Okay but that's arguing semantics. Sure, you can "fix" any software based product with enough time, energy, and money. But most of the time a failed entertainment product just gets left behind, forgotten, and written off as a corporate loss.
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[Polygon] It may not be possible to save Fallout 76
- Thread starter dex3108
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Also this, XIV was a technical marvel that just sucked to play. They had to rework the gameplay systems which while time consuming and difficult, is not as bad as needing to spend an ungodly amount of money literally creating a new engine to get the thing to work.
The people that kept playing and defending FO76 got exactly what they deserve and was properly rewarded with a buggy incomplete game littered with mtx.
All the negative press, and months go by and they have nothing to show for it. That anonymous person who claimed to work for Bethesda and how this was a cash in with no real plans to support it... believe it. It fees like a skeleton crew is on it for support, cause how do you not try to turn around all the negative press? Show off upcoming plans and content? It feels like they are done with it.
Sure but you'd think you'd want to find a cohesive voice for your site. Like I get different authors and stuff but it is a really weird look when you publish articles within weeks of each other that are at odds with what they are both saying.
The question is how much is it worth to Bethesda to save. Is this a Final Fantasy XIV situation where in the dev's estimation a failure would be an existential crisis for the franchise brand? Or is 76 considered a minor experiment/side project and now they can get back to the regularly scheduled series?
Big difference between any ol' failed product and a broken one. If you ever bought a product that doesn't work as intended, you usually get it fixed under warranty. I don't know if you actually played the game, but it's difficult to describe just how broken the game is, you can't go 5 minutes in that game without something unintended happening. I'm not just exaggerating, the game is legitimately broken on a fundamental level and it was sold this way. Bethesda should be criticized even harder than they have been for shitting out this product and scamming fans with their "GAAS" title that does little more than adjust a few numbers ever few weeks. I'm tired of hearing excuses for Bethesda. I don't care how unrealistic it is for then to fix the game, they owe it to the fans to fix it and that's it.
They are one entity. It's baffling to allow it on the best of 2018 list (which was published well after the game was exposed for what it is) and then run articles like this.
It makes Polygon as an entity seem scattered.
It's like saying that guy who plagarized that worked at IGN doesn't hit their credibility. Of course it does. It wasn't something all of them did but it still hurts their credibility and reliability.
Honestly Polygon putting this on their best of 2018 list was baffling enough.
I was in that group that thought TESO sounded so goddamn stupid. Remember the GAF thread when it got announced in a Game Informer cover story? People were a combination of pissed off and bewildered.
But the game came out and one friend recommending it to me was enough. I jumped in and loved it, despite a few flaws. Then they just straight turned it around into one of the best MMOs I've ever played, and a constant install both on my desktop and laptop, even if I don't play it as much as I wish I did. Part of me was hoping they'd do the same service to Fallout 76, and maybe they still can?
But the game came out and one friend recommending it to me was enough. I jumped in and loved it, despite a few flaws. Then they just straight turned it around into one of the best MMOs I've ever played, and a constant install both on my desktop and laptop, even if I don't play it as much as I wish I did. Part of me was hoping they'd do the same service to Fallout 76, and maybe they still can?
It's not that simple, though. Like, by that logic any game can be fixed with enough time and money, so we'd never say be able to say any game was unsalvageable even though some games are, practically speaking.
ZeniMax is a company with finite resources and it needs to keep selling games to keep itself viable as a going concern. Taking a team off a future game that they can sell for money to spend years working on free updates for a game people already bought just isn't going to be possible for them, practically speaking.
Your example of FFXIV at least had subscriptions.
Saying that it is not possible, practically speaking, for ZeniMax to spend huge amounts of resources salvaging FO76 is not the same thing as making excuses for them releasing the game in the state it was in.
Are there so few games that some part of the community is still playing this ?
C'mon man. Let it die. Even if you like Fallout Universe, MORE REASON why you should let it die faast.
C'mon man. Let it die. Even if you like Fallout Universe, MORE REASON why you should let it die faast.
They really did. It also helps it's not on TES engine, but something Zenimax built.
There's just next to no chance Bethesda can patch the Fallout 4 engine to a good enough level to save Fallout 76 as an online game.
Yep, and it still surprises me when I realize just how many hours of enjoyment I've gotten out of TESO.
They really turned that game around.
Dude. Those games released patches that made the game better each time. Bethesda released patches that is making the game worse. That's the reason this article exists. Bethesda are actually fucking up even more than they did at launch.
This really, really underscores my point, hahah. Initial reception is 80% of mindshare; "you only get one chance to make a first impression" and all that. There are few second chances in this crowded business.
I'm with the author on this one. I actually really enjoyed my time with it, despite the bugs. But when the cheating/duping got bad, and the patches seemed to reintroduce bugs or punish honest players, that's when I decided to put it down.
When/if new content comes and if they can truly stabilize it for honest players, I'll definitely be back. There's a lot of great FO storytelling in it, even with the hard limitations they placed on themselves with not having living NPCs in the game. The Order of Mysteries faction questline is such a highlight, for instance, and I'm really disappointed that so many people won't get to experience it because of the technical and balance issues FO76 is dealing with.
I really want to have a reason to go back. There's a lot of really great games out right now and, if I'm being brutally honest, the more time that goes by without good news about FO76, the more I'm starting to lose faith. :(
When/if new content comes and if they can truly stabilize it for honest players, I'll definitely be back. There's a lot of great FO storytelling in it, even with the hard limitations they placed on themselves with not having living NPCs in the game. The Order of Mysteries faction questline is such a highlight, for instance, and I'm really disappointed that so many people won't get to experience it because of the technical and balance issues FO76 is dealing with.
I really want to have a reason to go back. There's a lot of really great games out right now and, if I'm being brutally honest, the more time that goes by without good news about FO76, the more I'm starting to lose faith. :(
This game was botched from the git go...... i think the best thing they can do at this point is shift focus to StarField and whatever the sequel to Skyrim and make sure those come out with no fuck ups. they really need to take a step back and recalibrate after this disaster
I'm pretty sure Bethesda will sweep this under the rug and pretend like it never existed while they move on to Starfield, Elder Scrolls, and Fallout 5.
Bethesda have always been very sloppy in terms of bugs. Some of it may be a side effect of the ambition behind the games, but I still feel there have been way to many problems and issues with their releases. The performance of Skyrim on PS3 is particularly grating.
Online focus games are far more troublesome, and far more sensitive to the sort of jank that Bethesda are known for.
I have no opinion on whether or not the game can be "saved" or if it needs to be saved, but I do not that the sort of halfassery Bethesda releases won't fly in a GAAS.
Online focus games are far more troublesome, and far more sensitive to the sort of jank that Bethesda are known for.
I have no opinion on whether or not the game can be "saved" or if it needs to be saved, but I do not that the sort of halfassery Bethesda releases won't fly in a GAAS.
I think that is going to be a very common strategy going forward. It used to be that any GaaS type of game would get pulled if it bombed out of the gate. But there are multiple examples of games that, through some combination of tweaks or massive sweeping reimagining, became hits long after being written off as dead. Elder Scrolls Online, Rainbow Six Siege, Fortnite, Warframe, even something like Hitman in a way, all wound up succeeding because they invested the time in after release to improve the product.
Now, for 76, the negative PR might just be too much to overcome. And it would take a LOT of smart decision making going forward. But it probably has a long leash, and I wouldn't be surprised to see them pump content and fixes into it for atleast a full year before considering changing things up. The people saying that it'll shut down or go free to play this year are completely out to lunch.
There ain't nothing to cool your jets on Starfield quite like bearing witness to what came of Fallout 76.
Fallout 76 got rushed out way too fast and it shows the longer you play it. It was sadly made clear that the intention was to turn a profit rather than deliever a noteworthy Fallout experience considering the amount of issues that plagued the game at launch and continued for several months later. It is a shame too since it had a very interesting premise, but hell knows that it collapsed in on itself and the end result was an ongoing joke that has one punchline after another.
People are seriously underestimating the time, effort, and all-nighters that went into the FFXIV overhaul. Japanese workers have a hardcore culture when things are going well. Imagine how seriously they took it when the pride of their mainline series was at stake. These workers probably lived in the office. Literally working 24 hour days.
Will Bethesda drop everything to save FO76? Or will they pretend it never existed? Hmmmm.
Will Bethesda drop everything to save FO76? Or will they pretend it never existed? Hmmmm.
Lol... saw this the other day.
Man, I am so hyped for this. Something I heard from GameInformer's 131 rapid fire questions thingy that I really liked
Is there hacking in the game?
Yes
Does the minigame suck?
No, because there is no minigame
Thank you
Yes
Does the minigame suck?
No, because there is no minigame
Thank you
edit: I don't know why the fuck the spoiler tag's acting that way... edit2: hmmm... that was weird.
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Maybe they'll pour resources into QA now.
QA can't do shit about a game getting pushed out of the door before it's ready. Even less so if its way undercooked to the extent this one was.
I believe Fallout 4 got its official roadmap in March 2016. I'm expecting a roadmap for 76 in the same time frame.
If we reach May, the six month anniversary, without a solid roadmap, I think it's pretty fair to say that the game is dead.
At the very least it'll be $10 by then.
If we reach May, the six month anniversary, without a solid roadmap, I think it's pretty fair to say that the game is dead.
At the very least it'll be $10 by then.
It's beautiful. The menu flows through the luscious landscape of West Virginia with Fallout's signature soothing music, and the error message isn't even that intrusive.
Modders could still salvage it, if only Bethesda would push out private servers.
Instead, we get patches that reintroduce old bugs and new PvP modes for a game flooded with duped super-weapons.
Instead, we get patches that reintroduce old bugs and new PvP modes for a game flooded with duped super-weapons.
This game could have so easily been saved with a proper roadmap, LIKE EVERY BASIC LIVE GAAS DOES, and proper resources but it truely does feel like the game was handed to a skeleton Live crew.
Their bug fixing priority is completely out of whack and inefficient. The game is woefully unbalanced and they nerf/buff as if none of them actually play the game. In 3 months they have achieved little in actually making more than a tiny % of weapons and skills viable because of their boneheaded enemy resistance design.
Worst of all, there is 1 end game activity that is insanely unbalanced and inconsistent. Not to mention the half thought out pvp and workshop system. With the inconsistent loot drops, (3 star legendaries and scorch queen beast dropping fuck all loot, you risk your server crashing at any moment losing all the resources/time/workshops you invest because they STILL haven't stabilized them. A situation made alot worse by the dupers who've run rampant breaking the in-game economy. Then to double down on their worst fucking feature and announce a new PVP mode instead of pve content was just so braindead. A mode where dupers will be allowed to bring their broken shit INTO IT because they can't detect them.
It's just insane how much wasted potential this game had. These idiots thought having poor community managers on Reddit constantly saying, we hear you and have passed on the feedback to the developers, would shut people up for more than a month.
They created an inventory simulator in the apocalypse. I wouldn't be surprised if upper management has just written it off and made them mostly move on.
From a business perspective, the thing I don't understand at all is their Atom Shop priority. Who thought it would be a good idea to offer fucking mailboxes and sleeping bags? What market testing did they do to determine that yes, this is what people want to buy? Meanwhile, basic shit like weapon skins haven't been added at all and are limited to 3 weapons.
Their bug fixing priority is completely out of whack and inefficient. The game is woefully unbalanced and they nerf/buff as if none of them actually play the game. In 3 months they have achieved little in actually making more than a tiny % of weapons and skills viable because of their boneheaded enemy resistance design.
Worst of all, there is 1 end game activity that is insanely unbalanced and inconsistent. Not to mention the half thought out pvp and workshop system. With the inconsistent loot drops, (3 star legendaries and scorch queen beast dropping fuck all loot, you risk your server crashing at any moment losing all the resources/time/workshops you invest because they STILL haven't stabilized them. A situation made alot worse by the dupers who've run rampant breaking the in-game economy. Then to double down on their worst fucking feature and announce a new PVP mode instead of pve content was just so braindead. A mode where dupers will be allowed to bring their broken shit INTO IT because they can't detect them.
It's just insane how much wasted potential this game had. These idiots thought having poor community managers on Reddit constantly saying, we hear you and have passed on the feedback to the developers, would shut people up for more than a month.
They created an inventory simulator in the apocalypse. I wouldn't be surprised if upper management has just written it off and made them mostly move on.
From a business perspective, the thing I don't understand at all is their Atom Shop priority. Who thought it would be a good idea to offer fucking mailboxes and sleeping bags? What market testing did they do to determine that yes, this is what people want to buy? Meanwhile, basic shit like weapon skins haven't been added at all and are limited to 3 weapons.
I'm all for opinions but I would love to read the justification for giving Fallout 76 any sort of praise.
Actually, Square did the very thing you're saying they didn't do. They dropped Crystal Tools and spent an ungodly amount of money to build a new engine for FFXIV 2.0, and did a massive overhaul of the server code.
I really hope the gaming public remembers this mess once the next Beth game comes out, stop ignoring the glaring issues they've had for years and both pre-orders and reviews reflect this fact. If 76 is to be the game that took the rose colored glasses off everyone in regards to Beth games, then it served its purpose.
I was never troubled by bugs too badly, or connection issues. I played 60 hours or so and had fun. But I stopped because "there's nothing left to do". And it doesn't seem like there's anything in the pipeline either which is a shame
FO4 was a full featured single player game. FO76 is an online game, and you can't release an online game without continual proper support for it. 6 months to announce any new content for an online game that was being sold for full price is a huge mistake. And with all the bad press they are still being silent?