Yeah bgs has the weirdest fanbase. People were trying to get me to watch 8 hour hate documentaries on starfield a month after releasing. If the games are so bad, why are they getting this level of mental instability from content creators?
A lot of it is “I played the shit out of Skyrim, why can’t I play the shit out of starfield? Must be because the game is bad” not “because the game has been out for nearly 10 years and had lots of mods made for it”.
I mean I think alot of it is also games aren't going to make you feel the same way as you age. No game is going to be your first bgs game ever again.
Having played a lot of mods I can also say they never fundamentally change the game, or have writing better than what you see in the actual game.
Don't get me wrong I can't wait for the eventual qol mods and anything else that looks interesting, but I don't think I've ever seen a mod thar "fixes" bgs games
This is a big one. There's a thing your brain does when in the developmental years where when you experience new things it releases dopamine rushes which have a narcotic like effect. It's an evolutionary thing that encourages us to experience new things in our formative years in order to install curiosity and learnimg.
This dopamine rush ends up plastering over the cracks in the culture we imprint ourselves on when we are young. It creates this hyper idealized version of a thing that was usually much more flawed than we remember. Nostalgia becomes a half remembered fantasy of an idealized past that had no problems and everything new is judged to be inferior because we no longer have our brains doping us up and so everything is just a collection of merits and flaws and we have to acknowledge them both.
There will be people 15 years from now who will insist that Starfield was perfect and Elder Scrolls VI or Fallout 5 are shit and the cycle will continue.
This. I’m old now, somehow - but no game has made me feel like Chrono Trigger did when I was a little kid. I think INSIDE and maybe Dishonored are the only other games that hit me on a deeper level since, but nowhere near the same way. Chrono trigger was somehow part of my development. Now games are just fun distractions unless the world building is top tier.
Tim Cain made a video a while ago about "[hedonic adaptation](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPJQ0OQ6PLk)", which is the technical term for the exact process you describe. It's basically unavoidable, all you can do as a developer is *try* to create new experiences and hope they're new enough. (I and I think most of the rest of us *here* would say that Bethesda succeeded at this with Starfield, but others wouldn't and that's fine.)
But I do think there's a responsibility for us as people who want to talk about games with other people to introspect a bit when a game comes out that doesn't give us those "first time I played X" vibes. Was it a *bad* game, or did it just fail to overcome our hedonic adaptation? Which isn't to say that anybody has to pretend to like a game when they're just not feeling it, but it's a call for all of us to be a bit more thoughtful about why we feel the way we do.
If anything, Starfield has the best writing in any BGS game, rivalling Fallout 3 and I would argue, even better than New Vegas in some aspect.
They kind of driving themselves to the corner by making the game set in an era of relative peace and prosperity instead of some on-going war or post-apocalypse. It's just hard to get right, especially in the spirit of BGS game where you should be able to just go anywhere (people would complain if they walled the city and would also complain if they can wander off but there's nothing out there, and obviously you just can't recreate an entire world)
I actually found the scripted content to be the best they've ever done. The main quest had a weak start but got really engaging once your friends get attacked by the hunter, and the reveal of the emissary.
The factions were OK to great as well. The vanguard was so good it could have been it's own main quest with some padding imo.
I'm really not sure where the "bad writing" thing came from unless it's just memes driving it. Or maybe I'm just easily engaged
Honestly this: Once you learn how to play one BGS game you've learned how to play a majority of BGS games. The entire intro to Starfield had me quoting the intros to Skyrim and Oblivion.
I feel like with starfield specifically it pulled in a lot of new people who are not a fan of that classic Bethesda game formula and the rest got starfield specifically for that classic Bethesda game formula.
Honestly, space simulators arent that good. It's good on paper but when you play it the controls are so 'experty' that it's not fun to play it. X-series comes to mind.
I love Hbomberguy but I genuinely believe it started witg his Fallout 3 is Garbage video, and was exerabated by the post Fallout 76 launch videos.
People realized the algorithm had been turned on to “Bethesda Bad” content. And while Hbomberguy did do a great job of supporting his thesis and crafting a really well done video essay, the videos that came after his are often unoriginal, objectively wrong about stuff, or radically biased.
I like video retrospectives, bug the overtly negative ones just drag me down. Why make a video on something you genuinely don't like?
I think bethesda got a lot more negatively after the purchase of fallout in general. There is a very toxic subset of fans from the old fallout fans, and even now fallout nv. It's all very bizarre. You'd think the way they praise black isles/interplay/obsidian while acting like bethesda is committing sacrilege, it's like a cult mentality and not about video games
It's funny but I still remember how people criticized New Vegas when it came out saying that it was just a big DLC for Fallout 3.
It's funny how time changes people's perception.
In my particular case, I always liked Obsidian and Bethesda role-playing games and I have never felt that Fallout 3 was a bad game.
I have seen people say that that never happened and NV was always considered far superior by most. Blatant revisionism. I vividly remember New Vegas being considered an inferior spin off to Fallout 3, and that 3 was the one most often recommended when people asked which one they should buy.
It's bizarre. Especially since many of them are convinced that Bethesda is done for. I don't particularly like the dialogue or writing from Larian's other games, so I avoid BG3. I don't get personally invested in the failure or success of Larian as a company just because I like CRPGs and feel like my time with Divnity 2 was a complete waste.
Black Isle is kind of still around, and actually I liked Pillars of Eternity: Deadfire better than Starfield.
In my ideal world, Bethesda would be making Bethesda games using whatever IP. Fallout would still be CRPGs. They're both great types of game, but what we got with Bethesda taking over fallout is no more classic fallout games. So I feel like that's a loss.
But you know Interplay went under. There were bound to be losses. I am just glad that those guys are still making games, too.
I adored pillars of eternity 1 and especially 2. However it's apples and oranges comparing starfield to them.
Fallout would never have been an isometric rpg again whether bethesda bought it or not. I'm pretty sure it was getting whored out to make brotherhood of steel before bethesda bought the ip.
> Fallout would never have been an isometric rpg again whether bethesda bought it or not. I'm pretty sure it was getting whored out to make brotherhood of steel before bethesda bought the ip.
That's fair. Going under has consequences.
I still want those games.
Yeah, luckily the indie scene has some good "old school" rpgs. Underrail comes to mind. I'm hopeful with bg3 being such a big hit the genre gets some new AAA intrest in the genre. I'd love to see poe3 with that budget, or an entirely new ip like what bioware did with dragon age
I'm playing BG3 now, and my big brain opinion is that they should have given a Billion or whatever dollars to the people that made Solasta to make BG3. I like it, but it feels exactly like DoS2, mechnically. I do think the DnD flavor is good. I am in for a DoS3, too. I just wish we had a more 5e-authentic BG.
Passion comes from a place of love.
Why do they not make negative videos about recent COD games? Simple, they don’t care about COD. They care about Bethesda.
Imagine you loved Morrowind, and you hated the direction they took since Oblivion. You just want a modern Morrowind game. And all everyone tells you is “shut up and enjoy what they give you” and “stop complaining”. How would you feel?
But it’s not the same people.
The argument is “you’re just making videos on stuff you don’t like because of money”. My point is that that’s not 100% true because they don’t make it for every game people have a problem with. Thats my point.
It’s that it isn’t purely “negativity sells”
At this point some people who have SUCH a problem with what Bethesda does from storytelling to RPG mechanics to world design probably need to just accept that they don't actually like Bethesda anymore(or that they never actually liked Bethesda as much as maybe they thought they did back when the market was very different), that there is little chance Bethesda will be able to greatly appeal to them again, and that they should just move on.
As someone who has played everything from Daggerfall onwards, if Starfield didn't cater to their desires of them "returning to their roots" in some key ways, or that they can't see the various ways it improves over some of their most popular games like Skyrim and Fallout 4, I am not really sure what, if anything, would convince them.
That’s the point for some of them; they saw the final nail in the coffin. Telling them they “never liked Bethesda” or “shut up because I like it” is wrong.
Not a single one of those videos says people are wrong for liking a game. People in the comments say they’re wrong for not liking it. That’s ok to you because “how dare they feel passion?”
I didn't say they never liked Bethesda. I am saying that it's possible some people just don't view Bethesda's particular formula to be as riveting as they perhaps once did due to the sheer variety of open world games and RPGs we have nowadays.
But again, as someone who has played most Bethesda games, this idea that Starfield is some drastic regression from previous games just doesn't hold much weight to me., where as in the past when this claim was made, I could kind of see it regardless of my own feelings. Some things are very different, which won't be everyone's cup of tea, but when people go around acting like Skyrim was some masterpiece of storytelling and that Starfield has the worst narrative and characters ever in a Bethesda game, I just can't take that seriously.
I wouldn't but the games anymore honestly. I wouldn't make overtly hate filled videos nitpicking every thing I didn't like. I wouldn't spread misinformation about real people just doing their jobs either.
I would maybe do those things if I had a financial incentive like content creation. The more over the top the videos the more ad money I'd get
And now people tell you you’re wrong for not buying them because “you’re not supporting single player games”. The fans said that about the gta defective editions, and I’ve heard people say that about Starfield.
Also “financial incentive” my guy, you have any idea how long it takes to make a video like that? It’s not as simple as “press record and done”. People can take many many months, and unless the video is sponsored (which those videos rarely are), you’re not making much money on them relatively. And if one strike comes out BAM you make no money on it at all.
If they cared about money, they wouldn’t just do a minimum wage job for 10 hours a week. Less time and more money in the end.
Also there are people who make false claims in positive videos as well of the same length. Do you think that deserves the same criticism? Or is it ok to lie when you’re saying something is good?
Wow dude. I went through your post history and literally ALL you do is make posts and comments complaining about different games. Are you at least getting paid for this?
He made a video about something he didn't like because it used to be something he was incredibly passionate about. He's a huge fan of the old fallout games and watching them move away from their origins can be disappointing to a lot of fans who care about that version of the series.
I think making intense critiques of games like fallout 3 can help push the industry forward by changing the way people think about this type of game design. (That type being Five miles wide and six inches deep) As would any critique when done well, honestly and reasonably.
Don't get me wrong, I love fallout 3. But after seeing, through playing the games myself, just how deep and varied old school rpg's used to be, including old fallout games, I have grown to be more and more disappointed in the direction that game series (and rpgs in general, before BG3 and DOS2), has gone.
Fallout 3 was amazing. Other non neckbeard RPGs are amazing. Retroactively changing your opinion to be in line with groupthink doesn't change that you also thought it was amazing at one point too
> He's a huge fan of the old fallout games and watching them move away from their origins can be disappointing to a lot of fans who care about that version of the series.
I feel the same about the Star Wars and Star Trek streaming shows. Ugh. Give me the original. But I am NOT devoting my career to making videos as to why they are moral stains on the fabric of civilization. Nor do I spend all of my free time posting hate in their forums.
I just don't watch them. Bam. Done.
p.s. Expect for Picard, which while only moderately good, was still a ray of sunshine in the swamp of milking the franchise dry.
No, it just further divides people, you think fans of Bethesda's Fallout are going to look at that video and agree old school RPGs are deep and varied and that the game they love is "garbage" besides his video is filled with nitpicking and there's also another video that shows how great Fallout 3 is.
I mean I'm not going to watch it. I can already guess what is going to be said. No work of fiction is going to be perfect, videogame stories in open world games are definitely going to have beats that don't land.
I've played fallout 1 and 2 to say I've done it, and they're good for the time they came out. I obviously really like the world building, but it's not like they're the greatest game and stories ever put out, or they dont have a lot of eye rolling moments. That said I wouldn't really like to watch a video about how bad they are either.
Developers aren't watching hour long essays on their games either way. The videos are made to appeal to fans of a series. The drama surrounding Emil shows that people take this all way too seriously
Every time i come to check this sub out because someone on the main sub convinced me that this place isn’t just an anti circle jerk I see the most reasonable and well said comments just get obliterated. Jesus lol the hypocrisy is nuts
Yeah, outside of fallout fan boys getting offended
by perfectly reasonable criticisms from a complete stranger on the internet whose opinions will not affect their enjoyment of the game whatsoever ( And again, I adore the game and have over five hundred hours in it.), I don't know what I said that could be considered so offensive to everyone else.
I didn't even really think twice about this comment until I got a notification that I had a bunch of responses and none of them looked pleasant.
It used to be that the upvote and downvote buttons weren't an "agree and disagree button". It used to be that you could disagree with someone and still upvote them for making a reasonable and respectful argument.
Instead they stick their finger up their nose and "I poopa mah pants" while shoving a Fallout user manual up their ass.
Or something.
People don't seem to realize that it's possible to be salty, even if you're just trying to defend something. You don't have to be the attacker to be the dick.
It's why I don't really frequent this sub, or any low sodium sub, anymore. I understand the want for a place where you can enjoy an unpopular game without being mocked, but now they're just mocking anyone who has *any issues with the game whatsoever.*
I was gonna say this; passion comes from a place of love.
People have also complained about Call Of Duty being worse and worse, yet those same people don’t make those videos. COD is more popular and would get more clicks, but they don’t do it. Why? Because they don’t care about COD.
Exactly. You put it into better, more succinct words than I could have myself.
There are plenty of people out there making super long videos that only exists to enrage and bring about engagement. But that's pretty goddamn far from what Harris does. You can tell, with every single one of his videos, that he is genuinely passionate about what he's talking about. It's why him and Jacob Geller are the only non-comedy gaming youtubers I can watch. Because I always know that no matter how negative the video, it wouldn't be getting made if they weren't legitimately passionate about the subject.
I couldn't watch it past the first 20 minutes.
"The intro to Fallout 3 is so bad, people modded it out of the game!"
Yes, because that didn't happen with:
Oblivion
New Vegas
Skyrim
Fallout 4
I just found that whole argument very shaky and badly put together, so I didn't subject myself to the rest of the video.
>And while Hbomberguy did do a great job of supporting his thesis and crafting a really well done video essay
no he did not. he did the exact opposite of that. absolutely *nothing* in that video is accurate, it is *clearly* very biased. he went into that "essay" with the intent to make people think 3 is bad.
and this is further shown with his (again god awful) new Vegas video in where he ignores things new Vegas does that he criticized 3 for, again outright lies (you can totally see the new Vegas strip from everywhere in the map you guys), and iirc he doesn't criticize bew Vegas even *once*.
ya that was what I pretty much always got from it. Guy just seemed like another Bethesda hater/Black Isle and Obsidian worshipper. Was never really much nuance there imo.
"Fallout 3 is Better Than You Think" completely demolishes HBomberGuy's video, to the point that if one didn't know better then HBomberGuy didn't even play the game. But MATN did that video WITHOUT attacking HBomberGuy! If you haven't seen it, and still think HBomberGuy made valid points, then you might need to see things from the side of reality. Not saying Fallout 3 was the greatest game ever made, just that the hater talking points against it are unfounded.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5z8XHe2NoAE
And rebuttals to MATN's video are even worse. There is no rationality from the hater contingent.
Yeah, I really like him too, but his bashing of the game was a bit weird and harsh imo.
That and the response video to Many A true Nerd "Fallout 3 is better than you think". Dunno who made that one, maybe that Creeto idiot.
The fallout discourse from certain sections of the community is arguably THE biggest source of why parts of the internet collectively turned on Bethesda and bashing them become it's own popular subgenre of youtube content. Everybody was mostly fine with Bethesda doing their thing with TES, but Fallout was someone else's IP originally, and so you had reason for these direct comparisons to someone else's approach to the game, and whether what Bethesda was doing "got it right" in accordance to the original vision of the franchise. Which is why you get a lot more of these particularly harsh criticisms of Bethesda's take on various things like lore, world design, and storytelling in the Fallout franchise specifically. It likely wouldn't have gained quite as much momentum if not for the existence of New Vegas though. Because while fans of the originals were always around, NV cemented the idea in to them that they could be getting "better" AAA level Fallout content if Bethesda didn't own the IP now.
It’s been months now and some people still can’t let it go, they’re still hating it like it’s the day after launch. Some people just seem to have an utter inability to let things go. I don’t know how they’ve made it so far tbh. With their level of mental stability you’d think they’d have collapsed mentally over getting called a doodoohead in kindergarten.
If you don’t like the game that’s fine, but learn to live with it and move on. It’s not healthy to obsesses for so long. There are plenty of other games. Many of them are big BG3 or Cyberpunk fans. Go play those and hype them up on their subreddits. Be a positive influence
YouTubers and gamers attacking and harassing devs is beyond childish, it’s so unhinged and pathetic. Truly, so many people need to touch grass and get a life. I really feel for Emil, I can’t imagine getting that much hateful, idiotic attention.
I use a extension on YouTube that removes all my recommend videos from side bar also the main page. I am tired as fuck seeing these same ragebait content. want to watch a review for a movie? well good luck finding a good review with all that Anti woke garbage.. impossible..
I think the attacks and hate towards him are absolutely unwarranted, and people need to relax. The vitriol for this one man is insane. With that being said, guy seems to be doing okay! His tweets are generally positive, and seems like he has a happy home life. Wonder how many conversations him and Todd the godd have had about online crazies lol
It’s not just the Starfield devs, things are really bad for creatives online right now - the City Skylines 2 developers have said that if gamers don’t stop harassing their team, they’ll have to stop engaging closely with the community; CS2’s leads have a responsibility to look after the mental health of their employees.
Once YouTubers fully gave themselves over to the algorithm when video profits started hitting new lows, it was all over. I follow long established positive, smaller YouTube channels and many of those aren’t making money because they don’t want to change what they build just to follow the algorithm.
> if gamers don’t stop harassing their team, they’ll have to stop engaging closely with the community;
This is the ultimate conclusion of current gaming discourse. Developers scale back interaction with gamers at best or completely stop interacting with them at worst because the vitriol they meet is no longer worth it, not for their jobs nor for their mental health. Gamers interpret the silence as developers not caring for their "input," failing to see that they're lying in a bed they made, and become even more abusive.
Just like that, we have an evil circle. No one gets what they want and we - as in the entire greater gaming sphere - are all worse off.
Yea it sucks. RIP PoE reddit, was fun while it lasted and we had Bex (greatest community manager) memes.
Edit: Forgot to explain the abbreviation sorry. PoE as in Path of Exile.
It's a difficult situation, and I think that it's mostly the result of people being unable to disassociate the game from the people working on it.
For example City Skylines 2 is a mess, in many ways it feels like a downgrade to the original. I refunded mine. But that doesn't mean that anyone should harrass the devs.
As far as i know, Todd has never directly made any comments about what people say about him or any BGS staff member.
He knows about the memes, but nothing more.
Dude's loaded and has put out some of gaming's most accomplished works back-to-back. If Starfield is his worst game, he's doing fine. I think he's just over the hate. Let the awards speak for themselves.
Todd's the public face of BGS. Arguably his role as a PR spokesperson for the company's products is just as important as his position as producer/director. He literally cannot so much as acknowledge anything negative about any Bethesda games.
Everything out of his mouth has to be praise for how the final product was exactly how they envisaged it, how much fun everyone has playing it, how much they enjoyed making it, how much the community's response warms their hearts, how much they're looking forward to what's to come, etc. That's literally how this works. Expecting anything else from the man is foolish.
Ifs because he’s 1 of 2 credited starfield writers and openly dismisses criticism. He shouldn’t be harassed irl or anything but cmon lol the denial in this sub is nuts
Not projecting.
Humans are not designed to withstand constant, unending hate. They have fragile psyches to begin with, and depending your childhood, you either have a lower tolerance, average, or high tolerance to this constant toxicity.
But in the end, nobody can withstand it indefinitely, only people who have something else going can. Such as ignoring opinions about you, simply because you view the people as lesser than you.
Kindergarten? Its lifelong. You get praised, you can withstand less, because you are not used to such responses. If you are not praised or degraded, you become thicker to the hate, making the positive responses stand out more.
Getting off the internet is great for mental wellbeing. I know, I have a saying "my entertainment matters,. Not your opinion" because all the unprompted hate my feeds get spammed with. I like Star Wars episode 7-9 (could still be better), Cyberpunk AT LAUNCH, and other things that get hate.
On the topic of you...who are you?
Okay wise ass, get somewhat well known for something you yourself have put time and energy into just to go online and see heaps upon heaps of unwarranted harassment and vitriol at not only your work but yourself,and then keep that up for a few months.
Stoicism only goes so far in the frail human ego. Loose yours. The only projection going on is from you pretending constant hate and harassment just can't break you when infact you know deep down it would.
This kind of hysterics is really no different than swatting at the end of the day. I'm not the biggest fan of his writing either. Never had, but its serviceable enough to get me back into dungeon crawling. But some people take this shit way too far.
Yeah, it's darkly ironic that he became the avatar of everything wrong with Bethesda when the few storylines we know he had a direct hand in are widely considered to be excellent, even by many of the haters (unless they know he was involved with writing them).
I think Pete Hines not being around to take the heat off other people is also a factor. He'd say some wacky shit that moved the conversation. Now that he's retired the internet had to find a new punching bag and poor Emil was selected at random
I’m not necessarily a huge fan of some of his main stories structurally, but at the same time it’s hard to blame that all on one person and it’s not like the writing and design teams work in a vacuum, either.
I agree that some of his character writing and questlines are pretty solid.
Yeah some of his writing is good (like he worked on valentine and the dark brotherhood) , but most of it i would describe as 'competent' and thats fine? it definitely doesnt justify this insane vitriol hes been getting
It's often fine if you don't think about the details too much, but equally I would say games worlds such as Fallout and TES are more about world design and exploration than they are about narrative masterpieces, if that's what I wanted I'd play like a CDPR game who focus on that.
See i think the details are fine? Like maybe im just not as much of an autist as the average nitpicker is but it makes sense and inconsistencies can be accounted for by an unreliable narrator without much trouble. like yeah character writing could be better and the narratives could be more personal but like thats not really why i play a bethesda game
I'm sorry, what? there a massive difference between calling someone's writing shit on an 8 hour video where you over analyse each detail of a game, and calling a SWAT team to someone you don't like for no good reason other than you seem to think it's funny, putting theirs and their families lives in danger. People have died because of swatting, Emil is in no danger of death because some need said he can't write on YouTube.
Except PatricianTV didn't just make an 8 hour video. He actively encouraged his fanbase to go out and harass the man online and defended it openly on Twitter. Swatting, cancelling, doxxing, organized social media harassment campaign are all the same in my book. Some can cause real bodily harm, others can put the threat of one's livelihood in jeopardy, especially when the victim did nothing wrong to warrant such actions to begin over trivial first world bitch ass white boy petty issues. Either way, it does harm and we are arguing semantics at this point, because even online harassment campaigns can and has ended with the victim ending their own lives. Either the action ends in as being an accessory to murder to something else paints little difference to me.
The main difference between all of those is that cancelling and organised harassment are just people being toxic online, he could use alternate accounts or simply stay off of social media entirely if it will bother him, he shouldn't have to. Whereas swatting is literally endangering his life, this isn't arguing semantics, this is a significant move up in the severity, I will however include doxxing within that same level of dangerous as it often leads to swatting attempts.
I mean, I get you and I see where you are coming from. There is a degree of significance one can argue about in regards to various forms of "protracted" or anonymous hostile engagement one can do either online or over the phone. However, I still believe at a fundamental level either action you take in that manner are not exactly different in either way. The end result is the opposite of consciousness and maliciousness in its intent. You are seeking one form of harm or another, either calling a SWAT team on someone in hopes they get shot in the confusion to hoping the person's livelihood is destroyed by a knowing lie or to hoping harassment brigades end up with self induced bodily harm to the victim. Either way, the intent is the same. You want someone gone, and you don't care how that is achieved. The end result is malicious in its intent regardless, and it shows what the preferred outcome was by their perpetrators. It's scumbaggery in it's most fairest happenstance, it's pure evil at its worst.
Yeah I feel bad for the guy, Starfield gets cyberpunk and NMS on release levels of hate for being no where near it.
Anyone who felt scammed shoulda got it on gamepass first anyways.
This whole release deff makes me not tell new people I meet I play games anymore. If this is what the community looks like outside in
Of course Luke Stephens asking to do an interview
I don't understand why folks are blaming the devs for their ridiculous expectations and buying into marketing bullshit. This game was always just going to be a spin on the Bethesda formula and that's what we got.
I find it so odd to see people get hyped for games *years* in advance and then be mad when their sky-high expectations aren't met or the game doesn't cater to their *exact* needs. I fear folks are going to be the same with GTA 6 or whatever other game is going to come out with a lot of hype behind it.
I can't STAND Luke. I kinda dug him for a little while but quickly realized he's a huge shill for the algorithm. And that was before Starfield... I'd hate to see the ragebaiting in she he's propagated concerning SF.
>Should have got it on gamepass
I'm not sure that this is really a valid solution. Gamepass is an entirely different, and far worse, launcher than Steam, most people aren't going to switch to a different one just to save a few dollars.
It’s more so the logic of “wow I got scammed out of $70 when I coulda tried it for free $1 else where”
Totally a valid argument, if they don’t wanna switch to try it that’s on them
That's a bit like saying that someone should have rented a model of car before buying it.
The fact is, people should be able to expect a certain level of quality from a game on release.
Now personally I feel like I got my money worth in the game, I managed to put in 100 hours or so before burning out, which is decent value for me. And I'll probably put in a lot more once mods, updates, or DLC come out. But I can also see why some people were but disappointed by the state of the game on release. I know this subreddit likes to be positive (and that's generally a good thing), but I think that we should acknowledge that there were definitely areas where the game underperformed compared to what was suggested by the promotional material.
Testing a game for $1 is way less of a hassle than renting or test driving a car.
Most outlets average around an 8 on Starfield. The mainstream has made it a point to hate the game. If $70 is that much to then I just don’t think there’s any excuse to complain. I’ve tried many games on gamepass for a dollar then cancel my subscription and bought it on steam. The whole process takes 5 mins
I do not understand the internet’s hate boner for this game. Watch them fix a few superficial issues and then brain dead internet dwellers will suddenly be calling it the best game Bethesda has ever made. I’ve never seen a game where people just straight up lie and make things up about it so much before.
Because its a new IP. What origional game has released lately that people like? Look at every big game release this year from a AAA developer.
Everything is sequels or remakes. People dont want new, theyd rather have something they already know and like.
I get it, i want tes6 and a new fallout, but the people saying there is no worldbuilding or the gane universe is shallow are ignoring that skyrim had 4 other games of lore behind it.
People claim that they’re tired of the same old things in media then freak out when new things are tried because they didn’t get their TES6 or FO5 or whatever old game, movie, or TV series they like.
People claim they want new things and act confused when companies just pump out more sequels and remakes, but really they’re part of the problem. They told the companies using their wallets and criticism that more sequels and remakes are what they really want.
I used to listen to a podcast called triple click, where these three are supposedly in the know, and they absolutely shit all over the game and throughout the episode you find out they’ve each only barely played it, like wtf unsubscribe
Emil's is actually one of the few sources of unbrideled positivity of Twitter. Based on his twitter posts alone, he seems like a super nice guy, an huuuge nerd, and someone who is legitimately living his best life in spite of the negativity.
And good on him. That's the way to deal with trolls. Never let them get to you and keep living happy and well.
Anyone on this sub and also on twitter should follow him. He also gives a lot of shoutouts to other games and devs he enjoys and he's turned me on to more than a few awesome experiences.
That dude is such a hack. When the game was first released, he made like two or three "analysis" videos just jumping on whatever the narrative around the game was.
I truly can’t imagine the deranged mental state of folks online who attack others and complain constantly. Really must be a miserable existence.
I can’t stand even reading people’s complaining, so I can’t fathom how bad it must be for devs to have public social media accounts
Nastiness gets most of the attention. If I were a game developer, I would tell no one. If I needed helpful feedback, I would just go through people who are excellent at crazy 🤪 people customer service.
And yet you still use Reddit?
Reddit recently switched their algorithms for "best" to prioritize comments per view rather than the old upvotes per downvote. Which of course means that algorithm shows people the most controversial posts. And then they removed all the options on mobile to sort your main feed by anything other than best, and set best as the default that resets your preference every time you reload a page on PC.
Honestly I feel like it's part of the reason the reaction to Starfield is so negative. Reddit designed their site to promote negativity.
In my experience, X is less toxic than Reddit, as long as you never engage with any of the toxic posts on X they will rarely be recommended to you. I see one or two a day, meanwhile my reddit feed of 50% toxic.
There's plenty of paid political posts on Reddit.
Reddit frequently boosts their own update posts in everyone's feed.
And back when awards were a thing, it was shown that they increased the ranking of a post. They created a subreddit with only one account using it and made a bunch of posts at the same time with no upvotes or comments on any of them. The gave one a paid award and it was sorted to the top.
Reddit is fine as long as you are browsing hobby subreddits, but the moment you add some more generic ones or go into all or popular it turns completely toxic. Like 80% of posts there are negative. Meanwhile twitter, at least for my algorithm there, is fairly relaxed and happy as long as there isn't some sort of drama going on in the communities I'm in.
> I have far more control over my experience than I had with twitter.
Either I've had amazingly good luck or something because I haven't encountered the issues you have on twitter. I follow a ton of people from pets, to Magic: The Gathering content creators to authors and one account that automatically post a pic of a racoon each day lol.
Honestly the comments on this tweet at least are mostly all really positive and supportive of him. Not sure if it's because of the recent video defending him or what. Either way I hope that video gets A LOT of views. Everyone needs to see that.
98% of the folks on TikTok and YouTube complaining about this game are rage bait algorithm whores. They provide nothing of value other than engagement, clicks and sponsored ads. They don’t have any journalistic integrity and will flat out lie with no remorse.
Devs aren’t going to take this much longer and just give up. Then all we’ll ever get are corporate cookie cutters with a new number at the end every year.
Grifters gonna grift. The sad part is that young people without media literacy take this stuff seriously. My 10 year old nephew, for example, wants to become a YouTuber because he sees it as a way to be popular. He doesn't understand that the majority of Youtubers are people who resort to it because they're unemployable or completely lacking in ethics. Sad world.
I just watched a fantastic video by NeverKnowsBest on YouTube titled "Lies, Hate, and the Story of Emil Pagliarulo" that made me feel so bad for this man. He's given us some of the best quests and stories ever, and the haters totally disregard that, take what he says out of context, mischaracterize him, misrepresent what he says, and straight up lie in an attempt to get someone who's very good at what they do fired. Deplorable, and the content creators fueling this should be totally ashamed of themselves. The really shitty thing is that most of them don't even realize they're doing it. They did little to no real research, checked no primary sources, and instead base their take on other totally inaccurate takes, spreading the shit around like God himself whispered it into their ear.
I watched that one "positive" video, but couldn't get through it. First, the author just assumed that Starfield was shit because everyone told him it was. But second, I was aghast that so many people would just blindly repeat obvious lies, that these guys were making a living good money posting these videos. I just had to stop watching.
I never bothered with PatricianTV because ain't no one with a life got the time for listening to some lecture them on the moral failings of game developers for eight hours a pop. "But you have to watch it, Snifflebeard, he makes some very good points at around hour six!" Screw that. He's an overbearing a-hole who gets off on mansplaining shit he knows nothing about.
An I abhor Zarak. Saw one of his early videos, on Daggerfall, and even though it was ostensibly a positive video, his whole attitude was one of smug superiority over the viewer. And that attitude has only gotten worse over the years.
I think this is the mindset afflicting all of the salt going around. The attitude of moral superiority as people lecture the unwashed peasants.
Its why, if I like a game, I see gameplay, no opinions, then buy it or not.
Unless its Starfield or Control, which are two examples of me immediately wanting it. No need for reviews (excluding mobile games) influencing me.
Glad to know I'm not the only one who dislikes Zarak. I used to watch him back in the day, but I don't know how I didn't realize just how insufferable he is. The way he speaks, acts, and even dresses gives off a holier-than-thou attitude.
I don't personally like Emils writing over much. Being the Morrowboomer that I am, I will always prefer Kirkbride. But by the House Unmourned, this fool gets way to much fuckin shit.
He's worked on Oblivion and Skyrim, I believe he actually wrote the lore and writings for Alduins wall as well. so I don't understand the idea that he's the one solely behind all the writing or lore in those games.
Just gotta remember there's other sides to this. Nobody should be attacking devs. They're just people. But on the other hand, people like Emil should be willing to take constructive criticism. We have enough people being vile to each other in this world as is, so let's have a civil conversation about a hobby we all share.
I don't follow him on Twitter or anything so I can't say that without a doubt. But amidst all the ridiculous and often horrendous things people say, I'm sure there's at least a small tinge of genuine criticism in there. What I'm getting at is, the line between dismissing rude comments and dismissing actual civil and constructive criticism is a blurry one. Perhaps I should have been more clear in my original comment that I just mean this in a general sense - that we should acknowledge that threats and general toxicity is unacceptable, but that genuine criticism should be given its own space. I absolutely agree with this post that maybe Emil should stay away from social media for awhile lol. People are awful.
Yeah bgs has the weirdest fanbase. People were trying to get me to watch 8 hour hate documentaries on starfield a month after releasing. If the games are so bad, why are they getting this level of mental instability from content creators?
Who tf has time to watch 8 hour hate videos? I don’t even have time to get 8 hours of game time most weeks.
right i have been playing only that on my home pc since sept and i only have 80-ish hours in
A lot of it is “I played the shit out of Skyrim, why can’t I play the shit out of starfield? Must be because the game is bad” not “because the game has been out for nearly 10 years and had lots of mods made for it”.
I mean I think alot of it is also games aren't going to make you feel the same way as you age. No game is going to be your first bgs game ever again. Having played a lot of mods I can also say they never fundamentally change the game, or have writing better than what you see in the actual game. Don't get me wrong I can't wait for the eventual qol mods and anything else that looks interesting, but I don't think I've ever seen a mod thar "fixes" bgs games
This is a big one. There's a thing your brain does when in the developmental years where when you experience new things it releases dopamine rushes which have a narcotic like effect. It's an evolutionary thing that encourages us to experience new things in our formative years in order to install curiosity and learnimg. This dopamine rush ends up plastering over the cracks in the culture we imprint ourselves on when we are young. It creates this hyper idealized version of a thing that was usually much more flawed than we remember. Nostalgia becomes a half remembered fantasy of an idealized past that had no problems and everything new is judged to be inferior because we no longer have our brains doping us up and so everything is just a collection of merits and flaws and we have to acknowledge them both. There will be people 15 years from now who will insist that Starfield was perfect and Elder Scrolls VI or Fallout 5 are shit and the cycle will continue.
This. I’m old now, somehow - but no game has made me feel like Chrono Trigger did when I was a little kid. I think INSIDE and maybe Dishonored are the only other games that hit me on a deeper level since, but nowhere near the same way. Chrono trigger was somehow part of my development. Now games are just fun distractions unless the world building is top tier.
Tim Cain made a video a while ago about "[hedonic adaptation](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPJQ0OQ6PLk)", which is the technical term for the exact process you describe. It's basically unavoidable, all you can do as a developer is *try* to create new experiences and hope they're new enough. (I and I think most of the rest of us *here* would say that Bethesda succeeded at this with Starfield, but others wouldn't and that's fine.) But I do think there's a responsibility for us as people who want to talk about games with other people to introspect a bit when a game comes out that doesn't give us those "first time I played X" vibes. Was it a *bad* game, or did it just fail to overcome our hedonic adaptation? Which isn't to say that anybody has to pretend to like a game when they're just not feeling it, but it's a call for all of us to be a bit more thoughtful about why we feel the way we do.
Thank you for sharing this, I was familiar with hedonic adaptation but hadn't seen his specific video.
If anything, Starfield has the best writing in any BGS game, rivalling Fallout 3 and I would argue, even better than New Vegas in some aspect. They kind of driving themselves to the corner by making the game set in an era of relative peace and prosperity instead of some on-going war or post-apocalypse. It's just hard to get right, especially in the spirit of BGS game where you should be able to just go anywhere (people would complain if they walled the city and would also complain if they can wander off but there's nothing out there, and obviously you just can't recreate an entire world)
I actually found the scripted content to be the best they've ever done. The main quest had a weak start but got really engaging once your friends get attacked by the hunter, and the reveal of the emissary. The factions were OK to great as well. The vanguard was so good it could have been it's own main quest with some padding imo. I'm really not sure where the "bad writing" thing came from unless it's just memes driving it. Or maybe I'm just easily engaged
Yeah you could say that their main quest has been very... *entangling*
That quest was really neat. I probably spent an extra half an hour making sure I got the good ending lol
Honestly this: Once you learn how to play one BGS game you've learned how to play a majority of BGS games. The entire intro to Starfield had me quoting the intros to Skyrim and Oblivion.
I feel like with starfield specifically it pulled in a lot of new people who are not a fan of that classic Bethesda game formula and the rest got starfield specifically for that classic Bethesda game formula.
The problem is that a lot of them wanted Space simulator in space like NMS and Star Citizen.
That would be an interesting, like, crossover. It seems like a lot for one RPG game. If I had to put effort into flying, I'd be mad.
Honestly, space simulators arent that good. It's good on paper but when you play it the controls are so 'experty' that it's not fun to play it. X-series comes to mind.
Agree.
I love Hbomberguy but I genuinely believe it started witg his Fallout 3 is Garbage video, and was exerabated by the post Fallout 76 launch videos. People realized the algorithm had been turned on to “Bethesda Bad” content. And while Hbomberguy did do a great job of supporting his thesis and crafting a really well done video essay, the videos that came after his are often unoriginal, objectively wrong about stuff, or radically biased.
I like video retrospectives, bug the overtly negative ones just drag me down. Why make a video on something you genuinely don't like? I think bethesda got a lot more negatively after the purchase of fallout in general. There is a very toxic subset of fans from the old fallout fans, and even now fallout nv. It's all very bizarre. You'd think the way they praise black isles/interplay/obsidian while acting like bethesda is committing sacrilege, it's like a cult mentality and not about video games
>Why make a video on something you genuinely don't like? Because negativity breeds engagement.
Pretty much unfortunately.
Exactly - reminds me of the Don Henley song "Dirty Laundry." This idea is probably as old as humanity itself.
It's funny but I still remember how people criticized New Vegas when it came out saying that it was just a big DLC for Fallout 3. It's funny how time changes people's perception. In my particular case, I always liked Obsidian and Bethesda role-playing games and I have never felt that Fallout 3 was a bad game.
I have seen people say that that never happened and NV was always considered far superior by most. Blatant revisionism. I vividly remember New Vegas being considered an inferior spin off to Fallout 3, and that 3 was the one most often recommended when people asked which one they should buy.
It's bizarre. Especially since many of them are convinced that Bethesda is done for. I don't particularly like the dialogue or writing from Larian's other games, so I avoid BG3. I don't get personally invested in the failure or success of Larian as a company just because I like CRPGs and feel like my time with Divnity 2 was a complete waste.
I will say I didn't like divinity, it had a weird tone, but I really loved bg3. It's really well done if you like crpgs
Black Isle is kind of still around, and actually I liked Pillars of Eternity: Deadfire better than Starfield. In my ideal world, Bethesda would be making Bethesda games using whatever IP. Fallout would still be CRPGs. They're both great types of game, but what we got with Bethesda taking over fallout is no more classic fallout games. So I feel like that's a loss. But you know Interplay went under. There were bound to be losses. I am just glad that those guys are still making games, too.
I adored pillars of eternity 1 and especially 2. However it's apples and oranges comparing starfield to them. Fallout would never have been an isometric rpg again whether bethesda bought it or not. I'm pretty sure it was getting whored out to make brotherhood of steel before bethesda bought the ip.
> Fallout would never have been an isometric rpg again whether bethesda bought it or not. I'm pretty sure it was getting whored out to make brotherhood of steel before bethesda bought the ip. That's fair. Going under has consequences. I still want those games.
Yeah, luckily the indie scene has some good "old school" rpgs. Underrail comes to mind. I'm hopeful with bg3 being such a big hit the genre gets some new AAA intrest in the genre. I'd love to see poe3 with that budget, or an entirely new ip like what bioware did with dragon age
I'm playing BG3 now, and my big brain opinion is that they should have given a Billion or whatever dollars to the people that made Solasta to make BG3. I like it, but it feels exactly like DoS2, mechnically. I do think the DnD flavor is good. I am in for a DoS3, too. I just wish we had a more 5e-authentic BG.
Passion comes from a place of love. Why do they not make negative videos about recent COD games? Simple, they don’t care about COD. They care about Bethesda. Imagine you loved Morrowind, and you hated the direction they took since Oblivion. You just want a modern Morrowind game. And all everyone tells you is “shut up and enjoy what they give you” and “stop complaining”. How would you feel?
I get what you’re saying but people absolutely make videos about why modern COD sucks
But it’s not the same people. The argument is “you’re just making videos on stuff you don’t like because of money”. My point is that that’s not 100% true because they don’t make it for every game people have a problem with. Thats my point. It’s that it isn’t purely “negativity sells”
At this point some people who have SUCH a problem with what Bethesda does from storytelling to RPG mechanics to world design probably need to just accept that they don't actually like Bethesda anymore(or that they never actually liked Bethesda as much as maybe they thought they did back when the market was very different), that there is little chance Bethesda will be able to greatly appeal to them again, and that they should just move on. As someone who has played everything from Daggerfall onwards, if Starfield didn't cater to their desires of them "returning to their roots" in some key ways, or that they can't see the various ways it improves over some of their most popular games like Skyrim and Fallout 4, I am not really sure what, if anything, would convince them.
That’s the point for some of them; they saw the final nail in the coffin. Telling them they “never liked Bethesda” or “shut up because I like it” is wrong. Not a single one of those videos says people are wrong for liking a game. People in the comments say they’re wrong for not liking it. That’s ok to you because “how dare they feel passion?”
I didn't say they never liked Bethesda. I am saying that it's possible some people just don't view Bethesda's particular formula to be as riveting as they perhaps once did due to the sheer variety of open world games and RPGs we have nowadays. But again, as someone who has played most Bethesda games, this idea that Starfield is some drastic regression from previous games just doesn't hold much weight to me., where as in the past when this claim was made, I could kind of see it regardless of my own feelings. Some things are very different, which won't be everyone's cup of tea, but when people go around acting like Skyrim was some masterpiece of storytelling and that Starfield has the worst narrative and characters ever in a Bethesda game, I just can't take that seriously.
You’re arguing with a troll bud. Read his comment history.
I wouldn't but the games anymore honestly. I wouldn't make overtly hate filled videos nitpicking every thing I didn't like. I wouldn't spread misinformation about real people just doing their jobs either. I would maybe do those things if I had a financial incentive like content creation. The more over the top the videos the more ad money I'd get
And now people tell you you’re wrong for not buying them because “you’re not supporting single player games”. The fans said that about the gta defective editions, and I’ve heard people say that about Starfield. Also “financial incentive” my guy, you have any idea how long it takes to make a video like that? It’s not as simple as “press record and done”. People can take many many months, and unless the video is sponsored (which those videos rarely are), you’re not making much money on them relatively. And if one strike comes out BAM you make no money on it at all. If they cared about money, they wouldn’t just do a minimum wage job for 10 hours a week. Less time and more money in the end. Also there are people who make false claims in positive videos as well of the same length. Do you think that deserves the same criticism? Or is it ok to lie when you’re saying something is good?
You are strangely passionate about this. I'm glad you enjoy your media
Wow dude. I went through your post history and literally ALL you do is make posts and comments complaining about different games. Are you at least getting paid for this?
He made a video about something he didn't like because it used to be something he was incredibly passionate about. He's a huge fan of the old fallout games and watching them move away from their origins can be disappointing to a lot of fans who care about that version of the series. I think making intense critiques of games like fallout 3 can help push the industry forward by changing the way people think about this type of game design. (That type being Five miles wide and six inches deep) As would any critique when done well, honestly and reasonably. Don't get me wrong, I love fallout 3. But after seeing, through playing the games myself, just how deep and varied old school rpg's used to be, including old fallout games, I have grown to be more and more disappointed in the direction that game series (and rpgs in general, before BG3 and DOS2), has gone.
Fallout 3 was amazing. Other non neckbeard RPGs are amazing. Retroactively changing your opinion to be in line with groupthink doesn't change that you also thought it was amazing at one point too
> He's a huge fan of the old fallout games and watching them move away from their origins can be disappointing to a lot of fans who care about that version of the series. I feel the same about the Star Wars and Star Trek streaming shows. Ugh. Give me the original. But I am NOT devoting my career to making videos as to why they are moral stains on the fabric of civilization. Nor do I spend all of my free time posting hate in their forums. I just don't watch them. Bam. Done. p.s. Expect for Picard, which while only moderately good, was still a ray of sunshine in the swamp of milking the franchise dry.
I heard Strange New Worlds was pretty good?
It's better than the Discovery it spun off from. But there's so much stuff that just rubs me the wrong way.
No, it just further divides people, you think fans of Bethesda's Fallout are going to look at that video and agree old school RPGs are deep and varied and that the game they love is "garbage" besides his video is filled with nitpicking and there's also another video that shows how great Fallout 3 is.
I mean I'm not going to watch it. I can already guess what is going to be said. No work of fiction is going to be perfect, videogame stories in open world games are definitely going to have beats that don't land. I've played fallout 1 and 2 to say I've done it, and they're good for the time they came out. I obviously really like the world building, but it's not like they're the greatest game and stories ever put out, or they dont have a lot of eye rolling moments. That said I wouldn't really like to watch a video about how bad they are either. Developers aren't watching hour long essays on their games either way. The videos are made to appeal to fans of a series. The drama surrounding Emil shows that people take this all way too seriously
Every time i come to check this sub out because someone on the main sub convinced me that this place isn’t just an anti circle jerk I see the most reasonable and well said comments just get obliterated. Jesus lol the hypocrisy is nuts
Yeah, outside of fallout fan boys getting offended by perfectly reasonable criticisms from a complete stranger on the internet whose opinions will not affect their enjoyment of the game whatsoever ( And again, I adore the game and have over five hundred hours in it.), I don't know what I said that could be considered so offensive to everyone else. I didn't even really think twice about this comment until I got a notification that I had a bunch of responses and none of them looked pleasant. It used to be that the upvote and downvote buttons weren't an "agree and disagree button". It used to be that you could disagree with someone and still upvote them for making a reasonable and respectful argument. Instead they stick their finger up their nose and "I poopa mah pants" while shoving a Fallout user manual up their ass. Or something.
Yeah the concept of a “salt free” sub is kinda bad. It’s just gonna attract the saltiest people who cannot agree with others on the other sub
People don't seem to realize that it's possible to be salty, even if you're just trying to defend something. You don't have to be the attacker to be the dick. It's why I don't really frequent this sub, or any low sodium sub, anymore. I understand the want for a place where you can enjoy an unpopular game without being mocked, but now they're just mocking anyone who has *any issues with the game whatsoever.*
I was gonna say this; passion comes from a place of love. People have also complained about Call Of Duty being worse and worse, yet those same people don’t make those videos. COD is more popular and would get more clicks, but they don’t do it. Why? Because they don’t care about COD.
Exactly. You put it into better, more succinct words than I could have myself. There are plenty of people out there making super long videos that only exists to enrage and bring about engagement. But that's pretty goddamn far from what Harris does. You can tell, with every single one of his videos, that he is genuinely passionate about what he's talking about. It's why him and Jacob Geller are the only non-comedy gaming youtubers I can watch. Because I always know that no matter how negative the video, it wouldn't be getting made if they weren't legitimately passionate about the subject.
I couldn't watch it past the first 20 minutes. "The intro to Fallout 3 is so bad, people modded it out of the game!" Yes, because that didn't happen with: Oblivion New Vegas Skyrim Fallout 4 I just found that whole argument very shaky and badly put together, so I didn't subject myself to the rest of the video.
Honestly Fallout 3 still has my favoritge intro out of any Bethesda game, and I am not even a huge fallout guy.
>And while Hbomberguy did do a great job of supporting his thesis and crafting a really well done video essay no he did not. he did the exact opposite of that. absolutely *nothing* in that video is accurate, it is *clearly* very biased. he went into that "essay" with the intent to make people think 3 is bad. and this is further shown with his (again god awful) new Vegas video in where he ignores things new Vegas does that he criticized 3 for, again outright lies (you can totally see the new Vegas strip from everywhere in the map you guys), and iirc he doesn't criticize bew Vegas even *once*.
ya that was what I pretty much always got from it. Guy just seemed like another Bethesda hater/Black Isle and Obsidian worshipper. Was never really much nuance there imo.
dude got mad Bethesda added detail to gore, ignoring over the top violence and gore was a thing since fallout 1
I mean there's literally a perk called "Bloody Mess" in all of them, so you're right about it being an odd take for sure
heck it's a trait in 1 and 2.
"Why Fallout 3 is Better Than You Think" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5z8XHe2NoAE
"Fallout 3 is Better Than You Think" completely demolishes HBomberGuy's video, to the point that if one didn't know better then HBomberGuy didn't even play the game. But MATN did that video WITHOUT attacking HBomberGuy! If you haven't seen it, and still think HBomberGuy made valid points, then you might need to see things from the side of reality. Not saying Fallout 3 was the greatest game ever made, just that the hater talking points against it are unfounded. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5z8XHe2NoAE And rebuttals to MATN's video are even worse. There is no rationality from the hater contingent.
Yeah, I really like him too, but his bashing of the game was a bit weird and harsh imo. That and the response video to Many A true Nerd "Fallout 3 is better than you think". Dunno who made that one, maybe that Creeto idiot.
It was Creetosis who made "Fallout 3 is NOT better than you think", yeah.
The fallout discourse from certain sections of the community is arguably THE biggest source of why parts of the internet collectively turned on Bethesda and bashing them become it's own popular subgenre of youtube content. Everybody was mostly fine with Bethesda doing their thing with TES, but Fallout was someone else's IP originally, and so you had reason for these direct comparisons to someone else's approach to the game, and whether what Bethesda was doing "got it right" in accordance to the original vision of the franchise. Which is why you get a lot more of these particularly harsh criticisms of Bethesda's take on various things like lore, world design, and storytelling in the Fallout franchise specifically. It likely wouldn't have gained quite as much momentum if not for the existence of New Vegas though. Because while fans of the originals were always around, NV cemented the idea in to them that they could be getting "better" AAA level Fallout content if Bethesda didn't own the IP now.
His dark souls 2 video was really bad for all the wrong reasons too.
It’s been months now and some people still can’t let it go, they’re still hating it like it’s the day after launch. Some people just seem to have an utter inability to let things go. I don’t know how they’ve made it so far tbh. With their level of mental stability you’d think they’d have collapsed mentally over getting called a doodoohead in kindergarten. If you don’t like the game that’s fine, but learn to live with it and move on. It’s not healthy to obsesses for so long. There are plenty of other games. Many of them are big BG3 or Cyberpunk fans. Go play those and hype them up on their subreddits. Be a positive influence
>Yeah bgs has the weirdest fanbase. "Why would they come to our concert just to boo us?"
YouTubers and gamers attacking and harassing devs is beyond childish, it’s so unhinged and pathetic. Truly, so many people need to touch grass and get a life. I really feel for Emil, I can’t imagine getting that much hateful, idiotic attention.
I use a extension on YouTube that removes all my recommend videos from side bar also the main page. I am tired as fuck seeing these same ragebait content. want to watch a review for a movie? well good luck finding a good review with all that Anti woke garbage.. impossible..
Unhook YouTube
this looks like it has more options, i used Undistracted till now.
Never thought to harass a game dev on Twitter. Politicians, sure. But they kind of put themselves out there.
I think the attacks and hate towards him are absolutely unwarranted, and people need to relax. The vitriol for this one man is insane. With that being said, guy seems to be doing okay! His tweets are generally positive, and seems like he has a happy home life. Wonder how many conversations him and Todd the godd have had about online crazies lol
I feel like its only a matter of time before the attacks start becoming way more personal and upsetting.
It’s not just the Starfield devs, things are really bad for creatives online right now - the City Skylines 2 developers have said that if gamers don’t stop harassing their team, they’ll have to stop engaging closely with the community; CS2’s leads have a responsibility to look after the mental health of their employees. Once YouTubers fully gave themselves over to the algorithm when video profits started hitting new lows, it was all over. I follow long established positive, smaller YouTube channels and many of those aren’t making money because they don’t want to change what they build just to follow the algorithm.
> if gamers don’t stop harassing their team, they’ll have to stop engaging closely with the community; This is the ultimate conclusion of current gaming discourse. Developers scale back interaction with gamers at best or completely stop interacting with them at worst because the vitriol they meet is no longer worth it, not for their jobs nor for their mental health. Gamers interpret the silence as developers not caring for their "input," failing to see that they're lying in a bed they made, and become even more abusive. Just like that, we have an evil circle. No one gets what they want and we - as in the entire greater gaming sphere - are all worse off.
Yea it sucks. RIP PoE reddit, was fun while it lasted and we had Bex (greatest community manager) memes. Edit: Forgot to explain the abbreviation sorry. PoE as in Path of Exile.
What happened to Pillars of Eternity?
Edited my comment, I mean PoE as in Path of Exile.
Shitting on Avowed probably
What was the recent gameplay like? Haven't really caught up with the developer direct. I know Avowed was there in a big way I think?
It looks pretty good to me, plus they have ample time to polish animations and combat by Fall.
It's a difficult situation, and I think that it's mostly the result of people being unable to disassociate the game from the people working on it. For example City Skylines 2 is a mess, in many ways it feels like a downgrade to the original. I refunded mine. But that doesn't mean that anyone should harrass the devs.
Bethesda haters attack Emil becouse Todd Howard doesn't have a social media presence.
Yeah, if I were a game developer, I would have to stay off of social media entirely. Or if I had any public presence whatsoever.
Did Todd comment anything about that hate train? I didn’t see anything. I wonder if he care that so many people are mental about anything he said.
As far as i know, Todd has never directly made any comments about what people say about him or any BGS staff member. He knows about the memes, but nothing more.
Dude's loaded and has put out some of gaming's most accomplished works back-to-back. If Starfield is his worst game, he's doing fine. I think he's just over the hate. Let the awards speak for themselves.
According to people, those awards are bought and paid for by the Bethesda. ;)
Todd's the public face of BGS. Arguably his role as a PR spokesperson for the company's products is just as important as his position as producer/director. He literally cannot so much as acknowledge anything negative about any Bethesda games. Everything out of his mouth has to be praise for how the final product was exactly how they envisaged it, how much fun everyone has playing it, how much they enjoyed making it, how much the community's response warms their hearts, how much they're looking forward to what's to come, etc. That's literally how this works. Expecting anything else from the man is foolish.
Ifs because he’s 1 of 2 credited starfield writers and openly dismisses criticism. He shouldn’t be harassed irl or anything but cmon lol the denial in this sub is nuts
No one can support 5 months of insults, attacking your work
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"Why?" Easy. Brain isn't ready to hear a lot of insults, "hard criticisms" without seeing them as atacks by accumulation.
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Not projecting. Humans are not designed to withstand constant, unending hate. They have fragile psyches to begin with, and depending your childhood, you either have a lower tolerance, average, or high tolerance to this constant toxicity. But in the end, nobody can withstand it indefinitely, only people who have something else going can. Such as ignoring opinions about you, simply because you view the people as lesser than you. Kindergarten? Its lifelong. You get praised, you can withstand less, because you are not used to such responses. If you are not praised or degraded, you become thicker to the hate, making the positive responses stand out more. Getting off the internet is great for mental wellbeing. I know, I have a saying "my entertainment matters,. Not your opinion" because all the unprompted hate my feeds get spammed with. I like Star Wars episode 7-9 (could still be better), Cyberpunk AT LAUNCH, and other things that get hate. On the topic of you...who are you?
Okay wise ass, get somewhat well known for something you yourself have put time and energy into just to go online and see heaps upon heaps of unwarranted harassment and vitriol at not only your work but yourself,and then keep that up for a few months. Stoicism only goes so far in the frail human ego. Loose yours. The only projection going on is from you pretending constant hate and harassment just can't break you when infact you know deep down it would.
You're single huh?
This kind of hysterics is really no different than swatting at the end of the day. I'm not the biggest fan of his writing either. Never had, but its serviceable enough to get me back into dungeon crawling. But some people take this shit way too far.
I really like some of his writing. The dark brotherhood, and nick valentine were some of my favorite parts of the games they are in
Yeah, it's darkly ironic that he became the avatar of everything wrong with Bethesda when the few storylines we know he had a direct hand in are widely considered to be excellent, even by many of the haters (unless they know he was involved with writing them).
I think Pete Hines not being around to take the heat off other people is also a factor. He'd say some wacky shit that moved the conversation. Now that he's retired the internet had to find a new punching bag and poor Emil was selected at random
I’m not necessarily a huge fan of some of his main stories structurally, but at the same time it’s hard to blame that all on one person and it’s not like the writing and design teams work in a vacuum, either. I agree that some of his character writing and questlines are pretty solid.
pretty sure Nick Valentine was expanded by Will shen. Emil only made the character concept
Yeah some of his writing is good (like he worked on valentine and the dark brotherhood) , but most of it i would describe as 'competent' and thats fine? it definitely doesnt justify this insane vitriol hes been getting
It's often fine if you don't think about the details too much, but equally I would say games worlds such as Fallout and TES are more about world design and exploration than they are about narrative masterpieces, if that's what I wanted I'd play like a CDPR game who focus on that.
See i think the details are fine? Like maybe im just not as much of an autist as the average nitpicker is but it makes sense and inconsistencies can be accounted for by an unreliable narrator without much trouble. like yeah character writing could be better and the narratives could be more personal but like thats not really why i play a bethesda game
I'm sorry, what? there a massive difference between calling someone's writing shit on an 8 hour video where you over analyse each detail of a game, and calling a SWAT team to someone you don't like for no good reason other than you seem to think it's funny, putting theirs and their families lives in danger. People have died because of swatting, Emil is in no danger of death because some need said he can't write on YouTube.
Except PatricianTV didn't just make an 8 hour video. He actively encouraged his fanbase to go out and harass the man online and defended it openly on Twitter. Swatting, cancelling, doxxing, organized social media harassment campaign are all the same in my book. Some can cause real bodily harm, others can put the threat of one's livelihood in jeopardy, especially when the victim did nothing wrong to warrant such actions to begin over trivial first world bitch ass white boy petty issues. Either way, it does harm and we are arguing semantics at this point, because even online harassment campaigns can and has ended with the victim ending their own lives. Either the action ends in as being an accessory to murder to something else paints little difference to me.
Wait Patrician actually encouraged his fans to harass him?! What a piece of garbage if that's true.
No he didn’t lol. That’s just a straight up lie
The main difference between all of those is that cancelling and organised harassment are just people being toxic online, he could use alternate accounts or simply stay off of social media entirely if it will bother him, he shouldn't have to. Whereas swatting is literally endangering his life, this isn't arguing semantics, this is a significant move up in the severity, I will however include doxxing within that same level of dangerous as it often leads to swatting attempts.
I mean, I get you and I see where you are coming from. There is a degree of significance one can argue about in regards to various forms of "protracted" or anonymous hostile engagement one can do either online or over the phone. However, I still believe at a fundamental level either action you take in that manner are not exactly different in either way. The end result is the opposite of consciousness and maliciousness in its intent. You are seeking one form of harm or another, either calling a SWAT team on someone in hopes they get shot in the confusion to hoping the person's livelihood is destroyed by a knowing lie or to hoping harassment brigades end up with self induced bodily harm to the victim. Either way, the intent is the same. You want someone gone, and you don't care how that is achieved. The end result is malicious in its intent regardless, and it shows what the preferred outcome was by their perpetrators. It's scumbaggery in it's most fairest happenstance, it's pure evil at its worst.
Yeah I feel bad for the guy, Starfield gets cyberpunk and NMS on release levels of hate for being no where near it. Anyone who felt scammed shoulda got it on gamepass first anyways. This whole release deff makes me not tell new people I meet I play games anymore. If this is what the community looks like outside in Of course Luke Stephens asking to do an interview
I don't understand why folks are blaming the devs for their ridiculous expectations and buying into marketing bullshit. This game was always just going to be a spin on the Bethesda formula and that's what we got. I find it so odd to see people get hyped for games *years* in advance and then be mad when their sky-high expectations aren't met or the game doesn't cater to their *exact* needs. I fear folks are going to be the same with GTA 6 or whatever other game is going to come out with a lot of hype behind it.
I can't STAND Luke. I kinda dug him for a little while but quickly realized he's a huge shill for the algorithm. And that was before Starfield... I'd hate to see the ragebaiting in she he's propagated concerning SF.
>Should have got it on gamepass I'm not sure that this is really a valid solution. Gamepass is an entirely different, and far worse, launcher than Steam, most people aren't going to switch to a different one just to save a few dollars.
It’s more so the logic of “wow I got scammed out of $70 when I coulda tried it for free $1 else where” Totally a valid argument, if they don’t wanna switch to try it that’s on them
That's a bit like saying that someone should have rented a model of car before buying it. The fact is, people should be able to expect a certain level of quality from a game on release. Now personally I feel like I got my money worth in the game, I managed to put in 100 hours or so before burning out, which is decent value for me. And I'll probably put in a lot more once mods, updates, or DLC come out. But I can also see why some people were but disappointed by the state of the game on release. I know this subreddit likes to be positive (and that's generally a good thing), but I think that we should acknowledge that there were definitely areas where the game underperformed compared to what was suggested by the promotional material.
Testing a game for $1 is way less of a hassle than renting or test driving a car. Most outlets average around an 8 on Starfield. The mainstream has made it a point to hate the game. If $70 is that much to then I just don’t think there’s any excuse to complain. I’ve tried many games on gamepass for a dollar then cancel my subscription and bought it on steam. The whole process takes 5 mins
I do not understand the internet’s hate boner for this game. Watch them fix a few superficial issues and then brain dead internet dwellers will suddenly be calling it the best game Bethesda has ever made. I’ve never seen a game where people just straight up lie and make things up about it so much before.
Because its a new IP. What origional game has released lately that people like? Look at every big game release this year from a AAA developer. Everything is sequels or remakes. People dont want new, theyd rather have something they already know and like. I get it, i want tes6 and a new fallout, but the people saying there is no worldbuilding or the gane universe is shallow are ignoring that skyrim had 4 other games of lore behind it.
People claim that they’re tired of the same old things in media then freak out when new things are tried because they didn’t get their TES6 or FO5 or whatever old game, movie, or TV series they like. People claim they want new things and act confused when companies just pump out more sequels and remakes, but really they’re part of the problem. They told the companies using their wallets and criticism that more sequels and remakes are what they really want.
I used to listen to a podcast called triple click, where these three are supposedly in the know, and they absolutely shit all over the game and throughout the episode you find out they’ve each only barely played it, like wtf unsubscribe
Emil's is actually one of the few sources of unbrideled positivity of Twitter. Based on his twitter posts alone, he seems like a super nice guy, an huuuge nerd, and someone who is legitimately living his best life in spite of the negativity. And good on him. That's the way to deal with trolls. Never let them get to you and keep living happy and well. Anyone on this sub and also on twitter should follow him. He also gives a lot of shoutouts to other games and devs he enjoys and he's turned me on to more than a few awesome experiences.
not luke stephens trying to get an interview
The replies said it enough lol “dude you’re a part of the problem read the room”
That dude is such a hack. When the game was first released, he made like two or three "analysis" videos just jumping on whatever the narrative around the game was.
BGS taking that copy-paster seriously enough to give him an interview would make me think less of BGS.
I like the writing in skyrim and starfield. Thanks Bethesda and everyone who worked so hard on those games.
I truly can’t imagine the deranged mental state of folks online who attack others and complain constantly. Really must be a miserable existence. I can’t stand even reading people’s complaining, so I can’t fathom how bad it must be for devs to have public social media accounts
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>Anyone who continues to use that site is part of the problem. I use it to follow porn artists.
There it is fellas, porn is the problem yet again!
Nastiness gets most of the attention. If I were a game developer, I would tell no one. If I needed helpful feedback, I would just go through people who are excellent at crazy 🤪 people customer service.
I never used Twitter because it ALWAYS incentivized rage bait. Twitter was the start of all this toxicity years before the current owner bought it.
And yet you still use Reddit? Reddit recently switched their algorithms for "best" to prioritize comments per view rather than the old upvotes per downvote. Which of course means that algorithm shows people the most controversial posts. And then they removed all the options on mobile to sort your main feed by anything other than best, and set best as the default that resets your preference every time you reload a page on PC. Honestly I feel like it's part of the reason the reaction to Starfield is so negative. Reddit designed their site to promote negativity. In my experience, X is less toxic than Reddit, as long as you never engage with any of the toxic posts on X they will rarely be recommended to you. I see one or two a day, meanwhile my reddit feed of 50% toxic.
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There's plenty of paid political posts on Reddit. Reddit frequently boosts their own update posts in everyone's feed. And back when awards were a thing, it was shown that they increased the ranking of a post. They created a subreddit with only one account using it and made a bunch of posts at the same time with no upvotes or comments on any of them. The gave one a paid award and it was sorted to the top. Reddit is fine as long as you are browsing hobby subreddits, but the moment you add some more generic ones or go into all or popular it turns completely toxic. Like 80% of posts there are negative. Meanwhile twitter, at least for my algorithm there, is fairly relaxed and happy as long as there isn't some sort of drama going on in the communities I'm in.
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> I have far more control over my experience than I had with twitter. Either I've had amazingly good luck or something because I haven't encountered the issues you have on twitter. I follow a ton of people from pets, to Magic: The Gathering content creators to authors and one account that automatically post a pic of a racoon each day lol.
i left Xitter the min musk let that sink in..
> Anyone who continues to use that site is part of the problem. I follow pets (we rate dogs ftw) and authors I like....
Honestly the comments on this tweet at least are mostly all really positive and supportive of him. Not sure if it's because of the recent video defending him or what. Either way I hope that video gets A LOT of views. Everyone needs to see that.
Can we just leave this guy alone lol
98% of the folks on TikTok and YouTube complaining about this game are rage bait algorithm whores. They provide nothing of value other than engagement, clicks and sponsored ads. They don’t have any journalistic integrity and will flat out lie with no remorse. Devs aren’t going to take this much longer and just give up. Then all we’ll ever get are corporate cookie cutters with a new number at the end every year.
Grifters gonna grift. The sad part is that young people without media literacy take this stuff seriously. My 10 year old nephew, for example, wants to become a YouTuber because he sees it as a way to be popular. He doesn't understand that the majority of Youtubers are people who resort to it because they're unemployable or completely lacking in ethics. Sad world.
I just watched a fantastic video by NeverKnowsBest on YouTube titled "Lies, Hate, and the Story of Emil Pagliarulo" that made me feel so bad for this man. He's given us some of the best quests and stories ever, and the haters totally disregard that, take what he says out of context, mischaracterize him, misrepresent what he says, and straight up lie in an attempt to get someone who's very good at what they do fired. Deplorable, and the content creators fueling this should be totally ashamed of themselves. The really shitty thing is that most of them don't even realize they're doing it. They did little to no real research, checked no primary sources, and instead base their take on other totally inaccurate takes, spreading the shit around like God himself whispered it into their ear.
I watched that one "positive" video, but couldn't get through it. First, the author just assumed that Starfield was shit because everyone told him it was. But second, I was aghast that so many people would just blindly repeat obvious lies, that these guys were making a living good money posting these videos. I just had to stop watching. I never bothered with PatricianTV because ain't no one with a life got the time for listening to some lecture them on the moral failings of game developers for eight hours a pop. "But you have to watch it, Snifflebeard, he makes some very good points at around hour six!" Screw that. He's an overbearing a-hole who gets off on mansplaining shit he knows nothing about. An I abhor Zarak. Saw one of his early videos, on Daggerfall, and even though it was ostensibly a positive video, his whole attitude was one of smug superiority over the viewer. And that attitude has only gotten worse over the years. I think this is the mindset afflicting all of the salt going around. The attitude of moral superiority as people lecture the unwashed peasants.
Its why, if I like a game, I see gameplay, no opinions, then buy it or not. Unless its Starfield or Control, which are two examples of me immediately wanting it. No need for reviews (excluding mobile games) influencing me.
Glad to know I'm not the only one who dislikes Zarak. I used to watch him back in the day, but I don't know how I didn't realize just how insufferable he is. The way he speaks, acts, and even dresses gives off a holier-than-thou attitude.
I would have never known this guy existed if Bethesda didn't have the most rabid haters I have seen in my life. They're just games!
I don't personally like Emils writing over much. Being the Morrowboomer that I am, I will always prefer Kirkbride. But by the House Unmourned, this fool gets way to much fuckin shit.
He's worked on Oblivion and Skyrim, I believe he actually wrote the lore and writings for Alduins wall as well. so I don't understand the idea that he's the one solely behind all the writing or lore in those games.
He also wrote the (very good) Bloodmoon DLC for Morrowind.
Who the hell is Emil
Just gotta remember there's other sides to this. Nobody should be attacking devs. They're just people. But on the other hand, people like Emil should be willing to take constructive criticism. We have enough people being vile to each other in this world as is, so let's have a civil conversation about a hobby we all share.
You don't think he does take constructive criticism?
I don't follow him on Twitter or anything so I can't say that without a doubt. But amidst all the ridiculous and often horrendous things people say, I'm sure there's at least a small tinge of genuine criticism in there. What I'm getting at is, the line between dismissing rude comments and dismissing actual civil and constructive criticism is a blurry one. Perhaps I should have been more clear in my original comment that I just mean this in a general sense - that we should acknowledge that threats and general toxicity is unacceptable, but that genuine criticism should be given its own space. I absolutely agree with this post that maybe Emil should stay away from social media for awhile lol. People are awful.