Bethesda - the most overrated RPG studio of all time.

Played Fallout 3.... such a awful game

I didn't mean complex mechanics. I meant complex design. Huge and beautiful worlds, lots of primary and secondary missions, random events, hundreds of NPCs you can interact with, thousands of pickable objects with their own individual physics, etc, etc. I played Morrowind, Oblivion and Skyrim for 300+ hours each, and sure, i found a bug here and there (which is normal on games with so much variables), but nothing major.

So Baldur's Gate II isn't better written than any Bethesda game? Can I laugh at you? A game that can easily be one of if not the best cRPG ever made, and help save the CRPG after the disaster that was Ultima IX. Jade Empire generic? Its a very flawed game, but its far from generic, especially for its time.

All Bethesda does is make good looking worlds, but they are not narratively rich worlds, and really, nothing interesting to find, because of level scaling, my equipment is always better that the unique weapons a find.

Jennifer Hepler is no longer with Bioware, and even that, she is not a bad writer. David Gaider however, other than HK47 in KOTOR, is one of Bioware's weaker writers and I do think this has hurt the Dragon Age series.

However, Patrick Weekes is an excellent writer.

Considering how many employees they have it is not that bad. I dont remember the number of people, but I remember it being pretty small for an AAA studio.

The biggest problem with bethesda is that they are too ambitious. They bite a lot more than they can crew can chew. But unlike BileWare, their heart is in the right place seeing as they...

1. Support modders
2. Promote good mods
3. Promote freedom for their own game devs (though this can also be a bad thing), remember that last week thing they had with skyrim where the designers were told to do whatever they want?
4. Emphasis on gameplay rather than cinematic storytelling.
5. No day 1 DLC

They also have their fair share of problems

1. Combat in their games is always terrible with combat feeling incredibly floaty, enemies repetitive and bland, takes extremely little (if any) skill and redicilous hp bloating because the rpg elements are always terribly implemented. These things are bad to the point to where TES has some of the worst combat I have witnessed in any game. In Skyrim magic suffered greatly from the RPG elements, archery was buggy and had serious issues with invisible walls and lack of regional damage (compared to say Mount&Blade: Warband which registered head shots, body shots and leg shots and did a few more calculations to determine not only range but also damage).
2. The environments tend to be large, but their last 3 games have had very repetitive overworlds.
3. While Tamriel is easily the best setting in all of gaming, the writing is usually rather poor, especially after Morrowind.
4. There is very little quality content in their game. Their games are massive swimming pools, which sounds pretty nice until you realize that you are swimming in well...
5. They add new features that were either rushed or poorly thought out, and add nothing to the large world exploration those games have going for them (sometimes even detracts, which was the case with that awful Smithing skill)

All 5 of those problems could be alleviated at least somewhat if Bethesda toned down the scale of their game, and focused more on adding quality content than 100+ subpar dungeons that can usually be completed within 30 seconds.

Yes Bethesda is the most overrated RPG studio of all time, but don't kid yourself Bioware isn't any better and in some ways it's worse.

Oh and Mass Effect 3 sucked. Fact!

Neverwinter Nights 2 was garbage and if it was the same engine that was used in the Witcher 1 than that just shows how crappy they are at using engines let alone making them.

The Bioware that made Planescape Torment, Icewind Dale and the Baldur's Gate games is long dead!

What's left is some shadowy EA figure that's the same in name only.

I love Bethesda, Bioware, CDPR, Obsidian and even Larian Studios is slowly becoming one of my fav RPG devs

Haters gonna hate

What?

Also, Neverwinter Nights 2 with the Mask of the Betrayer expansion was one of the greatest WRPGs made last gen.

Skyrim and New Vegas were great. Skyrim was one of my most favorite RPGs of the last generation. So no they are not over-rated.

So you don't like Bethesda. Okay. Don't buy their games then.

I agree that New Vegas is much better then Fallout 3.

The mods make them great though.

TC is retarded. Nothing more to say.

Yes, I think they are overhyped. Some of the games are very good (Oblivion and Fallout 3), but few are great (Skyrim), but none is GOTY material. And yes, Fallout New Vegas is a lot better than 3!

Bethesda stands out because they are the only ones who can do what they do. They have spent many years fine tuning their processes for making worlds and have the cash to flesh it out. They probably even have quite a few key patents on certain game concepts. There is a steep barrier of entry for anyone to challenge them seriously, much less a smaller new dev who could inject some fresh ideas.

It's also odd how there always seems to be an ocean of hype behind them, including huge game scores, and after a couple years there is a general realization that after the initial "wow" factor the games are quite shallow

The most overrated is hyperbole.

But yes, Bethesda makes shallow videogames. They make a toy box you can explore, but the moment to moment action, questing, rpg builds/systems are straight up pathetic. Their games make for exceptional escapism, but everything else it does as a game is quite poor.

BUT

It has the single greatest mod of all time. I mean Planescape Torment is cool. Mother 3 is cool. Arcanum is dope. But their combat music isn't as good as dangerzone. Ergo Skyrim 50/10, GOTG, MASTERPIECE, GREATEST OF ALL TIME, etc, etc, etc

I agree, I still play Skyrim now because of the awesome mods

I loved Morrowind and Oblivion, but I have to say that Skyrim was pretty overrated. I liked some of the changes to player mechanics and the leveling system, but the game lacked what made the other games great, that being the quests, and quests of more complexity and multiple approaches to being solved. Skyrim had some really cookie cutter designed quests and it was really a disappointment. Also, I really liked Fallout 3, I thought they did a better job than Obsidian did with New Vegas.

They're a good developer/publisher with a good past, but after Skyrim I worry they're living off their past success and not wanting to put in the time to remaining an excellent developer.

They used to be the best.. until they took an arrow to the knee. Sorry. I'm really sorry.

I like their games though. I'm addicted to New Vegas at the moment.

No that glorious titles goes to Ubisoft

should make a thread .... Bioware vs Bethesda

Bethesda and Bioware are both overrated. Their games aren't the genre-defining masterpieces they're often hyped up to be. Skyrim wasn't even the best RPG of 2011.

it depends, how much do you want to see texasgoldrush having s psychotic break?

The make large, sprawling, epic, open-world, sand box RPGs that let you do whatever you want, whenever you want.

Do they have the most in depth systems and mechanics? No, but you'll be hard pressed to find better large, sprawling, epic, open-world, sand box RPGs that let you do whatever you want, whenever you want.

I agree 100%. New Vegas is worth finishing a buncha different ways to see all the great endings and it's fun every time...

@chaplainDMK: Hey now KOTOR rocked... And was rated T so none of the excessive gore or sex craze.

No, Bioware is better. Why? Because they simply don't repeat the same mistakes over again, not to the degree Bethesda does.

Bioware makes flawed games, but their flaws are new almost every time. They find new ones, and they learn from them. Sometimes they overreact like taking exploration out of ME2 and ME3, or basically what Dragon Age Inquisition is looking like to be. Bethesda on the other hand repeats the same flaws since Morrowind.

Are some Bioware games overrated? Yes. Dragon Age Origins is a huge example, the first Neverwinter Nights game is another, and to some degree, Mass Effect 2 (due to its poor main plot), But that does not make the company overrated. Baldur's Gate II is one of the greatest RPGs ever made, KOTOR was an excellent entry to the Star Wars EU, and Mass Effect as a trilogy is one of the best gaming accomplishments last gen.

and it's been like this since the beginning, but a lot of gamers, even on here I noticed, only started gaming with bethesda this past gen, or started gaming then in general, and it's their first introduction. Back in the morrowind days, the console following was a tiny percent, now it's a lot larger. Elder scrolls games are very much PC-centric and the proper way to experience them

and arena and daggerfall were PC only........wow daggerfall was a mess. It was far too ambitious for its own good.

I appreciate that Bethesda makes these detailed, rich worlds and focuses on single player gameplay (which is becoming rarer), but having said that, I've never really clicked with there games... which is frustrating to me because on paper I should love their games!

If you think JRPGs are real RPGs then that may explain a lot.

Ahhhhh Joy A goldrush thread, actually your beloved Bioware are truly the most overrated RPG studio of all time ( if you can even call the feces they have been dropping of late RPG's), they have one solid masterpiece Baldurs Gate 2 and that's it. Also just for all times sake dragon age 2 is one of the worst RPG games ever made a complete betrayal as far as choice is concerned, unlike the brain melting awesomeness that is the The witcher 2

Typical musala idiot response...oh joy.

Yet, its all as shallow as a puddle.

Its funny how Ultima games (IV and after) have deeper NPCs and world than the Elder Scrolls games even given the age of Ultima games. An Elder Scrolls basically took a lot of hints from Ultima.

@musalala

Making a bad RPG is, by no means, a bad thing. They make good games, cant say the same for Bethesda, good as their RPGs are, they're still bad games.

Complex design only works if it is pulled off. The games always feel unfinished and it seems the developer is unwilling to listen to constructive criticism. NO fan of these games would be upset if the developers pur a little more depth into the combat. It is a series that looks amazing on paper, does a few things well, but fails on so many levels. First the games are glitchy. There are so many bugs it is ridiculous. Second, yes there are hundreds of NPCs but there's just no character--the atmosphere is akin to any random D&D when it was peaked in popularity. The difference here is that D&D had the players breathing life into the characters; it was what the players made of it. In Elder Scrolls you just listen to a bunch of stoic actors--if these people played D&D with a group of enthusiastic people they would not be invited back. This translates into what the actual atmosphere is. It is dull and lifeless.

These games could be so much more and I don't think anybody would argue with that.

The game worlds are enormous, which makes TES games pretty fun to mess around in with mods. It's not like mods (other than maybe the occasional total conversion) make the game good, though. You are still stuck with Bethesda's mini-RPG collection.

CRPG with tactical party based combat, heavy dialogue use and highly interactive worlds with interactive that is relevant are complex and sophisticated.

Skyrim is "just a lot of frivolous shit".

It's like saying Transformers 4 is complex because it's 3 hours long.

@Heirren:

I'm not blindly defending Bethesda, their games are far from perfect. Terrible voice acting, average story and combat, glitches, etc. That said, they are the best at what they do: Open world games where you can spend literaly hundreds of hours doing everything you want without getting bored.

If DS was open world like Skyrim, would be pretty sweet........................................ ............ .... ..

tl;dr

Overrated games and devs for sure, but i still love their games. Ditto for Bioware who are also pretty overrated.

Their writing is ok, their stories are terrible, their dialog is ok but lessened by a piss poor animation budget that always makes things seem odd (like someone laughing uncontrollably while the character model does nothing but sway left-to-right), and their RPG mechanics top out at being decent.

They make great worlds though. They are generally huge and no other open world game is as fun to simply explore the environment as theirs are.

@clyde46 said:

Daily reminder that Bioware are shit.

This comparison would be cool if Witcher games were actually good

@faizanhd: JRPGs have better worlds and stories than WRPGs. Better Battle systems too.

Wrong, nothing beats the setting of Britannia from the Ultima series.

i disagree, i have put more hours into the elder scrolls and fallout games than i have all the other games combined, i admit that there games can be seriously buggy when first released but they are stil the best RPG's ever made in my opinion.

Fallout 3 & Oblivion.

Beth games are awesome when modded to the point of being unrecognizable. It's hard to find better open world RPG's than modded New Vegas/Skyrim. The vanilla versions are pretty bad though especially graphically.