Devolver Digital - Sums up the Industry

I don't get the Bethesda comment. Bethesda have consistently given us great games with hundreds of hours of content and full modding tools for free. Games that until the missteps of Fallout 4 were the measuring stick for rpgs that came after them. They have never had their own DRM, they have never introduced microtransactions, they have never required an online connection or any other dumb anti-piracy nonsense that never works, and yet all they get for their efforts is hate. People are crying about paid mods, but Creation Club isn't paid mods. Mods still exist as they are and they are free. The Creation Club content creators are being hired by Bethesda as full paid salary jobs internally, or as outside contractors to create official DLC for their games. It is literally no different than say, Nuke World, it is completely optional content that you can ignore if you want, and it doesn't change modding in the slightest. For years, everyone on Nexus has been telling modders that Bethesda should hire them, now Bethesda is hiring them and the same people are saying "F" Bethesda. The increasing old grumpy man syndrome and overall negativity and sense of false nostalgia is turning me away from this site and I have been coming here since day one, being basically silent unless something really bothered me and this hipster hater reality on the internet these days really bugs me. I would have thought an older site would present a more mature viewpoint than that, but apparently not.
 
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They have never had their own DRM, they have never introduced microtransactions, they have never required an online connection or any other dumb anti-piracy nonsense that never works, and yet all they get for their efforts is hate.

Skyrim = Steam
Steam = DRM
On the RPC or the Games Com, one member of an Adventure Games making firm told me that in some countries [and especially world-wide, my words] one just cannot publish a game without Steam anymore, because Steam is nowadys kind of required - not only because of its DRM, but also because of its selling outlet status.

Steam has become some kind of Monopoly - well not so much these das anymore, thanks to GOG.
I bet GOG was only founded because Valve refused to sell older games on Steam.

Steam is - highly cynically and very extremely put - kind of an Stockholm Syndrome : People LOVE their DRM these days !
 
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What are you talking about, hipster hate? You were the freaking first post, nobody said jack or cow patties. No idea what kind of delusion your suffering from, causing you to blame this website, but consider getting medical attention.
 
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@JeremyAlexander
The point I was making with the Bethesda comment was that Devolver Digital wanted that time slot for a reason, to make fun of the big boys.

For the record I generally like Bethesda rpgs for their world exploration and learn by doing. Not such a fan of their latest games because they are not enough rpg for me but they are still enjoyable enough.

Devolvers conference wasn't aimed at Bethesda particularly, check out the headline. And yeah I found it ironic considering Bethesdas reputation compared to the others.
 
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Bravo for this trolling performance where it matters - E3.
Here's hope next year someone, if not DD, will step up their game and do something similar with MMOs, season passes, horse armor DLC and gambling boxes.

In the meantime, here's a clip from it's "spiritual predecessor" that shook the world of anime so hard it got banned (not airing anywhere in the world, won't air ever again and you cannot buy it) - Osomatsu-San episode 1.

1505448828309829267.gif


Yea… WTF is going on in there. :D

-

Steam is - highly cynically and very extremely put - kind of an Stockholm Syndrome : People LOVE their DRM these days !
No. Steam client is a simple software DRM version and thanks to GOG there are plenty of games you get turned into DRMfree just by connecting GOG and Steam account.

There is no Stockholm Syndrome on PC - it plagues rubbish hardware with ofc hardware based DRM. Consoles.
 
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Ignoring the outright comical "Bethesda equals measuring stick of quality" comment, it is actually quite the contrary...Bethesda is receiving and has been receiving a free pass for a long time.
But the monopoly is coming to an end, and not everyone is as forgiving as before. Scam with paid mods, "acquisition" of Arkane and nearly ruining Human Head by trying to do the same, recent review "policy" and milking god knows how many Skyrim ports while putting least amount of effort in fixing issues that mod community has already fixed...why should anyone trust them?
Same issue is with Konami...hugely popular company once, but look at them now after all the crap they pulled recently.
There are companies that receive illogical amount of hate ( Bioware in particular, with overblown SJW nonsense), but be professional and treat your customers fairly and you'll receive same in return: Larian, CDPR and many others.
 
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Sad commentary on what the sheepeople will tolerate I think that Devolver hit the nail right on the head. The throw away society of today applied to games where you would be lucky to get 2 years out of a game before it is discontinued or gimped in some form or other by the publisher is now being taken to the next level where the games are still barely beta quality and they are releasing the next one just like it for full price.
The stupid thing is though people still buy the crap that gets released which lets too many of these corps get away with doing this repeatedly. As for Bethesda they may not be the worst of the offenders but they are far from the most consumer friendly either. They do rake in BILLIONS of $$$$ so they are a fair target as far as I am concerned.
 
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I don't get the Bethesda comment. Bethesda have consistently given us great games with hundreds of hours of content and full modding tools for free. Games that until the missteps of Fallout 4 were the measuring stick for rpgs that came after them.

I like Bethesda, but their greatness is far from consistent. Oblivion and Fallout 3 were nowhere close to being great. Fallout 4 is actually a significant improvement imo.
 
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People wearing those silly shirts clapping for pre-orders at the Xbox conference was funny and sad at the same moment.
 
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I don't get the Bethesda comment. Bethesda have consistently given us great games with hundreds of hours of content and full modding tools for free. Games that until the missteps of Fallout 4 were the measuring stick for rpgs that came after them. They have never had their own DRM, they have never introduced microtransactions, they have never required an online connection or any other dumb anti-piracy nonsense that never works, and yet all they get for their efforts is hate. People are crying about paid mods, but Creation Club isn't paid mods. Mods still exist as they are and they are free. The Creation Club content creators are being hired by Bethesda as full paid salary jobs internally, or as outside contractors to create official DLC for their games. It is literally no different than say, Nuke World, it is completely optional content that you can ignore if you want, and it doesn't change modding in the slightest. For years, everyone on Nexus has been telling modders that Bethesda should hire them, now Bethesda is hiring them and the same people are saying "F" Bethesda. The increasing old grumpy man syndrome and overall negativity and sense of false nostalgia is turning me away from this site and I have been coming here since day one, being basically silent unless something really bothered me and this hipster hater reality on the internet these days really bugs me. I would have thought an older site would present a more mature viewpoint than that, but apparently not.

I think you'll find that people have different preferences for different reasons.

A lot of people don't like Bethsoft games and don't consider them measuring sticks of quality.

Personally, I would tend to agree with you - that they make great games worthy of much praise, but I prefer Fallout 4 to both Fallout 3 and Skyrim.

But you're absolutely right that some people, here on the Watch, are completely irrational in their position towards certain big companies, specifically Bioware and Bethesda.

When I say irrational, I mean they conjure up complete fantasies to justify their dislike - or outright hatred - instead of looking at reality or the bigger picture. They use every excuse they can come up with and skew or distort every available fact to serve their misguided point of view.

They seem to be utterly clueless when it comes to the reality of the gaming industry - and specifically the publisher model and reality of business. All they care about is not getting what they want from strangers that are under zero obligation to provide for them.

I guess that's human nature - and some people don't feel they need to have rational reasons for much at all.

That's not likely to change, though.

Personally, I sometimes take pleasure in pointing out the utter nonsense of their arguments - and they get a little upset.

Won't change anything - though - especially not if the silent majority don't mind one lie spoken after the other.

Seems that these gaming bigots represent the norm around here these days, but what can you do.

Key is to not take it personally :)
 
People wearing those silly shirts clapping for pre-orders at the Xbox conference was funny and sad at the same moment.

I wasn't even aware that happened. Googled and got this instantly:
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?p=241101999
As for my most hated moments…

- People clapping at the "announcement" by Phil Spencer that the game revealed during the Microsoft press conference were all available for Pre-Order. Same thing for the "announcement" that all Xbox One accessories were forward compatible with Xbox One X.
Is bringing rotten tomatoes even allowed at E3?
I wouldn't throw 'em on Spencer, he did what people in his position are supposed to do, bulshitting the audience. I'd throw those tomatoes on the applauding sheep herd.
 
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They seem to be utterly clueless when it comes to the reality of the gaming industry - and specifically the publisher model and reality of business. All they care about is not getting what they want from strangers that are under zero obligation to provide for them.

I guess that's human nature - and some people don't feel they need to have rational reasons for much at all.

That's not likely to change, though.

Personally, I sometimes take pleasure in pointing out the utter nonsense of their arguments - and they get a little upset.

Won't change anything - though - especially not if the silent majority don't mind one lie spoken after the other.

Seems that these gaming bigots represent the norm around here these days, but what can you do.

Key is to not take it personally :)

Regarding publishers we want what we want. Reality be damned, I still want adventure games to make a major comeback.

People disagreeing with your conclusions means you have either failed to convince or you did not argue to the point they were trying to make. I think most people here are willing to concede to logic barring of course personal preferences in gameplay and the like for which there is no objective true.
 
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People disagreeing with your conclusions means you have either failed to convince or you did not argue to the point they were trying to make. I think most people here are willing to concede to logic barring of course personal preferences in gameplay and the like for which there is no objective true.

I'm afraid I don't think "most people" are willing to concede to logic if it goes against their emotionally entrenched position.

That's essentially the problem and why it's irrational.

I will say, though, that we have more people on the Watch with an open mind than I've seen in most forums. Well, we used to have - not so sure anymore.

But there are certainly people around here where logic has no impact whatsoever when it comes to Bethesda or Bioware.

It has nothing to do with personal preferences - because we're not talking about the games themselves - but the people who make them.

For logic to work, people have to listen first - and they have to be willing to be wrong in public - which is rarer than one might think.

Even the more reasonable around the Watch struggle with openly admitting that they're wrong.

Beyond that, it's my experience that logic is much harder to grasp for people than you'd think.
 
The stupid thing is though people still buy the crap that gets released which lets too many of these corps get away with doing this repeatedly. As for Bethesda they may not be the worst of the offenders but they are far from the most consumer friendly either. They do rake in BILLIONS of $$$$ so they are a fair target as far as I am concerned.

Pretty much...gamers tend to overreact ( given the nature of the hobby), but it goes both ways and no one complains with illogical positive reactions.
As for Bethesda, when you're a top dog, you're held up to higher standards and few... very, very few will consider theirs adequate.
And their more recent actions ( Bethesda publisher) speak for themselves, no matter how we mince words here.
 
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Sad commentary on what the sheepeople will tolerate I think that Devolver hit the nail right on the head.

It was one of the most embarassing conference moments (along with the PC conference)
A monetized denounciation of people looking for bucks.
By their own scale of values, they set themselves as the worst in the lot.
 
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But there are certainly people around here where logic has no impact whatsoever when it comes to Bethesda or Bioware.

I don't think that is the case with most people here. I would say that most people are first older and were playing those two companies games when they were making their mark in the gaming world.

As one grew bigger and one sold their sold, you have to admit their games became more geared towards pleasing a larger amount of people(making more money).

This is not to say at times threads here about either of them don't go off the rails into complete silliness. Though the fault is equal to the people that love their games as don't care for them as much.
 
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I don't think that is the case with most people here. I would say that most people are first older and were playing those two companies games when they were making their mark in the gaming world.

As one grew bigger and one sold their sold, you have to admit their games became more geared towards pleasing a larger amount of people(making more money).

This is not to say at times threads here about either of them don't go off the rails into complete silliness. Though the fault is equal to the people that love their games as don't care for them as much.

First of all, I don't see it that way - that all they're doing is appealing wider.

I've followed Bethesda for many, many years. One of my best friends knew Julian Lefay - which was one of the key creators of TES, and we often talked about games and the design philosophy behind them.

Essentially, the core vision has remained more or less intact since Arena - but it became a bit more focused when Todd Howard took over. Morrowind was a break from "bigger and bigger" - and it became more about creating a smaller world where the content density they're aiming for is plausible. Daggerfall, for instance, was mostly generated from algorithms - and they could never have created unique content to fill it.

However, it has always been about providing the player with an immersive world full of freedom. They've always focused on evolving the technology to get closer to a "simulation" of a world - which is the reason why they focused on Radiant AI and were among the first to use Speedtree tech to create realistic forests.

For every game, they've taken great strides in providing more freedom and more ways to "live" in the world. They were also among the first to provide a convincing simulation of horse riding - and stuff like realistic physics for archery.

So, in my opinion, they're getting closer and closer to their original vision.

Very unlike most big developers, they haven't grown in many years. They've chosen to stay at ~100 developers - because they feel that's the best compromise in terms of creative control versus the ability to create enough content.

But, yes, the budget has grown and grown - along with their ambitions.

You can't be ambitious and have a huge budget when developing AAA games without making concessions to serve the market. That's 100% impossible under the publisher model.

So, it's very true that their games aren't quite as obtuse and hardcore as Arena and Daggerfall. Because they can't get closer to their vision with a small budget and small development team.

What's really ironic is that CDPR, for instance, is MUCH bigger team - and they've made a TON of concessions in the name of appealing wide. If you compare Witcher 3 with Witcher - for instance - there's a monumental difference in handholding and "convenient" mainstream features.

In Witcher, you actually had to read the journal if you hoped to complete quests - and you didn't have convenient senses that essentially solved everything for you.

For whatever reason, that's not a problem for people here - but the Oblivion/Skyrim concessions is a big deal.

I find that so deliciously hypocritical and silly, really :)

Anyway, my point doesn't really relate to the games themselves.

To me, it's perfectly natural to dislike games - or even hate them. I have no problem with that.

The silly and irrational part is when you project your feelings about a computer game - unto the developers of that game - without, at the very least, considering that they're not living their lives to serve your preferences. They're not necessarily trying to make the best games they can in YOUR eyes - but in their own eyes, given the limitations of the publisher model.

THAT is what I find so pathetic and irrational. People don't seem to have a clue what it takes to be a full time developer aiming high in their own way.

But I'm not saying most of the Watch are like that. We have a few around here who're particularly stupid when it comes to Bethesda - but not most.

I would say, though, that around half of the Watch are not thinking things through when they're bashing developers.

I mean, if you want to bash someone - bash yourself for supporting capitalism which is the reason for how the publisher model works.

Bash the publisher - not the developer, if you must. But the publisher is really only subject to capitalism as well. It's a shared responsibilty.
 
I refuse to bush workers. There is only one person (type) I will bash.

22-2508_230409.jpg
 
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