Bethesda/Obsidian

[Treyster]

( Please read the whole post, partly reading it will make you think I am biased or harsh when I'm not)

Look maybe it's wrong of me to seek compromise but comeon. The fights dismissing Bethesda is childish.

Look I know you guys like FO1 and FO2 and their good games. But you act like Black isle Studies were gods. Fact is they made other Fallout games and they DID make them wether you'd like to pretend to yourself they did or not. And so you pretend they didn't and just say they made the two games you consider masterpieces: Fallout 1 and 2.

As for Obsidian their games have been buggy/Sub-par/ or actually pretty good but Average in scale. Meaning Surprise! Because their humans not everything they do is perfect and also the fallout veterens have been with them for awhile so don't pretend they JUST joined the team to make New Vegas.

I mean afterall, only Michael Jordan is God in disguise! *coughs*

Jokes aside Bethesda have made mistakes too, their games being buggy aswell like..well a lot of other RPGs. But their a class act RPG maker.

While Black Isle and their workers who moved on to Obsidian made Fallout 1 and 2 they made missteps aswell(Fallout Tactics, Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel and their recent games have been mediocore. So please don't protect them and treat them like gods because fact is they haven't been doing too well recently.

Now while yes they are making Fallout: New Vegas don't pretend like Bethesda is giving them free rein, fact is behind the scenes their helping aswell. Kind of like the situation with Devil May Cry where Team Little Devil and Hideki Kamiya helped the DMC 2 team to make DMC 3, a masterpiece in the hearts of DMC fans.

Look at both their strengths. Far as I've seen Black Isle's team(Some of them in Obsidian now) had strengths in story and writing. Bethesda's strengths are in making the game itself along with a bit of humor and writing.

What I wish would happen would be if Bethesda made Fallout 4 with a new engine and dabbled the game with ideas and humor and Obsidian was hired alongside to work on the story and writing.

Remember, everyone has their strengths and weaknesses.
So is true for Black Isle/Obsidian/ and Bethesda team members.

 

[Lynette]

Yeah, well I think no one thinks that Obsidian are the gods of rpgs (at least here) they made however KOTOR2 for example wich was very strong at the roleplaying parts and Beth has nothing comparable to show. Infact there is no good company left who makes good rpgs. Troika was the last one I know of.

 

[Treyster]

What I ment was what people try to imply is Obsidian nor Bethesda are better than eachother. More so what I mean is neither versions of FO blow eachother away. If ANYTHING FO 1+2 and FO3 if combined with their strengths to make 4 would be awesome. I mean look, hands down Bethesda have game worlds down and can dabble in story, humor pretty well. But Obsidians story/writing strengths are better than Bethesda's.

Point being Obsidian(Only a small amount of past Black Isle) is pretty good, in it's strengths atleast

Also I hate that everyone pretend Brotherhood of steel and tactics never happened. It did. Just as Bethesda fans wish morrowind or Oblivion never happened depending on their favorite.

My opinions are mixed but my first post explains it well. FO1 and 2 were good but even then the ideas were taken from movies and books and past age iconography. You can't inherently say they beat up FO3. Vice-versa

 

[Professor Danger!]

What is the point of this thread? No one is claiming that anyone has ever made a perfect game in every way possible.

 

[DarkCorp]

At the risk of feeding the troll:

F3: One ending consisting of varied parts:

1. Half assed Karma endings. Summarising it simply, the guy was either cool or a douchebag, or the worst one, just didn't give a shit.

2. FEV or no FEV. One blanket ending of life or death for capital wasteland.

3. Male or Female

4. Oh yeah, sacrifice yourself or someone else.

Its that fucking vague. No mention to specific town and actions. No mention of results of said good or bad activities in said towns.

Some montages with no narration or hint at what the endings are for.

Lets compare it to an ending in F2 for the town of Modoc:

The extermination of the Slags only creates new problems for
Modoc. Unable to find the Slags' underground cistern that
sustains the crops, Modoc is hit hard by the resultant
drought. Over the next several years, the people of Modoc
either move away or die of starvation.

Or

Relations between the Slags and the residents of Modoc
flourish. Between the two peoples, Modoc prospers and becomes
a major farming community, supplying all the outlying regions
with food.

Or

Armed with flares and clubs, the people of Modoc invade the
Slags' underground city. The Slags are quickly defeated, and
the Modoc residents slaughter every man, woman and child they
find. Rumour of this vicious attack spreads far and wide, and
fear motivates Modoc's neighbours to attack and destroy the
town.

See the huge difference here? And this is just for ONE town.

Bethesda can make pretty decent games. They just simply do not excell at dialogue or choice and consequence when compared to companies like Troika, Black Isle or even Obsidian. A lot of fans here just so happen to want the dialogue and choice and consequence of F1 and F2.

So kinda like said above. Its more of a critic on the strengths and weaknesses of game design between two different companies.

PS: If you noticed, action games pretty much have to look amazing but tend to be extremely shallow in regards to things like dialogue or choice and consequence. Occasionally, you will find games like Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines or Deus Ex, (even Mass Effect and KOTOR although some here would disagree), that do a pretty good job of combining the two together to try and find a happy medium. However, even these games share limited choice and consequence.

Fallout 3 can be fun for some but can in now way be considered a spiritual successor to the original Fallouts.

 

[Ausir]

While Black Isle and their workers who moved on to Obsidian made Fallout 1 and 2 they made missteps aswell(Fallout Tactics, Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel and their recent games have been mediocore. So please don't protect them and treat them like gods because fact is they haven't been doing too well recently.

No one from Black Isle nor current Obsidian was involved in the creation of Tactics and BoS. Tactics was made by Australian developer MicroForte, while BoS was made by a completely different division of Interplay, with no input from BIS.

Also I hate that everyone pretend Brotherhood of steel and tactics never happened. It did. Just as Bethesda fans wish morrowind or Oblivion never happened depending on their favorite.

...while Oblivion, Morrowind and FO3 were made by largely the same team. So the comparison is flawed.

 

[Adamguy61]

Like I said before on this forum, everyone should just stop their complaining/bitching and accept all the fallouts (I believe I compared them to children, and how I love some more than others, but I do in fact love all of them)

And also like I said before, we should make a petition/angry mob (whatever the situation warrants) to get Bethesda and Interplay to call off all of their squabbles and put both of their heads together to create the ultimate Fallout. (After NV comes out of course)

 

[Lynette]

Like I said before on this forum, everyone should just stop their complaining/bitching and accept all the fallouts (I believe I compared them to children, and how I love some more than others, but I do in fact love all of them)

And also like I said before, we should make a petition/angry mob (whatever the situation warrants) to get Bethesda and Interplay to call off all of their squabbles and put both of their heads together to create the ultimate Fallout. (After NV comes out of course)

I am so sorry that you, the grandmaster of taste and common sense, had to repeat yourself. Like I said, I am so sorry.

 

[DarkCorp]

Like I said before on this forum, everyone should just stop their complaining/bitching and accept all the fallouts (I believe I compared them to children, and how I love some more than others, but I do in fact love all of them)

And also like I said before, we should make a petition/angry mob (whatever the situation warrants) to get Bethesda and Interplay to call off all of their squabbles and put both of their heads together to create the ultimate Fallout. (After NV comes out of course)

First point:

How would you feel if I told you to eat shit and like it? I wanted Van Buren. People on this site wanted Van Buren. It was almost complete until those money grubbing upper management asses (cough, Herve, cough), figured they would make more money catering to the console crowd. Unfortunately for Herve and company, their product was way below par for the competition at the time. People had more fun playing games like Hunter: The Reckoning, GTA, Manhunt, etc that were ten times better than FBOS. So not only did Herve alienate the hardcore pen and paper rpg crowd but they also alienated their target fanbase.

Second Point: Could you imagine the sheer amount of memory or whatever requirements its going to take to run a game that looks amazing and has un-paralleled depth? Good thing for you Rosh isn't here anymore. Look, the key to first person shooters is GRAPHICS. Thats bvecause since its in first person, the player sees everything so it all has to look good. Now a game like Arcanum or Fallout, it was typically played from an overhead perspective. I mean so what if the teacup on the shelf doesn't have the bloom effect? Or who cares if the walls arn't super colored and textured. I woul dhave to zoom in super close anyways to notice. Get my drift?

 

[Crni Vuk]

As for Obsidian their games have been buggy/Sub-par/ or actually pretty good but Average in scale. Meaning Surprise! Because their humans not everything they do is perfect and also the fallout veterens have been with them for awhile so don't pretend they JUST joined the team to make New Vegas.

Obsidian gets its share of critism here just as any other developer that tries his hands on Fallout. As simple as that. While some are optimistic, others are pessimistic while others again are ... neutral (more or less). NMA is a quite large community, so you will find all sorts of comments and oppinions ... strange enough there are many out there which seem to ignore that and see it like a mass of Bethesda hating Fallout 1 carboncopy demanding mob that only enjoys the past for its retro feeling. That some original devs work with Obsidian is what many here find interesting and nice. What kind of game we get in the end is a different question and only the game itself will show what kind of experience it will be. Anything else is and will stay so far only speculation.

Jokes aside Bethesda have made mistakes too, their games being buggy aswell like..well a lot of other RPGs. But their a class act RPG maker.

Issue is. Bethesda did NOT any mistakes. A mistake usualy would mean that something is wrong or something bad happend. It actualy did not. I see it as bad. But that doesnt mean its a mistake. The many people that enjoyed both Fallout 3 and Oblivion proved that. And if you ask me thats a lot more worse then "mistakes". If it would have been a mistake either the people at Bethesda or the players would have regret it at some point and Bethesda would try to work on that in the future eventualy. But they dont. Bethesda knew what they did when they designed Oblivion. They knew what they did with Fallout. And they are happy with it. Particularly since the sales have been also quite high.

Heh. You know whats interesting. How Bethesda actualy acts regarding real mistakes. Remember that comment from Pete Hines regarding the issues with your companions in the end that you still had to sacrifice your self even when you had a ghoul with you immune to radiation ? It was something like "we knew about it and we feelt fine with it". So they knew their dialogues/ending was stupid but havnt seen any reason to work on that ... yes. Bethesda really knows how to make "RPGs".

 

[chaosapiant]

Personally, I have no problem with any of Bethesda's games. Obsidian scares me a bit. The writing talent is there in spades, but so far they have released nothing but broken and buggy games. You can say the same about Bethesda, but i've never had any problems with their games going back to Morrowind, and I've certainly never felt that they cut content. They probably did cut content and scale things back, but their games "felt" complete upon release.

Not so with Obsidian. Kotor 2 had a horribly broken and disjointed ending, and so did NWN 2. Mask of the Betrayer was totally awesome though, and Storm of Zehir was somewhere in between.

That being said, my hopes are very high for New Vegas. I love Fallout 3, but I also love the first 2 games as well. They each do something better than the other. Fallout 1 has BY FAR the best story line, Fallout 2 has BY FAR the widest open quest design i've every seen, as well by far Fallout 3 has the "feel" of the landscape and exploration down pat. My hope is that New Vegas will marry these design elements, and be the Fallout that everyone wished Fallout 3 would be, sans an isometric turn based game.

 

[Crni Vuk]

Personally, I have no problem with any of Bethesda's games. Obsidian scares me a bit. The writing talent is there in spades, but so far they have released nothing but broken and buggy games.

And? You been paying attention to the Bethesda forum recently ? How many people have mentioned countles bugs over there. How many of them have been fixed in Oblivion by the devs and not some modders that have spend their "free" time working on it. How did the DLCs for Fallout 3 worked for most of the players ? Yep. Many could not even play it. But Bethesda takes the money thats for sure.

Not that the bugs Bethesda did would excuse any buggy game from Obsidian. But if I have to choose between a buggy game with rediculous dialogues and a buggy game with excelent writting I would not even need a second to consinder what I would pick.

 

[chaosapiant]

I probably should have specified. I'm aware of the documented bugs and complaints of Bethesda's games, however I have not experienced anything personally in all three games that I would consider game breaking or even out of the norm. Obsidian's games on the other hand aren't just buggy, they are unfinished. There is a huge difference. Mind you, my opinion comes from first hand experience, it's not the collective thoughts of the forums.

 

[Ausir]

Not so with Obsidian. Kotor 2 had a horribly broken and disjointed ending, and so did NWN 2.

And so did Fallout 3 before Broken Steel.

 

[SharkClub]

Not so with Obsidian. Kotor 2 had a horribly broken and disjointed ending, and so did NWN 2.

And so did Fallout 3 before Broken Steel.

Oh, but didn't you hear? Paying for DLC to continue playing your games is next-gen innovation! We just have to wait for it to catch on for every game.

 

[chaosapiant]

Not so with Obsidian. Kotor 2 had a horribly broken and disjointed ending, and so did NWN 2.

And so did Fallout 3 before Broken Steel.

I have to disagree. The ending to F3 was certainly crappy, but not broken. It was done that way on purpose. It's definitely a thin line though.

 

[Hoxie]

Not so with Obsidian. Kotor 2 had a horribly broken and disjointed ending, and so did NWN 2.

And so did Fallout 3 before Broken Steel.

Oh, but didn't you hear? Paying for DLC to continue playing your games is next-gen innovation! We just have to wait for it to catch on for every game.

That's what ticked me off the worst about Broken Steel. You should NOT have to pay to keep playing the game, not in a huge free-roam world game like that, it's just outright money-grubbing BS, to have something that should have been in the game right off the bat.

 

[Crni Vuk]

Not so with Obsidian. Kotor 2 had a horribly broken and disjointed ending, and so did NWN 2.

And so did Fallout 3 before Broken Steel.

I have to disagree. The ending to F3 was certainly crappy, but not broken. It was done that way on purpose. It's definitely a thin line though.

so what do you call "sorry even if I am immune to radiation you have to sacrifice your self" dialogues ? If that isnt "unfinished" or "broken" then I dont know what.

The suicide conversation with Eden on the other hand ? Did that feelt a lot more finished ?

Letz be realistic here. There is no reason to defend Obisidian. But so is there no one to do it with Bethesda. Both have a history that contains not only good decisions. The last good game or letz say game with quality by Bethesda was anyway Morrowind.

That's what ticked me off the worst about Broken Steel. You should NOT have to pay to keep playing the game, not in a huge free-roam world game like that, it's just outright money-grubbing BS, to have something that should have been in the game right off the bat.

Of course I cant prove that so its just my oppinion. But I think they did that on purpose well aware about that people would complain about the ending and not beeing able to continue gaming so they get more people buying the DLC even if they had no interest in achorage. But as said just a speculation from my side.

 

[uk_john]

Bethesda is only about making money now - or they would not have used the Oblivion engine for Fallout 3 and would not have used the Oblivion voice actors, and like Oblivion they would have used more than the 6-10 voice actors they used in Oblivion and Fallout 3.

We have Fallout Vegas being overseen by this Bethesda, it's also reusing the Oblivion engine - again, so altogether I think this is being done with Obsidian because it will be cheap. As this is still the Oblivion engine, we're still going to get the cookie cutter geography where landscape 'parts' just get put together in different ways and yet still noticeably the same. The speech system is going to be all out of whack, and if it is being done on the cheap we will either get the Oblivion voice actors again, or different voice actors, but just a dozen of them for 100's of NPC's!

One things for certain, Fallout 1 and 2 will still be seen as classics in 10 years, I doubt Fallout 3 will be, and New Vegas is going to be another Fallout 3 given that there isn't extra money, it's using the same engine, and Obsidian have shown with their Alpha Protocol that they are happy to make an action-adventure and call it an RPG! After all, they have said AP will have 25 hours gameplay - and what proper RPG can be finished in 25 hours?!

 

[Llamalords]

First off Hello, I made an account just to reply to this downright idiotic comment.

Bethesda is only about making money now - or they would not have used the Oblivion engine for Fallout 3

Are you stupid? You know how much time and energy goes into making a Game Engine? (PS Its not called the "Oblivion Engine", It is called the GameByro Engine and was not developed by Bethesda. It has 30+ Games producted using it.)

would not have used the Oblivion voice actors, and like Oblivion they would have used more than the 6-10 voice actors they used in Oblivion and Fallout 3.

Fallout 3 has about 20+ actors and you know how expensive it is to pay 20+ PROFESSIONAL ACTORS/Vocal Artists to say 500+ lines EACH?
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1073664/fullcredits#cast

Oblivion also has 10+ actors,

http://www.imdb.de/title/tt0462271/fullcredits#cast

We have Fallout Vegas being overseen by this Bethesda, it's also reusing the Oblivion engine again, so altogether I think this is being done with Obsidian because it will be cheap. As this is still the Oblivion engine

More bullshit

we're still going to get the cookie cutter geography where landscape 'parts' just get put together in different ways

Has nothing to with the arugement made by the first poster but still, Fallout 3 is if not COMPLETELY composed of 3d Models so if you think that ANY GAME EVER MADE hasn't used the same 3d Model over again then you are stupid.


I don't want to reply to the rest of what you said because it will also bullshit and/or repeated the same silly rant. The fact is every Fallout is a good game, Bethesda is a famous Gaming/Publishing company and makes awesome games. You are just raging for the sake of rage because something happened that made you throw a tissy fit.