izigame.me

I remember the first time I played Oblivion.
It was December 26th, 2006. I was thirteen, my soul hungry for wonder, my heart still unaware of the weight nostalgia can carry.
That day, my mother gave me a Christmas gift.
A simple disc. A green case for my old Xbox 360.
But it wasn’t just a game.
It was the beginning of something.
It was Oblivion.
I installed it, turned on the console... and it was as if the real world disappeared.
I spent every hour of that day lost in Cyrodiil.
Snowy mountains, mysterious woods, ruins caught halfway between dream and nightmare.
I wasn’t playing it—I was living it.
And then… so many runs. So many new characters, new choices, restarts just for the sheer joy of starting over.
I knew every trick, every shortcut, every glitch.
And without any guide—when the internet was still a slow, rare whisper—I achieved 100% completion.
It was my world.
It was home.
Every now and then, my mother would sit beside me.
She’d watch the screen in silence.
She came from Donkey Kong 3, so to her, this was like glimpsing the future.
I still remember that one time... I handed her the controller, let her fight in the Arena.
She lost. She laughed.
She wasn’t made for that world, but... she liked being there.
She liked seeing me in it.
It was my refuge.
It was our small bridge.
And now, 19 years later, I go back.
The world has changed. I have changed. I’m 31 now.
And she… she’s no longer here.
And yet, playing the remaster feels like... like opening a window into the past.
The graphics are new, but the heart remains untouched.
Every tree, every sound, every line of dialogue speaks in a language only the soul remembers.
It’s the voice of childhood.
It’s the whisper of my mother laughing once more after losing that Arena fight.
Oblivion is not just a game.
It’s a time machine.
It’s a second chance to touch, even for a moment, what we thought was lost.
And as the sun rises over Cyrodiil, I remain there.
Fingers on the keyboard...
And a tear I cannot tell—if it’s sorrow or gratitude.