The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (2006) retro – PC performance graphics benchmarks of Graphics Cards

BASIC GAME INFORMATION

 

Name: The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Genre:RPG
developer: Bethesda Softworks
Release date: 2006

 

Oblivion is made in the best traditions of The Elder Scrolls series, offering you the highest level graphics and unlimited freedom of action in a huge, highly detailed world. The plot of the game will take you to the very heart of the Tamriel Empire – the province of Cyrodiil. The empire has been beheaded, its ruler has been killed, and it is up to you to go in search of the true heir to the imperial throne, hidden in a safe place.

In addition to completing your main task, you will be able to explore the vast expanses of Cyrodiil, join various factions, rise to the head of one of several guilds, or remain a free wanderer. In addition, Oblivion will allow you to appreciate a new level of AI, thanks to which all the characters in the game behave like real people – they sleep, eat, visit temples, steal and perform a great many other actions. Fully voiced dialogues and realistic facial expressions of the characters will play an important role in getting used to the game world.  

THE GRAFICAL PART

This subsection of our review highlights the main graphical aspects of this game. Particular attention is paid to the version of the graphics engine used, the version of the API used, graphic settings and the quality of development of the main visual aspects.

Supported OS and graphics API

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion only runs on Windows ME, Windows XP and Windows Vista/7/8. Other operating systems are not currently supported and are unlikely to receive support.

 

The primary and primary graphics API for the multiplayer game The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. is DirectX 9. 

Game engine

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion was developed using the Gamebryo game engine. GameBryo Element is a game engine created by Numerical Design Limited (NDL), which became the successor to the NetImmerse engine. Before NDL was acquired by Emergent Game Technologies, the engine was simply called GameBryo. 

 

Like many similar products, the Gamebryo license provides access to the engine’s full source code, so developers are free to customize it to suit their specific needs. Additionally, Gamebryo comes with documentation that includes search tools.

 

EGT also offers a trial version of the GameBryo kit, which includes the engine and tools for importing assets. This kit does not contain source code, which is only available in the licensed version. Despite this, EGT only distributes this product after an interview with one of their representatives. 

Advanced Game Settings

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion has simply the widest range of graphic settings and made it possible to customize the game for almost any gaming configuration of that time.

 

Below we have provided screenshots of the game at various graphics settings, where our readers can see the difference between the minimum, medium and maximum graphics quality settings.  

Low quality settings

Medium quality settings

Very high settings

As we can see, with different quality settings, the graphics change over a very wide range, so that visible improvements are visible to the naked eye.

Comparison of anti-aliasing modes

The smoothing in the game is very difficult to notice, but there are still some undoubted improvements..

Comparison of 1280×1024 and FullHD

At that time, the game fully supported FullHD – the viewing angle, due to the expansion of the side frames, increases significantly.

Comparison of FullHD and 4K

The difference when playing on a 4K monitor and FullHD is almost invisible. The developers of that time could not imagine why the game would need ultra-high resolution textures.

General visual design and game physics

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is a significant game of its time – it was able to combine a great story and an incredible open world, wrapped in the most technologically advanced component of its time.

 

By those standards, the beauty of the game world of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion seemed simply incredible. From snow-capped peaks to evergreen forests, we were treated to landscapes of incredible beauty, giving our adventures an incredible virtual immersion experience.

 

Well, of course, the game generated a lively demand for advanced video accelerators of that time, because many users began to question whether to lower the settings or the resolution, and they really wanted to see all the beauty of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion at maximum settings! 

 Next, we will move directly to gaming tests and determine what impact this game had on computer hardware of that time.  

TEST PART 1 – video cards of that time

GPU test

All video cards were tested at maximum graphics quality using MSI Afterburner. The purpose of the test is to determine how video cards from different manufacturers behave under the same conditions. The average and minimum FPS were taken as performance indicators. Below is a video of the test segment:

Game video cards from that time period were tested at different screen sizes 1024×768, 1280×1024 and 1920×1080 at the maximum graphics quality settings allowed by The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. In addition to the game launcher, all settings in the game itself were also turned up to maximum.

Testing at resolution 1024×768

 

Testing at maximum quality settings 1024×768

 

With these settings An acceptable FPS indicator was shown by video cards of the Radeon X1800XT or GeForce 7900 GS level. The optimal video cards will be solutions Radeon X1950 Pro and higher.

Testing at resolution 1280×1024

  

Testing at maximum quality settings 1280×1024

 

With these settings An acceptable FPS indicator was shown by video cards of the Radeon X1950 Pro level and higher.

Testing at resolution 1920×1080

  

Testing at maximum quality settings 1920×1080 

 

With these settings Not a single video card of that time showed an acceptable FPS.

VRAM test

Testing of video memory consumed by the game was carried out by the program MSI Afterburner. The indicator was based on results on top video cards from AMD and NVIDIA with separate screen sizes 1024×768  и 1280×1024 with different antialiasing settings.

Testing at maximum memory GPU quality settings 

 

The recommended amount of video memory usage for a resolution of 1024×768 will be 190 MB of video memory, for a resolution of 1280×1024 – about 210 MB of video memory and for a resolution of 1920×1080 about 250 MB of video memory.  

RAM test

 

The test was carried out on the basic configuration of Phenom II X4 [email protected] GHz with 2GB DDR2 800 MGz pre-installed memory. The entire RAM used by the game was taken as an indicator. The RAM test on the entire system was carried out on various test benches without launching third-party applications (browsers, etc.).

Testing the game’s RAM consumption at various quality settings 

 

As we can see, with different quality settings, the amount of consumed RAM is The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is at the level of 237-400 megabytes.  

TEST PART 2 – modern video cards

GPU test

All video cards were tested at maximum graphics quality using MSI Afterburner. The purpose of the test is to determine how video cards from different manufacturers behave under the same conditions. The average and minimum FPS were taken as performance indicators. Below is a video of the test segment:  

Modern video cards were tested at separate screen sizes of 1920×1080, 2560×1600 and 3840×2160 at the maximum graphics quality settings allowed by The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. In addition to the game launcher, all settings in the game itself were also turned up to maximum.

Testing at 1920×1080 resolution

  

Testing at maximum quality settings 1920×1080

 

With these settings, video cards of the Radeon HD 7770 or GeForce GTX 650 Ti level showed an acceptable FPS.

Testing at 2560×1600 resolution

 

Testing at maximum quality settings 2560×1600

 

With these settings, video cards of the Radeon HD 7770 or GeForce GTX 650 Ti level showed an acceptable FPS. 

Testing at 3840×2160 resolution

 

Testing at maximum quality settings 3840×2560

 

With these settings, video cards of the level of Radeon R7 260X or GeForce GTX 660 showed an acceptable FPS indicator. The optimal video cards will be solutions Radeon R9 270 or GeForce GTX 660 and higher.   

VRAM test

Testing of video memory consumed by the game was carried out by MSI Afterburner. The indicator was based on the results on top video cards from AMD and NVIDIA with separate screen sizes of 1920×1080 and 2560×1600 with different anti-aliasing settings.

Testing at maximum memory GPU quality settings 

 

The recommended amount of video memory usage for a resolution of 1920×1080 will be 512 MB of video memory, for a resolution of 2560×1600 – 768 MB of video memory, and for a resolution of 3840×2160 – 1280 MB of video memory. 

RAM test

The test was carried out on the basic configuration of Core i 7 [email protected] GHz with 16GB DDR3 2400 MGz pre-installed memory. The entire used operative memory was taken as an indicator. The RAM test of the entire Windows 8.1 system was carried out on various test benches without launching third-party applications (browsers, etc.).

Testing the game’s RAM consumption at various quality settings

 

As we can see, with various quality settings, the amount of RAM consumed in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is at the level of 250-400 megabytes. 

Testing system RAM consumption 

 

With 4-X gigabytes of memory, the system consumes about 1.7 gigabytes of RAM. In the presence of a system with 8 gigabytes, the RAM consumption of all RAM was 1.9 gigabytes. With a 16 GB system, system memory consumption was almost 2.3 gigabytes.

Well, at the time of its release, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion was one of the heaviest games and not everyone could afford to run the game at the highest quality, and not in the highest resolution. After 8 years, almost any gamer can afford to enjoy the gameplay, even in 4K resolution and with AA 8X full-screen anti-aliasing activated.