I was thinking how so many people in this forums are making a lot of threads with some good ideas, some bad, but my point being that how much do you think that Skyrim will be a Bethesda game and how much do you think that it will be a fan game because lets face it if we put all of the ideas from this forums together then it could make a 100 hour game, so how much does Bethesda take from this forums and how much is their own, and what game do you think would be better, the creativity of a fan game, or the creativity of a game made by the people who work for Bethesda?

100% bethesda 10% of the same ideas will be on the forum, they dont listen to this place and for good reasons, we are not the majority of the people that they sell the game to that is why there is still quest markers and fast traveling even though most of the forum is against them

Bethesda are professional video game developers. This forum is filled with one million people's sense of entitlement spread over a thousand individuals. I'd say it's pretty safely Bethesda's game because they actually have half an idea what is feasible in the first place and marketable in the second.

I mean, some of the ideas from the old, pre-announcement threads seem to be there, like how I asked to replace the leveling system with something more organic and to use obscure lore in the main quest, but that may well just be coincidence.

Let Bethesda do their own thing, and then let fans change it however they want with mods afterwards

This

Um, even without all of the great and mostly terrible ideas on these forums the game is already confrimed to be 300+ hours. I'm sure they've seen some ideas here and said "hey, that sounds pretty good, lets do it", but this place is mostly filled with terrible ideas and suggestions. So ultimately, I think Bethesda knows what should and should not be in their games, more so than any of us.

They'll have my money no matter what they do.

and this.

Go look at the top mods on TES NEXUS.
Im this close to believing bethesda should never ever listen to their fans.

This.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/UnpleasableFanbase

I'm pretty sure some Bethesda employees pay occasional attention to the forums, and if an idea strikes them as being a good one they will (mentally, at least) squirrel it away for future reference. Maybe even discuss it with a few other people, and if they also like it make a pitch for it to be included - probably in the next game.

But I seriously doubt if Todd Howard peers nervously at the forums each day and cries "OMG, the fans are demanding cake! Quick, throw away the milestones and the development schedule, we must get some fruitcake in there NOW!"

Almost all games are 99.9% developer games with a few exceptions

Forums are not designed for player feed back but for free advertising and word of mouth

Its why you never seen a developer on a forum anymore

Why should they listen? What Fable does is fine for Fable, a game series made by professionals for people who like fantasy that doesn't take itself too seriously. Naturally, that wouldn't work for TES, which is dead serious. If a professional video game developer makes something, it will be taken or left after it is played. If it gets overwhelmingly negative reactions after being used by the fanbase, then chances are it won't be done again. If it gets overwhelming negative reactions from the fanbase before release based on the fact that it is or is not what the older installments did, it can and should be ignored.

There is a reason I, for the most part, stopped suggesting things after the game was announced. That is the reason that by this point in development, most if not all conceptualization would be finished. So rather than dither about making myself look as though I have wads in odd places at the game not being tailor-made for my interests, I wait and see. I have, based on past history, every reason to believe Skyrim will be good, and don't bother saying 'thy should put in feature X" because if they hadn't built it into the game and integrated it with the other features by now, it would be a real pain to do it by this point.

Sigh of relief...

Devs are here reading threads all the time..

Despite what some may say a company does need to listen to the consumers to have an idea of what will sell well. After all is it not the goal of a salesperson to please his consumers so they will buy his products ? If the consumer does not like the product he is not going to buy it, and if the product is not to his liking it′s because the salesman made something other than what the consumer asked for.

Of course with a lot of people pleasing everyone 100% is silly but trying to please the majority is something a company should aim to do. But while I say that I also hope Bethesda will listen to their core audience a little bit, if every game just did exactly as everyone asked them to do every game would end up being the same and there are features that belong to the TES series that I hope will stay there for as long as the series is running.

In the end I do trust Bethesda to do what is right. I don't agree with many things in Skyrim but I can't really judge it until I've played it.

They're never going to be able to please everyone. But all they have to do to please the majority of their current fanbase is this:

- More of the same (as unbelieveable and far-fetched as this may sound, fans of TES liked Morrowind - so why try so hard to distance the series from that?)
- Make significant changes only to aspects that drastically need improving (appearance of NPCs for example, or the levelling system)
- Different setting (to keep the series fresh)

That's ALL they need to do. It's the addition of fancy gimmicks, removal of things we've come to expect (like greaves) and changes to the core gameplay that's just asking for trouble.

In a recent interview, Todd talked about how the team is overflowing with ideas. He may have even used the word overflowing. Since they've been working on Skyrim for many years, some of the ideas are probably very old and who knows, may have even inspired someone on the team who has read the forums....for *any* game. There's no way to tell. The team learned things from making Oblivion and some new ideas carried over into Fallout 3.

Now things will change again. I see it as progress and that's as it should be. I don't want the same game I've already played. These games are created with a team effort and Todd gives credit to the fans too so I think here and there, like the archery improvement...something reaches the creative people and may be explored and even implemented. As for threads complaining day after day about something, not so much. I want to play the game *they* want to create.

Just mho.

:tes:

So.. stagnate unless the only immediate alternative is a game-breaker?

Todd said in one of the earliest interviews that they'd rather do something new that might not work than sit on their laurels and get fat. They are NOT abandoning and betraying their "True Fans" by experimenting. They are NOT dumbing down the franchise for the lowest common denominator with their removal of spreadsheets. The act of being financially viable is NOT itself an evil, despite the earnest protestations of the people who can't remember how awful gaming used to be through their nostalgia filters.

Bethesda is making the game they want to make, not plotting to make some kind of mindless action sludge to spite the True Fans of the Great 90s.

The key to all of it is, that internet game forums don't remotely represent the fanbase - they're the distillation of the most extreme members of that fanbase, the six-sigma outliers on the bell curve of all fans.

None of us here are remotely similar to the "average" member of the fanbase.


edit: what Tengen said.

I changed your title since we really don't allow "vs" threads and besides I can't imagine why Bethesda or their fans would want to be against one another. Fans come here and talk about things they would like to see, things they don't want to see and complain or reveal in changes that are announced. They come here to talk about the games. This place is provided to the fans by Bethesda so we can do just that. As for them listening or responding to every wish or complaint or every suggestion...well of course they don't. But do they listen to their fans? They do a bit as evidenced by the addition of the compass in Oblivion, more consequences for your choices as evidenced in Shivering Isles and in Fallout:3. They listen. They have already let us know that leveling will be more like FO:3 since many, many complained about the leveling in Oblivion. They have let us know there will still be fast travel but they will be adding alternative means of travel such as carriages which is something else frequently requested. by fans. There are a lot of changes that are made because of fan interest or complaints.

But bottom line is they made the game. If they think somethings a good idea, they try it. If they think they have come up with a way to hold our interest by removing classes and birthsigns and instead focus on the future and destiny of our character then they will try it. As a fan, I'm going to try it as well. All we as fans can hope for is a game we will enjoy and I assure you Bethesda wants very much to do just that because the more that like it, the more that will play it and that does equate to more money and future games for us.
:grad:

It has been confirmed that the game is about 300 hours...if I remember correctly.

Actually the perfect formula for any great game is a collaboration between the fans and the developers. As for Bethesda they are one of the few developers out there that actually listen to the community and delvelop their own unique and awesome ideas for their games! I say Skyrim will be exactly just that.

Stagnation is such an overused term in the games industry today, and I fail to see how it would apply to the Elder Scrolls series if they stopped making unnecessary additions/changes/removals and just focused on what people love about the series already. They have a ton of lore to work from and make every game feel unique, and it's not as if we see a new TES game every year. The series would constantly get better and better, bringing in a steady flow of new fans without any need for drastic changes or new gimmicks.

Clearly they need to listen to their fans because their experimenting is leading them to make god-awful decisions like throwing the player-character into third-person to perform a finisher. There's just no defence for ridiculous changes like that.

I don't think we'd ever finish a game if we listened to all of your ideas :biggrin:

In all seriousness, we've got a great team full of awesome ideas, and most of their ideas are the ones that make up the game.

That being said, many of us read the forums, and we certainly take your feedback into consideration. Changing the way levelling worked from Oblivion to Fallout 3 (and Skyrim) is a good example of that.