Speculation: Obsidian skyrim clone in development

[Safav Hamon]

ELEX was made with a team of 26 people I believe, minus some outsourced small stuff. That game is ginormous

Elex is okay, but it's also kind of shit.

If Obsidian made a Skyrim competitor it would need to meet AAA standards.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

ELEX was made with a team of 26 people I believe, minus some outsourced small stuff. That game is ginormous

Elex is okay, but it's also kind of shit.

If Obsidian made a Skyrim competitor it would need to meet AAA standards.

the only area where skyrim beats elex is mods
mostly because skyrim is unplayable without at least 500 of them

 

[ColonelTeacup]

ELEX was made with a team of 26 people I believe, minus some outsourced small stuff. That game is ginormous

Elex is okay, but it's also kind of shit.

If Obsidian made a Skyrim competitor it would need to meet AAA standards.

Are we still pretending as if AAA have standards or quality?

 

[Funposter]

Beating bethesda at making an open world elder scrolls clone is like beating a dyslexic kid in a reading competition. Sure, you'll win. But lets not pretend like it was an accomplishment.

Saleswise that wasn't the case for Witcher 3 or Kingdom Come Deliverance.

Neither of these were bethesda clones.

Don't you rate me, roguey! It's true. Both Witcher and kingdom come lack the ability to play as a big titted girl, with a bouncy butt, and a plethora of mods, as well as silent protagonists. These games are NOT elder scrolls clones, or bethesda clones at all.

just wait for the KCD mod tools. They're coming.

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

A Skyrim clone or whatever you call it doesn't need to be AAA anything. Someone just needs to attempt it. No one even tries to make first-person, huge open-worlds to compete or at least give another option to the Elder Scrolls-style of RPG. It's an open market for someone to do something interesting. Even if it's a Gothic sized world or smaller than ELEX, some company can at least try to do something different in that vein. ELEX was excellent and again, made by less than 30 people on a smaller budget, so that proves that it's possible if you take the chance.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

A Skyrim clone or whatever you call it doesn't need to be AAA anything. Someone just needs to attempt it. No one even tries to make first-person, huge open-worlds to compete or at least give another option to the Elder Scrolls-style of RPG. It's an open market for someone to do something interesting. Even if it's a Gothic sized world or smaller than ELEX, some company can at least try to do something different in that vein. ELEX was excellent and again, made by less than 30 people on a smaller budget, so that proves that it's possible if you take the chance.

too big of a project, too much risk involved

the companies capable of doing it aren't willing to take the risks, things like kingdom come deliverance are flukes

 

[ColonelTeacup]

Beating bethesda at making an open world elder scrolls clone is like beating a dyslexic kid in a reading competition. Sure, you'll win. But lets not pretend like it was an accomplishment.

Saleswise that wasn't the case for Witcher 3 or Kingdom Come Deliverance.

Neither of these were bethesda clones.

Don't you rate me, roguey! It's true. Both Witcher and kingdom come lack the ability to play as a big titted girl, with a bouncy butt, and a plethora of mods, as well as silent protagonists. These games are NOT elder scrolls clones, or bethesda clones at all.

just wait for the KCD mod tools. They're coming.

I'm doubtful whether or not they can make enough of an impact. Henry is a voiced protagonist, much like fallout 4, and that leaves very little wiggle room for modding him into anything else.

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

too big of a project, too much risk involved

the companies capable of doing it aren't willing to take the risks, things like kingdom come deliverance are flukes

But that Kingdom Come game isn't even close to an Elder Scrolls "be who you want, do what you want" type of game. ELEX is even larger map-wise and arguably more interesting than Skyrim's map, yet it was made by a small fraction of what Bethesda's resources are. Had Kingdom Come not had a voiced protagonist and was set in a world with magic and monsters it would have done much better. It was a niche title from the start.

Until someone takes the risk and makes something like ELEX in first-person or a smaller but still large open-world RPG to try at the Elder Scrolls style, Bethesda is just cruising being the only option on the market. And they are a good option, but I'd like to see more. Certainly something can be done. Sacrifice some scale, scope, graphics and so on, and just work on making the gameplay and RPG stuff immaculate. PB also did it with the Gothic games, so how do they produce such magic while other medium to small sized devs don't even try?

And money and investment can be procured if the game looks promising. The Outer Worlds is a start but it probably will be much smaller in scope. Someone can do a Kickstarter if they have a working demo of the game or look for private investors like KC:D did, except don't make such a super niche title like those devs did.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

the money you get from a kickstarter is nowhere near enough to fund the development of such a game, even the KCD guys merely used kickstarter as a "see? people are interested!" hook for investors

they had the benefit of being in a country with (relative to western countries) very low salaries to drive down development costs

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

the money you get from a kickstarter is nowhere near enough to fund the development of such a game, even the KCD guys merely used kickstarter as a "see? people are interested!" hook for investors

they had the benefit of being in a country with (relative to western countries) very low salaries to drive down development costs

But they hooked investors, that's my point. A less niche open-world title would hook bigger and better investors. That KCD was too niche.

And Kingmaker was made on a less than a million dollars Kickstarter budget, it's enormous with tons of content, good graphics and sound and is GOTY 2018. Somehow an Elder Scrolls-style RPG can be made if a team tries hard enough. It's got to be possible. And again I reference Piranha Bytes and the Gothic/Risen/ELEX games. How'd they manage to make decently sized, meaningful open-worlds while having a tiny team and budget?

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

I mean, before Bethesda had any money or resources they made Morrowind, so there's got to be a way...

 

[rusty_shackleford]

They made their money from time traveling to make a prequel for morrowind — daggerfall.

Dragonbreaks are complicated business.

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

Daggerfall couldn't have made that much money, or did it? Morrowind was really their first big hit. If they can cram that much detail into Morrowind before having endless amounts of $$$ then I think some other ambitious upstart can do it. Or at least try. No one tries.

 

[Reapa]

Somebody should do a Skyrim-type game with turn-based combat like in Wizards & Warriors or Wizardry 8. Or at least make TB combat OPTIONAL.

love your avatar

 

[Reapa]

too big of a project, too much risk involved

the companies capable of doing it aren't willing to take the risks, things like kingdom come deliverance are flukes

But that Kingdom Come game isn't even close to an Elder Scrolls "be who you want, do what you want" type of game. ELEX is even larger map-wise and arguably more interesting than Skyrim's map, yet it was made by a small fraction of what Bethesda's resources are. Had Kingdom Come not had a voiced protagonist and was set in a world with magic and monsters it would have done much better. It was a niche title from the start.

Until someone takes the risk and makes something like ELEX in first-person or a smaller but still large open-world RPG to try at the Elder Scrolls style, Bethesda is just cruising being the only option on the market. And they are a good option, but I'd like to see more. Certainly something can be done. Sacrifice some scale, scope, graphics and so on, and just work on making the gameplay and RPG stuff immaculate. PB also did it with the Gothic games, so how do they produce such magic while other medium to small sized devs don't even try?

And money and investment can be procured if the game looks promising. The Outer Worlds is a start but it probably will be much smaller in scope. Someone can do a Kickstarter if they have a working demo of the game or look for private investors like KC:D did, except don't make such a super niche title like those devs did.

someone did. it was bethesda, with morrowind.

 

[Reapa]

and with skyrim se

 

[ColonelTeacup]

Daggerfall couldn't have made that much money, or did it? Morrowind was really their first big hit. If they can cram that much detail into Morrowind before having endless amounts of $$$ then I think some other ambitious upstart can do it. Or at least try. No one tries.

At the time of morrowind bethesda was nearly bankrupt after trying to create some space game and the failed elder scrolls redguard which was todd howards first game being in charge. Morrowind was their swan song, it was make or break at the time and if it failed bethesda was finished. It's why they made so many shortcuts and lazy hotfixes you can see in the game. They were cutting corners like crazy while making it.

 

[TheImplodingVoice]

ELEX was made with a team of 26 people I believe, minus some outsourced small stuff. That game is ginormous

Elex is okay, but it's also kind of shit.

If Obsidian made a Skyrim competitor it would need to meet AAA standards.

Elex isn't shit and the problems it has aren't nearly as shit as your polls and PoE 2 shilling.

 

[Funposter]

Daggerfall couldn't have made that much money, or did it? Morrowind was really their first big hit. If they can cram that much detail into Morrowind before having endless amounts of $$$ then I think some other ambitious upstart can do it. Or at least try. No one tries.

Morrowind was made using the investment money from this thing called ZENIMAX, which was founded in 1999. It may have been a core team of six people when development proper began, following the disastrous releases of Battlespire and Redguard, but it's not like Morrowind's production remained so stripped down the entire time.

 

[AW8]

Skyrim lived on mods, not hype. It's why it is still so popular today, and why it has the largest modding community to date.

Mods are inconsequential to Skyrim's success. The vast majority of Skyrim sales are for consoles, which didn't even have mod support until 5 years after release, when the game had already sold 30 million copies.

The average person who buys Skyrim on a sale today doesn't even think about mods when purchasing. They're thinking of battling dragons in an open fantasy world, because that's how the game is marketed and described by word of mouth, and that is exactly what created the hype that allowed it to sell 7 million copies in the first week.

 

[Father Foreskin]

I have told you all this before but Microsoft doesnt make rpgs. If Obsidian makes a Skyrim clone they need to simplify it and remove depth. This would mean the game would have to be shallower than a puddle. It would kinda be like a thin film of shit on your screen that you could barely see if you max out the brightness.

 

[Wunderbar]

If Obsidian makes a Skyrim clone they need to simplify it and remove depth.

as if skyrim had any depth.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

I have told you all this before but Microsoft doesnt make rpgs. If Obsidian makes a Skyrim clone they need to simplify it and remove depth. This would mean the game would have to be shallower than a puddle. It would kinda be like a thin film of shit on your screen that you could barely see if you max out the brightness.

microsoft doesn't make any games, they're a publisher

 

[ColonelTeacup]

Daggerfall couldn't have made that much money, or did it? Morrowind was really their first big hit. If they can cram that much detail into Morrowind before having endless amounts of $$$ then I think some other ambitious upstart can do it. Or at least try. No one tries.

Morrowind was made using the investment money from this thing called ZENIMAX, which was founded in 1999. It may have been a core team of six people when development proper began, following the disastrous releases of Battlespire and Redguard, but it's not like Morrowind's production remained so stripped down the entire time.

Wait, wasn't zenimax just a corp company one of the owners of bethesda created to do all the major business related dealings? He was the one who ousted the original owner of bethesda from the company. The one who was banned from banking.

 

[Father Foreskin]

as if skyrim had any depth.

It has more depth than any Beth game after it. I know its microscopic but Skyrim has like 86% more depth than fallout 76