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

[anvi]

They are leaders of decline and bringing DLC to already struggling world of gaming. I wish them the worst.

 

[luj1]

When Morrowind came out I remember thinking Bethesda are awesome.

Ironically it was their last good game, and last PC game

 

[Grampy_Bone]

guys get ousted from their own companies all the time.

You should look into the story, it's quite scummy. The fact that it happens "all the time" shouldn't make you happy, it should make you livid for the state of business practice in this country.
Altman is responsible for all the dumb money-grubbing shit Bethesda ever did. From crying about Skyrim mods being free to forcing Fallout into a garbage tier online cash grab, that's all Altman. Getting rich at the expense of one of gaming's most sacred IPs is not something Codexers should be celebrating.

PS. Altman 'early life' checks out.

 

[dreughjiggers]

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.

And now the useless eaters are permanent fixtures in the Microsoft machine.

 

[NecroLord]

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

Yeah. The more people you have on a project, the worse it will be. Gone are the old days of small nerd teams working dilligently to create awesome RPGs, now we have Twitter obsessed purple haired tranny devs, pushing the worst possible degeneracy.

 

[dreughjiggers]

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.

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. They might license it out but they won't develop it themselves. He did not specify who exactly was bored of the setting, whether it was Todd or the team in general.

My own sources tell me Starfield was delayed again, because Elon Musk wasn't happy with the conspicuous lack of chainmail bikini spacesuits. Also, and this is shocking news, but Robert Altman was actually a JEW. I know.

 

[NecroLord]

My own sources tell me Starfield was delayed again, because Elon Musk wasn't happy with the conspicuous lack of chainmail bikini spacesuits.

No Red Sonja in a spacesuit?
Mods will fix it, as they say...

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

My own sources tell me Starfield was delayed again, because Elon Musk wasn't happy with the conspicuous lack of chainmail bikini spacesuits.

No Red Sonja in a spacesuit?
Mods will fix it, as they say...

I think you want Barbarella

 

[unseeingeye]

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

I don't recall where I learned these things, it was many years ago. I remember looking into the BCCI scandal pretty thoroughly back in the day, and I've seen his court appearances on CSPAN. The thing about moving Weaver out of his own company had something to do with their cofounding Zenimax and I think his tricking Weaver into giving up his ownership of Bethesda and then trying to push him out of his co-ownership of Zenimax (which only partially worked), but it has been so long I don't remember the details or where I learned of them. It was fairly obvious that the guy was involved in major fraud and the BCCI itself was laundering money for cartels, drug traffickers, arms dealers and other illegal operations.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

his tricking Weaver into giving up his ownership of Bethesda and then trying to push him out of his co-ownership of Zenimax

Weaver goes to Altman and asks for money to keep the studio going. Instead of offering a straightforward loan or buyout, Altman forms a new company (Zenimax) and puts in the initial funds, while Weaver puts in the ownership of Bethesda. Soon as the ink is dry, Weaver gets fired and Altman takes everything (there was a lawsuit and a private settlement eventually). The real kicker is that the money that Altman put up to found the company wasn't even his, it was from investors, aka loans. The kind that Weaver needed initially. So this dude effectively buys a company FOR NOTHING, using the company's own IP as collateral before he even owned it! Probably just paid an $85 dollar LLC registration fee or something. Unreal. What a complete and total scumbag.

There is an entire history of shit like this in America, people getting screwed out of their hard work and creation by smoke and financial tricks. These people never actually put their own money at risk, but essentially use force and fraud to steal real property. "Hey bro, I rearranged some numbers on a spreadsheet, now I get your house. You signed it so it's okay." FFS.

 

[J1M]

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.

An environment where senior execs are just rubber stamping decisions sounds like one of the only environments at a large company where something innovative could be made.

 

[Artyoan]

I would say I disbelieve the idea that they are 'bored' of making another Elder Scrolls game, but I did see that Starfield image that shows the inventory to still be a scrolling text list. TES could have expectations these people know they can't reach.

 

[Darth Roxor]

I have a profound loathing for Bethesda, and not at all because of their development history (like I care about shit games), but due to their utterly shitty publishing practices. The moment this dickheaded company burns down, I'll take it as vengeance from beyond the grave for Dark Corners of the Earth, Prey and New Vegas, ESPECIALLY Dark Corners of the Earth. And then I'll laugh for the remainder of the day.

 

[ADL]

Even in its current state, TES universe is easily one of the best fantasy settings ever

It feels like Bethesda is embarrassed of their own lore and they tuck it away in game libraries while the games themselves resemble something between Game of Thrones and The Lord of the Rings without the fantastical elements of the rest of Tolkien's legendarium. It's why I like The Elder Scrolls Online, they're not afraid of getting weird.

I would say I disbelieve the idea that they are 'bored' of making another Elder Scrolls game, but I did see that Starfield image that shows the inventory to still be a scrolling text list. TES could have expectations these people know they can't reach.

Even if this were the case, I have zero sympathy. They have effectively unlimited resources under Bethesda and could easily leverage other Microsoft studios to their advantage. InXile, Obsidian and even Playground are one phone call away and anyone would kill to work on The Elder Scrolls IP. Not to mention anyone within their division such as Machine and Zenimax Online. Does anyone else find it odd that Arkane never got to make a Battlespire-esque game?

Their tech is definitely weird but it's not that weird that only they can work on it.

 

[luj1]

the more people you have on a project, the worse it will be. Gone are the old days of small nerd teams working dilligently to create awesome RPGs

yea

large teams and high budgets create turds

for contrast just look at Underrail and Grimoire

you need centrally authored content by 1-2 (max) educated leads

so rare nowadays because ppl used to come to the industry after majoring art/writing/philosophy, now you have shitty video game design degrees

 

[dreughjiggers]

We used to have self-educated programers and hackers making new game engines, its just unreal and unity all the way down. (Oh and gamebryo...) I'm not sure anybody left in AAA can build a new game engine for a game that isn't doing win button gameplay.

 

[Ol' Willy]

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.

Also he was a kike

 

[Delicieuxz]

It's been pretty obvious, if you've played any of their games post-Morrowind, that Bethesda don't really give a shit about their games. And Altman, the ruthless, psychopathic lawyer who stole Bethesda from Weaver and who died after the Microsoft deal, reportedly had never played a game in his life.

Bethesda is a mismanaged, low-talent studio whose success hasn't come from their own merit, but because they inherited a pioneering IP from people who were either kicked out of the company or left it after being sidelined early on. Since then, Bethesda has given that IP a b-tier (at best) treatment, while dumbing-down each successive game release. Todd Howard is a terrible game designer, whose only approach is ever to strip more things away. He's the opposite of a creative. He just takes away from what was already there and thinks he's done something impressive. Him and Emil Padugilo, or whatever that cringy, hack "writer" is named, have been an extreme blight on the Elder Scrolls and Fallout franchises. They have dragged the series far below their potential, and far below even a passable level.

 

[NecroLord]

It's been pretty obvious, if you've played any of their games post-Morrowind, that Bethesda don't really give a shit about their games. And Altman, the ruthless, psychopathic lawyer who stole Bethesda from Weaver and who died after the Microsoft deal, reportedly had never played a game in his life.

Bethesda is a mismanaged, low-talent studio whose success hasn't come from their own merit, but because they inherited a pioneering IP from people who were either kicked out of the company or left it after being sidelined early on. Since then, Bethesda has given that IP a b-tier (at best) treatment, while dumbing-down each successive game release. Todd Howard is a terrible game designer, whose only approach is ever to strip more things away. He's the opposite of a creative. He just takes away from what was already there and thinks he's done something impressive. Him and Emil Padugilo, or whatever that cringy, hack "writer" is named, have been an extreme blight on the Elder Scrolls and Fallout franchises. They have dragged the series far below their potential, and far below even a passable level.

Yep.
Emil Pagliarulo, by the way, designed the Thief 2 mission "Life of the Party".
How do you go from designing missions for one of the best games ever made to butchering RPG design in Skyrim?

 

[Roguey]

It's been pretty obvious, if you've played any of their games post-Morrowind, that Bethesda don't really give a shit about their games. And Altman, the ruthless, psychopathic lawyer who stole Bethesda from Weaver and who died after the Microsoft deal, reportedly had never played a game in his life.

Bethesda is a mismanaged, low-talent studio whose success hasn't come from their own merit, but because they inherited a pioneering IP from people who were either kicked out of the company or left it after being sidelined early on. Since then, Bethesda has given that IP a b-tier (at best) treatment, while dumbing-down each successive game release. Todd Howard is a terrible game designer, whose only approach is ever to strip more things away. He's the opposite of a creative. He just takes away from what was already there and thinks he's done something impressive. Him and Emil Padugilo, or whatever that cringy, hack "writer" is named, have been an extreme blight on the Elder Scrolls and Fallout franchises. They have dragged the series far below their potential, and far below even a passable level.

Hardly anyone cared about Morrowind. Bethesda built its brand with Oblivion, Fallout 3, and Skyrim.

 

[NecroLord]

Hardly anyone cared about Morrowind.

 

[Roguey]

Hardly anyone cared about Morrowind.

In 2006, I was someone with a greater-than-casual interest in games and I had never heard of Morrowind despite it being on xbox. Sure, it sold a couple of million, but didn't make a big splash. By contrast, Oblivion was everywhere.

 

[whydoibother]

Very cool. But then you launch the game, and its all the very dull brown&rust that every game was doing at the time.
Kind of like how Oblivion tried to have a forest map at around the same time everyone was figuring out making trees, when I think about it.

In 2006, I was someone with a greater-than-casual interest in games and I had never heard of Morrowind despite it being on xbox.

Every gaming magazine gave it top scores. I definitely knew about it before I played it.

 

[NaturallyCarnivorousSheep]

I believe Todd no matter what.

 

[Roguey]

Every gaming magazine gave it top scores. I definitely knew about it before I played it.

Yes, core gamers knew about it. People with a casual interest in games did not. Bethesda sells tens of millions per game because casuals like them.