I've enjoyed Skyrim a great deal, but I am so done with these random and completely inane quest bugs:

http://cathodetan.blogspot.com/2011/12/why-skyrim-is-not-game-of-year-worthy.html

This is so ridiculous. Bethesda designs a great game, but year after year they produce games which are just absolute nightmares of QA. The industry lets them get away with it because they sell so many titles, because they throw so much content at players that most get many hours of play ... which is good - but not worthy of beating out titles which can actually test their games in a way that players actually expect.

In respect to the invincible spider webs bug shown in the video lined above - I played the exact same quest on the exact same hardware from the exact same starting point with the exact same character and once got a wall of webs which could never be broken by any weapon, shout or item ... and then again when it evaporated like it should. There is no modern concept of quality assurance where that should be acceptable. This is not a platform issue - this is a Bethesda issue. They marketed heavily that Skyrim was going to use an all new engine ... which is now obviously not true. Instead, players are inflicted with the exact same kinds of problems we have seen since Morrowind.

The above are videos from just about three hours of play, with regular sized files and everything. This is not a hard drive issue on a specific model of PlayStation, it is the kind of thing that players of Bethesda games have experienced since Morrowind.

Are there things which are positive in the light of this? Sure. I'm not arguing that the games have a strong core ... I am just arguing that title after title Bethesda is allowed to get away with absolutely lousy quality assurance simply because they make games of enough size that most people look the other way. But what you see in these kinds of videos should not be what we consider "Game of the year" for any title on any platform.

Agree with the article but o well Beth brigade unite!

Why do people care? I thought Resistance 3 was the best FPS made this year, most people won't though. I also though Infamous 2 was better then Batman Arkham City. And I don't care if you think I'm wrong.

Well can't really argue with either point, so don't really think you are wrong.

Despite it's many flaws and shortcomings, the game is still the best [censored] game of any genre I've played since Oblivion.

I hated Oblivion; but you know what? It was also the best damn game I had played since Morrowind.

Bethesda might not deserve Best Developer, but Skyrim sure as hell deserves GOTY.

Yep, when I can't hack through a web I'll be pissed. But I can't relate because it hasn't happened to me yet. I don't know this guy's save reloading steps etc... so although I know it's not quite tin foil helmet it hasn't home yet. Skyrim, game of the decade.

It's my GOTY, and that's the only one I care about.

You have to make some allowance for the scale of the game...I mean yes some of the bugs are bad, in particular this spiderweb one (which I had not heard of before, is it common?)...

However most games with minimal bugs are linear action games with much less player choice, there simply is no way to desgin something this open ended and expansive and avoid a certain number of bugs.

Much like MMO's, I think that huge sandbox-ish games like Skyrim probably have a limited amount you can be sure of until release, and letting the public actually break it themselves.

So that person couldn't even get past spiderwebs.

Yeah, I pretty much stopped caring about his opinion immediately. He can go dolphin flop in MW3.

Anyone can create a canned blog and upload self-humiliating youtube videos.

This Except I loved Oblivion too.

I am just saying you shouldn't care if people think it's GOTY or not. Make your own list. Oh well to each there own I guess, if you feel the need to make this then ok.

No reloading steps. This was just two things that occurred during a normal night of play. Not elongated, no performance issues to date - this was just the last in a long line of quest related bugs.

It is an RPG. I could handle some performance issues - but having to constantly look over my shoulder because I can't trust Bethesda to make something as simple as spiderwebs destructible? That's just stupid.

Name one other game released this year that doesnt have bugs in it? Infact name a game in the last decade that didnt ship with bugs?

There are none.

Thats why the industry overlooks glitches and errors and instead focuses on the gameplay, the ability to svck a player in to the game and keep them playing and the general scope of the game itself. Skyrim has 100 times more content that Call of Duty does, it has WAY WAY more content that the absolutely atrocious Dragon Age 2 does, and has sold more copies than almost every other title this year bar CoD.

Does it deserve GOTY? Simply put, yes it does. No other game this year comes close to the level of content and choice available to the player with such a richly decorated world and with the same level of scale. And in all that is the different stories it tells via quests, books, general conversations and random encounters you get.

Its was a no brainer for GOTY this year.

Well there's a difference between consoles and pc.

Wow, read much? I went through the exact same quest doing the exact same thing - and the spiderwebs were destroyed as a normal person would expect. So ... what, I was too stupid the first time, but too smart the second time? Nonsense - the quest is something which can often be completed ... unless you run afoul of Bethesda's inability to create a stable game.

Having a large scale is not an excuse for having more bugs. Sorry, that's just bad development. And selling more copies is most certainly not an excuse.

I wouldn't call Skyrim GOTY because of how long it takes to level up and how limited your character is in a single player game. Not very actiony for my taste either.

Agreed!

More bugs than what exactly? Do you even know how many bugs every games ship with? Every game has bugs, some minor some huge. The only reason you appear to see more of them in Skyrim is precisely because there is more content in them to show bugs. Other games can get away with some of them because they have less content, therfor they dont show up as often or as glaringly. And there have been PLENTY of games that have worse bugs than Skyrim. The fact that this games sold so well is the reason they are showing up more readily, because more people are playing therfor more people will see them and report them.

And as I said its completely beside the point. GOTY and all other such awards overlook problems with titles if they are not complete show stoppers rendering the game totally and completely unplayable. And truely unplayable, not "qest borked gamz unplyblez!" that some like to spout.

No, sorry - when games either crash my system or make the current objective something I cannot complete ... I notice. I notice right there, and I notice right then. It completely interrupts what I am playing, and that rarely has happened to me ... unless I am playing Bethesda games. These are not "small, usually not seen bugs" multiplied by content - the two videos above are from one normal play session. Factor in things like the fact the two out of three saved characters can't even start the "Blood on the Ice" quest - and there is a picture of a studio which can deliver a great deal of material which might often be considered standard, but quite often is also delivered broken.

Out of an entire run of playing an average PS3 game, I might randomly experience a single lock up. Even if you used just straight math - Skyrim is over that average five to tens times that amount, easily - even just including performance issues and lockups, not even quests which can't be solved without going back to an earlier save. And Fallout: New Vegas? For me - a hundred times more buggy than any game I've played on any system.

The games have merit, but constantly overlooking these technical issues just gives Bethesda free license (and a lot of money) to do so once again down the road.

Getting a game with as much code and game data as Skyrim to run with at least a 90% success rate (or more) is commendable. I've followed Bethesda for the past 10 years, and every release they've made since I became a fan has had their share of bugs and issues.

Anyone that was around during Oblivion's release can remember the "Clavicus Vile bug" and the uproar that it caused. Bethesda sorted out the mess and eventually fixed the most glaring issues that Oblivion had. Then I saw history repeat itself (although to a lesser extent) with Skyrim's 1.2 patch, and they've addressed (and still addressing) the issues with this game.

I have full confidence that Bethesda will smooth out your platform's gameplay in the end. Just be patient.

Again, note the orignal post. I am not talking about my platform. In fact, compared to what you might read on the PS3 forums - I would say my overall performance when it comes to lag has actually been quite good.

I'm talking about quest stability. About the fact that I can't complete the White Phial quest because I happened to kill a Forsworn Briarheart earlier. That I could not see how to move forward with the Boethia Quest because the next dialogue scene never started. That Windhelm can't, twice over, figure out how to start a murder scene. That in one night of play I randomly could not use a greatsword to break a spiderweb or use the map to find an actual location. This is not to mention the lack of magic resistance, the backwards flying dragon or other 100% common bugs.

Or how about the inability to follow a quest giver during a specific quest? They might completely disappear. Or they might just simply stop moving.

Skyrim has many strengths, but this is not one of them: the more you play, the more likely you are to run into situations which will 100% stop what you were doing at the time. It svcks, it's impossible to defend from a QA point of view ... it doesn't make for bad game entirely, but sure as hell does not deserve GOTY.

I have yet to come across a single quest bug. Not a one. And I've logged 160 hours in this game. But when you have millions upon millions of gamers playing Skyrim, there is a high probability that someone somewhere will come across an unexpected glitch under very specific and unforeseen conditions and make a video about it.

Well, as far as I am concerned, I say that the number of bugs is not all that important. I agree that in a game of TES scale some bugs are to be expected. What I care for a great deal is, how Bethesda treat he bugs reported. If they are swift and deliver free and stable patches that fix the problems, then I'm happy. In a game this scale, I'd say it would take several more months, perhaps years if Beth was to check every piece of stone in the world to see if it is not clipping. On the other hand, the main quest should be something to be checked several times to assure that it is well playable. I sort of think that the first few months will be like beta testing for Beth and I can live with that, even though I would sure be happier if the game shipped without any bugs whatsoever, but I see this as a dream.

Then you have been insanely lucky. For breaking quests by having things like killing a Forsworn Briarheart and holding to said heart is a) easily reproducible on any platform and B) something that many, many players would come across.

Check the wiki pages, bugs on things like White Phial and Blood on the Ice are far from rare and way beyond what normal QA should allow for. Whatever QA manager allowed "hey, what happens if they already have a Briar Heart" to pass into production doesn't deserve a title with either QA or Manager on the business card.

Much less the one that allowed spider webs which are stronger the Draugr Overords...

Look, you may have had a pristine experience with the game and congratulations for that. That doesn't mean the game itself is anywhere near pristine. What you consider to be a "unexpected glitch under very specific and unforeseen conditions" is just normal play to many people.

Take the "Blood on the Ice" issues. I knew of the quest bugs before I started my third toon, and I still could not avoid them. Does sound either unexpected or unforeseen to anyone?