From experience I know I'll be downvoted but it is a pretty goddamned impressive engine. And yes that is even considering that Skyrim was buggy, what, 12 years ago?
this post was submitted on 12 Oct 2024
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It's still buggy after 13 years of patches and re-releases.
People said that but I played the game I'm sure over 100 hours and bugs impacted maybe .2% of my playing time.
People remember Skyrim bugs because they're funny.
Have they played their own games?
Bethesda RPGs are fun. But I'd say they are far from "perfectly tuned." Always found them to be wonky, clunky, bug-riddled.
When was the last RPG they released that didn't require tons of patching?
It was 10 years into playing Skyrim on my 4th medium of playing it that learned the courier wasn't supposed to be naked. I thought it was a comment on his poverty or something
Got something to deliver. Your hands only.
The problem with the latest Bethesda games has not been the engine. It’s the writing and the design choices
the writing, yes
but if their engine is "perfectly tuned" then that means their engine is informing their design
they can't make good design choices because they have to work within the limitations of an over-fitted engine
they can’t make good design choices because they have to work within the limitations of an over-fitted engine
Maybe that's why Starfield has become a 50% game, 50% loading screen.
They just dont want to invest the time to overhaul the engine or start from scratch. Even Call of Duty managed to do this.
“Even one of the largest and most well funded game franchises in history did this”
Elder Scrolls probably fits this category as well - not as much as Call of Duty but Bethesda probably has amongst the best RPG sales of anyone. They sold a hilarious number of copies of Skyrim alone.
Call of Duty is known for recycling as much as possible to pump out yearly games, I was actually surprised to hear they convinced management to give them time to rebuild the engine.
Besides, doesn't Bethesda Game Studios have more employees than Infinity Ward?
I think they (and by that I mean management) just don't want to spend the time getting the developers themselves up to speed on a new system. They've used the current one for so damn long, they likely based all scheduling on the fact that most of the people working there know it inside and out.
They've probably also put considerable work into the next project already and don't want to start over.
They've probably also put considerable work into the next project already
fallout 4 was 9 years ago, and people wanted them to switch to a new engine then
you're right, of course, but good lord have they had ample time to course correct since then
The train in fallout 3 was just a guy with a train for a head running along a track
That may bd silly to think about but it worked.
People wanted them to switch to a new engine for Skyrim. They claimed they were using a new engine, but it was the same old pig with makeup.
josh sawyer has said their engine has the best content creation pipeline he's worked with, which is probably why they're reluctant to give it up
but surely at this point they have to be doing something in the background to move to a different one. i seriously doubt they didn't try to get space-to-surface flight working, but evidently the engine didn't let them...which is more or less the same story as every other time they've tried to break out of the mold they've carved for themselves. it always ends up a janky mess.
whenever they build out actual new mechanics for the engine, like the settlement building in fo4, or the space flight in starfield, they're always just grafted on, rather than being interwoven with existing systems.
Sounds more like “We’ve tried nothing, and we’re all out of ideas!”
People really need to understand what an engine is before complaining about it.
counterpoint: if it isn't the engine holding them back, then everyone left is just fundamentally bad at designing games (i'm not counting "let's just copy what we designed last time" as design), and that's worse
then everyone left is just fundamentally bad at designing games
Obviously. The problem with Bethesda was never the damn engine, they've been consecutively dumbing down their games ever since Oblivion. The only anomaly was New Vegas made by Obsidian, which are actually competent at making RPGs and even with the dated FO3 engine at the time they managed to make one of the best games ever. The problem was never the engine, it's their game design philosophy.
the average player doesn't care about crunchy rpg systems. they do care if the core gameplay would've been outdated in 2010.
bethesda doesn't seem to be able to improve the core gameplay because the engine can't cope.
Perfectly tuned to churn out mediocre crap. Checks out.
Mediocre fun crap, please.
Are they, though? Starfield was so lifeless that I felt scammed even getting it for under $50 on release.
It makes sense. It would be pretty costly to train everyone there on a new engine and tweak the new engine enough to play nice with the kind of games they want to make.
I mean it is, but it might be less costly than continuing on the proprietary engine. CD Projekt and Halo both cut their losses and moved to UE5 as a compromise moving forward .
If CD Projekt, creators of one of the best RPGs of the last 20 years, thinks they can benefit from an engine switch I’m inclined to think they might be right.
Skyrim is a better RPG than anything CDPR made, and Skyrim isn't a good RPG.
Perfectly tuned my bubbley ass bro
Just give this over two decades old crypt of an engine up already
Perfectly tuned is not the right environment for creativity.
"perfectly tuned" means their game engine is coupled to their game design, which yeah, more or less makes genuine creativity impossible
not to mention the psychological factors, like the hurdle of convincing higher ups to try something new when simply not doing that is 10x less work