Rumor: Bethesda has been in turmoil since the death of their CEO

[ADULF HITLOR FAN KLUB]

You know that lore and world building are incredibly shallow when the most (and only) rememberable character from the series is the adoring fan.

 

[Tenebris]

Well I for one can't wait to get another human province that will have all it's interesting aspects neutered and imperialized.

 

[Late Bloomer]

You know you guys are circle jerking pretty hardcore right?

You know that lore and world building are incredibly shallow when the most (and only) rememberable character from the series is the adoring fan.

Nothing wrong with comedy. More games should try it. I would rather have the adoring fan as a sidekick than spend time being Geralt. What game has world building that you are fond of?

 

[Frank Capicoli]

Nothing wrong with comedy. More games should try it.

God no. Knowing modern writing it will just end up with a bunch of Joss Wheadon/Marvel movie tier quirky quips.

 

[dreughjiggers]

(Altman took care of a lot of people, he was by all accounts a good dude)

This is the same guy who manipulated Bethesda's founder Christopher Weaver out of his own company, was intimately involved with the Bank of Credit and Commerce International scandal, and consequently was permanently barred from banking? Perhaps the sycophants at Bethesda sung only praises of their boss, but everything I'd ever learned of that guy gave me the impression that he was a major douchebag.

Did you find all that on wikipedia? Sounds like a victim narrative. Whatever, op is a massive faggot.

 

[Reinhardt]

And Todd is a piece of shit too, producing at best disgusting mediocrity.

and still no one in vidya industry can even reach his mediocre level. in the land of 65 iq retards 80 iq is a king.

 

[mondblut]

people expect TES VI to be even wider (i.e. more floor space) since every game in the mainline series has been larger than the last.

WUT?

That mainline series?

 

[Maxie]

lesser men fall.. the least man prevails

 

[mondblut]

You know that lore and world building are incredibly shallow when the most (and only) rememberable character from the series is the adoring fan.

Lore and world building have nothing to do with muh characters. Virtual friends are for sad storyfags, the rest of us rightfully treat them as animated pieces of furniture.

 

[Roguey]

Expanding from a little over 100 employees to 500 was a mistake. That kind of rapid growth is going to cause all kinds of problems, always does.

 

[Yosharian]

Haha, Starfield is delayed.

I'm hearing a bunch of interesting shit, including:

1) The place has been in turmoil since their CEO Altman died a few years ago.
2) There are company-wide issues with management, for example with Shinji Mikami leaving Tango, apparently there are major disagreements/power struggles including how to integrate with Xbox/MSFT.
3) Pete Hines was made Head of Global Publishing but nobody knows what that means exactly
4) People really phoned it in over Covid. Especially a lot of the higher ups who got paid millions when the company was acquired by MSFT (Altman took care of a lot of people, he was by all accounts a good dude). But high level employees were doing crazy shit like calling into meetings from the Caribbean properties they had bought. Just a total lack of give-a-shit
5) Todd Howard is apparently one of the only guys left over there in a senior position who actually wants to make video games.

Pete Hines is a fucking idiot

Todd is a conman but at least he is our conman

 

[Morgoth]

Dogshit company after Morrowind.

Whatever may happen to Bethesda, just don't touch Machine and Arkane.

 

[Gargaune]

TES is actually a pretty decent piece of fiction, the issue is that the writing has gone downhill with each game and outside of each game's plot there isn't much going on in the background to pad out the lore. TES has pretty much stagnated, lore wise, since Morrowind.

I call 'em like I see 'em, and since Morrowind passed me by and what we got since 2006 is Oblivion and Skyrim, it's not made much of an impression fiction-wise. Maybe the reason is this:

I actually like the fact that TES appears generic on the surface and gets pretty damn crazy the deeper you dig. We only get bits and pieces of that in the games, of course.

Whatever the case, those last two TES games made me feel like Bethesda overshot "grounded" and landed on "tepid", they put the building blocks down (e.g. Skyrim - a declining empire fighting a war of secession over a political/religious conflict, a dragon god rising from the grave) but somehow didn't really channel that into a dynamic, impactful drama for current events. What's grounded feels familiar and routine and what's special feels arbitrary, like a DM who got an idea but didn't have too much time to dig into it.

I mean, seriously, Skyrim's hero is a guy whose superpower is... raising his voice? What, did the writer's dad step on one too many Legos?

Whatever may happen to Bethesda, just don't touch Machine and Arkane.

Is 2003 your join date or your current timezone?

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

It makes sense that they are choking, since they always made big games but now games have to be bigger than that, even. Nobody would buy a small little game made by Bethesda, kind of like that thing Josh made. I am of the opinion that something has to change and games (and tech in general) have to scale down. Increasing on everything is also giving diminishing returns up the ass. The changes between one iteration and the next are simply not noticeable anymore.

 

[Gargaune]

It makes sense that they are choking, since they always made big games but now games have to be bigger than that, even. Nobody would buy a small little game made by Bethesda, kind of like that thing Josh made. I am of the opinion that something has to change and games (and tech in general) have to scale down. Increasing on everything is also giving diminishing returns up the ass. The changes between one iteration and the next are simply not noticeable anymore.

Maybe, but I think Roguey's right on the staffing, Bethesda was traditionally on the leaner side of AAA development, with their high degree of specialisation on Gamebryo letting them build larger games than their staffing levels would otherwise indicate. Unless I'm mistaken, wasn't Bethesda clocking in around 80 internal staff when they shipped Fallout 4? Skyrim would've been fewer. The aggressive corporate bloat of late will have taken its toll on the studio's culture and vertical control.

 

[KateMicucci]

Not everyone working for bethesda is necessarily involved in gamedev.

 

[Fedora Master]

Fuck em.

 

[Roguey]

Unless I'm mistaken, wasn't Bethesda clocking in around 80 internal staff when they shipped Fallout 4? Skyrim would've been fewer. The aggressive corporate bloat of late will have taken its toll on the studio's culture and vertical control.

Oblivion had 70, Fallout 3 had 80, Skyrim had 90, Fallout 4 had 100. A long period of controlled growth followed by unchecked growth, a victim of their own success.

 

[Gargaune]

Oblivion had 70, Fallout 3 had 80, Skyrim had 90, Fallout 4 had 100. A long period of controlled growth followed by unchecked growth, a victim of their own success.

Ah, my numbers were a bit off. But yeah, they ran a tight ship for a long time, with gradual staffing as needed, until ZeniMax suddenly decided to fatten that goose a few years back. "Après l'acquisition par Microsoft, le déluge."

 

[The Wall]

Skyrim scoped RPG with depth of Daggerfall in UnrealEngine can be made today with help of AI, in Unreal Engine with less then 100 people. GUARANTEED

But not in West. West produces only Drag Queen Story Hours today, derailed trains with toxic chemicals and political prosecutions.
West in 2023 is physically incapable of producing Quality Entertainment

 

[The Wall]

Not everyone working for bethesda is necessarily involved in gamedev.

That's the Problem? WHAT have 400 additional devs given to their game project? FOUR FUCKING HUNDRED!
That used to be enoughh to make 10+ gaming block-busters of any given year from 2000-2010. Most installed till this day on many machines
What is added value? Dev speed? Quality? Scope increase?
FUCKING MYSTERY

People here and in West in general, like to mystify Reality. While it's nakedly obvious. If you ever worked in modern Western corp, you know most of those 400 are probably tranny lovers of various Microsoft execs

 

[DJOGamer PT]

You know that lore and world building are incredibly shallow when the most (and only) rememberable character from the series is the adoring fan.

Nigga are you stuck in 2008?
Dagoth Ur and Vivec have for years been considered the most popular characters of the setting
Even in regards to Oblivion M'aiq the Liar is more recognizable than the Adoring Fan
And Pelinal Whitestrake is the most memorable character in Oblivion

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

Oblivion has been reevaluated by people in recent years, ironically, because Bethesda games are including less and less class information and diversity. So their argument is "at least Oblivion had class builds, and custom classes". And I'm talking about normal people.

 

[lycanwarrior]

Haha, Starfield is delayed.

I'm hearing a bunch of interesting shit, including:

1) The place has been in turmoil since their CEO Altman died a few years ago.
2) There are company-wide issues with management, for example with Shinji Mikami leaving Tango, apparently there are major disagreements/power struggles including how to integrate with Xbox/MSFT.
3) Pete Hines was made Head of Global Publishing but nobody knows what that means exactly
4) People really phoned it in over Covid. Especially a lot of the higher ups who got paid millions when the company was acquired by MSFT (Altman took care of a lot of people, he was by all accounts a good dude). But high level employees were doing crazy shit like calling into meetings from the Caribbean properties they had bought. Just a total lack of give-a-shit
5) Todd Howard is apparently one of the only guys left over there in a senior position who actually wants to make video games.

Assuming the information is true...

Then basically BGS is just following in the same footsteps as Bioware, Rockstar, CDPR and other once-beloved game devs.

 

[S.torch]

This is consistent with what I've heard from my source who is familiar with Bethesda's thinking. He said that they are also not working on TESVI at all because they're "bored" with the setting.

Finally, every traitor is getting purged from our glorious Fantasy genre.