Oblivion:Technical Support

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Oblivion

This page is for technical problems with Oblivion -- e.g., video cards, system software issues. It also lists probable causes and possible workarounds and solutions. For problems with game logic, see Glitches. If you need information on whether or not your PC should be able to run Oblivion, please see System Requirements.

Contents

[edit] General Crash Advice

The nature of Oblivion is such that it will crash occasionally, no matter what you do. Still, there are several ways to minimize stability issues. The first way is to give it more system resources. This can be achieved in two ways: freeing up existing system resources and/or upgrading your computer hardware. Freeing up existing resources is mainly a matter of closing out of programs such as Anti-Virus scanners, Instant Messengers, Internet Browsers, and Peer-to-Peer software before running the game. For the more advanced user, disabling certain Windows Services can also help: Tweaking XP Services or Vista Performance Guide. Upgrading your computer is another thing that requires some computer knowledge, as it will require you picking out new hardware. A good guideline is the Recommended System Requirements. If your PC meets or exceeds those, it has enough power to avoid most low end system crashes.

[edit] Graphical Problems

[edit] White Screen when Starting Oblivion

Problem
When entering Oblivion, instead of being able to play the game, all you get is a white screen with GUI (and certain objects in rainbow colors).
Cause
Your graphics card does not support pixel shaders 2.0.
Solution
There are two different solutions, the cheapest of the two is to download Oldblivion, which will allow you to play on some Pixel shader 1.x cards. The other solution is to buy a new video card. To complete this, you need to identify what type(s) of expansion slots are available in your PC, and then buy a graphics card to fit in the slot.

[edit] Googly Eyes

Problem 
You can see through the right eye of every NPC in the game.
Cause
Mismatched eyes meshes and textures.
Solution
Don't mix cosmetic mods. Or use Wrye Bash to resolve conflicts.

[edit] Black Screen

Problem 
The game screen would randomly turn black except for the user interface every 30 minutes or so.
Cause 
Unknown - but potentially an overtaxed graphics card via heat or overclocking
Workaround 
This problem appears mostly on computers running Nvidia's Geforce 7xxx and 8xxx series video cards; downclocking the video card and/or changing the video card's driver seems to fix this problem on most computers. Additionally, disabling the HDR feature seems to help solve this problem. It has also been found that disabling AGP fast writes on AGP-based video cards may fix this glitch as well. Setting "int shadows" to 0 solve this problem when using HDR (tested on a GeForce 8800 GTX overclocked from PNY).
Workaround 2 
Hit the tilde key (~) to bring up the console. Type CAL and hit enter. Hit the tilde key again. Resets the game's graphics and brings the game screen back.

[edit] Slow Performance on Geforce FX cards

Problem 
The game runs extremely slow on any of the Geforce FX series cards
Cause 
This is because Oblivion uses 2.0 shaders for almost all its graphics. Unfortunately the Geforce FX series has a very bad implementation of the 2.0 shader and as a result Oblivion will not run at any acceptable speed. More information about why the FX series is so slow can be found on wikipedia here: GeForce FX
Workaround 
Editing the Oblivion INI Settings and turning off specular, diffuse and ambient lighting will solve almost all the performance issues resulting from the slow shaders. It will also result in significant decrease in game appearance quality (disabling the ambient shader gives horrible "fullbright" looks to everything, removing diffuse shader covers places meant to be darker than the rest with big opaque surfaces). Disabling Specular shader alone helps a lot already though.
Solution
  • Use a graphics card not from the FX series
  • Also you can give a try to Oldblivion which can increase the performance in low end videocards.

[edit] Sound Problems

Oblivion can be extremely picky about sound processing on both high end sound cards and low end on board sound. In some cases, the only solution may be to buy a new sound card. This can be especially annoying on laptops where buying a new sound card is not an option, so the only workaround that exists is to turn on subtitles. The first step in trouble shooting any sound problem is to update your sound card's drivers (If you card was made by Creative, this can be done here). If that fails to solve the problem, you may need a new sound card.

[edit] No music

Problem
Music can't be heard even though all other voices/effects are fine.
Cause
Unknown at this time.
Solution
Un-installing and re-installing the game.

[edit] Game freezes on music track change

Problem
Game freezes for a few seconds when the music track changes within the game.
Cause
Audio codecs that are handling the mp3 rendering on your pc.
Solution
Remove or disable the conflicting codecs. These codecs include, but might not be limited to, Nero, Vodei and Moonlight codecs.

[edit] No greeting

Problem 
In a single file, when my friend speaks to most of the NPCs, "I HAVE NO GREETING" comes up and he can't say anything to them. Could be caused by Shivering Isles, which he has just gotten. However, this happens everywhere, not just in the Isles.
Cause
Using the console command coc location to travel directly to a location outside the Shivering Isles.
Solution
Re-enter & exit the Isle using the Door to Cyrodiil to correct the NPCs' dialogues.

[edit] Remap mouse and joystick buttons

Problem 
I don't know how to remap mouse buttons
Cause 
Horrible UI
Solution
  • enter the game menu (esc), Options, Controls.
  • Click "controls" button.
  • Click the "arrowhead" icons on top of the dialog, by the word "keyboard".
  • The menu will switch between "Keyboard", "Mouse", "Joystick".
  • Left click on an entry to activate changing it. Then press corresponding key/button to assign it.
It's likely you will still need to use the .ini file for reassigning more than the basic 3 mouse buttons and mods with external programs to capture and reassign functions of the mouse wheel.


[edit] Crashes

Problem 
In some areas the game crashes within seconds of entering the area.
Cause 1 
Requirement for specular lighting in the areas, while it has been switched off.
Solution 
Set Specular Distance in the in-game video options to minimum.
Workaround 
Set the variable bDoSpecularPass in Oblivion.ini to 1 if you switched it off before. You can turn it back off after you're past the problem area.
Cause 2 
Corrupted master file. Casual crashes in Oblivion are to be expected, but sometimes the crash corrupts the master file causing exceptional crashiness in damaged areas (and as result likehood for further corruption of the file).
Workaround
Be in the first person perspective mode. As soon as you enter the area, look straight down at the floor and run to the desired exit door using your feel (map, hints from the floor looks), without looking up. Of course you can't do much in such areas that way. It can get you, say, across the Skingrad castle courtyard though.
Solution 
Reinstall Oblivion. Your saves shouldn't be lost but just in case back them up (My Documents\My Games\Oblivion\Saves) then uninstall Oblivion (with Add/Remove Programs), reboot, install Oblivion again, possibly reboot again. Most likely your savegames are still present, if not, recover from backup. Don't start with a savegame created in the crashy area, pick an earlier one if needed. If you would prefer not to reinstall the game, you can restore your autosave. Go to your Saves directory (commonly C:\Documents and Settings\"user name"\My Documents\My Games\Oblivion\Saves) and delete autosave.ess. Then rename autosave.bak to autosave.ess. Occasionally, the .ess and .bak will not have been generated during the same save, so restoring the .bak will result in starting from 2nd most recent autosave point. For reasons unclear, following the steps in Solution 2 will cease corruption of autosave files also.
Solution 2 
Stop overwriting existing save files and avoid using Quicksave. Disabling quicksaves will have a dramatic effect in reducing crashes. Supporting the hypothesis that corrupted saves cause game crashes rather than game crashes corrupt saves, it seems that clicking "new save" everytime will eliminate those pesky "crash on area transition" crashes. Autosave is still ok.
Cause 3 
iShadowMapResolution was changed from 1024 to 256 in Oblivion.ini for patch 1.2
Solution 
Open Oblivion.ini. Find iShadowMapResolution. Change 256 to 1024. Close Oblivion.ini and save changes.
Problem
Oblivion crashes on startup, I don't even get to the main menu.
Cause
Other programs disrupting disk operation, or you have old save games and settings in the (My Documents/My Games/Oblivion).
Solution
Disable them. Most likely you'll have to switch off your antivirus (if it scans all files you access), Google Desktop (same), possibly any P2P apps running in the background (they are rather disk-intense and memory-heavy) and anything that could pop up a message from system tray during the game (email notifiers, instant messengers, automatic updaters). This is the recommended minimum, but for optimal performance and stability turn off everything that is not essential to the system operation, freeing up resources for the game. You can safely switch this all back on after you finished playing. Note the firewall apps shouldn't affect the game stability (theoretically...) so feel free to leave them on, or if you feel unsafe, disable the network connection together with the firewall for time of playing.
Second Solution
Move all files in (My Documents/My Games/Oblivion) to a different location. Start the game and see if it works. If it does then you may copy back the "Save" folder back in.
Cause 2
Mods selected without having the correct master files
Solution
Check through all mods and ensure they have the required master files present and clicked on.
Cause 3
DirectX is missing newer d3dx9 revision files.
Solution
Download and install the newest DirectX End-User Runtime.
Problem
Oblivion crashes on alt-tab, the windows key etc. It also crashes on instant messenger notification, update confirmation request from my antivirus etc.
Cause
The Alt-tab problem is covered in Readme of the game - the game may, but doesn't have to work correctly after you switch to other app. The problem though is that Alt-tab is not the only method of switching Windows focus to other application, and all the others cause the same problem.
Workaround
Keep your task manager (opened with ctrl+shift+esc) open in the background while playing. After switching out of Oblivion, do not use alt+tab or the task bar to switch back. Instead select the application in your task manager and use the 'Switch To' button. This will restore the window on your desktop but nothing renders. Now click the taskbar to switch back to Oblivion. Works on WinXPSP2 with an ATI card and latest official Catalyst package. Sometimes has to be tried a few times, but has never failed. Alternatively, open any background applications you may want to Alt-tab too (eg: this website) before you start playing. Do not close these background apps whilst playing, or the game will freeze up.
Solution
Don't do it. Switch everything unnecessary off.
Problem
The game crashes occasionally, even though I did everything recommended. I have a low-end computer.
Cause
You have a low-end computer.
Workaround
Save often, tweak Oblivion.ini for less detail and extras, deal with it.
Solution
Get a better computer. Oblivion seems to be very sensitive to things like shortage of memory, disk access timeouts/interruptions, etc. Maybe the patches will fix it, but don't bet on it.
Problem
The game locks up after completing the Clavicus Vile shrine quest.
Cause
Unknown. Seems to be a bug in the game code, related to the item that is placed in your pack as a part of the quest.
Workaround
See the Clavicus Vile Bugs on the quest page.
Solution
Install the patch.
Problem
As soon as Oblivion is started up, the game crashes, the 'Bethesda Softworks' logo does not appear and the music goes into a loop. This began happening all of a sudden and with no previous major problems. I am unable even to uninstall the game. I tried reinstalling from the disk, but it had no effect.
Cause
Unknown. Best guess, .bik video files get corrupted.
Solution
Go to your oblivion folder, then data and then video. Make sure to back it up. Remove all the intro videos.

Remove the following:

  • 2k games.bik
  • game studios.bik
  • bethesda softworks HD720p.bik
  • Oblivion Legal.bik
Solution 2 
Open Documents\My games\oblivion\oblivion.ini. Under the first section, [general], change the line "SIntroSequence=bethesda softworks HD720p.bik,2k games.bik,game studios.bik,Oblivion Legal.bik" to "SIntroSequence=". This way you can keep your videos.

[edit] Saving Problems

Problem
As soon as I get out of the prison (in the beginning) I can't save any more! What should I do?
Cause
One possible cause (described in the Readme file) is pressing the Tab key while editing your character's name
Solution 
Change your character's name at the console: player.SetActorFullName "Player Name".
Workaround 
Load a save game from before you left the prison, and edit your character's name. Be careful while editing the name to not press the 'Tab' key (i.e., do not try to Alt-Tab out of Oblivion).
Problem
My most recent savegames do not appear at the top of the list any more, but instead appear randomly further down the list of saved games.
Cause
On the 360 there is a chance it may be because the date and time are not set correctly.
Solution
Set the date and time correctly.
Problem
When I attempt to load my game I get the message "This save game is corrupt", How do I fix it?
Cause
Unknown, this can happen at random times, usually after a CTD.
Solution
In the My Documents\My Games\Oblivion\Saves folder, rename the quicksave.bak to quicksave.ess and overwrite the original quicksave.ess file. This will set you back in time a bit (could be up to 5 minutes of play time) but you will keep your game. Don't forget to make named saves often.
Problem
I was playing oblivion in my PC and suddenly there was an energy down in my house. My No-Break didn't function as well as I expected so the PC rebooted. When I tried to run the game again I could initiate the game, but my saved games weren't running. The following message pops up: "Save game version is 0.00 and current version is 0.125, so errors may ocurr." I did the solution from the problem above, and now when a press Load in the main menu the game crashes. What should I do?
Cause
Your save gave has been partially corrupted but is valid enough to show on your load screen.
Solution
(You will probably need to do this from Explorer rather than the in-game menu) Delete your most recently-saved game then re-load Oblivion and try again.
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