This is how a remaster should be. Feels like playing a new game, but the richness of the Oblivion world is still there along with it's magical ambiance. I expected this to be a primarily nostalgic experience but honestly the nostalgia only hits every once in a while, which makes it feel even better. It feels so fresh that sometimes I forget I'm playing a 19 year old game that I've 100% completed multiple times, even as recently as a year or so ago.

The graphics and new UI look great. The new animations are really well done and feel like the perfect mix of more modern style combat and the simple combat of vanilla TES games. The tweaks to leveling are great, and feels like it was always meant to be like this. The updated armor and weapon designs are mostly better and more interesting, though I do feel like most of the clothing feels washed out.

There's a bunch of new bugs brought to the table by Unreal Engine, and most if not all of the old Oblivion bugs and quirks have stuck around too. Which, isn't necessarily a bad thing. A lot of that awkwardness is what gave Oblivion the character it has. That being said, I am looking forward to a port of the Unofficial Oblivion Patch for this one.

Speaking of mod support, its still early days at the time of writing, but things look optimistic. I think it'll have very similar modding capability as the original, and I'm excited to see what modders come up with as time goes on.

I really hope folks who got into TES with Skyrim give this a chance. I think they'll be blown away by the depth and attention to detail this game has, as well as great quest and level design. Skyrim is a great game, and it did a lot of things better than Oblivion, but I do think Oblivion did a lot of things better than Skyrim too. I hope new players will pick up on those things along with the charm that is uniquely Oblivion.