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'We Need to Change Course' — Bethesda Boss Tells Staff the Company Must Focus on 'Our Strongest Franchises' as Xbox Layoffs Hit Hard (www.ign.com)
submitted 4 months ago by to c/games@lemmy.world
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[–] 44 points 4 months ago (31 children)

What else have they been busy with? Just Starfield?

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  • [–] 35 points 4 months ago (20 children)

    Seriously, it isn't like Bethesda has a long list of IP to work with here.

    Other than Elder Scrolls and Fallout (which they should already be assumed to be focusing on to begin with), the only other IPs that are still alive would be DOOM and maybe Wolfenstein,

    Dishonored is dead, Quake is dead, they shuttered Tango so no continuation of Hi-Fi Rush or Ghostwire, RAGE is dead.

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  • [–] 9 points 4 months ago (5 children)

    Unfortunately, Bethesda decided to spend all their time working on Starfield. The only thing they had when they revealed the ES6 trailer, was the video. And that's because they knew they'd get lynched if they didn't annoubce ES6

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  • [–] 2 points 4 months ago (4 children)

    its not unfortunate that bethesda tried something new, more companies should be doing that. i do not want another sports franchise, call of duty, or far cry just churning out games ASAP with lessening quality

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  • [–] 4 points 4 months ago (3 children)

    I get where you're coming from, but I don't think that was a risk. Bethesda-style games take awhile to make, and they only have gotten longer. They used to be 3 years between releases between Arena, Daggerfall, and Morrowind. Then it was 5 years between Morrowind, Oblivion and Skyrim. And now it's been over 15 years since Skyrim. And Fallout hasn't been much better, with Fallout 4 releasing 10 years ago.

    And there's 2 main reasons for the dearth of Bethesda releases: Bethesda really needed to split into 5 teams: 3 creative teams for their main franchises (Elder Scrolls, Fallout, and Starfield), 1 for programming (Creation Engine updates, bug fixes, etc.), and 1 for finishing (Q/A, clutter). Right now, almost everything needs to go through Todd Howard. They need to instead have Todd be in charge of 1-2 creative teams, and have other people take the reigns of the others because Todd only has so many hours in the day.

    They could probably get back to releases every 3-5 years for each franchise and have enough wiggle room to take chances with delegation

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago (2 children)

    for sure, but i also think with starfield overhauling the engine and then COVID happening threw a gigantic wrench into bethesda's future. we'd have probably gotten es6 by now if not for that

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  • [–] 2 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    The engine overhaul for Starfield definitely took a lot of time. I still want to see what they could do with it in an ES game, or even porting older games into the new version.

    I think it'd be cool if they used some procedural generation to place trees in forests, so you could cut or burn some down and have the forest naturally grow back over time. Or officially add in seasons

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago

    theyve actually had procedural generation in all elder scrolls games, though for those it was purely for scenery and then touched up when needed, while in starfield it was for whole planets with procedural POIs and some touch ups on specific planets

    i am really excited for es6 because of starfield, the jetpacks are very fun and it gives me hope that levitating will come back from morrowind

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  • [–] 5 points 4 months ago (7 children)

    Hi-fi got picked up by a different studio, didn't it?

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  • [–] 3 points 4 months ago (4 children)

    Not as far as I'm aware.

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  • [–] 8 points 4 months ago (3 children)

    Tango was purchased by Krafton and HiFi Rush 2 is supposedly in the works.

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  • [–] 3 points 4 months ago (2 children)

    Oh sweet.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago (1 child)

    Eh, we will see. I am excited for hi-fi rush 2, but after the subnautica 2 debacle... we will see

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  • [–] 2 points 4 months ago

    Tango is still Tango, even if they now have to shoulder the yoke that is Krafton. I'm still excited for more Hi-Fi Rush.

    Krafton did lose massively in that attempt and the original Subnautica creators are getting everything they are owed plus some.

    Subnautica 2 is definitively a Subnautica game, going back to what made the game great in the original instead of the flop that was Below Zero. So, I'm pretty confident Hi-Fi 2 will be good and maintain the vision of the first game.

    Still, whether or not I'm paying for it depends on how much Krafton wants fuck around.

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  • [–] 4 points 4 months ago (4 children)

    Oh is it Bethesda and ID software now? I didn't know they merged. I knew ID software helped with Starfield, but I thought they were still separate.

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  • [–] 15 points 4 months ago (3 children)

    The Bethesda-id software-ZeniMax shit is so confusing, especially since Microsoft acquired Zenimax, and by extension Bethesda and id, in 2021.

    They are "technically" separate but Bethesda is still the primary publisher of id software's games, and thus they do fall under their umbrella.

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  • [–] 5 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    Asha Sharma had this statement, in amongst the rest of it. As per Ars Technica:

    Some decisions in the gaming division currently pass through “14 layers” of decision-makers, Sharma said, before promising that the new Xbox will be a “flatter organization” with “no more than 5, and where possible, 3” layers of management involved in any decision.

    You'd have to think that it's this shit that she's pointing at. Massively excessive management certainly helps with all the design-by-committee cookie-cutter crap that's filled with monetisation. Alas, they've just got rid of the really interesting studios that I'd like to see spread their wings a little.

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  • [–] 2 points 4 months ago

    Yea, bit of a double edged sword and doubly so with who is swinging it.

    Glad they see it's a problem of structure that's getting in the way of creation but their methods of trimming the excess has sadly closed a lot of my favorite studios.

    I will never get a Prey 2 no matter what iteration it seems.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 months ago

    It's similar to Google and Alphabet, the "child" company created the "parent".

    Bethesda created ZeniMax, ZeniMax own Bethesda (And ID, and Arkane), and then Microsoft bought ZeniMax and all the child companies.

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  • [–] 5 points 4 months ago* (4 children)

    TES6 for sure and possibly a new Fallout, if rumors are true. Also don't Bethesda handle Doom, now? There's gonna be a DLC to Dark Age coming out tomorrow.

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  • [–] 11 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (2 children)

    Also don’t Bethesda handle Doom, now?

    No, id Software is the developer company, which is owned by the publisher and published by Bethesda Softworks, both of which are owned by ZeniMax. The "Bethesda" that does actual game development is called Bethesda Game Studios; they handle franchises like Fallout and TES.

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  • [–] 5 points 4 months ago (1 child)

    Which one is talking in the article though? I am not sure who Jill Braff is; boss of the game development studio, or the larger publishing part of "Bethesda?" I thought Todd was the main person in charge of the game dev studio part, so I assume this is coming from the publishing part of Bethesda.

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  • [–] 3 points 4 months ago

    Let me preface this with the fact that I like Bethesda games, fallout, Skyrim, starfield, I enjoy them all.

    Does anyone else feel like they are all kinda the same game.

    • elder scrolls: medieval Bethesda game
    • fallout: apocalypse Bethesda game
    • starfield: space Bethesda game

    They share like 90% of the game mechanics.

    I could see cutting back on these if they were all radically different, but they all few so similar to me, almost interchangeable.

    But I’m sure not innovating and pumping out cash grab sequel after cash grab sequel will work, that works really well right? In a few years we can all read the “how Bethesda got beat by {scrappy upstart that actually provided interesting new games}” articles that try to piece together the mystery.

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