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Bethesda now has 180 staff members, up from 108 circa Fallout 4's release

Toni

Toni

Member
Getting staff for that Elder Scrolls 6 release.

22SWjTB.gif
 
K

kswiston

Member
Skyrim had a pretty huge return per team member if they were developing it with a team of around 100 for 3 years.
 
SlimySnake

SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
Wow only 100 people making massive games like Fallout and Skyrim?

This explains why the games are so buggy. there is no way they have enough QA engineers.
 
N

Nirolak

Mrgrgr
kswiston said:
Skyrim had a pretty huge return per team member if they were developing it with a team of around 100 for 3 years.
Click to expand...

They were 104 for Skyrim's release and only added four staff members for Fallout 4.

After that though, they seem to have realized they needed way more people.
 
S

Sotha_Sil

Member
It's finally happening. I think it's clear from Fallout 4 to Witcher 3 to Horizon that they were understaffed.

They've been one of the smallest AAA studios for a long time, if not the smallest.
 
A

Ahasverus

Member
And still no Elder Scrolls.

Hopefully 100 of them are coders writing a decent engine. After horizon, Bethesda's is emabrassing.
 
M

metalslimer

Member
They are a really small team by today's standards. Hopefully ES6 is revealed this year but they will likely reveal it it the year it's released aka 2019
 
S

Sotha_Sil

Member
SlimySnake said:
Wow only 100 people making massive games like Fallout and Skyrim?

This explains why the games are so buggy. there is no way they have enough QA engineers.
Click to expand...

The Technomancer said:
Wait Bethesda is that small? Wow
Click to expand...

Rad- said:
The fuck I always thought they were a huge studio. They are crazy profitable then I guess.
Click to expand...

They've always been like this. I think ~30 people made Morrowind? Between MW and Fallout 4, they increased to ~110 people.

On a per-developer ratio, they have to be the most profitable developers in the industry, lol. Oblivion, Fallout 3, Skyrim and Fallout 4 sold crazy numbers.
 
C

CHC

Member
They really need to up their tech. A tired line, but it's getting truer and truer with each release. Like, just being open world is no longer an excuse to have bad animations, bad voice acting, mediocre writing, and mediocre combat.

With the kinds of games that are launching now Bethesda has to get on top of doing some upgrades before it really bites them in the ass. They could probably skate by on 2 or 3 more games using the same engine and tech they have now, but sooner or later someone is going to come along and eat their lunch in a major way.
 
K

kswiston

Member
Nirolak said:
They were 104 for Skyrim's release and only added four staff members for Fallout 4.

After that though, they seem to have realized they needed way more people.
Click to expand...

I wonder what the production budgets were for those games. Even if we figure an average of $150k per person for salary and overhead for the entire 3 year period from Fallout 3 to Skyrim, you get a bit more than $45M.
 
E

eFKac

Member
Ok so that explains it.

I thought Bethesda is like a 400 man strong studio, not small like that.
No wonder they take so long to develop their RPGs and they're as buggy and unoptimized as they are, those are incredibly ambitious games for the studio size.
 
T

Tigress

Member
Selddon said:
Hoping they learn from the criticism of Fallout 4 and make RPGs this time
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I agree with this one. I liked Fallout 4 and with survival mode I loved it. But it was missing the RPG (I'd still call it one but it was a weak one). That being said, Far Harbor showed they could do an RPG and even have decent writing if they wanted to. I hope they get enough backlash for the weakness of 4's RPG they focus on that next time (I do like some of the improvements they made and I appreciate they did try to make some improvements like actually allowing you to pick sides but they implemented it badly). Also, Far Harbor had better quest design and I'd love to see more quests like you saw in it (I loved the hotel mystery quest and that they allowed you to figure out who it was and didn't even tell you if you were right though there was a right answer). Though I hear they ripped that one off a modder.

I'm not too fussed about the engine. I don't want them making a new one unless it can do what the old one can do (to me the maybe less buggy wouldn't make up for losing what makes their games unique and I do think their engine allows for them to make different games than other developers and more like a D&D game where you are free to play who you want if they'd actually use the potential the engine has). Also... what makes people think a new one would be less buggy? After all it's new and they won't have had as much time to find what new bugs it will have and refine it (new products all the time tend to be buggy because of this. For many things you don't really wan the first iteration of it).

I would have wished them hire better writers but I think the problem is more Emil. Seriously, it seems everything he touches that I've played by them has uninspired story and the DLC I know he didn't lead they have shown a lot more potential.
 
D

DemWalls

Member
Finally. If I'm not mistaken, I remember reading that their numbers haven't really changed since Oblivion, with many of the people in prominent roles being the same since Morrowind. Given how much F4 was criticized for being somewhat stale, I hope the new blood will bring some well needed change and evolution.
 
R

ReaperXL7

Member
Selddon said:
Hoping they learn from the criticism of Fallout 4 and make RPGs this time
Click to expand...

I don't think they care as their critics are a vocal minority.

Bethesda’s Fallout 4 sold 12 million copies and generated over $750 million in its first 24 hours at retail on Nov. 10. Those numbers obliterate the over $550 million in 72 hours that Activision-owned developer Treyarch earned with Call of Duty: Black Ops 3.
Click to expand...

https://www.google.com/amp/amp.time.../16/fallout4-is-quiet-best-seller/?source=dam
 
D

DriftingSpirit

Member
Ahasverus said:
And still no Elder Scrolls.

Hopefully 100 of them are coders writing a decent engine. After horizon, Bethesda's is emabrassing.
Click to expand...
That isn't really a fair comparison. GG has the benefit of working on one platform and the aid from being under Sony's umbrella.

I do think Bethesda needs to step their game up in general though. They won't be able to compete with something like Horizon but they still have room to improve.
 
H

Huge Succeeded

Banned
Selddon said:
but I'm hoping they scrap the voice acted PC altogether in further games
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I don't think that's going to happen and it's the prime reason I'm just not fucking around with Fallout anymore until someone else makes it.

Voicing the protagonist neutered Fallout 4's potential as a role playing game so fucking profoundly, and we all know that Todd & Friends are likely to keep that shit in, anyway. because it draws in those people who don't give a fuck about RPGs that aren't "Far Cry with Levelup!"
which is all that Fallout is now

I mean how do you voice a protag and then NOT voice the protag in future entries
there'd be people crying foul -who may not actually know or care how much that shit impacts the RPG-side - they'd say, "man, why isn't my guy speaking? this feels cheap, not at all like Far Cry :3"
 
A

Ahasverus

Member
DriftingSpirit said:
That isn't really a fair comparison. GG has the benefit of working on one platform and the aid from being under Sony's umbrella.

I do think Bethesda needs to step their game up in general though. They won't be able to compete with something like Horizon but they still have room to improve.
Click to expand...
Even Bioware's engine is better, and it's kinda bad. With The Witcher 3 existing, there's no excuse.

The engine can't even handle ladders. never forget that.
 
R

ReaperXL7

Member
Selddon said:
Todd already acknowledged criticism about the dialogue options in Fallout 4 and I guess improvements are seen in the DLC but I'm hoping they scrap the voice acted PC altogether in further games
Click to expand...

They would be dumb not to take any feedback, but believing they will ever go back to something like DaggerFall or MorrowWind is a pipe dream. Despite the issues in their games Bethsoft is a massively successful studio and the direction they have taken their games has only increased their audience.
 
C

Contica

Unconfirmed Member
Hopefully they hired some animators, getting by without any for so long is rather impressive.
 
BouncyFrag

BouncyFrag

Member
Throw in some more voice actors. I don't know how many times I ran into that guy who said he was a 'friend and that meant something' in Skyrim.
 
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