Bethesda Softworks - Interview @ Eurogamer

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Eurogamer spoke with Bethsoft's Todd Howard at QuakeCon. We discover that Arkane's game was going to be published by Bethsoft before the acquisition, Bethesda Game Studios has one game deep in development and another in pre-production and more:
Eurogamer: So even id has now gone to two teams, but you guys still seem to be doing one thing at a time. Is there any appetite to change that?
Todd Howard: We kind of overlap, so Fallout 3 was overlapped into Oblivion, so we'll be doing design. We have about 90 people on the team, but not everyone is on the main game. Most people are. We spent time on Fallout 3 during Oblivion so when Oblivion was done we had a design, a concept, and some stuff running for Fallout 3 so we could move the bulk of people onto it.
Likewise with the new game, we were working on it during Fallout 3. We had design, we had concepts, we had stuff we knew we wanted to do.
But it is one big team, and the nice thing about that is it's everybody's game. We have one culture. I spend a lot of my time on the game that's in pre-production, but the new game that's percolating takes the most of my time.
More information.
 
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Good interview. I'm pretty sure the game Todd is talking about is a new Elders Scrolls game. I wonder where it will be set?
 
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I'd love to know what they are working on.
 
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Whatever it is, i hope they make it more like MW than Oblivion.
 
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ES: Online.

Hardly. Not with the Gamebryo engine + their MMO's would be handled by ZeniMax Online Studios, and not by Bethesda. It's not an online/MMO game he's talking about..

TES V would be the best news ever :) hopefully more back to what Morrowind was, but that's wishful thinking ofcourse..
 
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Everyone wants to hear that TES V is in development. But I wonder why? Is it so the bashing can start as soon as possible? Strange...
 
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Everyone wants to hear that TES V is in development. But I wonder why? Is it so the bashing can start as soon as possible? Strange…

Or fanboisms?

Says Pibbur who liked both Morrowind and Oblivion very much and would definitely like to see TES V.
 
When TES V was still in development, it was the biggest open-world title announced. Of course people are anxious for TES V. I remember seeing the screenshots and wondering just how such a game would play. I mean, this was hot shit! Don't forget that after the disappointment many felt when they finally got the game in their hands.

To me, walking out of that first cave into the big, wide world was still an amazing moment. I hope TES V can be as revolutionary as IV was with the current hardware.
 
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I wrote what I wrote half seriously and half in jest. The Elder Scrolls games have a real love hate relationship with the fans of the series.

Before a title is released, the fans are all excited about it. Once a title is released, the fanbase has traditionally ripped it apart. This has been the historical pattern since Daggerfall…

When Daggerfall came out, it sucked compared to Arena (and I have real personal insight on this one, as a Daggerfall beta tester - the Bethesda CompuServe forum was filled with hate). When Morrowind came out, it sucked compared to Daggerfall. When Oblivion came out, it sucked compared to… well you get the picture by now.

Somehow, the current release somehow always sucks compared to the prior release. But watch how fondly everyone will recall Oblivion as soon as TES V hits the stores, because as history tells us, TES V WILL suck... compared to Oblivion anyway.
 
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Well, Daggerfall mortally wounded me - but that was before I got this jaded. It was definitely a prime factor in crushing my gamer heart, though ;)

Morrowind and Oblivion both promised the world - and they both failed, but I was less disappointed with Oblivion - and consider it the only game to approach SOMETHING like they promised.

I will most likely get excited about TES V - but I think the time for severe disappointment is over, for me.
 
Yeah, but I still miss getting all excited about games, though… Was kinda fun in itself.

Oh well…
 
I still get very excited whenever PB is releasing a new game. Speaking of which: Still no news? Odd, they've worked on something for close to a year now without anyone knowing anything about it.
 
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If I were to get excited, PB would definitely be the kind of developer responsible for it.

I'm slowly starting to get excited for Deus Ex 3 - because I really think the developers understand the first game. We'll see.

But it's nothing like in the past.

I spent basically an entire summer dreaming about Daggerfall. Endless hours looking at screenshots and reading whatever tidbit you could get, back then.

Those days are long gone :)
 
Oblivion was the game that made me picture in my head the first game where you could walk around a very detailed 3D world. Morrowind was amazing to see, but ran a bit poorly and with low draw distance. In the screenshots of Oblivion, I saw paintings instead of a video game and I dreamt of how it would be to walk around in it all.

Of course that disappointed somewhat later on, but not by much. The same thing I'm hoping to expect for TES V, but I'll probably have to wait for the next generation consoles to see a revolution in 3D worlds... Still...
 
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I wrote what I wrote half seriously and half in jest. The Elder Scrolls games have a real love hate relationship with the fans of the series.

Before a title is released, the fans are all excited about it. Once a title is released, the fanbase has traditionally ripped it apart. This has been the historical pattern since Daggerfall…

When Daggerfall came out, it sucked compared to Arena (and I have real personal insight on this one, as a Daggerfall beta tester - the Bethesda CompuServe forum was filled with hate). When Morrowind came out, it sucked compared to Daggerfall. When Oblivion came out, it sucked compared to… well you get the picture by now.

Somehow, the current release somehow always sucks compared to the prior release. But watch how fondly everyone will recall Oblivion as soon as TES V hits the stores, because as history tells us, TES V WILL suck… compared to Oblivion anyway.
A good observation. I've noticed exactly the same thing since being part of the community at around the time Daggerfall came out (I think I was pointed to it by Ultima dragons). I think the community is basically split into two halves each time - as soon as the games come out half the people don't like it (or claim not to) and complain loudly, while the other half are having way too much fun playing the game to say anything or argue back. Then the devs see the early response, change the next game in the series and it starts to come along. The half that loved the previous game start going on about how they're looking forward it, then when the new game comes out they're dissapointed that the devs listened to the fans who didn't like the last game. So they complain, while those who are now enjoying the new game are quiet.

It seems to have headed that way pretty much directly from Daggerfall->Morrowind->Oblivion as far as I can tell.

Admittedly I was a tiny part of it - I didn't moan because I loved Morrowind, but I did wish it was more like the feel of Daggerfall, so I was very happy when Oblivion came around. I'm sure I'll enjoy TESV, but I'll probably enjoy VI more :p
 
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LOL! That's an interesting observation. Cyclical software behavior in subsequent versions because of 2 polar opposite user groups who are only vocal when unhappy.
 
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