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Is Elder Scrolls 6 doomed to fail? I can't see how it will work

After the massive blunder of Starfield, I cannot see how Elder scrolls 6 could possibly be successful. Everything points to the fact that they knew that the game was not even half finished, in my opinion, with major glaring issues, and they decided to just send it off anyway. The difference between this game and Oblivion is that this time, it wasn't light-hearted and filled with silly mistakes that made people laugh. It instead inside it a lot of anger and disbelief as to how they could fail so spectacularly with a AAA title...

But this has not been the first time that Bethesda as a whole has failed, and is in fact the third strike. They failed spectacularly with Fallout 4, which took the gaming industry by surprise after seeing how poorly developed it was, and the extreme low quality of the story, how unfinished the game was, how simply broken many areas and features were, I could talk about it for hours. Biggest thing to me was the poorly made settlement system that barely even worked because there was no snapping, and it felt like playing an indie game. The second strike was Fallout 76, crazy how disappointing his game was and even to this day is still broken and in disarray. It's only been able to survive purely because of microtransactions...

Then, you look at what most people are playing right now, and it's Skyrim. Above any other game out there, it's Skyrim. The similarity between Skyrim and Elder scrolls 6 doesn't really matter that much, the age is what you should really focus on. Why are people playing such an old game still to this day? Hint, it's because every single other title they've released has been a disappointment.

Personally, I have no faith or belief that Elder scrolls 6 will be anything other than a colossal disappointment. I don't see how Bethesda as a studio can possibly manage to produce AAA titles anymore, I think they have a budget of half of what they need to have, and it's only getting smaller each year as costs are being cut, and People are being laid off, stakeholders and stockholders want more revenue growth than ever before. It's unbelievable honestly. They expect infinite growth with minimal headcount that keeps shrinking

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  • Financially, I'm not sure if you could say that starfield or fallout 4 was a failure.. Look at steamcharts player counts as an indication. All time peak concurrent players:

    Skyrim: 90,000

    Skyrim SE: 79,000

    Fallout 4: 470,000

    Fallout 76: 72,000

    Starfield: 330,000

    Sure skyrim has sold on many platforms and over time likely has sold the best, but you can't say that starfield and fallout 4 were commercial failures. Starfield being on game pass day 1 means the real concurrent numbers would be enormous.

    I've not played starfield and agree it looks like shit, but TES VI is likely going to sell gangbusters to mainstream audiences given how much Skyrim broke into the mainstream.

    I agree with you that Bethesda isn't what they used to be with TES Morrowind - Skyrim era and desperately need to get rid of that engine. But for the metric that truly matters, sales, I don't know what it would take for TES VI to fail.

    • I think there's two definitions of successful in gaming today. First is financially successful, it generated some decent profits for the stockholders. Second is how it was actually perceived by the community as a whole. Oblivion was spectacularly well received and made game of the Year edition. Fallout 4 was heavily criticized, but still somewhat successful in terms of the community reaction. Starfield was globally frowned upon, as someone who has played that exact game, it's horrible. I honestly feel like that game is a one out of 10. 1.0 out of 10 would be my exact rating if I had to give it one. It's not going to get the cyberpunk treatment, so sure maybe it'll break profits and be considered financially successful. But I don't think that game should ever be considered a success in any other aspect

      • A 1 out of 10 for Starfield is ridiculous; either hyperbole, or you haven't played many video games before to see what a 1 out of 10 would truly be. I was very disappointed by it too, but level set a bit here.

        • I couldn't take this post seriously with how much subjective opinion is stated as fact. Fallout 4 is one of my favorite games, but that doesn't mean I'm blind to its faults and shortcomings. That being said, I can't read something that's claiming extremely broad negative things like Fallout 76 is still "broken" and only lives because of MTX" without acknowledging "why people are playing this and microtransacting if the game is broken and irredeemable?" And without defining what is broken and what is not.

          I think Starfield was a wake up call for Bethesda. They need to heed it and keep up with the times, get back in touch with the simulational and unique things that they were known for and can still carve a niche out of, and not rest on their laurels as the rest of the gaming landscape innovates around them.

          As soon as the unique and interesting mechanics and systems have been eclipsed by Bethesda's failure to make an exceedingly polished and innovative game, people stop justifying the jank and the public opinion falls off. Starfield is their last sign to turn the ship around.

        • I remember buying mistmare on cd back in 2003. That thing was a broken mess of a game that crashed constantly, and no returns once you open the seal. Kids these days don't know what a 1/10 game really is, lol. That game was so bad most of the (short) Wikipedia page on it is about it's low scores, including a 0/10.

        • A 1 out of 10 for Starfield is ridiculous; either hyperbole, or you haven’t played many video games before to see what a 1 out of 10 would truly be

          I've played 20 years worth of games. My criteria is actually very logical. What is the scale of the company and their resources, the budget, past releases, and then finally, the game itself: How many hours do I get out of it? How linear is it? How believable is it? How captivating? Replayability? I give Starfield a 1.0/10 in all of these. Keep reading if you're curious why

          Linearity: This game is almost entirely linear, despite being called a "sandbox". There's no point whatsoever to wandering around away from the main storylines. Unlike Skyrim, Oblivion, hell even Fallout 76... You can't just go wander off and find some new awesome area to do interesting stuff in. You find a new area, but it's bland, has nothing interesting, or is very short-lived. So you're basically coaxed back to just go finish the main story, with is such a linear and plain slog.

          Believable: There are so few important choices to make, none of them really feel meaningful either. Also, the story just feels so cheesy. It's so bad. You're wandering around with a cowboy and his pre-teen daughter shooting people in the face, really? Yeah, that makes sense. All your companions are judgmental and never STFU with the 'holier than thou' attitude, forcing you to basically be good, or to be lectured constantly and nagged. Towns feel pointless and unbelievable. Not a single town I visited felt like a real place. For example, the western style town felt like Westworld. It was so clowny.

          Replayability: Once you've done the entire storyline, there's literally no reason to replay the game. It's such a linear and unimaginitive story that there's really nothing worth going back and seeing again

          Now why is this a 1.0 out of 10? Taking the company size, their past projects, their capabilities, their support network (the entire mod community of all their games).... They had the potential to make SOMETHING better than this, but it was clearly rushed. It's also highly unlikely they'll give it the Cyberpunk or NMS treatment, leaving it bland, boring, broken... for $70. Unbelievable. The fact that a multi-million dollar company backed by Billion dollar Microsoft could produce this is just ridiculous.

      • I think you're missing the point that the majority of l companies don't care about the quality of what they release. Large pro consumer companies like Valve and Lego (I couldn't think of any others video game related), who might be willing to let their bottom line fall in favor of improving relations with the customer, seem to be very much in the minority. For most others, the only thing that's important is how the bottom line is affected. Starfield, for all its flaws, was the #11 bestselling game of 2023.

        Now, you could be onto something when you mention Bethesda's poor track record, and how that might play into ES6's release. If they keep making disappointing games, maybe there will be a "boy who cried wolf" type situation where, since Bethesda keeps making disappointing games, no one will want to buy ES6 by the time it comes out. Personally though, I don't think that's very likely. The reality is that many (if not most) consumers don't even know who makes the games they buy, nor do the look into the other games that company makes. And for the ones that do, more still probably don't care. I think no matter what there will be a sizable amount of people who see Elder Scrolls 6 and go "Hey, I liked Skyrim, this'll probably be great!"

      • First is financially successful, it generated some decent profits for the stockholders.

        This is the only sort of success they care about. Anything else is secondary. These companies gladly burn bridges with their communities so long as they believe it'll benefit their bottom-line.

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