How did Bioware and Bethesda, RPG masters a decade ago, fall so low?
- Thread starter Segafreak
- Start date
Making a great traditional RPG generally
a) won't make you sell >5 million units, and
b) provides no opportunities for successful ongoing monetization.
In other words, making a great traditional RPG and making a game on an "AAAA" budget are mutually exclusive.
a) won't make you sell >5 million units, and
b) provides no opportunities for successful ongoing monetization.
In other words, making a great traditional RPG and making a game on an "AAAA" budget are mutually exclusive.
I see everybody keeps saying that all the talent left at bioware, but to what extent is that actually the case? It seems more like a case of mismanagement from several levels.
Why are people so confused about GaaS and/or blaming it.
Bioware and Bethesda have been 'chasing' GaaS for decades. Games as a service is just the strategy of putting out some sort of post release content to keep people playing and paying for your game longer. Both companies did this. Bethesda has had expansions and season passes and such in Fallout and Elder Scrolls for the last bunch of releases. BioWare had smaller DLC post release since ME1.
So storytelling fits fine with GaaS. Like anything you can fuck it up or do it well.
And yes MMOs are GaaS. They're one of the first big ones that made publishers chase big post release revenue.
I think because they're expert of specific type of RPG, Anthem and Fallout 76 are outside of their normal expertise
what about horizon zero dawn? that's both AAAA and RPG sold like 10 million copies on one platform
I mean there are exceptions, but I don't think he's really wrong here. Also studios seem to really have trouble monetizing single player RPG content (I'm guessing because the easy stuff that works in GaaS games get laughed at because we'll just mod all that crap in.)
Taking their fan bases for granted, sitting on their laurels, there's many other factors. BioWare and Bethesda are opposites in their issues though.
In the case of Bethesda I blame the streamlining for taking out the character building mechanics. In Skyrim you have basically become a jack-of-all-trades which makes role playing a profession - in a series that has already been very limiting to role playing - pretty obsolete. And then of course the writting went from mediocre to bad...
At least the worlds they craft still remain immersive and worth to explore.
At least the worlds they craft still remain immersive and worth to explore.
Zenimax sure wont. But i would not be so sure that EA will support a giant single player dragon age game. I bet it will also be some sort of gaas game in the end
For what it's worth, I feel most of the output from these studios is still generally okay/good. And not like...fundamentally fucking broken and awful. Although Fallout 76 is apparently a real contender for those titles, and I don't intend to find out first hand.
That being said Fallout 4, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Mass Effect: Andromeda, and maybe to a lesser extent Anthem (again, need to try for myself), are all average games at worst. Some loathe them, but they're not fundamentally busted, generally have a ton of content and decently impressive ambition. All just fail to come together as whole projects.
This is probably kind of a broad answer, but I think a major roadblock both Bethesda and BioWare hit were other studios essentially catching up with modern technology and the scope of the kind of games both are famed for, alongside they themselves failing to modernise and impress with new technology and concepts.
Irrespective to how you feel about either last gen (there's a real argument both made steps towards greater accessibility of their franchises versus older work, which can be seen as regression), all produced generally well rounded, original titles in the landscape of gaming. If just for the scope of their productions and the content they offered. You knew you were playing a Bethesda game. And you knew you were playing a BioWare game. And both were tailored to specific tastes.
Maybe, in this day and age, that just isn't enough any more. Other devs mightn't be making the exact same games, but there's contenders out there, and much of what both companies were know for has arguably become homogenised. BioWare isn't the only studio producing titles with immensely rich world building and lore, and absurd density of voice work. Bethesda isn't alone now producing worlds that can be explored, begging for immersion. We mightn't be drowning in exactly these kinds of games, but with Guerilla and Horizon, and CDPR and The Witcher 3, we're seeing more developers put in seriously impressive work into these massive, open, semi-RPG type games that encourage exploration and discovery. And developers are pushing harder on narrative across the entire medium, leading to more dialogue, larger casts, and more professional performances.
So with the standards raised last gen, and now others catching or outright caught up, there's a real argument that what Bethesda and BioWare are offering aren't bad, but also lack an original hook that capturing modern audiences in the way they did last generation. Maybe their games are, to put it bluntly, far too familiar and unambitious, and maybe the market has moved on to other titles. Their games are instead at best technologically competent and updated clones of their design template from the previous generation, with most attempts at ambition unfortunately squandered under either technical barriers or production difficulties, which again draws comparison as other developers simply do better with the same ideas. Fallout 76's open world co-op RPG stuff really isn't original; the online faux-MMO survival sim genre is older, littered with titles, and developers have learned lessons the hard way Bethesda failed to. BioWare started exploring more open, quest riddled, crafting laden concepts in Andromeda and Inquisition, but again are amateurish in their expression and design versus more experienced developers.
So yeah, I dunno. I do think both are home to very talented developers. And I don't think any have output I'd label catastrophic (I mean, again, Fallout 76 aside). But I do think both may legitimately be victims of time, and a failure to adapt to growth.
That being said Fallout 4, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Mass Effect: Andromeda, and maybe to a lesser extent Anthem (again, need to try for myself), are all average games at worst. Some loathe them, but they're not fundamentally busted, generally have a ton of content and decently impressive ambition. All just fail to come together as whole projects.
This is probably kind of a broad answer, but I think a major roadblock both Bethesda and BioWare hit were other studios essentially catching up with modern technology and the scope of the kind of games both are famed for, alongside they themselves failing to modernise and impress with new technology and concepts.
Irrespective to how you feel about either last gen (there's a real argument both made steps towards greater accessibility of their franchises versus older work, which can be seen as regression), all produced generally well rounded, original titles in the landscape of gaming. If just for the scope of their productions and the content they offered. You knew you were playing a Bethesda game. And you knew you were playing a BioWare game. And both were tailored to specific tastes.
Maybe, in this day and age, that just isn't enough any more. Other devs mightn't be making the exact same games, but there's contenders out there, and much of what both companies were know for has arguably become homogenised. BioWare isn't the only studio producing titles with immensely rich world building and lore, and absurd density of voice work. Bethesda isn't alone now producing worlds that can be explored, begging for immersion. We mightn't be drowning in exactly these kinds of games, but with Guerilla and Horizon, and CDPR and The Witcher 3, we're seeing more developers put in seriously impressive work into these massive, open, semi-RPG type games that encourage exploration and discovery. And developers are pushing harder on narrative across the entire medium, leading to more dialogue, larger casts, and more professional performances.
So with the standards raised last gen, and now others catching or outright caught up, there's a real argument that what Bethesda and BioWare are offering aren't bad, but also lack an original hook that capturing modern audiences in the way they did last generation. Maybe their games are, to put it bluntly, far too familiar and unambitious, and maybe the market has moved on to other titles. Their games are instead at best technologically competent and updated clones of their design template from the previous generation, with most attempts at ambition unfortunately squandered under either technical barriers or production difficulties, which again draws comparison as other developers simply do better with the same ideas. Fallout 76's open world co-op RPG stuff really isn't original; the online faux-MMO survival sim genre is older, littered with titles, and developers have learned lessons the hard way Bethesda failed to. BioWare started exploring more open, quest riddled, crafting laden concepts in Andromeda and Inquisition, but again are amateurish in their expression and design versus more experienced developers.
So yeah, I dunno. I do think both are home to very talented developers. And I don't think any have output I'd label catastrophic (I mean, again, Fallout 76 aside). But I do think both may legitimately be victims of time, and a failure to adapt to growth.
These. The second quote explains how.
Give it a rest. It's not "hate boners"(what a stupid term). People love/loved both of these studios and are disappointed in the direction they seem to be going.
Bc those older methods didn't come with the tag GaaS. That was just expansions and DLC. The modern day approach has evolved and with it came a new name.
I agree they could do what they've been doing, but when I say GaaS I don't mean the older methods even if those now fit under that term.
1) Game development have skyrocketed. They put multi in Mass Effect 3 not sure if it generated any $$
2) Making a big budget AAA single player rpg is a money sink
3) Anthem feels imo about 80-90% complete, it wasnt ready for release but EA had a deadline, this is not a case like Crackdown 3 where the game was fundamentally flawed, had they released Anthem in the fall it could of been the beginning of a flagship series poised for continuation on the next gen systems..instead, its probably going to flop and wouldnt be surprised to see Bioware shut
2) Making a big budget AAA single player rpg is a money sink
3) Anthem feels imo about 80-90% complete, it wasnt ready for release but EA had a deadline, this is not a case like Crackdown 3 where the game was fundamentally flawed, had they released Anthem in the fall it could of been the beginning of a flagship series poised for continuation on the next gen systems..instead, its probably going to flop and wouldnt be surprised to see Bioware shut
Face it, BioWare failed to utilized their core strengths to make a strong multiplayer GaaS. The problem isn't with games-as-a-service here, it's unfortunately with BioWare.
Truth.
Fallout 76 is not the latest game that BGS proper has worked on, that would be Fallout 4 which is fantastic (as long as you ask anyone not from this forum). Even if BGS proper did create 76, one game (and their first online one at that) does not mean the studio fell from grace. What kind of expectations are those that one bad game makes a studio shit?
Genre lines are blurry, but Horizon is less of an RPG than even Assassin's Creed.
The problem isn't GaaS though. Those games always fit the label.
The issue now is the melding of a few things into gaming as a whole. Businesses saw free to play monetization able to make bank and want to combine that with the explosion of day 1 sales for maximum revenue. And then the trend of early access and ability to put out games and finish them later, which isn't a GaaS problem. It's a problem with the fact that the games can be fixed digitally so the board room sees no real reason to delay until they're ready. They see early access games making billions while not officially finished and it's hard to make the case they should wait.
That's the issues going on here, not games as a service. Getting good content after release is fine. It can be handled well or not, as anything else. It's when it combines with a product not ready to release and maybe tweaked for a more f2p like loop that gets people irritated. But bug ridden messes can happen with non GaaS games, too.
This narrative that only era doesn't find Fallout 4 a FANTASTIC GAME is tiresome, untrue and old. And quite ironic seeing as every community on the internet says the same thing about their own userbase (only NMA hates Fallout 4! only reddit hates fallout 4! only 4chan hates fallout 4! only gamefaqs hates fallout 4! only Facepunch hates fallout 4! only insert forum hates fallout 4!)
Anthem was always a really poor match given the strengths of Bioware. But even considering that it falls bafflingly short of expectations so I'm not sure what happened there.
Fallout 76 is clearly a "let's just shit something out while our important games are still in the oven" type of thing. But it turns out creating a massive world with tons of content and multiplayer for the first time for the team and engine is far too ambitious for that. I wouldn't worry too much about it. (I would worry because of Skyrim and Fallout 4, but that's another discussion)
Fallout 76 is clearly a "let's just shit something out while our important games are still in the oven" type of thing. But it turns out creating a massive world with tons of content and multiplayer for the first time for the team and engine is far too ambitious for that. I wouldn't worry too much about it. (I would worry because of Skyrim and Fallout 4, but that's another discussion)
In Bethesdas case it comes down to not having a good relationship with its fanbase. I mean any developer would kill for a player base as dedicated as Bethesdas. When you can release game after game on the same busted assed engine and have people volunteer to fix and improve on it time and time again. What seems to be the best course of action is to improve upon the games by building a better engine and continue making games for your established can base while maybe tweaking it slightly so that new players can see what all the fuss is about.
What Bethesda seemed to do was try to monetize mods in a way that gave them the biggest cut of the money and make fallout games for people that didn't like fallout games. Even in 4 it felt like it plopped all the selling points right in the starting area, you like power armor? Closest mission and it's yours. Want a dog? There's one right outside town just hanging out. Bethesda makes interesting games, they don't make good ones.
What Bethesda seemed to do was try to monetize mods in a way that gave them the biggest cut of the money and make fallout games for people that didn't like fallout games. Even in 4 it felt like it plopped all the selling points right in the starting area, you like power armor? Closest mission and it's yours. Want a dog? There's one right outside town just hanging out. Bethesda makes interesting games, they don't make good ones.
The Witcher 3 sold over 20M, Horizon Zero Dawn (new exclusive IP)is probably close to 10M or more, Skyrim has sold even more than The Witcher 3.
High quality games will sell a ton, especially RPG/Open World.
MMOs seem to have a lot more content and cost much more money to produce. Without the content, it seems like grinding and balancing are much harder to nail. Pacing suffers. Hence anthem's tomb issue. I don't know. I'm not convinced yet shlooters with campaigns of these types (ie with these gameplay loops) work.
Is it just resetera which hates Fallout 4? I mean Im well aware that it sold virtually a shit tonne at launch but I feel as though people are forgetting the cumulative effect of goodwill, hype and word of mouth. Fallout 4 was always going to sell well.The fallout community alone and the previous success of skyrim was going to make sure of that, but going forward is the next fallout games success as guaranteed as before.
Now that the critical good will is gone for bethesda games, the studio is now under more scrutiny from the customer base and the quality will be judged a lot more harshly going forward.I still see Bethesda going through a mild decline trajectory similar to Biowares if they dont tighten up their quality and writing.
Now that the critical good will is gone for bethesda games, the studio is now under more scrutiny from the customer base and the quality will be judged a lot more harshly going forward.I still see Bethesda going through a mild decline trajectory similar to Biowares if they dont tighten up their quality and writing.
Only ---- hates Dragon Age 2, only --- hates Mass Effect Andromeda, only ---- hates DAI. Thess statements might be true if you take a narrow view of the games community but Anthems release has taught me that negative press can certainly build up and screw you over if you arent carefull.
Last edited:
The market demanded these games, like it or not. All the profit is in games as a service now, and gamers eat it up. At least with Bethesda, they went out and bought a separate studio just to make Fallout 76. Bioware on the other hand, put all their talent and strength into Anthem. That has to hurt worse for them, although I will say Anthem is a better game than 76 and has the potential to turn it around. On the bright side here, Bethesda is committed to Starfield and TES6 and Bioware is working on Dragon Age next. It's not the end of the world for either studio by any means and they both have a bright future ahead.
How was Bethesda ever an RPG master? I find their games are nothing special. Not bad, but not amazing either
BioWare has been iffy since ME3 and Bethesda was never great. Plus it's not like people aren't going to fall over themselves hyping the next RPG by either company, no matter what it is, the minute gameplay is shown.
It happens every time.
It happens every time.
That's what I'm saying. Fallout 3 was meh (all fallouts made by Bethesda are meh minus fallout shelter, that tells you all you need to know about Bethesda)
Did you play Morrowind back in the day? Was it not a great RPG?