Fallout 76 Really Sucks. People Act Shocked.

[BigGuyCIA]

I remember it.

It's an old (7 years now) interview with Gamasutra where Todd Howard was asked about making Skyrim more accessible to hardcore audiences.

You look at Call of Duty, the most popular game in the world, and that's actually pretty hardcore. At the end of the day, it's a hardcore game, has RPG elements in multiplayer, making classes, picking perks. I think the audiences are there, and we tend to make our game more for ourselves and other people who play a lot of games.

I remember this well because the old Bethsoft forums almost fucking imploded with panic over being likened to Call of Duty.

 

[Hassknecht]

With all the Bethesda fans switching sides I'm just sitting here thinking about how in television shows people sometimes make the statement "Simpsons did it first". Now I'm sitting here and thinking "NMA did it first".

I'm quite happy the Bethesda fans are waking up, I just hope they take the time to engage with the rest of the fan base to obtain a better picture of the state of the Fallout franchise. Up until now the Bethesda fans have been fighting everyone tooth and nail defending Bethesda Games Studios, but now they're against them I wonder if they will be amiable to more rational discussions?

At the current rate of BGS burning themselves down, plus alienating their more hardcore fans I expect Bethesda to suffer a considerable amount before there is a change in leadership there.

Let's be honest, Bethesda Games Studios needs to shake things up at the top, not the bottom.

Here's how I would fix Bethesda Games Studios:

1. Stop all work on all projects.
2. Require all employees to submit to an internal review based on merit.
3. Fire all the lazy, jaded, and incompetent employees starting at the very top.
4. Label the Gamebryo/Creation engine obsolete, then acquire another more modern engine. In this case I would choose to save money by using another engine owned by Bethesda/Zenimax like Id Tech.
5. Hire on new employees that are competent and willing to learn. If possible I would try to steal/lure developers from other companies in an effort to regain some faith from the fans.
6. Retool all employees to work on building a comprehensive set of utilities for the engine to support the needs of future development with the engine.
7. Generate a tech demo based upon the work completed from the new development utilities, then release the software to the modders to explore.
8. Review all previous projects for viability, if they can be salvaged within the new engine then work may begin. If they cannot, then they would be scrapped.
9. Before setting everyone to work on their various projects I would ensure that they understand what it is they are working on. For new projects I would focus on the pre-production materials while comparing the ongoing work.
10. For established IP's I would have all of the developers review all related material to them. So for Elder Scrolls as well Fallout I would have each team go back and replay the previous titles. Then I would demand of them an essay outlining game mechanics, art style, narrative dynamics, etc...
11. Once they have reviewed the IP's and provided their findings I would then have them discuss the ins and outs of the franchises within their project groups. Once they outline the core attributes I would then allow them to think of ways to improve upon them, but not retract from the core elements.
12. Once I'm pleased with the current state of the teams I would then send them to work on developing their titles.
13. As development moves on I would have the development teams generate small game demos for release to the public. That way the customers can get a free sneak peak at the ongoing projects.
14. I would then start a marketing campaign that revolves around actual game play, and then bring on YouTube personalities to promote the content. I would also release a public statement declaring the companies intentions, goals, and expectations of the projects so that consumers are completely aware of BGS' new path.

So basically you'd spend many, many millions on reworking a company that is, by all means, still very much profitable and despite all bad press unlikely to really fail hard. I know it's all nice to dream about how we'd turn Bethesda into a company that's all "By Gamers, For Gamers" like the Interplay of old, but let's be real here, there's no reason for them to change in the near future. All bad press aside, they're far from over.

 

[SquidWard]

Agreed with Hass on that. Also, the engine isn't always the problem. They've been putting games on top of games that already had bugs. It's not the engine, it's the games. Just look at other engines who have been updated throughout the years like Unreal. Or the fact others used the Gambryo engine to great effect. Updates to an engine can be huge or small. They can radically change the engine. The problem with Bethesda's is that they are still finding things that were in Morrowind in the modern titles. They aren't cleaning the slate to start a new game from scratch or bugfixing when they reuse code over and over.

Someone on the forum seemed much more knowledgeable about the engines than me but that's what I've come to learn of them recently. It is not in the best interest to rid them of Creation engine but rather fix their problems instead of piling more code on top of the problems.

I remember this well because the old Bethsoft forums almost fucking imploded with panic over being likened to Call of Duty.

Thank you, by the way.

 

[0wing]

Gambryo

 

[Einhanderc7]

I agree with both of you @Hassknecht & @Squadcar my view point is indeed far too lofty. However I think of it more of a foundation rebuild rather than a band aid fix.

As for the engine, considering they have been jury rigging it all this time I must admit I don't have any confidence in Bethesda Games Studios' programming. While yes, the engine could be cleaned out, updated, and optimized further. With the current state of the engine, they would need to go back to the drawing board to fix a lot of the issues it suffers from.

To be candid, the amount off effort, time, and money that would need to be applied to lubricate such an upgrade would be a lot. Plus if they did they would then be competing with other engines that are already far ahead of what they have. You can polish a turn, but in the end it's still just a polished turd.

By today's standards the Creation Engine is simply far too behind the curve to really be brought up to speed. To fix it they would need to rip it apart, and I just don't see them ever doing that.

 

[RangerBoo]

I remember it.

It's an old (7 years now) interview with Gamasutra where Todd Howard was asked about making Skyrim more accessible to hardcore audiences.



I remember this well because the old Bethsoft forums almost fucking imploded with panic over being likened to Call of Duty.

Thanks man. Knew that existed somewhere.

 

[TheGM]

By today's standards the Creation Engine is simply far too behind the curve to really be brought up to speed. To fix it they would need to rip it apart, and I just don't see them ever doing that.

Yeah but isn't it really easy to mod? because the only people who seem to play beth games on the regular are the weirdos with their creepy sex mods.

 

[Cobra Commander]

I can not think of a game more accessible than skyrim. So I think they got it?

 

[Einhanderc7]

Yeah but isn't it really easy to mod? because the only people who seem to play beth games on the regular are the weirdos with their creepy sex mods.

It was "easy" to mod a long time ago, however as it is now being glued together with gum, paperclips, rubber bands not so much.

The problem here is that modders have to tip toe around the gobbily gook Bethesda jammed into the engine. That doesn't make it easy to mod, it makes figuring out why something broke a nightmare. That's only a minor reason, another issue with modding the engine is the modular system. Due to this system it's very easy to make a simple mod incompatible with everything else. Don't get me wrong, there are modular systems that work, however the Creation Engines system is very rigid. So if a module breaks or a mod breaks something it can turn into more spaghetti than it already is.

 

[BigGuyCIA]

As for the engine, considering they have been jury rigging it all this time I must admit I don't have any confidence in Bethesda Games Studios' programming. While yes, the engine could be cleaned out, updated, and optimized further. With the current state of the engine, they would need to go back to the drawing board to fix a lot of the issues it suffers from.

This point usually gets strawmanned to hell and back - even from the man himself:

I think most people that aren't making games use the word 'engine', you know, they think of 'engine' as one thing, and it's, we view it as technology, right? so there are lots of pieces, and every game, parts of that change. Whether it's the renderer, the animation system, the scripting language, the AI, the controls... so, some people talk about Gamebryo but that's, like, we haven't used that in a decade. And a lot of it is, some of it is middleware, whether that's Havok animation here, and, so 76, we changed a lot of it. You know, it's an all new renderer, new lighting model, new landscape system, and then, when you go to Starfield, even more of it changes. And then Elder Scrolls 6 which is really out in the horizon, even more of that will change there. There's things that we like, you know, we like our editor, we're used to it. It lets us build really really fast. Our modders know it really well also. So there's some base ways that we build games that we will continue to do that way, because it lets us be efficient and we think it works best.

Or from talking heads at /r/BethesdaSoftworks:

There's a large degree of issue avoidance and technical debt. I've noticed in videos/interviews where Todd is asked about the engine he always, without fail, talks about how they've changed the renderer or lighting. Essentially how the game looks. It's that fucking vistas meme from RedLetterMedia all over again - a total deflection and obsession on visual facades. He deflects to talk about his editor and how it's easy to build worlds, but every engine has that...Unity, Unreal, CryTek.

He never talks about the underlying framework or foundation. The frames being tied to physics. Ladders. Vehicles not turning your character into a slenderman-esque monstrosity. Moving objects that account for Newton's Law where when you jump on a moving boat you don't just fly backwards. Synchronization issues causing major input lag.

 

[Einhanderc7]

I'm right there with you @BigGuyCIA , a lot of people are sadly ignorant of what a game engine is.

For those reading this and are not quite sure what a "game engine" is, I'll break it down.

A game engine is the framework which the game is built upon. It's usually two distinctly different attributes that are made to function in tandem to facilitate a simulated environment.

Physics:
The physics part of the engine is a "default" engine that only manages physics calculations. What the physics engine does is determine through variable calculations how something within it's simulated environment would act based upon the engine's default or set values.

For example, if a rock falls how fast will it fall? Does it bounce? etc...

This allows a developer to not only adjust how the physics operate within the simulated environment, but also as an option to be used in direct game play. Physics engines also play a crucial role in animations such as movement, ragdoll, or mechanical.

The Framework:
The framework is the developer created foundation that contains all of the programming libraries which include but are not limited to entities, user interface, debug, world generation software, etc...

Without the framework there is not game, without physics there is no game, merge the two together and something magical happens.

A great example of solid framework is Valve's SDK, which is free and provides all of the required framework to support game development. For those that are curious I suggest checking it out as it's pretty neat.

 

[nkchan16]

Looks like those fools who paid 200 bucks for the CE will eventually get their crappy canvas bags... hopefully sometime in the next year.
https://twitter.com/BethesdaSupport/status/1069713890806849536

 

[RangerBoo]

Looks like those fools who paid 200 bucks for the CE will eventually get their crappy canvas bags... hopefully sometime in the next year.
https://twitter.com/BethesdaSupport/status/1069713890806849536

I love some of the comments. "People should just be thankful for what they got." "We got a awesome helmet and a glow in the dark map! What more else could you want?"
And its with sheep like this that corporation will always get away with everything. Because people will always act like its a gift from God when a corporation has to do a PR move on their lawyers advice to not get the shit sued out of them. "Oh they're going out of their way to give us real canvas bags! This shows that they care about us fans and aren't trying to prevent a lawsuits from forming!"

 

[Jabberwok]

Not sure if anyone linked to the Errant Signal on 76 yet:

 

[Einhanderc7]

I don't know about anyone else, but I don't think I'm willing to accept Bethesda digging themselves out of their hole yet.

 

[nkchan16]

Some moar from the Bethesda leaker guy... or gal... Quite possibly fake shit, just some teenager trolling. Although it would be funny if it was Todd himself.

Some more messages in this thread if you're interested... although nothing really juicy.

https://boards.4channel.org/v/thread/441713773

 

[stjohn]

if it was Todd that would be pretty funny.

 

[SquidWard]

Yeah very possibly fake but they definitely left enough ambiguity and made it seem plausible as hell. Also, I've seen 4chan leaks be fairly reliable when they don't sound fake as hell.

 

[Hassknecht]

Emil kicking up shit because Todd wants the story to be good. That sentence alone is pure gold.

/edit:
The rest of the thread makes Todd sound... Nice. What a twist.

 

[nkchan16]

"Todd likes CBBE" Now, this makes it all legit!