Obsidian Comments On Fallout 76's Reception

AlphaAtlas

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Fallout 76's had a rocky launch, to say the least, and many have used previous Fallout games as a reference point to call out what exactly went wrong. Obsidian's own take on the Fallout universe, Fallout: New Vegas, is often cited as one of the best in the franchise, and the developers just posted a video directly addressing Fallout 76. Unsurprisingly, Obsidian is sympathetic to Bethesda's situation, as they say it's "painful" to see a game developers pour countless man hours into not live up to expectations, and the studio notes they've had some serious failures in the past.

Check out the video here.

"This isn't meant to be negative - it can probably be taken as negative. We really enjoyed making Fallout: New Vegas and people really enjoy Fallout: New Vegas," Urquhart says. "Bethesda is looking to take the Fallout brand in a different direction. There's nothing right or wrong about that. That's their choice. They own it, they get to do what they want with it. But in our mind, there are people that enjoy where Fallout was. That is what we wanted to do with The Outer Worlds, to give people that. And you know what? Maybe that's a bad decision from the standpoint of the number of people that will buy it. I don't know… People seem to really enjoy what Fallout: New Vegas was, so let's give them an experience that's as similar as we can to that."
 
My understanding is that it's not going to be as open world as FNV was. From what I've seen it's going to be semi-open world with a well fleshed out role playing / dialogue system.
Imho that is positive. I mostly didn't liked the FO franchise, lots of stuff to do but most/all of it feels cheap. (didn't play new vegas though)
I would prefer a shorter experience with quality content instead! Or even better, as much content but of high quality.
 
Give the people what they want. Huh that almost sounds like sound business advice. Who would have ever guessed that giving customers what they want is a good idea?

Just realized my phone autocorrected giving to fucking lol.
 
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I'm surprised they didn't give up like every game company out there gives up if there is 1-2 duds.
 
Give people what they want, or tell them, "if you don't like it, don't buy it." I wonder which one is sound business advice.
True, true. A certain portion of the gaming market really like what FNV offered. Companies have to recognize that if they change the formula, they're going to lose some part of those customers, and have to make it up by appealing to other potential customers. At the same time, though, customers have to realize that "different" doesn't necessarily mean "worse." Just because the latest game in your beloved series doesn't match the style that you're used to doesn't mean that it's a worse game.

Contrast this to, say, Windows 10, which isn't just different, it's significantly worse than Win7 in a significant number of ways. (yeah, I couldn't resist the dig)
 
I don't know, there might be brown, gay, or female people in this Obsidian game. They have a history.
Actually they stated this game doesn’t have any romance options because it complicates and railroads a story and they wanted to avoid doing that. So your character is only as straight or gay as you choose to make them in your own little offline fan fic head cannon.
 
Anyone else notices that in an obsideon fashion they took the best elements of borderlands, fallout 3/4, and FF15 and smashed them together into a title and called it originality?

I mean minus the clunky looking squad NPC AI(which is usually retarded intellectually no matter the game) it looks like its going to be a blockbuster title most of us will enjoy. I certainly plan on buying it if it reviews checks as good as their videos show. I just can't help but feel they took the cheap shot by playing 100% safe mechanics rather than trying anything new.
 
Fallout New Vegas was an amazing game and I hope this new one has the same quality. The video was certainly great.
 
As a huge fan of previous bethesda games and launch day destiny player, I of course had to try out 76. Was very disappointed. It was like if destiny ate fallout 4 and the diarreah it crapped out was fallout 76.

It was empty and lifeless as a fallout game it was stiff and unsatisfying as a destiny game.

TLDR: F76=Windows Mobile OS
 
Anyone else notices that in an obsideon fashion they took the best elements of borderlands, fallout 3/4, and FF15 and smashed them together into a title and called it originality?

I mean minus the clunky looking squad NPC AI(which is usually retarded intellectually no matter the game) it looks like its going to be a blockbuster title most of us will enjoy. I certainly plan on buying it if it reviews checks as good as their videos show. I just can't help but feel they took the cheap shot by playing 100% safe mechanics rather than trying anything new.

at this point in gamings history, giving people what they want and releasing a polished product IS original.
 
Actually they stated this game doesn’t have any romance options because it complicates and railroads a story and they wanted to avoid doing that. So your character is only as straight or gay as you choose to make them in your own little offline fan fic head cannon.

I don't know, there could still be brown people who aren't being shot and female people are aren't being rescued.

All kidding aside, I hate romances in RPGs they always play out like crap and just end up being a min/max method to get a bad cutscene that will inevitably fade to black.

The only good romances in any game ever were in Saint's Row 4.
 
I was just thinking it would be cool to start on a failing space station, that was supposedly mans last bastion, or somethung like that and have to abandon it due to an environmental disaster like micro meteorites finally breaching a reactor, or batteries failing etc. See the station explode?? Maybe. Then crash down and get scavenged by the BOS and from there anyones bet.
 
I mean yeah it's great and all that Obsidian is comforting Bethesda game studios and yeah it's a shame with that much man hours and effort...but the customers are the ones who bought it, if it didn't live up to expectations it should have never been released in that state, mistake after mistake that could have been avoided, they even repeated the same problems with Fallout 4 in 76 that they full well knew about.

Todd Howard keeps saying BGS is more than Fallout and ES, and I would respectfully disagree, BGS probably wouldn't exist if it wasn't for those 2 franchises, so why fight it, if that is what the fans that support you buy it's economics 101 you keep making it otherwise it's money left on the table, I mean because any game that wasn't Fallout or ES did well like WG hockey? Come on here, you have a responsibility not only to your shareholders but to your patrons to make a product they want and will buy, It would be like porsche saying hey we are tired of making the 911 turbo So they stop making it...........I can't even imagine the balls that it would take to say that to your fanbase/customers.

Grant it there are entitled and toxic gamers, but there are toxic people that work at studios and publishers, and despite what you may think you aren't entitled to making a crappy game expecting there to be no backlash and people will just buy it up at record millions/billions of profits when you don't deserve it.

I mean why do these people think we all hate EA and their business tactics.
 
I was just thinking it would be cool to start on a failing space station, that was supposedly mans last bastion, or somethung like that and have to abandon it due to an environmental disaster like micro meteorites finally breaching a reactor, or batteries failing etc. See the station explode?? Maybe. Then crash down and get scavenged by the BOS and from there anyones bet.


I pl ike that but my ideal would be like its failing space station and you go around and repair and clear out the old corrupt leadership, like a mix of George Washington and judge dredd.

Kotor you were like jedi judge dredd.
 
If they use the F4 engine I'm in. If not ... maybe.

Gamebryo/creation engine is widely panned for its awkward animation and physics. Your statement is very upstream, so I am curious what abilities or features you are concerned about them losing?
 
Hell no! That engine needs to die! I'm sick and tired of editing the .ini files.
You mean the edits that 99.9% of the time has been proven to be completely placebo?

Outer worlds is using UE4 hence it's multiple mentions to having much smaller world segments.
 
You mean the edits that 99.9% of the time has been proven to be completely placebo?

Yes, the edits that fix mouse acceleration, FOV, shadows, frame rates (see poltergeist bug) and a slew of other tweaks that the developers should have fixed a decade ago, yes those edits. Oh wait they don't because the games are made for consoles, its up to the PC players to fix their shortcomings.

Brah, do you even Gamebryo? Try playing Any of the Gamebryo titles at 121fps or above and see what happens, :jimlad:
 
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Yes, the edits that fix mouse acceleration, FOV, shadows, frame rates (see poltergeist bug) and a slew of other tweaks that the developers should have fixed a decade ago, yes those edits. Oh wait they don't because the games are made for consoles, its up to the PC players to fix their shortcomings.

Brah, do you even Gamebryo? Try playing Any of the Gamebryo titles at 121fps or above and see what happens, :jimlad:
Very few of those edits actually do anything. Most of the ones that actually do something invoke older segments of the engine you do NOT want to invoke. bMouseAcceleration is entirely 100% a placebo setting btw. No effect whatsoever on any Bethesda title ever published.
Also, you can actually run any gamebryo game at 120 fps. Multiples of 60 work just fine. The issue comes more from a lack of consistency in frames. Even the "poltergeist" but is generally related to users turning off vsync.
You'd be very amazed at how many "bugs" are caused by users editing crap in gamebryo they don't understand. Ugrids was and still is hilarious to see in "tweak" guides.

Gamebryo made for console. I almost spit my coffee out.
 
Very few of those edits actually do anything. Most of the ones that actually do something invoke older segments of the engine you do NOT want to invoke. bMouseAcceleration is entirely 100% a placebo setting btw. No effect whatsoever on any Bethesda title ever published.

Gamebryo made for console. I almost spit my coffee out.

Are you for real right now? Because I can tell you that they do work. Ever had the flickering shadow bug in Skyrim? You can fix it by setting the sun time limit in the .ini file. Same with Mouse Acceleration 100% fixed. So don't tell me and others they don't work because they do. I've been fixing their damn shitty code for over a decade, all the way back to Morrowind.

Please don't spit your coffee out, its wasteful :)
 
Are you for real right now? Because I can tell you that they do work. Ever had the flickering shadow bug in Skyrim? You can fix it by setting the sun time limit in the .ini file. Same with Mouse Acceleration 100% fixed. So don't tell me and others they don't work because they do. I've been fixing their damn shitty code for over a decade, all the way back to Morrowind.

Please don't spit your coffee out, its wasteful :)
Yes, I am for real. Its utter placebo. bMouseAcceleration not enabled in any Bethesda title. Any effect you think you see from editing those aspects of the ini files is a figment of your imagination. This has been confirmed multiple times by bethesda themselves as well.

The "flickering" effect fix was due to driver/game level conflicts. bDeferredShadows should not be changed. All your "fix" did was temporarily disable a feature that had a bug(actually think I remember this one. It was a driver level bug).

I've actually worked with gamebryo before and I can honestly tell you almost every single setting in the INI is binary or doesn't work. You might have minor arguments about some features you may like or dislike but as far as "fixing a bug" nothing there does anything remotely of the sort.

Without derailing this thread just for a quick cheat sheet:
ugrids will kill your game. Period. Dot. End. Don't touch it. DONT.
All shadow settings generally require texture edits or are modified from the launcher/game just as easily. Additional edits beyond the menus is only applicable with performance starved machines by selectively disabling elements to simulate the full shadow package.
LOD settings are editable mostly. They also cause the most performance impact per pound of edit. Most of them are not even editing spaces you can actually see anyway.
sResourceArchive is generally safe to edit if you aren't an idiot and need to redefine paths for mods(you probably don't though)
prefsini is more editable but again they don't really do anything beyond the menu settings.


ANY thread function is either disabled or HORRIFICALLY buggy and were not used for a REASON.

So you can change LOD functions so being on top of a mountain shows .0001% more detail at a distance. You can edit shadows above default at a performance penalty and fidelity you will absolutely not notice anyway since the in-game menu shadow settings are quite broad to begin with. All other edits that actually do anything useful are represented by the games menus. Unless you for some dumb reason really want to edit precombines out of the game.
 
blah blah blah TLDR I think I'm buying this Outer Worlds game I've never heard of. Where the hell did this thing come from? FN NV was great, I'm still playing it (I'm slow).

I guess I should read the rest of the thread now.... I'll be back

read it. didn't miss anything
 
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Fallout NV was rather fun but I enjoyed fallout 3 more.

But that's kinda like fighting over inches, because I seriously had fun in both. The variable story arch in NV really threw me curve balls often!
 
It's the community who ruined the game, not the company. The game itself is awesome, but for some reason the community had focused on finding bugs and ways to break it, and then judge it from there.
The best example was the problem with the nukes at the beginning, as soon as players found out about them, they started spamming them to break the server and then cry about it all over the internet.
 
It's the community who ruined the game, not the company. The game itself is awesome, but for some reason the community had focused on finding bugs and ways to break it, and then judge it from there.
The best example was the problem with the nukes at the beginning, as soon as players found out about them, they started spamming them to break the server and then cry about it all over the internet.

So what you're saying is... don't fix anything because the bugs only matter if someone exploits them? Also, literally every game that has ever been released has had people trying to find ways to cheat/tweak/break/etc., there are so many people outside of what the testing environment is that will try things none of the devs would have thought of; the way you fix broken things is by having people discover them, sure it sucks for the rest of the in-game population until it's fixed, but that's what early access or extended demo's are for.

The game was an incredibly unpolished and unfinished product. It needed to either be sold as an early release, or had beta tests every weekend for a period of 3-6 months to test for so many of the broken things there were. I'm not sure if Bethesda was thinking they were going to see huge profits for getting it "released" around the holidays, if they really believed that it was ready to go live, or if they knew that it has a strong following and that fan boys and apologists would wait out the rough times and didn't care about releasing it the way they did.

What really gets me about releases like this, there is a history of bad releases to learn from, and it seems so many games come out that end up with the same issues that have happened before, it's mind-numbing when that happens, and even more-so when they could have avoided it by just asking the fans for a little more time or to support them through paying for early access. To me, early access is a huge winner because it comes with the expectations that it isn't finished, it is in progress, and they are working to get it ready; not all games have followed that path, but it's a much better way to handle anger or frustration over horrible planning or rushed timelines.

I can only speak from a speculative standpoint, but I would be willing to bet that the dev's didn't have much choice in this launch and were just following the orders of the suits who want ever increasing profits. Quality products will always sell and your customers will be much more grateful and understanding when you show you're considering them in some way.

Am I the only one who sees the irony in most of our "business schools" being run by leftists? And we wonder why MBAs are bad managers? Really?

So many posts bring in political crap that isn't pertinent or has anything to do with what is going on. You, I, anyone, could speculate all day why there are "bad managers", and a lot of today's problems (in all facets) are because of division and name-calling instead of mature, productive, conversation and constructive criticism.
 
Are you for real right now? Because I can tell you that they do work. Ever had the flickering shadow bug in Skyrim? You can fix it by setting the sun time limit in the .ini file. Same with Mouse Acceleration 100% fixed. So don't tell me and others they don't work because they do. I've been fixing their damn shitty code for over a decade, all the way back to Morrowind.

Please don't spit your coffee out, its wasteful :)

Don't bother, he is a diehard fan of the once great and now horribly aged Gamebryo engine.
 
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