» Sun Nov 18, 2012 12:52 am
This whole Dawnguard drama has been nauseating. I'm a PS3 user. I cannot afford a PC good enough on which to play a game like Skyrim. When I heard that Skyrim was coming out for the PS3 I was thrilled. Sure, I knew there had been problems with Oblivion on the PS3, but then it had been 5+ years since then and I figured they (Bethesda) had got all those PS3 issues sorted (I didn't know much about Fallout). I got all caught up in the hype. Skyrim looked amazing and nobody was given any reason to think that it'd wouldn't run well on the consoles. Except the rumours that reviewers only got Xbox copies of the game... still they were only rumours right?
Then Skyrim was released. My little brother (an even bigger Elder Scrolls fan than me) was majorly excited. So when I bought the game for myself I bought him a copy too. I couldn't wait to get home and play it and, at first, it was everything I hoped it would be... but then the glitches reared their ugly heads.
The frame rate of the game dropped right down in a matter of weeks. The game kept crashing, not only during gameplay but on loading screens and even on start up on one occasion. The game was practically unplayable. I was frustrated... but I kept my calm. They'd fix it I said. Just be patient and wait for the patches. And I did. They dribbled out then stopped. Solved some problems and created more. But I was still patient.
Then Dawnguard was announced and I was super-excited. From I first read Dracula when I was six years old I've loved vampire stories and this DLC seemed tailor-made for me. But my excitement was nothing compared to my brother's; he too had been persevering with the game, despite all the bugs and crashes, and he was ecstatic about the release of Dawnguard. So we heard about the 30-day exclusive with Xbox and my brother was a little miffed but I told him that it wasn't a big deal. Besides, the extra thirty days would help them sort out any glitches they'd find in the PS3 version right? He agreed and we waited.
Now I'm not one for keeping up with gaming vlogs or the like but my brother is. He stopped watching them because most of them were about Dawnguard and he didn't want to come across any spoilers while he waited to play the game finally for himself. So he waited. And waited.
There wasn't a word about the release of Dawnguard on the PS3 during that 30 day exclusive. Not a single thing. I knew that was a bad sign but I kept telling my brother that it'd be out, that he was not to worry. The 30 day period came and went and still there was no word. Then the PC version was released along with an update concerning the PS3 version. They were having trouble.
"Okay," I thought, "this isn't a big deal. It may be a few weeks more but we'll get it." I was wrong. Then there was the 1.6 update. It was way behind too and when it finally was released it was only brought out in America. Us Europeans had to wait. It finally came out, fixed some things (caused a few new problems) and now we didn't have to dismount to kill those damn Snow Bears... Hardly any consolation. I began to be seriously peeved. It had been almost a month and there had still been no word. Not even a tentative time frame was given for when we could expect Dawnguard to be released.
Then Hearthfire was announced for the Xbox and there was no mention whatsoever of it being released on the PS3, nevermind Dawnguard. That was it. Two months had passed since the release of Dawnguard on Xbox, one since the exclusive period had ended, and there was still no word as to when we could expect it to appear. To say I was angry would be an understatement. I was furious.
And then finally we get an update that includes this line:
“This is not a problem that we’re positive we can solve…”
It feels as if all my early fears have come true. I doubt we'll ever see Dawnguard on the PS3 - unless they expect us to shell out another €60 for the GOTY edition whenever that appears which is not going to happen because I'm not going to pay for a game twice because they couldn't get it right the first time. That's lame. My little brother, who'd been so excited about this DLC and who waited so patiently for it, is crushed.
But worse than all that, the more I read up on this, the more I realised Bethesda knew the PS3 version had serious problems before release. Not only did Todd Howard himself admit as much, but the fact that the only copies sent to the reviewers were for the Xbox was a major red flag. They knew the product was broken... and they deliberately kept us in the dark about it and callously sold it anyway. They knew that the memory issues would be compounded by the release of the DLCs... and yet there was not a hint of that being the case when they were selling their game. There was even no hint of that being the case when they first announced Dawnguard for the Xbox and nobody can seriously claim they weren't aware of the issues with the PS3 version by then!
We were led to believe we'd be getting a product and service as good as the one Xbox players were getting - that all the content that would be available to them would be available to us - but it looks like we were lied to. They should never have released Skyrim on the PS3 when they knew they'd have such serious issues with it. If I'd known at the time I'd never have bought the game* or I'd have perhaps saved up for a PC and bought it for that. Now however I'm not going to give them even that (small) bit of satisfaction. They're not going to get a single cent from me in future. It'll hardly put a dent in their finances - they won't even miss my custom - but aside from expressing myself on forums like this it's all I can do.
I'll have nothing to do with Bethesda or any game they have any involvement with ever again. They screwed up on this one. I feel completely cheated.
*Which is probably why they kept quiet anyway - so people like me would part with our hard earned cash.
