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Arthmoor Request For A Free Headshrink Please........


Thane Baldur

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Just like an abused spouse, I keep coming back. But the double whammy TKO of F76 & FO4 were my tipping point. I was 99% done with Howard and Bethesda.

But then F76 began a painfully slow road to recovery. My heavily modded Skyrim & Enderal sustained me. The New California & London mods kept my passion for Fallout alive.  Then we got Howard's 1E+06 version of Skyrim aka the AE edition Which -- I bought because abused spouse syndrome. Because its inferior modded content did absolutely nothing to replace my existing mod deck. Regardless, I began my slow road from Howard's collateral damage and inflicted emotional abuse. My scarred psyche began to heal as I began to live again. 

Then Starfield reveal happened a month ago. Which immediately resulted in my psyche being gaslight like this....

...And the circle of emotional insanity began yet again. Starfield began to instill a cautious optimism that has built up into genuine hope over this past month.  

And just when I thought I'd recovered from the PTSD seal clubbing Howard inflicted with FO4 & F76, this (excellently published) analysis of Starfield by 21Kiloton popped up in my YT feed

Then @41:10 paranoid reality came roaring back....

 

...After the Artic seawater got dumped on my head. From seeing the close up shot of THAT FACE which has haunted my nightmares. That is the same poker face of Mr. 16-times-the-detail abuser I was traumatized by for half a decade. He didn't even bother changing his jacket from last time! Or matching shoes..... O.x

Right after that: @42:55 21Kiloton points out the XP gain feature at the screen center. He claims these are PLACEHOLDER XP. Which means Bethesda hasn't even begun work on the level scale grind and character progression scaling. This would support a reason why Howard moved the release date to next year. It's not to  give the game final polish and performance tweaking. So it would seem the game is still in a post alpha but pre beta testing state?? 

TL;DR

Is 21Kiloton's sarcastic dig about the XP gain true? Could Bethesda really be that far behind in terms of developing the actual game? Basically based on what this cynical YTer said, is it really possible this was a skillfully compiled demo consisting of cobbled together bits gameplay from the game? Pleaseeeee tell me the XBX reveal wasn't a working clone of a Star Citizen flawless marketing vid. Which sole purpose is designed to reel & sucker new fan bois in.......

/end of paranoid reflection essay>

Edited by Thane Baldur
Because I can dammit
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Uh, I don't know why you asked me for a head shrinking, but all I can tell you is that Youtubers posting stuff today about a game that's not going to be out for another year are not reliable sources of information.

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:lol: Artic wrektification aside, 21Kiloton's review itself looks to be very much a WIP.

Spoiler

WIP = Work in Pee

 

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:) just ignore it until after the release fallout (sorry about the pun), and then wait until 5 years after release, maybe 6.

Meanwhile drink water, buy a rowing machine or go swimming/walking for half hour a day, increase health decrease depression.

Next patient :D

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20 hours ago, Arthmoor said:

Uh, I don't know why you asked me for a head shrinking, but all I can tell you is that Youtubers posting stuff today about a game that's not going to be out for another year are not reliable sources of information.

Because you're a crotchety old lizard who everyone with a mod deck autonomously gives OG respect? And more specifically, because my PC reveres his builder i.e. namely because:

USSEP

Alt Start-LAL

Cutting Room Floor

Oakwood/Granite Hill/Falkreath etc. etc.

 

6 hours ago, alt3rn1ty said:

:) just ignore it until after the release fallout (sorry about the pun), and then wait until 5 years after release, maybe 6.

Meanwhile drink water, buy a rowing machine or go swimming/walking for half hour a day, increase health decrease depression.

Next patient :D

So according to you and the new Bethesda Game Release Cycle:

1. Don't pre order

2. Wait for game to be patched day 1

3. Wait for modders Arthmoor to patch it better

4. Wait for modders Arthmoor s to improve visuals and QoL

5. Wait for all DLC to be released

6. Wait for modders Arthmoor to patch DLC

7. Wait for GOTY/Complete/Definitive Edition release

8. Wait for modders Arthmoor to patch GOTY/Complete/Definitive Edition

9: Wait for modders Arthmoor to add further improvements to visuals and QoL

10. Buy GOTY/Complete/Definitive Edition at discount and enjoy?!?

O. K.......

ohboy.jpg.b92f61070bd7ff933160d6509abe2312.jpg

 

 
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45 minutes ago, Thane Baldur said:

Because you're a crotchety old lizard who everyone with a mod deck autonomously gives OG respect? And more specifically, because my PC reveres his builder i.e. namely because:

USSEP

Alt Start-LAL

Cutting Room Floor

Oakwood/Granite Hill/Falkreath etc. etc.

 

So according to you and the new Bethesda Game Release Cycle:

1. Don't pre order

2. Wait for game to be patched day 1

3. Wait for modders Arthmoor to patch it better

4. Wait for modders Arthmoor s to improve visuals and QoL

5. Wait for all DLC to be released

6. Wait for modders Arthmoor to patch DLC

7. Wait for GOTY/Complete/Definitive Edition release

8. Wait for modders Arthmoor to patch GOTY/Complete/Definitive Edition

9: Wait for modders Arthmoor to add further improvements to visuals and QoL

10. Buy GOTY/Complete/Definitive Edition at discount and enjoy?!?

O. K.......

ohboy.jpg.b92f61070bd7ff933160d6509abe2312.jpg

 

 

To be fair Arthmoor outsources most of his art.

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1 hour ago, Thane Baldur said:

So according to you and the new Bethesda Game Release Cycle:

1. Don't pre order

2. Wait for game to be patched day 1

3. Wait for modders Arthmoor to patch it better

4. Wait for modders Arthmoor s to improve visuals and QoL

5. Wait for all DLC to be released

6. Wait for modders Arthmoor to patch DLC

7. Wait for GOTY/Complete/Definitive Edition release

8. Wait for modders Arthmoor to patch GOTY/Complete/Definitive Edition

9: Wait for modders Arthmoor to add further improvements to visuals and QoL

10. Buy GOTY/Complete/Definitive Edition at discount and enjoy?!?

O. K.......

 

:D you are reading a lot into my previous post, but yeah pretty much, who else is going to apply such dedicated personal time (along with all the community members who take part and contribute) to authoring a wholesale bug fix outside of Bethesda that anyone can trust to be as altruistic as the unofficial patches provides .. Assuming ofc Arthmoor doesn't throw in the towel and say fuck you to the generally unappreciative community with little niggles about choices made.

You gonna step up and provide the same?, do you have the requisite expertise/setup?.

Personally I am out of the game of following Bethesda's archive of fuckups which keeps fans on tenter hooks with hype, and prefer trying to find Developments houses which come good on the overall promise of a bug free game (although Hellogames and NMS seem to be failing in the long haul, Egosoft are still doing a good project in the X series). I am (as Arthmoor has previously mentioned), a bit disillusioned if I expect any game these days to be perfect.

Seriously if you think things can go better on the Unoffical patch side of things .. Join the team with whatever talent you may have and present your considered arguments. I have not really been a part of the unofficial team, but have contributed on many occasion and delved deep enough to see how well thought out each decision has been made for Morrowind, Oblivion, Skyrim and Fallout 4. There has been some serious talent applied to game scripting / mesh improvements / animation improvements etcetera with only open source or publicly available tools sometimes incurring personal expense.

The amount of dedication and personal endeavor applied to unofficial patches for Bethesda games is unprecedented.

If you think things could be better, step up and dedicate your life to solving the problems of the generally entitled public.

If not, stop trying to take the piss out of people who are trying, with veiled topics such as this one.

I personally sort of agree that software developers should provide a better user experience .. eventually .. But games are so complex and really in need of Hollywood budgets / development time .. I dont think it is realistic that even a house such as Bethesda with a triple A 300 + strong dev team can competently produce their dreams ( despite my own occasional piss takes :) ).

I know, from a gamers perspective who wants everything like, yesterday, thats a downer. But really programming without bugs takes years (on top of the predicted dev cycle), artists are outsourced so things like texture issues may never get solved unless the dev house re-employs them, same goes for sound / animation / modelling issues. Is it worth it for the development house economically to re-employ everyone concerned? ..

.. Vote with your wallet, and stop picking on people genuinely trying to help, they might just give up and say "you do it instead". The amount of crap I have seen Arthmoor put up with over circa 15 years I am surprised he hasn't done just that already.

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Please, if you inflate our heads any more I'm going to have to chainsaw all the doorframes.

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Well thanks for the feedback. Much appreciated.

Had no idea Bethesda's team was so small! (or is that normal for a AAA dev?) Regardless, given that dev size, it looks like SC SQ42 dreams.txt is 1000% doomed then  :ghostface:

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3 hours ago, Thane Baldur said:

4. Wait for modders Arthmoor s to improve visuals and QoL

You had this one more right as modders vs me. I am not a 3D or texture artist by any measure of these terms. As Sigurd said, most of the time I outsource to get that kind of thing done. That includes for the patches as well since I couldn't Blender or Max my way out of a half shredded wet paper bag.

Also Bethesda currently has a total team size somewhere around 700-1000 people after all their acquisitions were done in the last couple of years. So they're not the same ultra-lean team of 120 people in total that they had up through the development of Fallout 4. So I really do think that with nearly 7 times the talent that Starfield won't be like these other games. Especially since Microsoft seems to be making BGS take more accountability for bugs in general. And yes, I fully appreciate the irony of Microsoft hounding anyone to fix bugs.

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:facepalm:after posting I wondered if I was still right about Bethesdas team size, but then wandered off to cats do crazy stuff on youtube :woot:

.. I really ought to block youtube in my routers block list.

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On 7/17/2022 at 11:27 PM, Arthmoor said:

Also Bethesda currently has a total team size somewhere around 700-1000 people after all their acquisitions were done in the last couple of years. So they're not the same ultra-lean team of 120 people in total that they had up through the development of Fallout 4. So I really do think that with nearly 7 times the talent that Starfield won't be like these other games. Especially since Microsoft seems to be making BGS take more accountability for bugs in general. And yes, I fully appreciate the irony of Microsoft hounding anyone to fix bugs.

Yes. That gives me hope. Especially given NMS which has grown to a team of 26? or so devs. Yet this tiny Indie dev studio still managed to crap out another brick that takes MMO/single player game play to next level with latest frigate update. Empyrion Galactic also pushed out another significant game update shortly after the reveal. 

It seems Todd DID manage to ignite a much needed volcano under the space dev derriere's in the industry. :lol:Wonder if it's enough to push CI +/- G into releasing SQ42 before Dec 31st 2077 next....  :peer:

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9 hours ago, Thane Baldur said:

~ It seems Todd DID manage to ignite a much needed volcano under the space dev derriere's in the industry.

In Hellogames case I dont think Todd Howard had any influence, more like millions of Redditors with digital Pitch forks and burning torches :)

(Hated Reddit at the time, moderators on there turned into spineless ineffectual two faced tossers, any of the rules they would normally enforce suddenly they just turned a blind eye to the horrendous nature of humanity at its worst, and the general opinion no matter how bad was left to propagate because if the moderators went against it then the result would have been bad for Reddit as a business .. That's just my theory, but I think we have seen a similar sequence of events on Skyrim Reddit in the past when the cesspool is stirred into anger)

Anyway I remember just before NMS was released that Sean Murray was in an interview with someone (popular in America I think), and among the looong conversation Sean Murray was naively gushing the games virtues, being coy on some aspects (which we later found were not quite ready at release) .. And well he said one sentence among it all promising that they would dedicate themselves to making the game perfect for as long as it takes. I usually take promises with a pinch of salt when it comes to games, but there was something about his manner and overall presentation that made me believe he would fulfil all the promises. 6 years later they have done just what they promised and much more on top, and still going strong.

Hellogames started NMS with just 6 Developers, since release to date they have slowly increased to 26 devs, but a bunch of those are working on what Sean has described as their next release which is as ambitious as NMS (would love to know what it is, but they are keeping very secretive on that one, no doubt learned from being too verbal about NMS in its early days).

I do think though that the reverse is true, ie Game devs in general have been influenced by the huge backlash Hellogames received, and maybe, just maybe, Todd Howard and Bethesda will put more long term effort into their next release, plus as Arthmoor says Microsoft may have a good influence on them. Fingers crossed anyway.

Anyone here remember the days we used to buy games on Cassette Tapes / Floppy disks which never had any bug fix releases, so they had to be damned near perfect before going to production?, and we all depended on the artwork on the package cover plus small description to decide if the game would suit us or not (or game reviews in magazines like C64) .. Unfortunately thats never going to happen again (well, unless your name is Square Enix or Nintendo who have the resources to make such complex games as we have now, really good at release).

But then I do appreciate how much goes into a games development now, technologically they are far more advanced and need an army of resource specialists, and now we are nearly all online updates and long term support has become an advantage game devs make the most of. How an indie ever gets off the ground these days is an amazing feat.

If you have the time, and have not seen it before, watch the following video through to end, its a good summary of NMS "engoodening" :)

 

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1 hour ago, alt3rn1ty said:

Anyone here remember the days we used to buy games on Cassette Tapes / Floppy disks which never had any bug fix releases, so they had to be damned near perfect before going to production?

  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

I remember how damn near perfect Daggerfall was before going into production.  :D

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4 hours ago, alt3rn1ty said:

Anyone here remember the days we used to buy games on Cassette Tapes / Floppy disks which never had any bug fix releases, so they had to be damned near perfect before going to production?, and we all depended on the artwork on the package cover plus small description to decide if the game would suit us or not (or game reviews in magazines like C64) .. Unfortunately thats never going to happen again (well, unless your name is Square Enix or Nintendo who have the resources to make such complex games as we have now, really good at release).

  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

Oh wow! Good to know I'm not the only one who remembers what a 5.25 floppy looks like :lmao:

Not to mention you typically got a COMPLETE and professional gaming manual from the dev/publisher.  Which doubled as decor artwork when not in use while you're playing the game. Not hard to see why the Seaside Library and Books in Skyrim were always at the top of my mod deck :D

Yes, I'm that hyper immersive bookworm player in Skyrim/Fallout. Who'll literally read all lore/information literature (base game and player added) that I run across. As my PC is emoting reading while sitting in his hot tub/hot springs in wilderness somewhere. So I really miss the reading aspect most of all, because I feel that as Moore's Power Law advances the Tech curve, the younger gen/newer RPG player base lose perspective of why lore is so important in RPG titles. They become more focused on superficial features like graphical fidelity, voiced PCs, loot/shoot em up action game play. Guess I'm too old fashioned lol

Anyways, back in day when Garriot's Ultima series reigned supreme in RPG industry, that was the golden age of PC gaming. Before the cancer that was Prima Guides took over the industry. Game manual quality started to go to crap then. It was pretty much dead by the time YT and other social media/fan blogsites made the web the standard publishing medium.

Edited by Thane Baldur
really....
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Ah, but remember, that golden age of PC gaming came crashing down when EA bought out Origin. Yes, that's where they stole the name for their present day game client. Ultima 9 was a pile of hot garbage on the best of days, and Ultima 8 was the first known case where a game company had to send out new discs to registered owners because of fatal bugs that could easily stop you from being able to finish the game. It was shocking news for gamers of the time. Something we've all accepted as normal practice now that one can download these things on a whim.

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Those earlier games were much simpler, and were little more than board games with a random number generator instead of 64 sided dice.   You navigated a sprite (and their entourage) around a static, flat map.  Combat was turn based "I hack you hack".  It should really be no surprise that the more complex a game is the greater the chance of error,

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Actually, Ultima 8 was where everything started going to sh8te. That was right about when Garriott was forced to sell his soul to the Exceptional As$h@ts. Everything in the game franchise took a dark turn for the worse. It was obvious from gameplay (TON of game breaking bugs) to game mechanics. Will never forget how that stiff, bandy legged Avatar gave you a headache. With its Super Mario Bros bouncing, jumping-can't-walk-must-sprint-everywhere arcadey run style. Despite my increasing disillusionment, I stuck it out and tried to finish the game. Got to point where I just needed to complete the 4th artifact quest to master the Pyros/sorcerer Titan in order enter the Ethereal plane. That was the moment I experienced my first glacial hatred of the Exceptional As$h@ts as an evil entity.

#NeverHappenedLol said Murphy's Law. Got hit with a game breaking bug that locked up my Amstrad PC. No amount of calling EA's customer support helped. And unlike in previous Ultimas (especially Black Gate/Serpent Isle) I was shocked to find that CS was completely UNWILLING to send me a patch disk! That was when I first became aware something was seriously amiss. Not realizing I was witnessing the start of the Ultima franchise being cannibalized. By the time Ascension was released, I bought it for the box art and sadly never played it. Was too disillusioned to bother playing the game. This pushed me to eagerly embrace the dysfunctional distraction of UO. But once again, Murphy's Law returned from vacation. And I swear it directed every PKer in Quake to take up residence in UO. The PvE care bear nature of the game changed forever. So that historic event where Lord British was assassinated was something of an anti climax for me.  I decided I'd had enough shenanigans of the UO fanbase that had gone irreversibly feral.  Wandered a couple years in Final Fantasy and never really got hooked. It just wasn't the same experience. I'd just about given up on the RPG fantasy genre when I stumbled across an intriguing title called TES I: Arena. By a nondescript company called Bethesda, which thankfully was NOT owned by the Exceptional As$H@ts. And the rest is history.... 

Since Ultima 8, it literally took me a decade to realize Ultima's acquisition was the start of a hostile monopoly campaign by Hawking aka the Indie AntiChrist. His unethical, Borg-esque conquests destroyed the Indie dev industry. And sadly, this still serves as the base model which AAA  As$H@T CEOs the likes of Riccitiello and pubs the likes of As$H@TVision still utilize to date. And because of this unethical business acquisition model, innovative devs like Bullfrog, Westwood, Playfish, Visceral etc. were cannibalized and followed UO to their graves. Sadly, for the more popular devs franchises (the likes of Maxis/Sims Studios, Bioware and Mythic) it literally took 3 decades for them to become transformed into the soulless husks they've degenerated to date. Macro transactions and MVP releases finished them off. RIP Maxis. RIP BiowareMythic :(

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You probably didn't miss much if you never completed Ultima 8. Still, it was better than the steaming pile of dung that 9 ended up being. EA may not have wanted to send you a patch disc for that, but eventually they sent one to everyone who had registered. Which made it the second time a company had to do that in order to fix a buggy mess. Only it didn't really fix it completely. Game still had severe show stopper bugs in it after that. I managed to finish it but the game was so lackluster that I honestly don't remember that much about it other than the one bug I completely broke the game with. Ever since then I've always been wary of when EA acquired a studio. It never ends well for any of them.

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Agree mostly with what everyone says, what did it for me was basically the point at which I was spending more time trying to avoid or deal with bugs and glitches than actually playing the game properly (pick whichever game you choose!) that killed the games in question for me and I spent quite a few years avoiding "games" altogether until persuaded by an early ES which I observed a friend play. That put me into consoles as I still didn.t want to risk busting my PC on a game!

So for me those sort of game ruining bugs are a big no no and much as I have done my share of complaining about Bethesda (or maybe its now because I am old) I have come to realise perfection in a complex game is near impossible when profit is a driver.

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On 7/22/2022 at 12:51 PM, Thane Baldur said:

a 5.25 floppy

Those newfangled things? The first games that I'd received were for mainframe and minicomputers, on 7 or 9 track tapes. Still have a couple hanging around. Eventually was distributed on 8" and then 5" floppies.

On 7/23/2022 at 8:52 AM, Thane Baldur said:

Ultima 8 was where everything started going to sh8te

Ultima(s) had game busting bugs long before that.... Remember trying to sail across an ocean, eventually the graphics would break up, and I'd discover that all my saves were bad. IIRC, I've never successfully completed any Ultima. But I'd tended to treat them as open world role playing, not getting around to the main quest before far too long.

Big disappointments were Railroad Tycoon 2 and 3. Two could never complete the main campaign sequence there were such bad bugs. Had a good time building general railroads, while listening to the extensive high-quality soundtrack. Three had a game breaking bug that was never fixed for my Mac platform (but was eventually fixed on the PC): build a single track, then later double track, then train would halt at that section junction. Since that meant you could only play the early part of any scenario, it made the overall game nearly worthless to me.

So the defining decline is usually when the title or series was sold by the original developer.

On 7/17/2022 at 8:42 PM, alt3rn1ty said:

The amount of dedication and personal endeavor applied to unofficial patches for Bethesda games is unprecedented.

Getting back on topic, agreed. But the sheer number of bugs is also unprecedented. And the lack of official updates is unprecedented. Also, the number of new bugs in official updates is unprecedented.

Contrast with the Civilization series. It always initially had problems, but comprehesive patches were fairly rapidly released. Even later editions after Sid left. There was an expectation bugs would be fixed, especially with them making money from expansions. If you haven't gone bankrupt, you should be patching bugs and supporting your customers.

 

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42 minutes ago, DayDreamer said:

Those newfangled things? The first games that I'd received were for mainframe and minicomputers, on 7 or 9 track tapes. Still have a couple hanging around. Eventually was distributed on 8" and then 5" floppies.

< Snip >

Talk about coincidence, I just sent a small box of write protect rings to a local Junior College for their museum.  

 

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