Look at the windmill scene. -.-
Your lack of memorizing everything is odd.

What does knowing (or not knowing) what province the game is going to take place in have to do with the quality of feedback? I'm sure Bethesda learned a lot from what people said about Oblivion here.

I just have a hard time wrapping my brain around the idea of getting upset about something before a game is released. If the game comes out and it doesn't live up to my expectations, yeah, I'll be disappointed. But until then it's hard to get upset about anything before I see it in its proper context.

This game people have been contemplating for awhile now....say a few years worth of suggestions?

Somehow i made a double post.

Enjoy my avatar sitting here for the second time!

ENJOY!

This is a much better way to do it. First off, people wont get so annoyed as we were after having waited for oblivion for so long. This way it'll be within reach from day 1. Secondly they're still working on minor features which is the only thing we could possibly hope they'd change due to feedback from us anyway imo.

On the other hand, the fact that the game is nearly complete means that they won't promise us any big features that are likely to change significantly before release. Like Oblivion's object shadows, the city of Sutch, some of the AI, etc.

It was obvious what was going on when Bethesda claimed the name rights for TES 5 Skyrim years before the official announcement. I don't know if many people noticed though...

The only gripe I have with the 'release strategy' is the seemingly arbitrary date they've come up with...11/11/11. You just know this was dreamt up by the marketing department , because they thought it looked cool. It probably has nothing to do with when the game will actually be ready. The development team probably hung their heads in collective disbelief when the PR guys announced this.

I can't think of another AAA game that's announced its exact release date so far in advance. It's a cheap gimmick. And the game dare not let its release slip beyond this date, because it would ruin the PR. The end result will be a game full of bugs that'll ship with a day 1 patch.

If it would be nearly complete we wouldn't have to wait 8 months for it...

..is that a joke? Can't tell if you're serious or not. You must be new here.
We've pretty much known that TES:V will be in Skyrim for oh..I don't know..over a year now since before the announcement? You didn't follow the suggestion/speculation thread very much obviously. It wasn't a surprise in the least that it was in Skyrim. Copyright claims told us that a long time ago.

That's not completely true. Just because fans didn't know what area the game would take place in, doesn't mean that they don't have valuable feedback. I have heard many great suggestions on this forum that have nothing to do with location.

I must be new here? Compare our joined dates, that should answer your question pretty fast.

And companies trademark all the time, it doesn't mean it's confirmed. Only a fool would take a copyright as confirmation of the new setting.

Also, it's nice getting feedback from people that don't actively track down Bethesda's trademarks.

What does knowing where the game takes place have to do with Player's feedback? Player's wishes influence gameplay elements no matter in which province it takes place.



Of all provinces, Bethesda ONLY trademarked word Skyrim. And the game won't be announced before they trademarked the name.
But as I said, the province doesn't matter in slightest. Player wishes are the same no matter the province.

There's a difference between wishes and actual feedback after viewing a product.

Oh but it does... how could we suggest hockey if the game was set in Black Marsh...

Bethesda's strategy is right on the money.
Just look at the stats: thousands of posts, myriads of topics. The salivating is but palpable. Once you fullfil desire it begins to fade.
Bethesda is playing an erotic game on us, slowly striping off one glove after the other, one step forward, two steps back. All this is classical marketing done the clever way.

They won't stop. They shan't fullly undress. They'll just tease us into maddening ardency and in the end we'll thank them back with a smirk and $80 worth of a checkout.

Id be more angry if my main characters tended to warriors or rogues right now as too much skill wise is hidden from us at this point. We should have known all 18 skills by now AND roughly what every skill did and didnt do.

I should have known enough by now to realy think about what kind of warrior I was going to try... but I dont know. Same with rogue. Until I can come up with a warror I cant realy get my head around ideas and issues of a skyrim warrior now can I?

I'm not annoyed at all. I'm more annoyed with those who talk about a game for over 2 years before it's release.
And we have no idea how long in development they are. They could be 86% complete for all we know.

They chose it because

A) They were already waiting for the game to be near completion before announcing it, so obviously it's a really safe release date
B) It's all 1's, so it's easy to remember, thus improving marketing power and helping opening-day sales
C) It's a Friday in Mid-November, which is the most profitable launch window in the year for games. It's when most people purchase games as Christmas presents. It's part of why Halo, Gears of War, and many other games did so well at launch.

Oh well. Game should be great anyway! :thumbsup:

I dont think Beth has too much to worry about. They make the game they want to play, it just so happens that lots of other people want to play it too.

It's like Apple. When was the last time Apple ever did any customer research? That's right, never. Yet they still have astronomical sales. Companies whose employees ARE their target market can get away with not listening to "feedback" from their customers. In all honesty, if Beth listened to these forums with any seriousness we would end up with one really wacky and poorly selling game. Let the devs do what they do in line with their gaming philosophy and they will produce an excellent game. Try to muddy the water with all of our infinite wisdom and it's gonna turn out crappy.

Just remember what Henry Ford said: "If I had listened to my customers, I would have invented a faster horse."

More commonly, they ask for financially implausible things that would actively turn off any but a very small minority of the fanbase. Remember, if it doesn't cater to you precisely, no matter how specific or strange your tastes, the entire series is ruined forever

Okay, now my actual serious post content (or the serious stuff that isn't satirically funny): They are professional game designers and also avid gamers. We have been suggesting before the actual announcement, and many of the things I asked/hoped for have already been explicitly implemented (contextual animations, back to strangeness, AoE spells, more stylized artistic direction). We are not professional game designers, with very few exceptions I assume, and so while we know what we individually want, we don't know how difficult it is to implement particular features, have them be both balanced and fun, and juggle angry moral guardians who stack the odds against games as an art form, a fanbase (which is a word that has an opposite real definition to its listed one at most times nowadays), meddling publishers, and a budget that is less than what they need because games aren't taken seriously.

So while we can go ahead and say "I want this," don't demand anything because they have enough to worry about.

Hmm I don't think we have to be worried about whether or not they took our feedback into account, I know people who played both Morrowind and Oblivion had a lot to say after they had played through Oblivion, and since that was going on 5 years ago Bethesda has had a lot of time to peruse their way through our numerous gripes.

Although they are almost done with Skyrim at this point (I assume), that does render a lot of what is said on the forums non-applicable, but that doesn't mean that Bethesda hasn't already thought about the things we are bringing up. I think their marketing strategy has been pretty awesome. I think the game will be great, I'll save my complaints til after it's been released.

well it's still better than Blizzard anouncing Diablo almost 2 years before its release.

Duke Nukem Forever (Hail to the King) has been announced for so long it is the defining industry joke.