Pink Elephant in the room : V - Skyrim

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 8:00 am

Half of the complaints aren't legitimate. It's just a bunch of people complaining for the sake of complaining. As for the legitimate complaints, well some are addressed and some aren't. In the case of balancing weapons, well it's probably on Todd's "To Do when Half Life 3 comes out" list. His main concern is to address bugs and nothing more. If you're all complaining about balance, shut up, svck it up, and play. The chance of it being fixed is slim.

You have been taken surveys? Oh wait, you work for Bethesda?

No, I guess you're just like other internet users that want to feel important - taking a wild guess so people will take you serious.

If you don't have a valid source to support your statement, please stop posting this kind of stuff.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 6:22 am

as far as I'm concerned there's a single golden rule for gamers (or any consumers in general really):

Criticism motivates change, praise provokes stagnation.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 2:13 am

Where's this tsunami of criticism exactly? Only thing that's been complained about out of this forum was the PS3 lag.

This, the PS3 lag and the save boat is an critical error, however it should be pretty easy to solve lots of it by letting the cell reload remove ash piles and lose arrows. The save game bloat is clearly visible on PC as you see the file size increase way faster than in Oblivion or Fallout however as PC has lots of memory it will not become a real problem on them except on very old characters.
Except for this it don't appears to be an very buggy game.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 2:23 pm

Patience, my friends, is a virtue. There are unarguably things wrong with skyrim, but I didn't care one bit when I got a random CTD or saw mammoths fall from sky or some idiot was talking over some other idiot who was trying to tell me something important while hovering 5ft in the air. I laughed at most of them, in fact. Bethesda is undoubtedly AWARE of all of these issues and some none of us probably even know about yet.

The games not even been out that long yet, really. Good things come to those who wait.

Mmmmm, Guiness.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 9:04 am

Kerberos? Bioware? Valve?

eww, the attitude of people towards "complainers" is utterly disgusting, marginalizing, downplaying and labeling people having issues as "trolls" and saying since More people are happy than are sad, the sad can go stuff themselves in a corner. I have a question, If the Happy people are happy shouldnt we start addressing the people having problems? its not like the happy people have anything more to offer, we have their money already and they are satisfied, how about we tend to the unhappy customers?

Beth doesnt owe us anything? *COUGH* You paid money for their product, if your Product is not delievering are you REALLY going to keep the mindset that they don't owe you anything? really?

I'm sorry that is just utterly disgusting.

Yes it is an elephant in the room, because 3 patchs and the majority of the fixes are Book shelves, Marriage and undoing the damage of a previous Patch. not to mention they tried to make a joke out of it this time? the days of "funny bugs" are over Beth use to have a predispositioned Character of some jolly folks just making their way around and releasing games, their near anonymous existence prior to Skyrim Made these Bugs laughable and tolerable. but now that "Beth" is gone going on many years now, AND the lime light is on them, time to stop smirking and get things done.

The thing is, those fixes take time to work out. Do you want a patch 3 weeks later only to find out that Beth screwed up the resistances again or some other problem occur. I'd rather they take their time and get it right.

This, the PS3 lag and the save boat is an critical error, however it should be pretty easy to solve lots of it by letting the cell reload remove ash piles and lose arrows. The save game bloat is clearly visible on PC as you see the file size increase way faster than in Oblivion or Fallout however as PC has lots of memory it will not become a real problem on them except on very old characters.
Except for this it don't appears to be an very buggy game.

That I believe is the main problem with the PS3 version, the fact that the game doesn't respawn as often as Oblivion and the PS3 has issues going above 10 MB's. Only problem is I can't see a faster respawn rate being added in with a patch, I think Beth will figure out how to solve the problem but not for another 3-4 months.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 5:07 am

I will bring this up for I have yet to see a topic about it.

In a nutshell, how do you interpret Todd Howard's silence concerning the harsh criticism SKyrim has recently suffered, both on the tech and gameplay fronts?
True, the game has sold like hot buns and received unprecedented accolades, but they seem just about proportional to the mix of just and unjust criticism.

My perdiction is DLC will still sell like buns out of the oven, but less so than Skyrim. Perhaps a message will get across.

Todd recently had plenty of oportunities to pass comment. Yet, he chose not to but for a laconic line where he mentioned DLC would be directed at making the game better.

What's your take?

People are used to bethesda games

Great, immersive worlds, tons of bugs. I think Bethesda occupies an unique position in the videogaming industry in which it's allowed to ship buggy games: everybody knows that and still the majority is happy or learns to live with it.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 9:25 am

Funny how you label it ?meanigless noise? and then proceed to discontruct your own statemetnt, precisely by establishing the usefulness of those figures.

Did you even read the post? I demonstrated that you could equally well construct TWO sets of statements, which were the exact opposite in meaning, based on the same presumed data. That's pretty much the very definition of data which is meaningless noise.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 8:24 am

Stardock

Right. If memory serves their CEO did personally admit that they screwed up Elemental. Of course Skyrim isn't a disaster like that. Even on PS3. And Stardock is a small privately owned company, unlike major developers they can do that :hehe:

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 12:31 am

If the game was perfect, how could we appreciate the MODs?

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 6:35 am

Even if it was, mods still offer customisation for personal preferrences.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 4:13 pm

I will bring this up for I have yet to see a topic about it.

In a nutshell, how do you interpret Todd Howard's silence concerning the harsh criticism SKyrim has recently suffered, both on the tech and gameplay fronts?
True, the game has sold like hot buns and received unprecedented accolades, but they seem just about proportional to the mix of just and unjust criticism.

My perdiction is DLC will still sell like buns out of the oven, but less so than Skyrim. Perhaps a message will get across.

Todd recently had plenty of oportunities to pass comment. Yet, he chose not to but for a laconic line where he mentioned DLC would be directed at making the game better.

What's your take?

I think you might be misinterpreting what is being said. "Better" most likely means "more content".

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 11:19 am

This thread makes me nostalgic for the show Johnson and Friends

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 12:20 am

I'm sure Todd is deeply regretting his involvement in the creation of one of the best selling, highest praised games ever created.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 1:27 pm

Did you even read the post? I demonstrated that you could equally well construct TWO sets of statements, which were the exact opposite in meaning, based on the same presumed data. That's pretty much the very definition of data which is meaningless noise.

No. You cannot. Unless you're a lawyer well versed in art of Sophism.

#1 If Skyrim DLC percentages are significantly lower than Oblivion's, there's ground for making the claim a large chunk of people who bought the game weren't thrilled by it. Frankly, your claim it could be interpreted as people finding DLC unnecessary is ludicrous. Customers vote with their wallets and happy customers come back. It's this very basic assumption, proven right by past games, that has Bethesda spending significant resources making DLC. Why would they venture into making DLC in the first place if they didn't hold such belief?
I'm sorry your point holds no water.

#2 If Skyrim DLC percentages are significantly higher than Oblivion's there's grounds for making the claim a large portion of people who bought the game loved it and were happy to spend additional cash on it.

#3 Checking out PS3 percentages and contratsing them against other platforms' would also help clarify how the Lag issue impacted sales.

So, no. Unless you're a lawyer well versed in art of Sophism, in this instance you can't make opposite claims based upon the same data. I'm dead sure Pete Hines will be having a look at those figures and contrasting them with Oblivion's. That's what pros do.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 3:28 am

I think you might be misinterpreting what is being said. "Better" most likely means "more content".

Full quote:
http://www.joystiq.com/2011/12/11/skyrim-to-have-multiple-dlc-releases-powerful-buckets/

Howard couldn't yet share plans for DLC, but he says it will be focused on "ways to make the game better, not just have more, because the game is so big. So we're going through ideas right now, and processing everything people are doing in the game, and trying to think of ways that we can improve it." There will be multiple releases (as with Bethesda's past games), but Howard says they "don't have a timetable. They won't be quick, and they'll have a lot of meat on them."

Draw your own conclusions.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 5:42 am

I'm sure Todd is deeply regretting his involvement in the creation of one of the best selling, highest praised games ever created.

Not to mention unprecedented high exposure criticism from IGN, GameInformer and, just out, PCMag, all minor publications.
Look, I understnd you chose the straw man route, went with the easily shot down caricature.
I can understand that.

The game is very good. The game is a bestseller, fastestseller, crossseller.
Still, lots of room for readjustment and imprvement.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 5:58 am

Full quote:
http://www.joystiq.com/2011/12/11/skyrim-to-have-multiple-dlc-releases-powerful-buckets/

Howard couldn't yet share plans for DLC, but he says it will be focused on "ways to make the game better, not just have more, because the game is so big. So we're going through ideas right now, and processing everything people are doing in the game, and trying to think of ways that we can improve it." There will be multiple releases (as with Bethesda's past games), but Howard says they "don't have a timetable. They won't be quick, and they'll have a lot of meat on them."

Draw your own conclusions.

I did read the full quote, and knowing how Beth works these days, it's safe to assume that there will be no improvements.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 12:39 am

Probably. Wasn't the dollar amount $650 mil last I saw.

:banana:

<------ I believe that's Todd, as we speak..... :laugh:

Yep and him and the family are spending Xmas vacation somewhere like Aruba on the beach.....lol

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 3:56 am

Does Todd ever comment on anything outside of official interviews?

Nope.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 6:01 am

"Elephant in the room" is an English metaphorical idiom for an obvious truth that is being ignored or goes unaddressed. The idiomatic expression also applies to an obvious problem or risk no one wants to discuss.

It is based on the idea that an elephant in a room would be impossible to overlook; thus, people in the room who pretend the elephant is not there have chosen to avoid dealing with the looming big issue. - Wikipedia

I disagree with the negative characterization in the subject line. That is why I posted what I posted.

Back to the dungeons!

:tes:

Ah, but a pink Elephant in the room is a phantom looming problem caused by alcoholism.

The only legitimate complaints are performance issues. Any "balance" complaints are subjective.

Anyone who's worked on any creative endeavor knows you always want to make it 'better'. Cezanne painted Mont Sainte Victoire dozens of times because he could never quite capture it. But in a commercial setting you hit a deadline and have to let go and move onto the next project. DLC allows Bethesda to add the stuff they'd have liked to include in the main game before the clock ran down and the money ran out, or because they just hadn't thought of it at the time.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 6:52 am

I think it's pretty clear that he means they are going to try to come up with some cool ideas instead of just shove out a few recycled caves with bandits.

It sounds like OP is hoping there will be some sort of fix or mod or something? Nobody will pay for a glitch fix, and any other kind of balance mod will have extremely low sales compared to say a new quest or even an armor skin.

I read these forums a lot and I gotta say, the majority of complaints are stupid whining. I'm on PS3 so I have the most to complain about, yet there are tons of threads about "why isnt there anything above max level/armor/etc?" or "I grinded my stats to 100 and now the game is boring/broken" or "why do they let me exploit? I can't control myself so the game must be broken" etc etc ad naseum.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 4:23 pm

I read these forums a lot and I gotta say, the majority of complaints are stupid whining. I'm on PS3 so I have the most to complain about, yet there are tons of threads about "why isnt there anything above max level/armor/etc?" or "I grinded my stats to 100 and now the game is boring/broken" or "why do they let me exploit? I can't control myself so the game must be broken" etc etc ad naseum.

To be fair most of those threads (or that one type of thread) you mentioned get filled with "hater" and "whinger" rather than logical reaons why it is a silly thing to complain about.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 8:09 am

what would he say? "my bad we f-d up a epic game with bad programming and QA even though we had all the time and money to do it right"

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 2:59 am

This thread reminds me of that IGN article where they called the ps3 issues a crisis. Then they took a poll (to add credibility to the article) and it came out to about 34% (which cannot be filtered to see if they were legit) of respondents experiencing issues.

It was funny then too.

» Mon Jun 18, 2012 2:09 am

Let me put it this way:

When Todd says:

DLC is directed at making the game better.

How do you interpret these words? I see a
a hint of contrition.

A tiny one.

:biggrin:

Really?
I see DLC = better meaning more dungeons, more quests, more fun stuff to do.
Not bug fixes - they are called Patches, not DLC.

You seem to have an agenda (Making Todd the villain of the piece) here that is skewing your perception.

There have been bugs to fix (backwards flying Dragons etc.) as with all games. But I have not seen any of this harsh critism you mention. Where is this critisim - and is it real issues, or 'differences of opinion' on the design of the Game.
I have seen people critising the Console UI on PC, and lamenting missing feaures such as Spellmaking. but nothing earth shattering or game breaking.

Another recent 'superficially similar' game got a roasting for heavily dumbed down for Console gameplay - so I am not blind to critism of a game, but I jsut don't see any here to justify such claims.