11 mo. ago • 96%

Bethesda Thought It Was 'Infallible' Before Fallout 76 Launch, Says Former Design Director

www.ign.com Bethesda Thought It Was 'Infallible' Before Fallout 76 Launch, Says Former Design Director - IGN

Bethesda's former design director has said the developer thought it was infallible ahead of Fallout 76's disastrous launch.

72 comments

Did they just ignore that Fallout 4 wasn't exactly universally praised at launch?

110
- It also wasn't universally hated. It came out to a pretty decent reception. Mixed with the normal response to Bethesda bugs.
  
  76 was universally panned. Super buggy, to pvp oriented, none of the story that people wanted from fall out, over filled with bad micro transactions. It was a hollow shell, and the shell wasn't all that good looking.
  
  49
  
  It wasn't hated, but faint praise for a main release of one of your biggest IPs is pretty far from infallible. Alarms should have been going off, but they were ignored.
  
  18
  
  And at the start it has 0 NPC's. The story was told through notes and computers.
  
  8
  
  There was a good bit of story in 76, though? I quite liked the storyline where you take up the mantle of a radio drama heroine after finding out what happened to the previous holders of the title and breaking into their secret lair.
  
  Or, I dunno, does it not count as story because most of the important events have already happened? Maybe it's "lore." I had a good time with it, anyway.
  
  2
  
  On the contrary, I think it was by far the most beautiful Fallout game. It wasn't just green and brown and had gorgeous scenery instead.
  
  1
- Yep, it speaks to how out of touch they are in their bubble.
  
  46
- Maybe it came along at the right time in my life, but Fallout 4 has got to be in my top 2-3 games ever.
  
  The atmosphere in 4 is unlike almost anything I’ve played before or since. The story is great fun and I loved the settlement-building - it gave the game a sort of second life as a fairly chill building game once the story was complete.
  
  Fallout 76 was just poorly judged and clunky. The multiplayer aspect ruined it. Although with that said, I did enjoy the C.A.M.P. idea. That was a good mechanic.
  
  20
  
  People can argue whether it's as good as the previous fallout games, but it was in no way a failure. I quite enjoyed it too, and it being not as good as 3 or NV doesn't mean it's down in the gutter with 76.
  
  9
  
  Same thing for me. Fallout 4 must be the Bethesda game I spent the most time with.
  
  4
  
  My problem with 4 was that I didn't identify with the protagonist much. The world was great but the main story arc was pretty cringe. There's a million ways to do a revenge arc and they tried to be like "oh millennials all have kids now so let's do that" and it just missed the mark.
  
  3
- I get the feeling that there is something like a "look at them laughing with us!" when really we are laughing at them, kinda situation... you know?
  
  Like they think that so many mods being made is because we love their games, when a majority of mods are really the fans fixing shit that shouldn't be broken in the first place.
  
  It sure comes from a place of love, perhaps, but it shouldn't be happening to such an extent in the first place! I shouldn't need a UI mod to play Bethesda games! Not should there ever be not one, but several Unnofficial Patches!
  
  17
- I still refuse to purchase or play it because it removed specific dialogue. The dialogue options were my favorite part of 1 and 2 and were huge parts of the world building and character progression in the world.
  
  I get the move to 3D and real-time voicing makes that beyond prohibitive, but that was one of a few reasons I played through F2 over a hundred times and F3 twice. (NV three or four times)
  
  11
  
  I get it. I just think ultimately FO4 is its own thing and either it's for you or it isn't. Nothing wrong with not being interested!
  
  6
- It wasn't "universally praised" but it had generally positive reviews when it was released. Fallout 76 was panned.
  
  11
  
  Generally positive, but the negatives were pretty big things you had to look past.
  
  2
- FO4 got a little flack, but overall it was very well received. You can see the reviews for yourself. Most of them are pretty high.
  
  9
  
  It was on the lower end of favorable, lots of 8s about 10% of professionals being mixed. That's not well received. Steam was about 75% positive, that's not glowing reviews. It's a good, but not great game. That's great for a random indie title or a yearly release, but for once a decade franchise title, it's not good.
  
  -1
- I mean, it kinda was. It had the biggest midnight launch of the entire franchise. Stellar reviews across the board. Insane online coverage.
  
  7
I played every fallout game as they came out. Bought my first windows computer to play F1 after playing it on my roommates computer. I was extremely excited for F76, but held off on purchasing until the reviews came in.

Very quickly realized that it was never going to be the game for me. Really glad I didn't get burned on that purchase, but disappointed that I never was able to immerse myself in MMO fallout. It had such potential to be great.

21
- If it was an actual MMO or had no online features at all it would be pretty good, IMO. It's too small in the player count for it to be a real, good, MMO, and the online features get in the way of a solo experience (the AI lags and rubber bands super annoyingly). It's a shame, because it's basically more Fallout 4 (gameplay wise anyway) but with a bunch of shit in the way of making it actually fun.
  
  3
- My understanding is that it’s been pretty well supported with a steady stream of content, patches and improvements, and the community is pretty fun. I have not played it, but I do hear good things overall.
  
  1
  
  It’s definitely changed a great deal since release. I started playing ~2 years ago and still do regularly. Bethesda doesn’t devote a ton of resources to 76 but there is something new every few months. The community is better than some other games I’ve played and in general is helpful and chill.
  
  3
Last great games were Skyrim and New Vegas. FO4 was ok.

76 and Starfield are absolute garbage

21
- What’s wrong with star field, I’m about 200 hours in and still am enjoying it
  
  8
  
  It's not garbage it's just classic Bethesda, by which I mean current classic Bethesda, as opposed to classic classic Bethesda.
  
  Have you noticed how pretty much every mission is, fast travel to place x, kill a bunch of grunts, loot the body of the main guy, fast travel back to quest giver, get money.
  
  The story is fine but the gameplay loop is just dull.
  
  I want to fly my ship around and I want a moon buggy (What's the point of entire procedurally generated planets if you can't look at them, I know they're boring but still).
  
  17
  
  Its empty. Nothing is happening on the planets. You walk for minutes from one place to the next, have 2 loading screens in that time and nothing of interest is happening
  
  9
  
  Hating Bethesda is cool at the moment so people only discuss the negatives of starfield and not the positives.
  
  Having said that I'm only 8hrs in so my opinion isn't worth shit really. But I'm enjoying it so far having met constellation and then just fucked off on my own for a bit to explore
  
  2
  
  You can enjoy it, but that doesn't mean it's good. I would just have fun with it if you don't see any problems. Otherwise if you're curious, go and find the reviews that outline very clearly how bad it is.
  
  2
- I would describe Fallout 4 as Mid, but I still out over 1000 hours into it. Never progressed the main story past meeting my Son.
  
  Starfield is lacking that charm that FO4 had. Post-apocolyptic Boston had more working computers to read lore of of than in all the settled systems.
  
  6
  
  I had forgotten how pointless the computers were. Barely any lore on them even. And the worst simply Open Door that is right in front of you.
  
  3
“Remind yourself that overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer.”

12
They don't do multiplayer well for one. They need to be as innovative in multiplayer as they are in single player.

7
- What innovations have Bethesda been recognized for? What innovations should we acknowledge Bethesda for?
  
  24
  
  Morrowind was utterly amazing and set up bars that are still being look at two decades later.
  
  For starters, only the Rimworld engine gets close to how moddable the creation engine is. It truly is a masterpiece of design.
  
  Then, as cheesy as it is, for an Open world sandbox RPG with a quest line.
  
  But they've been riding that gravy train for 20 years too, and all they really did was jam in graphical improvements, add increasingly barebones action elements(sword/gunplay) and rip out RPG elements.
  
  34
  
  They're the market leader in horse armor DLC for one :colbert:
  
  25
  
  Kirkbride used some innovative drugs to come up with big parts of Morrowind.
  
  7
  
  Turning bugs into a business model?
  
  2
  
  Literally nothing. They have not created multiple games that dozens of companies have tried and failed to replicate.
  
  -1
- ESO still seems to be trucking along.
  
  3
  
  Eso isn't made by bethesda
  
  1

You've viewed 72 comments.