dev Direct), I think Microsoft at least let them knew.

At the end of the day, Expedition sold 1 million copies in three days and reached 110k CCU on Steam. Which is incredible for team of 30 people.

@naruball It did well enough for a 7.

Very tabloid 'let's hate Oblivion title.

@Godot25 Kudos to those guys, the game has been well received. Have played very little of it, but am impressed from what I've seen so far 👌

@themightyant Was a bad move imo, shadowdropping Oblivion like that, during the same week as FH5 and Expedition 33.
Sack that business manager.

I pre ordered expedition 33. I only buy games I would play and expedition has been great so far. Don't know what oblivion is, other than it being a remaster of an old game. I don't play old games.