Todd Howard, Pete Hines, and the other guy I can’t think of his name right now, are the holy Trinity at Bethsoft. They figured out how to take the success of Morrowind and milk the shit out of it while “streamlining” every game.
The original ES creators said years ago the direction of the series is not what they would have done. And you can see how these three did the same thing to Fallout that they did with Elder Scrolls. Their “best” contributions have been creating DLCs and charging for mods. They’ve made bank for Zenamax. And that’s all they care about.
They’re creativitly bankrupt. I feel bad for the devs that grew up on the og elder scrolls games and became devs with the company.
This is so sad fate. Morrowind was absolute gem of that era, nothing compared to it at the time. It has wonderful world it takes place in which is believable and filled with interesting characters, supported by truly brilliant soundtrack. And while story is quite decent there’s about gazillion other things to do, explore, see.
It’s sad that every upcoming bethesda game was more and more simplified and lost a bit of the morrowind magic.
I don’t think their games are necessarily becoming more simplified, it’s more that they seem to focus on areas of the games which would help make them more “mainstream” (for example, Fallout 4 made crafting and upgrading more complex compared to 3 and NV, but this is similar to other AAA games), while focusing less (and thus simplifying) other areas.
This is not necessarily a bad thing, I personally think Fallout 4 improved over 3, and Skyrim over Oblivion (though NV and Morrowind are still better). But this also leads to disasters like Fallout 76.
That’s true, but isn’t contrary to my point - Fallout 76 is a disaster because they set out to create a mainstream Fallout live service game, instead of focusing on the strengths of the series. This was further reinforced when they introduced a battle royale mode IMO.
Ted Peterson, one of the actual creators of TES, was involved in writing for Morrowind. It’s the only reason it retained even a shadow of Arena & Daggerfall’s creepy, ambitious charm.
And if you were with TES from the start… with Arena, Daggerfall, and even Battlespire… then Morrowind was nothing but a massive disappointment. And the franchise went even further downhill from there. It’s clear that Todd has no respect whatsoever for the magic that Peterson, Lakshman, and LeFay created together.
I’ve tried to get a sense of pre-Morrowind Elder Scrolls titles, but, as a later arriving fan they can be impenetrable. I’m old enough now to get annoyed when people say that about ES3 though, so I guess it’s come full circle.
I’m not really interested in arguing with anyone about which game is better or anything, I just feel a sense that I’m missing something. What was lacking with Morrowind that you saw in its predecessors?
I concur completely. I mean, I like Morrowind quite a bit, but coming from playing 1000 hours in Daggerfall and seeing this tiny simplified, constrained game world in the sequel was disheartening. The fact that everything since has been so much worse in that regard had made Morrowind age pretty well I suppose.
Todd Howard, Pete Hines, and the other guy I can’t think of his name right now, are the holy Trinity at Bethsoft. They figured out how to take the success of Morrowind and milk the shit out of it while “streamlining” every game.
The original ES creators said years ago the direction of the series is not what they would have done. And you can see how these three did the same thing to Fallout that they did with Elder Scrolls. Their “best” contributions have been creating DLCs and charging for mods. They’ve made bank for Zenamax. And that’s all they care about.
They’re creativitly bankrupt. I feel bad for the devs that grew up on the og elder scrolls games and became devs with the company.
Todd Howard was the project leader for Morrowind and its expansions
This is so sad fate. Morrowind was absolute gem of that era, nothing compared to it at the time. It has wonderful world it takes place in which is believable and filled with interesting characters, supported by truly brilliant soundtrack. And while story is quite decent there’s about gazillion other things to do, explore, see.
It’s sad that every upcoming bethesda game was more and more simplified and lost a bit of the morrowind magic.
I don’t think their games are necessarily becoming more simplified, it’s more that they seem to focus on areas of the games which would help make them more “mainstream” (for example, Fallout 4 made crafting and upgrading more complex compared to 3 and NV, but this is similar to other AAA games), while focusing less (and thus simplifying) other areas.
This is not necessarily a bad thing, I personally think Fallout 4 improved over 3, and Skyrim over Oblivion (though NV and Morrowind are still better). But this also leads to disasters like Fallout 76.
I think that most of Fallout 76’s characteristics were a result of it being a multiplayer game.
That’s true, but isn’t contrary to my point - Fallout 76 is a disaster because they set out to create a mainstream Fallout live service game, instead of focusing on the strengths of the series. This was further reinforced when they introduced a battle royale mode IMO.
Ted Peterson, one of the actual creators of TES, was involved in writing for Morrowind. It’s the only reason it retained even a shadow of Arena & Daggerfall’s creepy, ambitious charm.
And if you were with TES from the start… with Arena, Daggerfall, and even Battlespire… then Morrowind was nothing but a massive disappointment. And the franchise went even further downhill from there. It’s clear that Todd has no respect whatsoever for the magic that Peterson, Lakshman, and LeFay created together.
I’ve tried to get a sense of pre-Morrowind Elder Scrolls titles, but, as a later arriving fan they can be impenetrable. I’m old enough now to get annoyed when people say that about ES3 though, so I guess it’s come full circle.
I’m not really interested in arguing with anyone about which game is better or anything, I just feel a sense that I’m missing something. What was lacking with Morrowind that you saw in its predecessors?
The unity remake of daggerfall is free, slightly more accessible and absolutely worth checking out.
I forgot about that. Will have a look, cheers
I concur completely. I mean, I like Morrowind quite a bit, but coming from playing 1000 hours in Daggerfall and seeing this tiny simplified, constrained game world in the sequel was disheartening. The fact that everything since has been so much worse in that regard had made Morrowind age pretty well I suppose.