Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

Bethesda vs. Bioware

Vaarna_Aarne

Notorious Internet Vandal
Joined
Jun 1, 2008
Messages
34,585
Location
Cell S-004
MCA Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2
Bioware is definately worse. With Bethesda and Toddler, I at least get the impression that they're genuinely trying their best to improve every time. It's just that Toddler isn't as awesome, perfect and handsome as MCA.

Bioware on the other hand is so far up their ass that they can only get worse, and after Dragon Age 2 there's no doubt they're far worse than Beth was around Oblivion.
 

racofer

Thread Incliner
Joined
Apr 5, 2008
Messages
25,577
Location
Your ignore list.
Vaarna_Aarne said:
Bioware is definately worse. With Bethesda and Toddler, I at least get the impression that they're genuinely trying their best to improve every time. It's just that Toddler isn't as awesome, perfect and handsome as MCA.

Fixing Bethesda:

C5pRF.jpg
BENHS.jpg
 

Azarkon

Arcane
Joined
Oct 7, 2005
Messages
2,989
Bethesda:

Good (Arena) -> Great (Daggerfall) -> Average (Morrowind) -> Bad (Oblivion) -> Below Average (FO3) -> Average (Skyrim)

Bioware:

Good (Baldur's Gate) -> Great (Baldur's Gate II) -> Average (Throne of Bhaal) -> Average (Neverwinter Nights) -> Average (KOTOR) -> Below Average (Jade Empire) -> Average (Mass Effect) -> Average (Dragon Age) -> Good (Mass Effect 2) -> Bad (Dragon Age 2)

The main similarity that they both start off strong and become weaker as you go, which I guess is typical of slam dunk AAA companies.

The main difference, and which seems to have prompted this thread, is that Dragon Age 2 is bad, but Skyrim is not.
 

waywardOne

Arcane
Joined
Aug 28, 2010
Messages
2,318
The epic McDonald's vs Burger King debate.

Answer: They're both mass-marketed shit for plebes. Sure I'd enjoy it when I'm drunk or starving, but I wouldn't be proud of it.
 

thesoup

Arcane
Joined
Oct 13, 2011
Messages
7,599
You guys keep on saying how Bioware is about to crash and crash hard.

We may laugh all we want at the shit that their games have become, but they are selling better than ever. We all laughed at ME3 and its shitty leaked dialogues, but the press and consoletards will see it as the best written thing since the Bible.

TOR will be shit, no doubt about that, but I doubt it will crash hard. It won't overthrow WoW, but I believe it will have a steady audience.

The only universally hated game they made was DA2, so maybe that's a start, but still, everywhere you go, people will cite Bioware as the greatest developers EVAH with unparalleled writing.


As for the topic of the thread, I don't really have a say in it because I'm done with both companies.
 

Volourn

Pretty Princess
Pretty Princess Glory to Ukraine
Joined
Mar 10, 2003
Messages
24,924
i think it's hilarious that the anti BIo contigent thinks DA2 is a fialure when it sold 2mil+ while the pro Obsidian contigent thinks DS3 is a untouchable success and it sold less than a mil. Fukkin' laugh my fukkin' ass off.


Anyways, I don't enjoy Betehsda shit games. Thankfully, I tend to wait until theya re $10 before trying it and no Skyrim for me. FFS Obsidian - a company that are repsonsible for some of the worst games ever - came in - and did a Bethesda game better than bethesda. LMFAO

BIO = 9

BETH = 1


"The only universally hated game they made was DA2"

Define 'universal'. This is a bullshit full of lies with no facts to back it up. Is it as beloved as other BIO games? No. But, 'universally hated'? No.

Come on, guys, get out of the Codex bubble.
 

bonescraper

Guest
After trying out Skyrim i must say Bethesda. Fuck, at least they made the evil path valid in their latest game, which can't be said about any games made by Bioware since like... forever. FO3 was shit, but it was still a little step forward from the atrocious Oblivion (maybe FO3 would stand on it's own if it was some generic post-apoc RPG, but no... they chose to dumb down Fallout), and Skyrim is was huge positive surprise for me. It's actually a fun game, despite it's declining RPG aspects. So, in my book, Bethesda inclined a bit while Bioware went full Derp quite some time ago. Both don't make proper RPGs, but Bethesda actually makes better games.
 

thesoup

Arcane
Joined
Oct 13, 2011
Messages
7,599
Volourn said:
"The only universally hated game they made was DA2"

Define 'universal'. This is a bullshit full of lies with no facts to back it up. Is it as beloved as other BIO games? No. But, 'universally hated'? No.

Come on, guys, get out of the Codex bubble.
Pretty much every non bioware fanboyish community claims it's shit, apart from five people. The average user metascore is 4.4. That's how much people hate it.
 

Forest Dweller

Smoking Dicks
Joined
Oct 29, 2008
Messages
12,196
Jaesun said:
Code:
Turd-o-Meter v3.1

Shit                                   Kinda Shit                                         Less Shitty
|--------------------------------------------|-------------------------------------------------|-------------------------|
 |                     |                                                                |
 Bethesda            BioWare                                                        Obsidian

No.
 

Volourn

Pretty Princess
Pretty Princess Glory to Ukraine
Joined
Mar 10, 2003
Messages
24,924
1900 people - which is less than the entire Codex membership btw - does not prove anything nor does it represent the mJORITY.

The game sold 2mil+. That means 1, 998,100 people's opinions are unknown. LMFAO

Plus,a re you really gonna take the same base that rates such Codexian anti favorites like Oblivion, NWN, and the like seriouslyu? Hypocritical much?

On top of that, it's also ahrd to take any site seriously where 0s, 1s, and 10s tend to be the most common numbers used. LMFAO
 

Stinger

Arcane
Joined
Aug 13, 2011
Messages
1,366
I don't know about TOR crashing and burning. Apparently it's the fastest pre-ordered title or something.

It's definitely making money- doubful as to whether it'll make up for the shitloads spent on marketing and voice acting but it isn't a complete failure.
 
Joined
Nov 8, 2007
Messages
6,207
Location
The island of misfit mascots
I remember when I first started posting here, I made a post arguing that it was absurd to hold Bioware as being in the same league of shittiness as Bethesda. My argument was that Bioware made popcorn blockbuster games, not particularly high on rpg-ness, and not exactly my personal taste, but none too offensive either. I could understand how some people would find them fun, and I had no difficulty getting myself to complete them. Bethesda, on the other hand, had just sent the entire rpg genre crashing downwards in skill, taste and fanbase with Oblivion - a game that seemed almost impossibly awful, yet was getting rave reviews everywhere. Worst of all, Oblivion had changed the rpg market, so that what was formerly known as 'rpgs' were now considered obsolete, and the former rpg-fanbase an unprofitable rump to be discarded in favour of the new masses who had piled onto Oblivion as 'baby's first crpg'.

But since then, Bioware has plummeted with each new release, while Bethesda has, well, stayed about the same and possibly even marginally inclined. I'd say the roles have reversed. I have no interest in playing Skyrim, but it at least looks like Bethesda is still interested in making crpgs. Bland ones, with too little world interaction and next to no tactical challenge, but crpgs nonetheless. In a stronger market, where lots of crpgs were released each year, catering to a variety of tastes, Bethesda would simply be unremarkable. A producer of large but predictable crpgs. Yes, Skyrim continues to streamline, but they also improved the godawful level scaling, and more the point, there's a clear vision of the kind of game they want to make. Bethesda is basically a shit version of Origin, dedicated towards shitty attempts at remaking Ultima 7. And whilst there might be far better crpg producers out there, they still seem to be aiming at making 'ultra-simple crpgs', rather than railroaded cutscene producers.
 

draexem

Novice
Joined
Oct 13, 2006
Messages
75
IronicNeurotic said:
3 years ago this wouldn't even have been a valid question but after New Vegas and Skyrim the tables have pretty much turned.

Whats your opinion?

How can you possibly compare 2 companies that make completely different games?

Bioware games have better story, better combat, better A.I, better dialogue, better characters.

Bethesda games are better games to live a life in and do random shit. Better loot.

They are too different, it's all about which you prefer.
 

Vibalist

Arcane
Joined
Jul 21, 2008
Messages
3,583
Location
Denmark
thesoup said:
Volourn said:
"The only universally hated game they made was DA2"

Define 'universal'. This is a bullshit full of lies with no facts to back it up. Is it as beloved as other BIO games? No. But, 'universally hated'? No.

Come on, guys, get out of the Codex bubble.
Pretty much every non bioware fanboyish community claims it's shit, apart from five people. The average user metascore is 4.4. That's how much people hate it.

Stop replying to Volourn, for fucks sake. :roll:
 

Roguey

Codex Staff
Staff Member
Sawyerite
Joined
May 29, 2010
Messages
35,653
"Define 'universal'. This is a bullshit full of lies with no facts to back it up. Is it as beloved as other BIO games? No. But, 'universally hated'? No.

Come on, guys, get out of the Codex bubble."

Seriously, everyone knows Bioware's worst is Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood. You won't even find anyone who will defend that.
 

Data4

Arcane
Joined
Sep 11, 2005
Messages
5,529
Location
Over there.
Bethesda is in dire need of someone that Bioware has and who seems reasonably competent: a voice director. Despite how shitty Gaider's writing is, they're at least able to coax a fairly decent performance out of their voice actors (aside from Male Shepherd, of course).
 

kris

Arcane
Joined
Oct 27, 2004
Messages
8,835
Location
Lulea, Sweden
Hobo Elf said:
At least Bethesda gave us Morrowind and Daggerfall. Bioware only has Bladder's Gate, and even then it's not really that great.
And what does New Vegas have to do with Bethesda? Is this secretly a troll thread?

All depends on were you sit. I found both Morrowind and Daggerfall boring, while I liked Baldurs gate. It is not really now before their last games that I changed to favour Bethesda since DA2 was horror and Skyrim quite okay.
 

sigma1932

Augur
Joined
Nov 11, 2011
Messages
119
Ulminati said:
Let Obsidian write the story and quests, bethesda make the landscape and put bioware in charge of facial animation and voice acting. Under no circumstances should you let Bethesda near quest design nor allow bioware to write dialogue for player companions. That goes double for female party members. Triple for Carth Onassi. You'd still have to find a company to code a decent engine for the game and someone to write a compelling conflict/combat/character advancement system though. I'd play that game.

...

Thinking about it for a bit, I might be convinced to let Blizzard do the engine and have a say on combat mechanics. Their game engines are usually pretty good at what they set out to accomplish. But not until they purge themselves of darkness. (AKA throw off the shackles of Bobby the Jew)

This I can agree with... to a point. If we wanted to put together an ideal super-developer company:

Bethesda does the marketing, and the marketing only... and even then, not until they sign a "we will not sue" agreement because they're a bunch of money-grubbing sue-happy pricks.

Obsidian does the fleshing out of content within the game (World design, quests/story/writing, gameplay mechanics, etc.)... not necessarily because they're great at it, but moreso because they're at least not horribly incompetent in this area.

Blizzard (or even, dare I say, Nintendo? Hmm...... naaaah... don't need any spikey-haired androgenous pre-teens in my games) builds the engine and does the play-testing. Should eliminate script-related bugs. I considered including the the gameplay mechanics (i.e. "ruleset"), but they haven't really done anything past combat mechanics... plus it'll be stuck in a permanent "still being tweaked" state until they finally give up 8 years later when newer projects demand more of their time...

Granted, Blizzard's graphics aren't the greatest close up, but they're satisfactory, IMO. My philosophy on graphics is that as long as I can tell the difference between a 6, 8, and 9 without straining, and any artwork looks finished and smooth rather than blocky and half-colored, I'm good. To make an analogy to HD video, it's nice to have, but at the end of the day, not being able to determine if the big-titted milf getting plowed on my screen shaved her pubes the day of the shoot or the day before isn't at the top of my priority list.

Bioware gets left out because they're in never-never land right now-- the "identity crisis" argument someone made probably fits best... I'd say they should build the engine, but they've even had trouble with that lately... though that could possibly be more an issue of DX9 vs. DX11.

...... Or, we just wait to see how AoD turns out, and potentially vote ITS as new king of RPG-land... I'm reserving my official opinon on this after putting too much faith in DA:Zero being "the spiritual successor of Baldur's Gate" before it was released and being given a single-player MMO. Even if AoD does turn out to hit the benchmarks set by FO1,2/PS:T/ BG with 10 years of advancement added onto that, I'm not convinced they won't sell out to a bigger company and start making money-grubbing AAA-slam-dunk-box-office-super-smash-monkey-movie console-tard shit afterwards.

On topic: Bioware started going downhill with KOTOR1 (NWN1 at least had the toolset, otherwise I'd have said that), and Bethesda lost my favor with Morrowind and later fueled my hate for them with FO3. I won't give either my money again without having played their games extensively first.
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom