I'm sure the beta testers will tell you.

Beta testers?

Just maybe that new updated engine is the answer.

I just try to remind myself how complex these games are now. You do not go from "Point A" to "Point B" to "Point C". Whenever you give players the opportunity to go out in the world freely, there are bound to be some unforeseen conflicts.

It amazes me how complex these game are.

I know there will be bugs, but there is a big difference in designing and developing a new game engine and fine tuning and upgrading an existing engine you know well.

They are actually in a much better position than Obsidian was with Fallout New Vegas.

For one they had a development cycle nearly twice as long as Fallout New Vegas.

They have the people who designed the engine working on improvements for years.

Since Skyrim came after Fallout 3, I'm assuming that the Creation Engine was designed to handle a modern FPS from the get go instead of having it added on to the GameBryo Engine used for Oblivion.

After Skyrim they should have way more experience with the Creation Engine and tools than Obsidian had with the GameBryo Engine and tools.

So there is some hope for no super major bug fests on release.

As long as we don't get any killer bugs and nothing that corrupts a save, it shouldn't be too bad once they fix the initial bugs.

Plus once the modding tools come out, bugs will be solved even faster.

I don't mind the zany bugs. I love watching giants send bodies into the troposphere. Dragons flying backwards can be amusing sometimes as well.

I cannot abide broken quest bugs and inventory cluttered by permanent stickies.

Bugs aside, I just hope to [censored] hell that they looked at Sheson's memory patch and learned from it, in addition to the LAA fiasco at Skyrim's launch. I can deal with bugs because they eventually get fixed (at least the worst ones). But performance issues are absolute hell.

I would have never played FNV if there weren't community mods/patches available to permanently fix the screen stutter bug and the crashing.

how dare you.... you forgot about the mosquitos... the replacement to the *gulp* cazadores....the blood bugs...

I never got severe bugs except dramatically slowed frame rate (sometimes to the point it seems crashed for a couple minutes), but that was due to the PS3 having split RAM. Otherwise I saw a few little things like corpses' limbs stretching and jumping all over and prompts staying onscreen after moving the crosshair away from objects/people.

Should be fine on the PS4 so not worried

Sometimes I think when people say they've never encountered bugs in their BGS games is that they don't realize they've encountered them.

Knowing it's Bethesda, I don't quite buy it -w-'

Their games are still fun with the bugs though... Apart from the game-breaking bugs, the minor bugs are hilarious...

I also remember this "funny" bug from FO:NV (not Bethesda's work, but who cares?):

http://new4.fjcdn.com/comments/3869019+_b05d21d595de5bbb843bd83191cf45b0.jpg

As someone who has had to troubleshoot actual bugs on real-world computer systems, I always find these types of posts somewhat interesting (or sometimes exasperating).

Having the unofficial patch logs be longer between Skyrim and Oblivion means nothing due to the differences in the game sales and thus total audience (i.e., total number of different system configs).

Funny thing is that people complain about bugs in BGS games but I don't see the bugs that are complained about. However, I maintain my systems and do not download things that I do not trust such as bit torrent software. I also use systems that are gaming systems so I do not overtax the system (a lot of possible problems can crop up when a system is pushed near or over its limits). I do not overclock, either, as that can cause a lot of problems with various software, including games, particularly stability problems.

I have also experienced instances when software updates cause hardware issues even when the hardware previously worked fine (and had not been changed in any way in the time frame being experienced) and the software was from official trusted sources. It happens even to the best and most dedicated people in any profession, after all.

In my informed opinion, I think most of the so-called "bugs" are actually not bugs but rather various issues specific to certain user system configs. Otherwise, the bugs people claim such as "broken quests" or "corrupted saves" or "CTD" would happen far more regularly out of the entire player base. If BGS cannot recreate the "bug" due to it being on the user end rather than a BGS issue, then they cannot fix it because it doesn't actually exist for their systems or most other players'. That is what we see with many of the so-called "bugs".

Going back to the unofficial "patches", I have had them cause many problems in my games, so they are certainly not any better than vanilla efforts from BGS and in many instances they are worse. I normally use them only because they fix minor errors (e.g., typos, weapon/armor stat differences from what they should be based on sequences for similar equipment) which I personally find extremely bothersome but many people overlook as relatively unimportant.

Obviously, any mods can create various problems, and some people seem to forget this important detail of choosing to use mods. I put up with the problems because BGS' character aesthetics are so poor for me and I need proper aesthetics to role play my character concept(s).

I just wish Todd, Pete, and the rest of Bethesda's marketing staff would STOP claiming "be any character you want to be and do anything you want to do" when such claims have been proven untrue ever since Morrowind, at the very least. Making false marketing claims, particularly ones such as this that are extremely important for any RPG, is something much more worth criticizing than so-called "bugs" because such claims are fully under Bethesda's control.

or on Skyrim I had a physics bug that was caused by me casting lightning on a wooden cart (it went zooming into the distance and would randomly through multiple different characters come flying out of the horizon and hit something usually killing it )

I wish to see a building that cannot be entered due to an npc standing in the way

As bad as bugs are open world sandbox games are the one that I will excuse to a degree especially games like Fallout where they let you go anywhere at anytime. Much harder to cover all eventualities and predict all possible broken chains that it is in a more linear game

Providing none of the bugs are game breaking and a good attempt is made to fix in patches I can forgive

Freezes are a pet peeve of mine, can't play Fallout 3 because of them. Oblivion, New Vegas and Skyrim I can although they aren't perfect. Skyrim had a number of issues like Weapons not despawning off enemies, which means if you didn't personally clear every corpse, the weapon would still be there and would add to the memory.

I'm hopeful that it will be different this time around and that we have fewer bugs this time around.

Logical, but highly speculative.

I am absolutely with you here. But, let's break it down for non programmers...let me give you a little peek inside the rabbit hole...

As someone who works in Software Development, I'll be the first to tell you: I don't care if Bethesda has a QA Budget of 10 Billion dollars. On Launch, there will be bugs. Possibly severe ones. Why? Becuase there is no way to test for every case. Unfortunately, with a game as big and complex as Fallout 4 will be, until the .exe gets into the wild...you never know what you're going to run into. Do you think for even a single minute, that QA folks have systems that have every program ever made for windows installed on it? How about in every permutation of software concievable? No?

This is why, you put your best efforts forward to test for cases you reasonably think of...you try to make sure you cover as many bases as you can. But if you want 99% bug free software, download the Apollo landing program. It's about the only one there is, and even there...it's debatable.

I run a very clean system, for the most part. But I also have things like: a desktop multiplexer...a background monitor which starts streams when I play games. (Forge) and a whole host of little things in order to make my computer workflow effecient. Do you think anyone at Bethesda has duplicated my *exact* setup, but not just the setup...the order in which I installed everything...including my Steam games? The multiple DX installs that those steam games invoked? How about every windows registry ever? Imagine the scope of trying to QA something like that...just try for a second. Then get a bottle of aspirin and chug.

This outline just scratches ths surface of how hard it is to QA not just complex games, but complex games running in complex environments with near infifinte permutations. It's difficult. Give Bethesda a break here. They will do the best that they can, but as I said earlier...until the game is released...into the wild...some bugs just won't appear. Let's hope Bethesda has the proper infrastructure to handle *that* when it happens. But don't ask for a release with limited, or even small inconsequential bugs being the norm. Never gonna happen.

What can you do when these things happen? First up: don't shout into the forums. You're just going to insure that a comm manager skips over you ranting. Write a good description of the bug. Especially if you have the steps needed to repeat it. This, more than anything...is how to help and not hinder the situation on launch day. Don't say things like "Oh, this should be easy..." that phrase alone will cause a programmer to curse you with a pox upon your house, and all your future generations. Seriously.

Just some food for thought. =)

In terms of heavily modified games, Oblivion is the most unstable and both Morrowind and Skyrim are pretty stable.

In terms of vanilla games, New Vegas takes the cake of being the buggiest. That quest in Camp Searchlight - I did things in the wrong order and had to have Private Edwards go off to the wasteland.

That's my experiences, and I'd say that I agree with you. Skyrim did have some bugged quests but nothing that the console can't fix.

In my experience. Skyrim had more bugs than NV (generally side quest related), but the ones NV had were absolute showstoppers. And by that I mean the ones that prevented you from entering the strip or corrupting your saved games.

So fingers crossed a bit of QA slips through the QA department this time around.

I will add this though. Having finished playing Witcher 3, it's obvious that no one at CDPR ever sat on a lounge 3-4m away from their TV, because the text on release date on screen was simply too small. So please, someone just play a little in a lounge room.

1. A software bug is an error, flaw, failure, or fault in a computer program or system that causes it to produce an incorrect or unexpected result, or to behave in unintended ways.

one can only hope, the ps3 version of fallout 3, great until you hit level 30. fallout Nv awesome until you hit vegas then unplayable. skyrim the best out of them all but don't leave it paused to go to the bathroom or when you return it starts lagging. if there is bugs on the ps4 version the silver lining will be that no one can say its the console they'll have to admit Bethesda screwed up.

I think a lot of the "bug" issues in Oblivion thru Fallout NV were due to some serious issues with a potential save game bug (that still exists to this day). The longer you played the game (especially Oblivion) the more likely you were to hit the bug....they increased the counter that messed up with FO3, but the potential is still there. I assume it's also present in FONV, but it was confirmed to NOT be an issue with the Skyrim revamp of the Engine.

Skyrim also has some issues with saves (due to how they merged scripting in with the saves) but from what I understand none of the "vanilla" scripting is a problem (only mods) and at least there is way to "clean" Skyrim saves.

Beyond those types of bugs, most things can be fixed or modded out, so I'm not overly worried.

Still...it's a Bethesda game so how often will you save?

It's a Bethesda game.

There will be bugs. There will be terrible bugs.