This isn't surprising. Todd Howard already stated that given the choice between fidelity or framerate they would choose fidelity every time. It's disappointing that he thinks that's still what people want in 2023, but it's not surprising.
I wouldn’t say that’s accurate at all. Especially since providing more options to players is never a bad thing, letting them pick performance vs quality.
At least give a performance/fidelity toggle like many games. Especially with how similar the Xbox architecture is to Windows, I’ve always wondered why devs can’t use some of the same tools to give console players more graphical options.
This helps the game be better on PC and later consoles. I'm down for it, it's a welcome decision. And yes, I'm still salty they mixed levitation in Oblivion because of consoles.
Well it’s not that surprising a decision. Game studios are perpetually stuck in an arms race. If they made a game that looked like Skyrim but was more compact, faster, bugless, and allowed variable frame rates… would they get anywhere near as much attention?