The lead designer of The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim has discussed the difference in design philosophy between Bethesda games and Larian’s Baldur’s Gate 3.
It’s worth noting that this guy is talking not of old Bethesda but modern Bethesda. The writing team behind Morrowind and half of Oblivion absolutely cared about the details that only 1% of people might see. Morrowind especially is a world built around you exploring the world building. It’s not about levelling up (wowee I can miss the flying fuckheads 2% less now), it was about exploring the politics and cultures in the world.
At some point, Bethesda games became about the mechanical exploration, about going over there because that looks like it might be interesting, oh it’s just a cave with combat in it oh well maybe over there will be interesting.
No. Dragon Age: Inquisition, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, and Baldur’s Gate 3 all draw influence from Skyrim. I think open world games are better because of Skyrim.
Dragon Age: Inquisition and Witcher 3 both began development in the same year Skyrim released. I don’t know if I can really say they were influenced by Skyrim because of the timing, but I haven’t played either.
Baldur’s Gate 3 drawing influence from Skyrim I will have to vehemently disagree with. That assertion just makes no sense at all.
Skyrim is a great game… for its time. Todd Howard is the blight on the games industry for putting so many resources toward so many Skyrim remasters/re-releases/money grabs. Even if he outsourced all that work, those are dev houses he could have spent their time helping Bethesda actually fill their huge open worlds and perhaps get the same feeling of “every decision actually matters” that Larion did.
It’s worth noting that this guy is talking not of old Bethesda but modern Bethesda. The writing team behind Morrowind and half of Oblivion absolutely cared about the details that only 1% of people might see. Morrowind especially is a world built around you exploring the world building. It’s not about levelling up (wowee I can miss the flying fuckheads 2% less now), it was about exploring the politics and cultures in the world.
At some point, Bethesda games became about the mechanical exploration, about going over there because that looks like it might be interesting, oh it’s just a cave with combat in it oh well maybe over there will be interesting.
Skyrim was a blight on the games industry.
Skyrim is twelve years old.
And the stagnation it caused in the genre is evident, no?
No. Dragon Age: Inquisition, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, and Baldur’s Gate 3 all draw influence from Skyrim. I think open world games are better because of Skyrim.
Dragon Age: Inquisition and Witcher 3 both began development in the same year Skyrim released. I don’t know if I can really say they were influenced by Skyrim because of the timing, but I haven’t played either.
Baldur’s Gate 3 drawing influence from Skyrim I will have to vehemently disagree with. That assertion just makes no sense at all.
Skyrim is a great game… for its time. Todd Howard is the blight on the games industry for putting so many resources toward so many Skyrim remasters/re-releases/money grabs. Even if he outsourced all that work, those are dev houses he could have spent their time helping Bethesda actually fill their huge open worlds and perhaps get the same feeling of “every decision actually matters” that Larion did.
Howso?
So many games wanted to be the next Skyrim, and so they brought over a lot of its systems and design choices. Including the bad ones.
The flood of games going open world, reliance on mods, and marketing through memes.
I can’t think of many games that do that. I can’t really think of anyone that tries to be like Bethesda games in the bad ways.
People enjoy shitting on things and loudly, hyperbolicly saying that they are objectively bad and the worst thing ever. Especially Skyrim.
It’s ok to not like the game or even hate it. Doesn’t make it objectively bad or somehow the downfall of video games.
I was very disappointed with the lack of cities. I wish i had oblivion in skyrim.
Eh, let op make the point before jumping on it like this.
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