Oblivion:Xbox 360

The purpose of this page is to document some aspects of Oblivion that are specific to the Xbox 360 version of the game. The vast majority of gameplay is identical on all platforms (PC, Xbox 360, or PS3): the quests are the same, the glitches are the same, etc. One difference during gameplay is that reaching certain milestones will unlock achievements; these are listed at Xbox 360 Achievements. Achievements added by the Shivering Isles expansion are located at Xbox 360 Shivering Isles Achievements

Missing PC Features

Some of the PC features that are not available on Xbox 360 (or PS3) are:

The console. This means that in many cases bug fixes that are used by PC players are not available to Xbox 360 players. It also means that most cheats and exploits are not available.
The construction set. The construction set does not directly affect game play; rather it allows the game files to be viewed and edited. A lot of the information on the Wiki is derived from the construction set, because it allows the factors controlling game play to be easily identified.
Mods other than the official plug-ins cannot be installed due to security features that prevent modification of the Xbox 360.

Interface Differences

Although the keyboard and Xbox controller clearly provide very different methods of interacting with the game, most of the controls work the same way. Some differences, however, include:

On the Xbox 360 there is no way to toggle Always Run, despite suggestions otherwise in the game guide, or Auto Move.
- Walking vs running is controlled by how far forward you push the left thumbstick. Slight motions of the thumbstick will cause your character to walk; pushing the thumbstick as far as it will go will cause your character to run. (This is most obvious if you use third-person view).
The Quick Save and Quick Load shortcuts are not available; save and load are only accessible through the Menu options.

Controller Settings

A complete list of controls is provided at Controls. Some game controls that are not obvious or are not covered in the game guide are:

When at the "How many items?" dialog (e.g., when selling multiple items), Left Bumper or Right Bumper moves the slider all the way left (one) or right (all), respectively.
When an item is selected in your inventory, Left Bumper will drop the item in "grab" mode. Grabbing an item this way does not require you to hold down the Left Bumper.
Unlike the PC, spells cannot be repeatedly cast by holding the Right Bumper.

Xbox 360 Fixes

One problem specific to the Xbox 360 is that the cached game data can become fragmented, leading to a gradual deterioration of game performance, including lagging and screen freezes. To fix this problem, you need to press and hold the A button on the controller while the game is first loading (up until the "Bethesda Softworks" logo appears). For more information, see Oblivion-Fragmented-Cache-Data-Fix.

Music

The track "Auriel's Ascension" is not included on the original Xbox 360 version of the game. However, it is included on the PC and PS3 versions and the Game of the Year edition of the Xbox 360 version.

Video Output

A video output of 720p/1080i is supported in the Xbox 360 version of the game.

Patches

If you are connected to Xbox LIVE, your Xbox 360 will automatically prompt you to install the patch by telling you that "an update is available for this game". You do not need to pay for Xbox LIVE membership; the free Silver membership is sufficient to obtain the patch.

If you are insistent on being able to continue to play without the patch (e.g., to retain your ability to clone and use other exploits), it may be possible to simply decline the patch. But if you decide to go without the patch, you will remain vulnerable to many unfixable bugs in the game, and you will not be able to play any of the newer official plug-ins (The Vile Lair or later).

It is also possible to remove the patch if you ever feel the need to. To do this, first open the "System" blade in the Xbox 360 dashboard, then go to memory, and press Y on the hard drive to open the "Device Options" menu. Then press the following sequence of buttons: X, X, Left Bumper (LB), Right Bumper (RB), X, X. You will be asked if you want to perform maintenance on your hard drive and delete all patches. Choose yes. To later reinstall the patch, just get onto Xbox LIVE again. However, if you had downloaded additional content that relied on the patch, loading a save game may cause your game to crash (particularly true if The Shivering Isles is installed), or will at least reset the plug-in content, causing you to lose any equipment you may have obtained from the plug-in.

With the August 6, 2008 update of the Xbox dashboard, the ability to clear your cache is available in the system tab.

Official Plug-ins

All of the official plug-ins, including Knights of the Nine and Shivering Isles, can be downloaded from the Xbox Live Marketplace. An Xbox live subscription is not necessary to download the plug-ins (i.e., the free silver membership is sufficient), but you will need to pay for each plug-in using Microsoft Points. If there are multiple users on your Xbox 360, the plug-ins will be available to all accounts (user profiles) on that console.

If you wish to delete an official plug-in, you just need to delete the associated file. Under the "System" blade, select "Memory", "Hard Drive", "Games", then "Oblivion". The directory that is now open lists all your save files, and also lists any downloaded content. Select the file for the plug-in you want to get rid of, and choose delete. If you delete the plug-in file, you can subsequently download a new copy without having to pay for it again.

In addition, a Shivering Isles DVD is available for purchase in retail stores; a Game of the Year edition of Oblivion is also available. A hard drive is necessary to install the plug-ins for Shivering Isles and Knights of the Nine from the DVD even if you would have enough space on the S-Console sans hard drive's 4 GB internal memory unit.

The Shivering Isles DVD includes only Shivering Isles and Knights of the Nine. It requires that you separately purchase (or already own) Oblivion.
The GOTY edition is a full version of the game, including Shivering Isles and Knights of the Nine. It is a two-DVD set: the first DVD only contains the original Oblivion content; the second DVD must be installed in order to add the extra content. The GOTY edition does not include any of the other official plug-ins.
The Shivering Isles and Knights of the Nine are available on DVD as well as on Xbox Live Marketplace. The other eight official plug-ins are only available for the Xbox 360 through the Xbox Live Marketplace (with the exception being a disc given away with an issue of the US edition of Official Xbox Magazine; this disc contained Wizard's Tower and Thieves' Den).

Unofficial Mods

Unofficial mods cannot be played on an unmodified Xbox 360 or PS3. While it is possible to access the Xbox 360 with some programs, it is not possible to add mods since doing so would require creating an Xbox 360 container file, which is only possible if you know the encryption method and private key used to generate the hashed security certificates.

Transferring Game Saves

Using a USB memory stick

Xbox 360 game saves can be transferred to a PC (running Windows 98 or later) fairly easily since the April 2010 system update, which grants the ability to transfer save games to a generic USB memory stick in a partially encrypted form. The only hardware required to transfer saves is a USB memory stick with a capacity equal to or greater than 1GB, as anything under that is not supported by the Xbox 360. A walkthrough of the Modio method can be found here. [1]

It should be noted that Microsoft has begun a process of banning save files shared on the internet by blacklisting specific console IDs that have been seen uploading their save game files.

Transfer your save files to the USB memory stick.
1. Under "System Settings", choose "Memory".
2. If you haven't yet configured your USB stick for use with the Xbox 360, select your USB device and choose how you want to partition the space.
3. Select the device on which your save files are located and then select "Games", "Oblivion". There'll be a list of downloaded content and save games.
4. Select the files you want to transfer and copy them to the USB memory stick. Once you're done copying, you can now plug the USB stick into your PC.
Extract your save files from the USB memory stick.
1. Method 1
  1. Download USB Xtaf Xplorer [2]. Extract the files anywhere and run USBXTAFGUI.
  2. Click File... Open Device. The program should automatically detect the USB stick and a folder 0. {dir}Content will appear.
  3. Navigate though the folders by double clicking until you reach your Oblivion save games, which are in the form SAVE NN - (hex code).
  4. Select the save games you wish to extract, click Extract and choose a folder where you want to save them.
2. Method 2
  1. Download Modio [3], extract, and run.
  2. Click the orb in Modio (the one with an M in it)
  3. Click "Explore my device..."
  4. Click "File>Open/Close Drive". Modio should show you a view similar to xport360 or xtaf.
  5. Navigate to your oblivion folder and open it.
  6. Click on your save.
  7. Right click and choose "Extract" and save it to your Desktop.
3. The file you have at this point still is still an Xbox 360 save. We will need to convert it to the .ESS format.
  1. Pull up the main Modio window and click n drag the save from your Desktop to the window.
  2. Click the tab "File Contents" and right click on "gamedata.dat" and save it to your PC Oblivion save files directory as "Whatever.ess"
  3. You're done! Start up Oblivion, and load the game!

Using an Xbox 360 Memory Unit (MU)

It's possible to transfer Oblivion save games from an Xbox 360 memory unit to the PC, but it is a much more difficult process. It requires additional hardware and several shareware programs. This section describes one procedure that has been used successfully to transfer files, that does not require making any modifications to the Xbox unit. Although the process has been tested, use it at your own risk.

Before starting, you will need to purchase:

An Xbox 360 memory unit (MU), for example a 64MB unit.
A Datel Xbox 360 transfer kit (and the included Xchange360 software).

Both are commercially available at stores that sell Xbox 360 accessories.

You also need xport 360 or xplorer 360 xtreme so actually see your HDD and you would need a rehash/resigner program such as modio or concept v 3.0

Transfer your save files to the memory unit. (Only necessary if target save file is not already on a memory unit)
1. Under the "System" blade, select "Memory", you should then see both your hard drive and the MU.
2. Select "Hard Drive", "Games", "Oblivion"... you should then see a list of all your save files, and any downloaded content.
3. Select the files you want to transfer, and copy them to the MU.
Transfer the data from the memory unit to your PC.
1. Plug the MU into the USB cable that comes with the transfer kit.
2. Open the Xchange 360 software that comes with the transfer kit.
3. Click on the 360 memory card blade, and "backup your memory card".
4. A single ".z36" file containing an image of the entire contents of the memory units is created on your hard drive (by default to the folder "My Documents\X360 Memcard Images"; this can be changed under options)
Convert the image file from a ".z36" file to a ".bin" file
1. For the Xplorer360 software (used in the next step) to recognize the image file, it needs to be converted to a different format.
2. Download and install XIC from 360-HQ (currently available as "XIC V1.0.exe")
3. Using XIC is straightforward, just double click on the .exe and you will be prompted to provide the names of the .z36 and .bin files
Extract individual Xbox360 save files from the image
1. Download and install Xplorer360 from 360-HQ (currently available as Xplorer360beta5)
2. Open the software, and from the "Drive" menu select "Open... Image", and open the ".bin" file
3. You will then be able to explore through the image's directory structure; the save files are typically in a directory buried several layers down under "Content" on "Partition 1"
4. The oblivion files will be listed as files with names like "Save 2451 - 01C6DDD6B53A3B30"; the save number will match the save number visible in-game.
5. Highlight your save files, then under the "Edit" menu select "Extract..." You will be prompted for where to extract the files to
Extract the oblivion save file from the Xbox 360 container file
1. The files you have at this point still have an extra layer of Xbox RSA-type security included in them. If you try to load these files as-is into a PC version of the game, the load menu will recognize the files, but the game will freeze up if you actually try to open them.
2. Download and install wxPirs.exe [4], available in version 1.1; for release information see xbox-scene.com. Note that this software also requires installation of Microsoft .NET framework.
3. Under the "File" menu, open one of the files extracted in the previous step
4. In the bottom panel, you should recognize the title of the save file, e.g., "Save 2451 - Nenya, Level 20, Play Time: 255:43:30"; the real data that you've gone to all this trouble to get is in the right hand panel, always identified as "gamedata.dat".
5. Right click on "gamedata.dat" and choose extract; pick a name for your save file, e.g. "Save 2451.ess".
6. Transfer this .ess file to your PC Oblivion save files directory, and you're done Start up Oblivion, and load the game!

If you are able to connect your Xbox hard drive to your PC, it is instead possible to directly access the save files from your hard drive using the XPort 360 File Browser (or other software). Copy the save files directly to your PC; this replaces steps 1 through 4 above. You will still need to use step 5 to remove the security layer. This method saves time and hard disk space, and also does not require the purchase of a memory unit.

Transferring PC Game Saves to the Xbox 360

Transferring PC game saves to the Xbox 360 is possible, however the PC save MUST NOT MAKE USE OF ANY USER CREATED CONTENT e.g. If your character is a vanilla dremora via plug-in then the xbox version will accept it because it has the Dremora components but if the save contains any content that was not part of the vanilla game then upon loading the xbox will crash (freeze).

Special thanks to the creator of this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhWlAJaigTo&feature=related Here's how you do it:

You will need:

A USB Stick/Cable (Note: If you are using a USB stick then make sure you Configure it first if you haven't already by plugging it in and then go to System Settings/Memory/USB Storage Device/Configure)

And Modio

1. Choose any of your saves from the Xbox 360 version, and then follow everything above up to getting the Xbox 360 save to your computer. If you are using a USB Stick then transfer the save from the Xbox 360 to the Stick and then plug it into your computer.
  1. Copy or cut your preferred PC Save and then paste it onto your Desktop.
  2. Rename the PC Save to gamedata.dat (make sure it is exactly like that).
2. Open Modio, or download and install it if you haven't already.
  1. Click on the circular blue 'M' at the top left.
  2. Select Explore My Device...
  3. Click File and then click Open/Close Drive
  4. Click the folder called Content until you reach the file with your save
  5. Right click and select Extract
  6. Save it to your desktop
3. Minimize the Xbox360DeviceExplorer Window and then drag the Xbox 360 save to the Modio Window and release
  1. Select the tab File Contents
  2. Right click on gamedata.dat
  3. Select Replace File
  4. Select your PC Save
  5. Go back to the first tab and click Rehash and Resign
  6. Then click Save to Device
  7. Then place your save back into the Xbox 360

You're done! Enjoy!

Using Xbox360 Downloadable Content While Offline

You may find that if you are using a different console than the one you originally downloaded the plug-ins on, that you will be unable to use them when playing while offline, this is because the licenses for the plug-ins are associated with your old console and need to be migrated to your new one. To rectify this and be able to use the content offline visit www.xbox.com and follow the "license transfer" process in the support section.

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