There was a whole era of gaming from the late 90s to like 2010 where like a couple developers made something special, left, and then the company coasted on the code for a decade.
For me it was the Company of Heroes series.
Reposting my comment from another thread because I’m interested in spurring discussion.
Imo Bethesda is, in many ways, a victim of its own success. Morrowind and Oblivion were both solid entries that did well critically and financially, but no one was prepared for the massive impact of Skyrim. Its success transformed open-world fantasy games into a staple of AAA gaming, and the game has stayed relevant for over a decade.
However, even when it was first released, Skyrim fell short in several areas that were often overlooked due to the sheer “wow” factor of its open world. The game is plagued by bugs, many of which are game-breaking and persist even in recent re-releases. The AI is brain-dead, melee combat is clunky, and the quest design and writing often lack depth.
In the years since, the landscape of gaming has evolved. Numerous fantasy and open-world games have improved upon things that Skyrim did well, and raised the bar for what players expect from many areas where Skyrim fell short. Players today have a wealth of games to choose from and are less forgiving of these types of flaws. Starfield’s lukewarm reception reflects Bethesda’s seeming unwillingness—or inability—to update its design philosophy for a modern audience.
The expectations for The Elder Scrolls VI have become impossible for Bethesda to meet. These expectations are sky-high not only among fans but also from Bethesda’s new parent company, Microsoft. TES6 will almost certainly be a financial success, but Microsoft didn’t acquire Bethesda for just “decent” results like Starfield; they acquired the creators of Skyrim to make blockbuster hits that dominate the charts and win critical acclaim.
In the end, Bethesda knows they will never recapture the lightning-in-a-bottle success of Skyrim. So they’ll keep sitting on the IP, until Microsoft forces them to release something mediocre, and their studio joins many of the other classic RPG developers in obscurity
I never got the big deal with Skyrim. I’m not saying it’s bad, but I don’t get why people went all crazy for it. Bethesda over streamlined the Elder Scrolls series with Skyrim for the mainstream audience. By removing and/or simplifying game systems.
EDIT You can be the leader of all the guilds with a single character. Just why?
By removing and simplifying systems they made the game more easier for random people who’ve never played a game or haven’t played since the NES. My english teacher that year was hijacking her son’s playstation just to play skyrim.
The vanilla Skyrim is good not great, but solid. It’s the mods that make this game truly exceptional. With mods, you can shape Skyrim into whatever you want, and that’s why, I think, so many people love it.
I never got the big deal with Skyrim
I’m guessing you never played it on PC.
But I did. Also the classic “The modders will save the game.”. Man, I’m getting tired of that.
Agreed. Modding doesn’t “fix” Skyrim either. It adds surface-level content and tweaks but the fundamental bones of the game are still there and they are heavily flawed. One of the few exceptions I can think of are things like Skywind but that’s only because it removes Skyrim’s story entirely, overhauls many of its mechanics, and uses the world/lore/story of one of Bethesda’s better games.
And in the case of Starfield - it’s entirely beyond salvaging with mods. Mods will not be able to fix the biggest problems with that game because they are literally the very way the game was made. To fix them would require basically remaking the entire game from scratch.
I always thought that was a joke about modders adding in big bouncy titties and the game not having much else going for it…
also schlongs of skyrim mod sounds super important for living those exhibitionist fantasies
Even Oblivion felt too streamlined. Morrowind was too good.
I got super prepared for Oblivion to be as complex and difficult as Morrowind and was severely disappointed by it even at launch. Skyrim was slightly better than Oblivion in terms of mechanical complexity (dual wielding, how magic works, the forts, etc), but also even more streamlined in others (like how skills and leveling work).
I’ve played the absolute shit out of all 3 (as well as FO3, NV and 4) though. There is just some inexplicable draw to them. And it’s that very thing that Starfield lacks that had me rush the MQ and just stop playing once it was over.
Deep or not, I hated the levelling system of Oblivion with a passion. Needing to micromanage which skills I increase for each level so I can get a good attribute increase was such a micromanagement pain, especially when everything kept scaling up your level. Often I felt like I was getting weaker, not stronger, when I leveled.
I’d much prefer they replace the system with something different (like how it works in fallout 3) than what they did in Skyrim where they just carved out all the annoying bits and left barely anything behind though.
Oblivion’s leveling didn’t change from Morrowind, it also had that flaw that could really fuck you up if you didn’t optimize getting extra points in the minor skills before the major skills.
I enjoy that Skyrim made leveling up simply a matter of gaining X points across skills, but how they ditched the attributes and went for +10 on one of Health, Stamina or Magicka made it feel kinda dumb.
Most Bethesda RPGs are going for bredth instead of depth. They give you a giant world to explore and usually throw you into that world with complete freedom relatively quickly.
I generally agree that Skyrim (and Oblivion to be honest) aren’t particularly strong games when you look at pretty much any individual system, and the games don’t interest me much, but I totally get the appeal.
I liked and hated Skyrim. Most of the dungeons seems to be copy pasted, and the world feels empty… but the game is good.
They should release it as early access and just fix all the crap people find wrong with it
no.
Why not? are you expecting a fully game on release? When have they ever put out something that wasn’t fixed by modders?
Better yet, I’d like to see them put out more of a platform than a game with maybe a built in missions they can call “Cannon”, sort of like the ARMA series does. Let the people build it, they have been anyway.
Are you telling me that it is excusable for a company engaging over 400 people over many many years in a production of a videogame to not playtest their game and make players pay for testing it?
Dude, Early Access is okay if you are an indie games company with limited resources, NOT an AAA producer with infinite budget.
K, but who cares anymore?
I sometimes download Skyrim again, mod it for hours and as soon as I start a new game I realise I don’t even wanna play it.
You might be interested to know that there are several hardcore modding scenes, where the point is to mod the game for fun. The mod guides are updated every month or so and includes thousands of mods. It takes days to install, and actually playing is optional. In most cases, a new save is required every update, so modders keep an additional playable state if they actually want to play the game.
Lexy’s LOTD is my fav one, it’s only over a thousand mods, has very detailed instructions, and a very friendly community.
I just keeping modding games I actually wanna play like Rimworld or CP2077 but there’s really a scene for everyone and everything.
Hot take: I’m fine with Bethesda taking their time to release a game if that means it’ll be higher quality. There are thousands of games released a week. Hi play something else in the meantime.
if that means it’ll be higher quality.
Hahahaha! That’s a good one.
wasted too much time on starfield, FO76, and mobile games. that’s all they have released since 2018. and if you don’t count VR editions or special editions then you’re back to 2016 with FO4.
8 years of junk. They could have made TWO elder scrolls in that time.
“Only” 12 years. FFS. “Journalism” is a joke.
I hate the way most of the ES fans talk and think about this. I see where the frustraition is coming from but for the most part all of the hate is baseless, you all act like you have seen even a pixel of it. Yes the last few games were not their best to say the least but i belive they had a reason for most of the fumbles. While sometimes it was just plain “we need more money” other times itwas a bit more complex with how starfield was a passion project which they made to test out the limits of their game engine. it was never supposed to be a ground braking game just a way to monotize their testing while giving the hungry fans something to play with while they wait. There is no solid proof or reason to balive that TESVI will be trash. It may not be as good as skyrim in some aspects but i belive it will at least surpass it in some other ones. Another thing which bugs me is people being angry at how long it takes them to make it while you know they did projects in between, would you reather a buggy unplayable mess now or a fully flashed out game a year or two later. The best thing to do is wait and see. Don’t make it harder for everyone to be excited. I may have missed some things in this post so if anyone wants to debate me feel free to reply!
-Cheers!
it was never supposed to be a ground braking game just a way to monotize their testing while giving the hungry fans something to play with while they wait.
Can’t re-write history just to cope, buddy
would you reather a buggy unplayable mess now or a fully flashed out game a year or two later
Right now we don’t get either so that’s a weird 2 options to pick
- They never said that it was what i said it was but i think we can all see it.
- i don’t get your point. yes we don’t have neither but they only recently started development you act as if they have been working on it for a dacate which isn’t true so my point still stands.
Thanks for engaging tho unlike the 8 people just downvoting me without giving any feedback on why i am wrong. Cheers
And considering Bethesda’s track record, we will get a buggy mess 2 years from now. I mean, just compare the list of shit the Unofficial Skyrim Patch fixes that Bethesda hasn’t addressed in 13 fucking years
Tbh I kinda hope Bethesda doesn’t make a new Fallout game, I predict if they do make a new one it’ll make Fallout 76 look like New Vegas in comparison.
TESO and Star Field?
TES:O is a different team entirely, it’s made by ZeniMax it’s only published by Bethesda.
I hate it when I forget relevant things like that.
Maybe Todd Howard the Duck will tell us what’s going on
Everything is just working
Starfield was boring as hell and now they’re too scared to try ES6 (because it’ll be garbage).
I would love to be wrong…
This is, more than likely, exactly what will end up happening.
They know Creation Engine is not fit for the task. They know the writing is stale and uninspired. They know that it’ll more than likely be aimed towards mainstream success, rather than being a good rpg, making it even more simplified.
I really hope i’m wrong, but I’m not holding my breath for TES6 anymore
They’re not too scared to make Elder Scrolls VI. It’s their next project. It’s just not coming until probably 2028 at the rate they’ve been working lately, and it’ll feel 15 years out of date this time instead of only 10.
What’s really crazy is to compare Bethesda with CDPR. I’ve been replaying the Witcher 3 and it just struck me how I won’t have to wait 15+ years for the next entry. And to look at how much more efficient they’ve been in the past.
For a timeline, Witcher 2 released in May 2011 and then the Witcher 3 released in May 2015. Took 3.5 years to develop. Cyberpunk released December 2020, only 4.5 years after W3 had its last major DLC. Then in 2023 they released a very large update for Cyberpunk, about 2/3rds the runtime of the main game. And then in 2025 we’ll probably get the next Witcher game. They have like 3 games in active development now.
So what’s the difference with Bethesda? Well Skyrim sold 30 million units and Witcher 2 sold about 8 million. Less than a third the income. Yet if you compare CDPRs staff to Bethesdas at time of their next games, CDPR had doubled Bethesda’s work force. And guess what happened? Witcher 3 sold 40 million while fallout 4 sold 25 million. Thats despite Witcher 3 costing an estimated $81 million while Fallout 4 sits closer to 1.5x that at $125 million.
Then you talk about engines and it gets even worse. CDPR arguably started with a worse engine and I shouldn’t need to explain how much they’ve destroyed BS in that regard as well. Witcher 2 looks worse than Skyrim by a lot imo. But by the time their next game rolled around, it was an industry leader in graphics. And cyberpunk 2077 is like the next Crysis now while starfield is… oh boy. And guess what? After all that work on their engine, they abandoned it. Why? Because their resources are better spent making games and systems in an engine someone else updates for them. Bethesda meanwhile not only can’t juggle the ball of updating an engine and game dev, but they’re not even smart enough to swap engines.
Bethesda has all the signs of a dying studio and Microsoft is the sucker for buying them. And it’s a waste of talent more than anything. Talented people exist at Bethesda whose resources and career development would be far better off being applied on UE4.
Microsoft now owns the elder scrolls and fallout IP, plus everything under the smaller studios (Doom, etc). Bethesda won’t matter in the long run.
Witcher 1 using the NWN engine is still hilarious to me
I actually didn’t know this but I did play through that recently and I actually have really good things about how that game looks even to this day. I know they did some touching up and I’m assuming updated textures for the enhanced version but it aged a lot better than many other games from that era did
Given the technical problems with Cyberpunk at launch, I don’t know that it’s a great idea to champion them. Both studios have had a similar release cadence in the same time periods.
When Microsoft bought Bethesda, they bought Zenimax, which includes far more than just the likes of Elder Scrolls.
I swear people forget how atrocious the cyberpunk 2077 launch was.
On machines that were actually strong enough to run it, it was mostly fine. I played on PC and while I admit the later balancing update was probably necessary, I didn’t run into most of the real nasty bugs people liked to talk about. I had a great time putting in 100 or so hours in version 1.
A solid 80% or more of all the problems Cyberpunk had at launch stemmed from trying to launch it on last-gen consoles. It absolutely was not intended for PS4 or XB1 and targeting those platforms was a mistake. Once they pulled availability for those and buckled down on getting it prettied up for next gen, the quality jumped by a mile within the next year and a half of updates.
The launch was rough, I grant you that, and maybe I’m just simping for CDPR but even at the time I was in the vocal minority saying, hey this game really isn’t that bad if you give it a chance and run it on hardware that it was intended for.
And of course now with its updates and DLC it’s just genuinely a great game.
It’s almost created this double underdog scenario for CDPR. First, they released Witcher 2 and then 3, where their game quality jumped incredibly drastically from the first game.
Then they brought their reputation crashing down to earth on Cyberpunk’s release, but fixed the game well enough that it now feels like an underdog overcoming odds in the public memory. They’ve basically fully recovered their public image, which I’m unsure if they deserve. People can like how it turned out now, but they shouldn’t forget.
Yeah they fixed it up pretty good and I think that’s why people moved on. Just pretty bad for the Playstation fans considering it unlaunched from the ps4 until the following year while the ps5 was still unobtainium.
Join the dark side – stop taking your pills and enjoy Elder Scrolls 6 and Titanfall 3 with the rest of us
