Bethesda Softworks - Changing Approach to Single Player

Changing approach to single player by focusing on multiplayer?

Todd Howard deserves the rage he gets online.

Eh? In the interview he clearly differentiates between the upcoming single player games like Starfield and the new Elder Scrolls and the upcoming multiplayer games like Fallout 76. He says that single player games will continue to be important for Bethesda. Good news, no?

Originally Posted by you
What does it mean to change ones approach to SP ?

Sounds like a main theme for another Torment game.

Originally Posted by Pongo
Eh? In the interview he clearly differentiates between the upcoming single player games like Starfield and the new Elder Scrolls and the upcoming multiplayer games like Fallout 76. He says that single player games will continue to be important for Bethesda. Good news, no?

How can they be good when people want them to be bad?

Someone is wearing their Bethesda pajamas right now

Not in this heat, believe me. Added bonus info: Not wearing much at all

But someone never takes off his PB fan badge

Originally Posted by Ramman
Changing approach to single player by focusing on multiplayer?

Todd Howard deserves the rage he gets online.

Nah I see it meaning some type of co-op or live element in all future SP games.

Hint: Creation Club Content and GameHub.

Originally Posted by Pongo
Eh? In the interview he clearly differentiates between the upcoming single player games like Starfield and the new Elder Scrolls and the upcoming multiplayer games like Fallout 76. He says that single player games will continue to be important for Bethesda. Good news, no?

He also put Wolfenstein: Young Blood with TES and Starfield when talking about single-player game, but Young Blood is a 2 players co-op game (that you can play solo).

Ahh - fair point then! I haven't paid much attention to the new Wolfenstein, didn't realise it was primarily co op. Hopefully not an indicator for the new TES or Starfield.

I would love co-op in TES 6 and Starfield - if they're anything like their past games.

Done properly, it would greatly enhance the experience for me.

That said, I don't think Bethsoft will implement co-op in those games. There's certainly no financial incentive evident, as their games are so popular without it. They would be risking more than they stand to gain, I think.

But in terms of what's best for the actual games - I think co-op is a natural evolution.

Co op in games doesn't bother me as long as the single player experience is good. If I had any friends I'd even give it a go. Seeing that isn't the case though, games primarily designed around co op don't interest me at all.

Originally Posted by Pongo
Co op in games doesn't bother me as long as the single player experience is good. If I had any friends I'd even give it a go. Seeing that isn't the case though, games primarily designed around co op don't interest me at all.

DOS 2 certainly seemed to retain its popularity. In fact, I'm surprised more people haven't bitched about the multiplayer around here.

Might have missed it, though

As for how games are designed, I only care if they're fun. I don't make my like or dislike of individual features into some kind of principle about the whole thing - because principles make people stupid as the brain stops evolving within the context of that principle.

I’d love to see co-op come to elder scrolls series. Story lite sandbox environment seems ideal for co-op.

Wish I had the ability to host a fully modded skyrim with my son and a few friends. I would think it would greatly enhance the experience.

Originally Posted by sakichop
I’d love to see co-op come to elder scrolls series. Story lite sandbox environment seems ideal for co-op.

Wish I had the ability to host a fully modded skyrim with my son and a few friends. I would think it would greatly enhance the experience.

How old is your son? If he's not too young, then FO76 is probably going to be quite similar.

I think Joxer managed to call it an mmo somewhere; but to be honest I played it single player and never noticed it was designed for multiplayer. I did play (during beta) ds multiple player and it was fine but I mostly prefer to play single player. This way I don't have to worry about folks yelling at me because they disagree with my perspective.

Originally Posted by Darth Tagnan
DOS 2 certainly seemed to retain its popularity. In fact, I'm surprised more people haven't bitched about the multiplayer around here.

Might have missed it, though

As for how games are designed, I only care if they're fun. I don't make my like or dislike of individual features into some kind of principle about the whole thing - because principles make people stupid as the brain stops evolving within the context of that principle.

I'm going to guess there will be even less choice during character build.

Thinking of Skyrim as the backdrop for my comments here. If they implement co-op, I'd want it where someone can come into my world to help me but the story would stay focused for me. Vice versa of course when I'm the one helping a friend. This keeps things simple.

Also, the game would necessarily need difficulty to motivate people to play co-op. While co-op in Skyrim still might have been fun, it hardly would have been compelling, outside of just wanting to play with a friend for the sake of it, even if you could double the difficulty of the hardest setting. If they could get some Dark Souls-like combat and encounters going on… that together married with the gameplay of Skyrim would be great, imho…

I'm really hoping for much more combat difficulty in Elder Scrolls games. Without the tension of combat being difficult, gear and items don't mean much. There was a lot of gear and items and spells and skills in Skyrim, but you hardly needed any of it because combat just wasn't hard. With all the hub-bub about shouts… I never used them.

Originally Posted by rjshae
I'm going to guess there will be even less choice during character build.

Considering how much has been stripped since Daggerfall, I do sometimes wonder if the next Elder Scrolls game will feature Joe with a healthbar.

Originally Posted by TheMadGamer
If they could get some Dark Souls-like combat and encounters going on… that together married with the gameplay of Skyrim would be great, imho…

Color me uninterested if they make another Dark Souls clone or something similar. This seems to be another trend with certain developers lately. Just look as The Surge and other RPGs for examples. At the end of day just not cup of tea thank you very much.

Originally Posted by TheMadGamer
Considering how much has been stripped since Daggerfall, I do sometimes wonder if the next Elder Scrolls game will feature Joe with a healthbar.

Well simple is Better is the Bethesda motto.

I believe that is taken form interview with Tod Howard about how they evolve each game. Basically they try to make things simpler/ more refined for every new game.

Originally Posted by Couchpotato
Color me uninterested if they make another Dark Souls clone or something similar. This seems to be another trend with certain developers lately. Just look as The Surge and other RPGs for examples. At the end of day just not cup of tea thank you very much.

No no, I didn't say I wanted the next Elder Scrolls game to be a Dark Souls clone.

But if I could swap out the combat of Skyrim with the combat of Dark Souls, that's what I'd like. Combat in Dark Souls is fun and challenging. Marry that up with the sandbox world of Elder Scrolls and I think it would be fun.

But if any conversation that includes the words, "Dark Souls" is unacceptable, then I'd just say that Elder Scrolls needs better combat that is harder and more challenging and motivates the player to seek out gear, spells, and other abilities because they actually matter.