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Issue 411

Digging up old potatoes

I’ve always had a complicated relationship with the whole videogame ‘remake’ thing.

Even in the most honest and respectful interpretation – in which the new blood work their hardest to remove any trace of themselves – and even if the people publishing the work are doing their best and most banally evil work to remove any trace of the original from anything bar the unassailable vault that is cultural memory, it’s still a different work of art.

A remaster, on the other hand, is a bit more complicated. To me, it’s not a defined state of being, more a spectrum, one whose value can only be determined by execution and feedback, not intent. The difference between a good and bad remaster is not so simple as a question of fidelity, stability or the quality of the replaced textures.

There’s this more cerebral element that must be considered. What does the facelift do to the tone of the piece? How does it affect a person’s emotional response?

Obviously, there’s a specific game I have in mind when thinking about these things: the recently shadow-dropped remastered edition of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. I found myself conflicted when I first saw screenshots, ones of a game that looks really nice in its own right, especially the texture work and lighting, but in turn making the game not really feel like Oblivion any more. Which is interesting, because initial feedback from a lot of players is that this new version of the game is essentially little more than new skin stretched over old bones. All the Bethesda jank is still present. The core remains the same, but it just doesn’t look right to me. It’s that Brian Eno quote: “Whatever you now find weird, ugly, uncomfortable and nasty about a new medium will surely become its signature”. We’re missing the washed-out lighting, the potato faces, the evidence that it is, in fact, a game from the past.