Skyrim Remastered Is Having Serious Audio Problems

So it turns out that not every aspect of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Remastered is quite as remastered as we thought. It turns out that plenty of audio complaints are rolling in about a downgrade, meaning that the game looks and plays better, but sounds worse than ever.

The good news is that, launching on Friday, it doesn't sound like an audio downgrade was part of Bethesda's plan for Skyrim Remastered. Still, it's ruffled a lot of feathers, and we imagine some gamers are now moving the epic RPG to the back burner until the remastered experience is ready to roll.

This discovery comes to us via Gamespot, who stumbled upon a reddit post that might actually explain what happened. According to LasurArkinshade, the team at Bethesda decided to compress the ever-loving-hell out of the game's audio to the point that it actually sounds worse than the original game. We imagine that crappy audio was not the intention and, thankfully, Bethesda has already launched a counter assault. They later post on reddit that they are are currently working on a fix and, if all goes well, they hope to have this whole audio situation worked out sometime in the coming week. So hopefully folks won't have to wait too long to get a glorious soundtrack to go along with their equally glorious and visually upgraded adventure.

Some folks have apparently figured out a workaround to fix the audio problem on PC, but we're not so sure tinkering with the game is a great idea when Bethesda has said they are aware of the problem and already working on a timely fix. Anything you do might not sit well with their official patch, so this is probably one of those cases where it's best to sit tight and be safe rather than sorry. But, hey, you do you.

If you're unfamiliar with the remaster of Skyrim, it's basically everything console gamers have been waiting for, minus the current issues with sub-par audio of course. Thanks to the power of the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, gamers on consoles can now enjoy an adventure that, visually, is on par with the PC version of the game. Everything else folks loved about the game five years ago remains intact, though now all of that DLC and some extra goodies have been pulled together under one roof. There's even mod support on consoles, though it has shaped up to be a pretty limited experience. If you never played Skyrim, though, and aren't too bothered by mod limitations, then the consensus seems to be that this is a top-notch return to the land of Tamriel.

But we would, of course, be interested in how it's treating our readers. Is the remastered version of Skyrim everything you hoped it would be? Are the audio issues bumming you out and, if so, are you just waiting until Bethesda patches it up? Let us know in the comments below.