Istill Posted March 4, 2016 Posted March 4, 2016 Unfortunatly, I haven't played any of the Witcher titles yet, and I only took a very brief look at Bioware's Dragon Age titles. Both have pretty big sceneries, although it would seem that at least the Dragon Age titles are dividing the map into various sections. I have played Gothic 1 and 2 and both were pretty brilliant. Yes, a lot of bugs, but with Skyrim I had no less than 2 gamebreaking bugs and countless other annoyances like crashes, glitched ragdolls and the like, to be more precise: an AI package error with some villagers from Morthal caused me to have crashes everytime I ventured near that town, causing me to loose 3 hours of progress and even more to find out what was happening. And I couldn't progress the negotiations later on because I had appearantly started the Civil War quest line and one NPC was not reacting at all due to the scripts of said War storyline. I had to use the console to continue. I had quest givers not being in place, and some other stuff. Yet I have never encountered any of the like in Gothic, maybe due to its simpler nature, Questgivers usually staying in one place, not a lot of folk on the roads and the like - like you said: smaller sceneries, maybe. But I'm not counting on it. All I'm saying is, after all that time Bethesda should have fixed at least those gamebreaking bugs. But they didn't. Dragon Age 1, 2 and even Inquisition work much like the old Infinity Engine games, meaning NPCs do fuck all but move from point A to B, if they move at all. The Witcher 3 is the first game of the series that features an open world, but is built like GTA, Assassin's Creed and Far Cry. No persistent NPCs (with the exception of a handful of important NPCs), everything gets spawned and despawned as needed. The world is a stage and if you don't look closely or don't care about this kind of thing, it works perfectly. Gothic 1 and 2 had their fair share of gamebreaking bugs, just google a bit and you'll find workarounds and console commands for most of them. And yeah, the world was much smaller, but as far as I remember it was pretty alive, with people having a daily schedule and all that. I hope you see the similarities now - Gothic 3 was literally unplayable when it was released. I had to start over at least once in each Gothic game (which taught me to always use multiple saves) and Gothic 3 produced a broken savegame every other hour or so, especially when a scripted event happened the chances were pretty high that something went wrong. Risen went back to smaller, isolated worlds, but was full of bugs, too. Games from Piranha Bytes are well known for being unstable and riddled with bugs, much like Bethesda's games, but much, much worse. Squashing bugs in such a huge game (not necessarily speaking content-wise) is a task that could very well take an eternity. Just look at the unofficial patches for Skyrim - there were some game breaking problems introduced with some versions of them that weren't in the original game and the last update was on the 23rd of February 2016, that's more than 4 years after the release of the game and they are still going. Sure, they're modders and not the devs, but it should give you an idea of how long the game should've been postponed to make sure most of the bugs are gone. I'm not being an apologist for Bethesda here, at least I'm not trying to be. It's just that with these games, you have to know what to expect. If you can deal with that, fine, if not, the option to not buy it is always there. Hoping that someday developers are able to fully finish and flesh out any game, however big it may be is something that would be wonderful, but I doubt It'll happen. And if you prefer the staged shows of other open world games, be my guest, nothing wrong with that. But there's more than enough games like that, there's no need for Bethesda to go down that path as well. It's good that they try their own thing, even if they are copy-pasting a lot from their previous games. Man, you know that many of the thing you said about other games also applies to SKYRIM? I mean how much is these random NPC that arent scripted? Like 5 in vanilla game? Or the same encounter with prisoner every fuckin hour? Dont say that world is barren westeland, where in Skyrim it also is, and you wont change that. You cant say that Gothic was bugged out that much, I mean third one yea, but First and second? I dont think so. Many bugs were made by the players by doing thing they shouldnt be doing.
GrimReaper Posted March 4, 2016 Posted March 4, 2016 Man, you know that many of the thing you said about other games also applies to SKYRIM? I mean how much is these random NPC that arent scripted? Like 5 in vanilla game? Or the same encounter with prisoner every fuckin hour? Dont say that world is barren westeland, where in Skyrim it also is, and you wont change that. You cant say that Gothic was bugged out that much, I mean third one yea, but First and second? I dont think so. Many bugs were made by the players by doing thing they shouldnt be doing. Almost every NPC in Skyrim has a schedule, a sandbox AI and AI that determines how and if they fight. It's pretty simple if you look behind the inner workings, but sadly much more complex than what most other games offer. A big thing for me that many other people tend to ignore is that every NPC has their own inventory which can be fully manipulated by the player. I do not consider the world of Skyrim a wasteland because there is actually stuff happening. Very simple, often small things, but they do happen. Just like Gothic did, but Gothic did in a much smaller scale, when they tried to up the scale, the game went to shit. And if you really think that the Gothic and Risen games weren't a mess then you're being delusional. Gothic 3 just was the worst offender to the point of being simply unplayable. All the other games had bugs and glitches that prevented you from progressing, dooming your playthrough if you didn't have a backup save that was done before you did whatever caused the plot stopper. Justifying a bug by saying it only happens when you do things the wrong way is a silly thing to say in an RPG that wants you to have freedom and figure out things for yourself, m8.
Istill Posted March 4, 2016 Posted March 4, 2016 Man, you know that many of the thing you said about other games also applies to SKYRIM? I mean how much is these random NPC that arent scripted? Like 5 in vanilla game? Or the same encounter with prisoner every fuckin hour? Dont say that world is barren westeland, where in Skyrim it also is, and you wont change that. You cant say that Gothic was bugged out that much, I mean third one yea, but First and second? I dont think so. Many bugs were made by the players by doing thing they shouldnt be doing. Almost every NPC in Skyrim has a schedule, a sandbox AI and AI that determines how and if they fight. It's pretty simple if you look behind the inner workings, but sadly much more complex than what most other games offer. A big thing for me that many other people tend to ignore is that every NPC has their own inventory which can be fully manipulated by the player. I do not consider the world of Skyrim a wasteland because there is actually stuff happening. Very simple, often small things, but they do happen. Just like Gothic did, but Gothic did in a much smaller scale, when they tried to up the scale, the game went to shit. And if you really think that the Gothic and Risen games weren't a mess then you're being delusional. Gothic 3 just was the worst offender to the point of being simply unplayable. All the other games had bugs and glitches that prevented you from progressing, dooming your playthrough if you didn't have a backup save that was done before you did whatever caused the plot stopper. Justifying a bug by saying it only happens when you do things the wrong way is a silly thing to say in an RPG that wants you to have freedom and figure out things for yourself, m8. You did not understanded a thing from what i said... Okay, lets start again. Gothic, Risen... Yea Risen was a better than the third Gothic, but it was mess in combat mechanic becouse every fight was forcing you to use potion, rly, fps lock to 30, that were technical issues, some physic glitches but what game dosent have them these years, nothing harmful here. From my side i can tell i never got a game breaking bug in Risen 1. Same applies for Gothic, i never got a bugged quest, that broke my game, every quest i was able to finish. Of course there are quests that have to be done in particular order otherwise something will wont work , but im not calling it game breaking, there are just things you can do before, and after other. Its just like having an apple and giving an apple. When i have 1 apple i can give it to some one, but if i have 2 and i said i will give every apple, they will take 2 apples, you get it? If you give him 1 and then get the second to someone else everythjing will work. Some of that are clearly bugs, but some are not. Im not delusional man. I Finished gothic i dont know how many times, and i got game breaking bugs in only the third game, andthat was before patches came there. I wont be defending it couse of questpack 4 and other fixes couse its modders work, not companies. Okay, about thing... i was saying that, if you are gonna go to old world in the act 1 without doing stuff in act 1, dont expect game to work like it should. Same with skyrim, dont expect if you teleport yourself to fight with alduin at start. Look, skyrim maybe dont have bugs like that in the big matter but many of them lies in the engine. Man i dont care about shedule of npc, or complexity of that, im not a programmer. But i know one thing, redshirt npcs, like Ysolda have something like that or vittoria Vinci, but look at it, they are doing stuff the same way other companies did 10 years ago, i mean for instance Gothic, people had their own shedule, cooking, talking, being in bar, most of them were doing stuff, not all, but most, not so complicated but so it is in skyrim. Plan of nazeem is to be on market or sleep, and here your complexity dies. You can say about random events like some bard or thalmor, or whatever but these are 2 random events that dont matter for the most part. enemies are wandering caves they are in, but moslty they dont they have a square they always stay in, they dont care its a day or night. So stop talking about revolutionary work they did with Ai, becouse they dont. The thing if npc will fight can be teterminated by many thing, but mostly this is this PC lvl> NPC lvl. Counting people with classes like townsman, or shoopkeper or whatever. Everything they are doing is determinating that by classes and classes behavior, for instance, Nothing more complcated here. The random events are becaming ridicilious after some time, when you are metting the same pair wandering skyrim in the way to solitude for wedding first meeting them at solitude, then near windhelm becouse of reasons. There are MODS that expands this shedule like Notice board, the people of skyrim or something else. With this mods you will actually met Uthgerd escorting bard, or other people or going with bads of adventurers into caves and killing everything there. But these are mods, there are mods for that also for other games. Dont say that skyrim dont have gamebreaking bugs, becouse these bugs also exist, for instance Juib quest that crashes the game till you finish it.
GameLover Posted March 4, 2016 Posted March 4, 2016 I'll start this rant of mine with one statement. As soon as I saw the Online TES game being released, I felt it in my heart that things were changing .....and fast.... and more importantly, in a way that made me think to myself "your time is up, I hope you had fun over the years". For me, I totally hate FO4. Played through every quest on my first play through... if memory serves, around 120 hrs total for that 1st play. Tried to restart it again for a 2nd play..... and it hit me like a hammer... I had ZERO interest in doing it again.... and I mean literally zero. No amount of mods will fix that game for me. Yes, pretty character mods, nice gun & armor mods and all... but the story is shit for me. The NPC interaction / stories were terrible and is the main reason I have no interest anymore. The NPC's at every little farm saying the same shit over and over (bandits attacking us, bandits kidnapped someone, over and over and over again). And for me, the settlement building is CRAP. If I wanted SIMS, then I'd go buy SIMS. I didn't mind the "build defenses" idea, but it made no difference whatsoever. If I went off to do another quest, BAM, some god damn bandits, mutants or whatever apparently showed up in the face of dozens of laser turrets and fully armed guards and settlers and apparently managed to destroy my settlement. Then, on top of that, I couldn't make any real progress elsewhere as I was constantly being told via radio or whatever that "X" settlement was under attack, needed my help or whatever..... forcing me to stop what I am doing and run/warp/fast travel over there to see whats up.... just totally ruined my fun (if I managed to squeeze any fun out of whatever I was doing to begin with). Also related to the above, the pipboy info screen on settlements was never correct. Showing problems when there were NONE, or not showing me problems when there were some. To sum this point up, I felt like a god damn baby sitter with settlements... fukin hated it all together BTW, if I am the "leader" of the minutemen, WTF are they doing..... do something, protect the settlements and leave me the fuck alone to play the lackluster storyline at least. Say what you want about Skyrim, but I enjoyed many many of the NPC interactions, their stories etc.... and still do years later after the game's initial release. The Lore is what pulls me in.... I spent hours reading every book cover to cover in the game world..... and methodically placing them on my every growing bookshelves. FNV was kinda okay...kinda.... I really liked the OWB DLC which was my fav storyline of that game. FO3 also had memorable moments story wise, as well as the DLC's to a much smaller degree. Oblivion is a fun game for me as well as Morrowind. All of the above games are still on my HD, fully modded of course and playable to this day.... but the key point, I have fun in those worlds where as in FO4... I have no fun.... just feels like someone is punching me in the nuts over and over. Funny, sad and scary, but when I watched Todd Howard on stage talking up FO4..... I had the urge for some reason to run up there and punch him in the nose. Now after seeing the product in action on my rig for myself after its release, if I were in that position again, I would be on that stage and he would be under it. Beth has let me down.....and from my reading elsewhere, many other ex-lovers of the franchise(s) as well. As has been said elsewhere many times over, they are moving to the inferior consoles. It's not about fun and profit anymore, it's only about money.
Goblin Guy Posted March 22, 2016 Posted March 22, 2016 Unfortunatly, I haven't played any of the Witcher titles yet, and I only took a very brief look at Bioware's Dragon Age titles. Both have pretty big sceneries, although it would seem that at least the Dragon Age titles are dividing the map into various sections. I have played Gothic 1 and 2 and both were pretty brilliant. Yes, a lot of bugs, but with Skyrim I had no less than 2 gamebreaking bugs and countless other annoyances like crashes, glitched ragdolls and the like, to be more precise: an AI package error with some villagers from Morthal caused me to have crashes everytime I ventured near that town, causing me to loose 3 hours of progress and even more to find out what was happening. And I couldn't progress the negotiations later on because I had appearantly started the Civil War quest line and one NPC was not reacting at all due to the scripts of said War storyline. I had to use the console to continue. I had quest givers not being in place, and some other stuff. Yet I have never encountered any of the like in Gothic, maybe due to its simpler nature, Questgivers usually staying in one place, not a lot of folk on the roads and the like - like you said: smaller sceneries, maybe. But I'm not counting on it. All I'm saying is, after all that time Bethesda should have fixed at least those gamebreaking bugs. But they didn't. Squashing bugs in such a huge game (not necessarily speaking content-wise) is a task that could very well take an eternity. Just look at the unofficial patches for Skyrim - there were some game breaking problems introduced with some versions of them that weren't in the original game and the last update was on the 23rd of February 2016, that's more than 4 years after the release of the game and they are still going. Sure, they're modders and not the devs, but it should give you an idea of how long the game should've been postponed to make sure most of the bugs are gone. I'm not being an apologist for Bethesda here, at least I'm not trying to be. It's just that with these games, you have to know what to expect. If you can deal with that, fine, if not, the option to not buy it is always there. Hoping that someday developers are able to fully finish and flesh out any game, however big it may be is something that would be wonderful, but I doubt It'll happen. And if you prefer the staged shows of other open world games, be my guest, nothing wrong with that. But there's more than enough games like that, there's no need for Bethesda to go down that path as well. It's good that they try their own thing, even if they are copy-pasting a lot from their previous games. IMO I'd be interesting if Bethesda and Zenimax Media followed the "Minecraft" or "Kerbal Space Program" route, where both games are constantly updated by the developers and have proper mod support, meaning that the game won't crash and burn in your face after you install even the simplest of the mods. Of course, this doesn't mean that the games are fully bug-free but it surely gets rid of potential ragequitting inducing bugs and crashes, on top of adding new content to the game. But since they love to rely on the modders to fix stuff (literally making them work for free), keep using the same obsolete engine in plain 21st century (which is equal to try using Windows XP for gaming in 2016 for example) and keeping pumping games up to compensate past failures, hardly anything will change. Unfortunatly, I haven't played any of the Witcher titles yet, and I only took a very brief look at Bioware's Dragon Age titles. Both have pretty big sceneries, although it would seem that at least the Dragon Age titles are dividing the map into various sections. I have played Gothic 1 and 2 and both were pretty brilliant. Yes, a lot of bugs, but with Skyrim I had no less than 2 gamebreaking bugs and countless other annoyances like crashes, glitched ragdolls and the like, to be more precise: an AI package error with some villagers from Morthal caused me to have crashes everytime I ventured near that town, causing me to loose 3 hours of progress and even more to find out what was happening. And I couldn't progress the negotiations later on because I had appearantly started the Civil War quest line and one NPC was not reacting at all due to the scripts of said War storyline. I had to use the console to continue. I had quest givers not being in place, and some other stuff. Yet I have never encountered any of the like in Gothic, maybe due to its simpler nature, Questgivers usually staying in one place, not a lot of folk on the roads and the like - like you said: smaller sceneries, maybe. But I'm not counting on it. All I'm saying is, after all that time Bethesda should have fixed at least those gamebreaking bugs. But they didn't. The Civil War questline is to this day an infuriating coin flip, even with all the official and unofficial patches. It speaks volumes that after so many years AND the final patch, the main fucking quest is still bugged. If it wasn't for Loverslab and all the sex and roleplay mods it offers, Skyrim would be nowhere near my HDD. But hey, why bother fixing your game when you have a mod community to do it for you, right? In my case, what is keeping this thing in my HDD are house mods. With mods like DavideMitra's Modern Safehouse and Underground Bathhouse, why bother go adventuring ? Alduin, Miraak and Harkon can wait! But yeah, like I said before, until Bethesda and Zenimax keep taking the path of least effort, they'll keep losing their edges and (hopefully not) join the likes of Acclaim, 989 Studios, Data East and other long gone developers and publishers.
shinji72 Posted March 22, 2016 Posted March 22, 2016 This video is about this very subject. Actually this thread inspired me in doing it.
TheOzoneHole Posted March 23, 2016 Posted March 23, 2016 IMO I'd be interesting if Bethesda and Zenimax Media followed the "Minecraft" or "Kerbal Space Program" route, where both games are constantly updated by the developers and have proper mod support, meaning that the game won't crash and burn in your face after you install even the simplest of the mods. Of course, this doesn't mean that the games are fully bug-free but it surely gets rid of potential ragequitting inducing bugs and crashes, on top of adding new content to the game. But since they love to rely on the modders to fix stuff (literally making they work for free), keep using the same obsolete engine in plain 21st century (which is equal to try using Windows XP for gaming in 2016 for example) and keeping pumping games up to compensate past failures, hardly anything will change. But yeah, like I said before, until Bethesda and Zenimax keep taking the path of least effort, they'll keep losing their edges and (hopefully not) join the likes of Acclaim, 989 Studios, Data East and other long gone developers and publishers. In my case, what is keeping this thing in my HDD are house mods. With mods like DavideMitra's Modern Safehouse and Underground Bathhouse, why bother go adventuring ? Alduin, Miraak and Harkon can wait! Considering the amount of money ZeniMax and BethSoft (the publisher) are pulling in, I don't expect that we'll see BGS go out anytime soon. I feel that they're like Nintendo that way; terrible products because they are so out of touch with the consumers, who buy their products both out of loyalty and the vain hope that, maybe this time, it will be good like it used to be. I am sure there are plenty of younger players who do not understand the complaints about FO4, they think it is a perfectly fine game and, having not been exposed to FO1, FO2 or Morrowind, do not see the problem with the lack of player agency or the total inability to sympathize with or become immersed in the FO4 main character. I do agree that BGS needs to start using modern technology for their games, however, I can see the point about maybe pulling things back a bit. Far Cry Primal seems to be an example of what happens when a dev tries to put only the latest and greatest into their game.
Guest endgameaddiction Posted March 23, 2016 Posted March 23, 2016 That's just it, how many people have posted in the past "maybe this time they'll get it right and I'll give it another chance"? But in the end it's the same scenario. The one's who should be angry here are the pc gamers. Console gamers don't care. They plug n play and move on. How many of those console gamers have decided to get the PC version because of mods? Apart from fixing their broken games, we have helped generate more revenue for BGS. How many more faulty games is it going to take for someone to finally just give up with BSG? There's too many loyal BSG followers who are okay with their crappy games because modders will fix it. At what cost? Tolerating mod users who bitch about this and that? Where's Bethesda's thanks to the community? Their thanks was enforcing paid mods on everyone back in April last year, because that's how well they know the mod community. I completely lost their respect when they came out and said that. Those suckers damn well lurk Nexus and LL just like Robin. Hidden undercover snatching ideas and turning it into their own profit with a next title. And their gratitude is paid mods? *flips the bird at BSG* If this was the 90s or earlier, their asses would of been out of business. People back then wouldn't tolerate this kind of treatment, but people today do, which is why BSG will continue to grow and never fade away.
fred200 Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 At the moment, there are 38,552 people playing Fallout 4 on Steam. That ignores the major markets of XBox One and PS4. I have 400 hours in myself. Care to tell us how many people are playing your favorite RPG - right now? Bethesda must be doing something right.
TheOzoneHole Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 That's just it, how many people have posted in the past "maybe this time they'll get it right and I'll give it another chance"? But in the end it's the same scenario. The one's who should be angry here are the pc gamers. Console gamers don't care. They plug n play and move on. How many of those console gamers have decided to get the PC version because of mods? Apart from fixing their broken games, we have helped generate more revenue for BGS. How many more faulty games is it going to take for someone to finally just give up with BSG? There's too many loyal BSG followers who are okay with their crappy games because modders will fix it. At what cost? Tolerating mod users who bitch about this and that? Where's Bethesda's thanks to the community? Their thanks was enforcing paid mods on everyone back in April last year, because that's how well they know the mod community. I completely lost their respect when they came out and said that. Those suckers damn well lurk Nexus and LL just like Robin. Hidden undercover snatching ideas and turning it into their own profit with a next title. And their gratitude is paid mods? *flips the bird at BSG* If this was the 90s or earlier, their asses would of been out of business. People back then wouldn't tolerate this kind of treatment, but people today do, which is why BSG will continue to grow and never fade away. First off, yes I admit that I am totally guilty of giving BGS another chance after Skyrim. I really did not like Skyrim when it first came out but, thanks in no small part to mods, I play it quite a lot (3000+ hours). I'd bet that I've sunk just as much time into Oblivion and a fair amount into Morrowind. At this point I've got 300 hours in FO4, and I'm satisfied that I've pretty much done all that I'm going to with it for about the near future. Second, it is PC gamers who are getting the shaft from BGS. Console players, as you said, have no reason to complain other than bugs and crashes. They are the ones keeping BGS on this path, and they have been since Oblivion. Morrowind was released to console and did well enough for BethSoft to begin to focus on console sales. I played the hell out of Oblivion on 360 and switched after I learned about modding. FO3 did well on console, and so Skyrim was designed to be a console game first and foremost. So was FO4. Remember, BGS, BethSoft and ZeniMax do not give a flying fuck if we like their games so long as we buy their games. Once they've got our money, they're laughing all the way to the bank. They clearly do not know anything about modders or the modding "community". If they did they would have known in advance about the shit that would've been thrown at them with paid modding. I've heard everything from it being an idea that came from Valve (they have, I hear, no real corporate structure so people just will go and do stuff like that), to it being totally BethSoft's idea. I've heard that Beth were the ones who insisted on an un-curated workshop. (Listen to TotalBiscuit's video about it (yes he talks with Dark0ne, please restrain your obsessive loathing).) Personally, I think that BGS should start listening to people outside of its own forums. And even on the Nexus people are saying pretty much the same thing: BGS builds sandboxes, not stories. FO4 tried to be a gunplay driven story, not an epic sandbox; and that is the reason that it has failed so hard to the consumer. BGS tried to do something that they just are not good at and it bit them in the ass. Sure the critics loved it, but the general games press loves everything that comes from any of the AAA publishers or studios. (Again, see TB's channel for talks on that.) TLDR: Yes, BGS was dumb; maybe they'll learn from it. (I doubt it.) P.S. @Fred200 Where do people keep getting these statistics? My Google-fu is lacking tonight.
Guest endgameaddiction Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 I'm not perfect. I bought TES Anthology knowing about BGS and their broken games dating back from Fallout 3 being my first BSG and then Fallout New Vegas, which wasn't done by them, but their engine and assets are. Not knowing about TES in advance, my blindness and ignorance paid the price so I'm just as guilty. Learned my lesson with Skyrim, though so. But that is why I haven't bought FO4 apart from not having a strong enough PC to run the game. We all live and learn. But it's the ongoing same treatment that gets people fed up. They have taken plenty of time to develop the game, I don't think they can take a year from that development to thoroughly play test it as much as possible. Bethesda knows what they are doing, otherwise they wouldn't entice consumers and sell their products. It's like they have people hypnotized. And while the clock is ticking I fear it's going to happen where paid mods will return and eventually it's going to grow massively within the console modding community that the PC is not going to get much love in the end. I mean I stop and think about it and put myself in their shoes. I think about the idea of not having to deal with piracy on the pc version and it being distributed freely over the net. And if they can have that amount of control, what can we do, jump to console and join the bandwagon? If that's the case, most will migrate to a different game and mod it. I'm honestly just waiting for a bigger fish in the pond. I know it's bound to come and eventually at some point BSG will fade as most modders will swarm to something fresh fully moddable with a big tool kit. It's just a matter of time.
Jazzman Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 Since the beginning of time when an x still marked the spot we have two versions of RPG gamers: 1. People that ultimately need a script to play any role, mostly the role of the other, alien sex. 2. People that don't give two figs about prefab scripts and play their role as they may see fit. To what faction you belong already determines your tendency to complain more or less about BGS. Guess why NPCs that emerge out of the rubble won't stop complaining about the living conditions...
lordgdavid Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 I would not say they lost their edge, rather they are targeting a wider audience.
Yami X Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 At the moment, there are 38,552 people playing Fallout 4 on Steam. That ignores the major markets of XBox One and PS4. I have 400 hours in myself. Care to tell us how many people are playing your favorite RPG - right now? Bethesda must be doing something right. The majority can be wrong.
Jazzman Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 At the moment, there are 38,552 people playing Fallout 4 on Steam. That ignores the major markets of XBox One and PS4. I have 400 hours in myself. Care to tell us how many people are playing your favorite RPG - right now? Bethesda must be doing something right. The majority can be wrong. Minority reports that claim to be right have hardly any impact on the commercial markets and almost none on consumer behavior that reflects the present zeitgeist. That leads us to the average lifespan of a gamer generation, approx. five years, it is said, and that ain't much. Then new, young folk enters the scene. For them the new games are developed, not for us who we came before. We must adapt or fade away, and on that very day all those precious moments we have will be lost in time, like tears in the rain. That's the way it goes, there is no other. With my 26 years I've thus seen three of these RPG generations and its getting more and more difficult to adapt to the minor changes that come with each gamer generation. I have to lower my sights permanently not to get sick by a perhaps romanticizing understanding of an idealized past. Have fun! Yeah, yeah or whateva.
fred200 Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 If you want to see how many people are currently playing a game you own on Steam, open the Steam app on any mobile device. Navigate to Library, which shows you a list of your games. Click any one, and it shows you how many people are playing that game - right now. For example: Fallout 4 - 37,713 Skyrim - 27,751 Fallout NV - 2,318 MGS5 - 3,491 Witcher 2 - 891 And what depresses me about our civilization: GTA 5 - 43,509 Most people these days play on consoles. They are not reflected here. I don't play Witcher 3 on Steam - it is not reflected here. It is easy enough to say Bethesda got their sales by lying to prospective customers. It is a lot harder to say that about people still playing months after the game released.
Slorm Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 I'd view those figures with some caution as many people play offline, so I would assume they are not included
fred200 Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 I'd view those figures with some caution as many people play offline, so I would assume they are not included Like with consoles, the numbers will be higher than shown, but I would expect the percentages to hold pretty well. Generalizing a bit: More people are playing Fallout 4 right now than all the rest i showed combined (except GTA 5).
shadowlord445 Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 Have Bethesda lost their edge on creating RPG's? My honest opinion... No, they are just doing what everybody else is doing, dumbing down the game to appeal to dipshit casuals who can't think for themselves, and who need their hands held.
Jazzman Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 I'd view those figures with some caution as many people play offline, so I would assume they are not included Like with consoles, the numbers will be higher than shown, but I would expect the percentages to hold pretty well. Generalizing a bit: More people are playing Fallout 4 right now than all the rest i showed combined (except GTA 5). Thought I have made myself clear already. This things change over a period of years, and this quite inevitably. It's the commercial way or the highway. A statistical snapshot of who plays what of today doesn't even hold water for a single month as forecast.
Goblin Guy Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 Considering the amount of money ZeniMax and BethSoft (the publisher) are pulling in, I don't expect that we'll see BGS go out anytime soon. I feel that they're like Nintendo that way; terrible products because they are so out of touch with the consumers, who buy their products both out of loyalty and the vain hope that, maybe this time, it will be good like it used to be. I am sure there are plenty of younger players who do not understand the complaints about FO4, they think it is a perfectly fine game and, having not been exposed to FO1, FO2 or Morrowind, do not see the problem with the lack of player agency or the total inability to sympathize with or become immersed in the FO4 main character. I do agree that BGS needs to start using modern technology for their games, however, I can see the point about maybe pulling things back a bit. Far Cry Primal seems to be an example of what happens when a dev tries to put only the latest and greatest into their game. That's what happens with communities like them dedicated to nostalgic/diehard fans: It's the usual "I'm buying this because it's by [insert brand name here], so, it must be good" mixed with a bit of "fan dumb" (not that all fans are like this, of course, just the zealots), instead of they trying something new, out of their "comfort zone". There's also the old argument that these fans "bought into" (pun intended) that mods are the "ultimate fix" for all the game issues, meaning that if you're a "console peasant" (pffffft!), you're screwed unless you get a computer to join the "PC Master Race" (even more pffffffft!). But the thing is: even with the unofficial patches, Bethesda games like Skyrim will find a way to crash/freeze in your face just to piss you off, and there's nothing you can do about it. No amount of memory and bug fixes by modders (Again, free work. And nobody likes to work for free, right ?) will fix an issue that's related to something inside the game's core, so, even patches have their limitations. And when the bugs get that obvious, there's no way of ignoring them, making you feel like you're stepping on eggs. I even did some search on Google on why BSG gets away with making "rushed" games (YMMV) while other companies like EA and Activision get bashed like there's no tomorrow if they "dare" to do the same. Among the angry responses of Bethesda fanboys, rude posters, usual trolling and the generic "mod support, /thread, lolz" answer, I found some interesting posts: http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/1924939-How-does-Bethesda-get-away-with-everything-they-do-wrong?p=38025486&viewfull=1#post38025486 http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/1924939-How-does-Bethesda-get-away-with-everything-they-do-wrong?p=38025690&viewfull=1#post38025690 http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/1924939-How-does-Bethesda-get-away-with-everything-they-do-wrong?p=38031761&viewfull=1#post38031761 http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/1924939-How-does-Bethesda-get-away-with-everything-they-do-wrong?p=38864511&viewfull=1#post38864511 http://i.imgur.com/MUdEqXp.jpg http://i.imgur.com/NAHAgTd.jpg http://i.imgur.com/CiVHBox.jpg http://i.imgur.com/VTY9Tzz.jpg There's also the famous argument that games like Skyrim are huge, open world games, don't allow you to catch all the bugs at once since it varies from system to system. I already suggested the "Minecraft" route of regular updates to solve such issue, so I won't repeat myself. As for younger players, some of them play FPS not for the story but for the action it provides and could care less about the NPCs. They just want to shoot stuff on the screen and feel the thrill of feeling him/herself inside an action movie, generally seeing the bugs as minor "outtakes"/"bloopers" during the course of the "movie". Not to mention how these bugs and glitches from Bethesda games are kinda "selective": while some say that their game run smoothly, others say that the game keeps crashing due to "n" reasons, even without mods a.k.a. "Vanilla", which "reinforces" the "argument" (mostly ad hominem) of the rabid fanboys that "they don't know wtf are you talking about", that you have a "shitty PC" and that you are doing nothing but spreading "misinformation" like a "troll". Hardy har har. Yeah, they should keep with the recent technology but not overdo it, of course. At the moment, there are 38,552 people playing Fallout 4 on Steam. That ignores the major markets of XBox One and PS4. I have 400 hours in myself. Care to tell us how many people are playing your favorite RPG - right now? Bethesda must be doing something right. The majority can be wrong. I've learned the hard way that quantity doesn't always equal quality with shows like "Invader Zim" and games like "Skyrim". Instead I question if the hype/numbers are really worth my time and my internet connection before I jump into conclusions. I'm not perfect. I bought TES Anthology knowing about BGS and their broken games dating back from Fallout 3 being my first BSG and then Fallout New Vegas, which wasn't done by them, but their engine and assets are. Not knowing about TES in advance, my blindness and ignorance paid the price so I'm just as guilty. Learned my lesson with Skyrim, though so. But that is why I haven't bought FO4 apart from not having a strong enough PC to run the game. We all live and learn. But it's the ongoing same treatment that gets people fed up. They have taken plenty of time to develop the game, I don't think they can take a year from that development to thoroughly play test it as much as possible. Bethesda knows what they are doing, otherwise they wouldn't entice consumers and sell their products. It's like they have people hypnotized. And while the clock is ticking I fear it's going to happen where paid mods will return and eventually it's going to grow massively within the console modding community that the PC is not going to get much love in the end. I mean I stop and think about it and put myself in their shoes. I think about the idea of not having to deal with piracy on the pc version and it being distributed freely over the net. And if they can have that amount of control, what can we do, jump to console and join the bandwagon? If that's the case, most will migrate to a different game and mod it. I'm honestly just waiting for a bigger fish in the pond. I know it's bound to come and eventually at some point BSG will fade as most modders will swarm to something fresh fully moddable with a big tool kit. It's just a matter of time. Remembers me from Gaia Online: an once great avatar and social network website where you could met new friends and people, it's now a shadow of what it used to be, mostly due to the new administrators of the site, which don't give a damn about nothing but themselves and how to make even more money. Dopamine, baby! The greatest shift happened with the introduction of an item called "Flynn's Booty" (and no, this doesn't have anything to do with butts, ya' pervs out there), which was basically a "gold (site free virtual currency) generator", which could only be bought with real money. This item gave you a random amount of gold, ranging between 1,000~1,000,000 gold. Turns out that the admins liked from this event so much that they decided to release it several more times, under protests of "Gaians" like me, since several releases of this item would break the MMOG's economy apart and render mini-games that give gold as prizes useless, since it was basically the same if you typed in your Skyrim's console "player.additem f", with the difference being a RNG value + Gaia being a MMO, making this item equal to "cheating the system". The results ? Now the site's virtual economy is butched beyond relief, a mass exodus of former Gaians to Gaia Online "clones" like "Solia Online" occured and unless you're a millionaire, you can't create the avatars you want, thus, suppressing creativity. Also, TekTek, an avatar maker site based on Gaia is gone for good. Will something similar happen to BSG ? Only time will tell, since nothing lasts forever. But for now, they'll still laugh all the way to the bank and keep making modders do "free work" for them. PS.: Skyrim is my first BSG game ever. First and last game for sure. New Vegas was done by Obsidian and published by Bethesda, so, it doesn't count.
prinyo Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 At the moment, there are 38,552 people playing Fallout 4 on Steam. That ignores the major markets of XBox One and PS4. I have 400 hours in myself. Care to tell us how many people are playing your favorite RPG - right now? Bethesda must be doing something right. Justin Bieber has currently 2 songs in the US top 10 so he must be doing something right.... This is very subjective but if we "turn" games to music for me FO3 would be Led Zeppelin, FONV would be Deep Purple and FO4 is Justin Bieber. Now there is no point in arguing if Bieber makes good music or not. The problem is that after Zeppelin and Purple people expected something like AC/DC. They got something quite different instead. Hence the negative feelings. P.S. Don''t even look at this if you are a Fallout fan :-) P.P.S. Considering the trend I'm more worried that after Jethro Tull (Oblivion) and Pink Floyd (Skyrim) we are going to get Richard Clayderman when the next TES is released.
fred200 Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 At the moment, there are 38,552 people playing Fallout 4 on Steam. That ignores the major markets of XBox One and PS4. I have 400 hours in myself. Care to tell us how many people are playing your favorite RPG - right now? Bethesda must be doing something right. Justin Bieber has currently 2 songs in the US top 10 so he must be doing something right.... This is very subjective but if we "turn" games to music for me FO3 would be Led Zeppelin, FONV would be Deep Purple and FO4 is Justin Bieber. Now there is no point in arguing if Bieber makes good music or not. The problem is that after Zeppelin and Purple people expected something like AC/DC. They got something quite different instead. Hence the negative feelings. P.S. Don''t even look at this if you are a Fallout fan :-) P.P.S. Considering the trend I'm more worried that after Jethro Tull (Oblivion) and Pink Floyd (Skyrim) we are going to get Richard Clayderman when the next TES is released. There is an awful lot of elitism around these days. Just because I can't stand Justin - and I suspect you feel the same way - that does not invalidate the likes and desires of an awful lot of people. What those screaming kids like is just as valid as what we like. Same for Fallout - you might not like the current iteration, but a lot of people do. That does not mean they are stupid, or "not true to the lore" - it just means their taste is different than yours. Still valid - but different.
prinyo Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 At the moment, there are 38,552 people playing Fallout 4 on Steam. That ignores the major markets of XBox One and PS4. I have 400 hours in myself. Care to tell us how many people are playing your favorite RPG - right now? Bethesda must be doing something right. Justin Bieber has currently 2 songs in the US top 10 so he must be doing something right.... This is very subjective but if we "turn" games to music for me FO3 would be Led Zeppelin, FONV would be Deep Purple and FO4 is Justin Bieber. Now there is no point in arguing if Bieber makes good music or not. The problem is that after Zeppelin and Purple people expected something like AC/DC. They got something quite different instead. Hence the negative feelings. P.S. Don''t even look at this if you are a Fallout fan :-) P.P.S. Considering the trend I'm more worried that after Jethro Tull (Oblivion) and Pink Floyd (Skyrim) we are going to get Richard Clayderman when the next TES is released. There is an awful lot of elitism around these days. Just because I can't stand Justin - and I suspect you feel the same way - that does not invalidate the likes and desires of an awful lot of people. What those screaming kids like is just as valid as what we like. Same for Fallout - you might not like the current iteration, but a lot of people do. That does not mean they are stupid, or "not true to the lore" - it just means their taste is different than yours. Still valid - but different. That's exactly what I meant. I did not say that Bieber/FO4 "is bad". It is a question of taste and I'm not judging people based on what they like. I said that it is not what people expected. My point is that the logic in the post I quoted is wrong. When you look at the negative reviews, most people say that FO4 is a good game, but a bad FO game and a bad RPG. So my example was that those people expected hard rock but got a pop hit instead. Maybe Bieber is too controversial to be used as an example. Let's use Adele then. Most of the negative reviews about FO4/Adele is not that she can't sing, but how her songs differ from Purple and Zeppelin and are definitely not ACDC.
Jazzman Posted March 24, 2016 Posted March 24, 2016 That's exactly what I meant. I did not say that Bieber/FO4 "is bad". It is a question of taste and I'm not judging people based on what they like. I said that it is not what people expected. My point is that the logic in the post I quoted is wrong. When you look at the negative reviews, most people say that FO4 is a good game, but a bad FO game and a bad RPG. So my example was that those people expected hard rock but got a pop hit instead. Maybe Bieber is too controversial to be used as an example. Let's use Adele then. Most of the negative reviews about FO4/Adele is not that she can't sing, but how her songs differ from Purple and Zeppelin and are definitely not ACDC. Sorry but it is by no means a 'question of taste' but a matter of time and personal branding on the timeline, a branding that one simply can't get rid of anymore. My dad likes games and tunes that were already old before I was born. And that is quite normal. In 10-15 years the kids that have started gaming (or listening to music) in these days almost inevitably will call the games (or music) of their successors in youth 'tasteless', perhaps even crap compared to the stuff of 'the good old days'. Yeah. Man, man never changes.
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