Fallout: New Vegas Dev weighs in on Skyrim's PS3 Lag Issues

[Versuvius]

New Vegas and FO3 didn't have these problems on the console.

 

[tangoprime]

Wait- The PS3 and Xbox both only have 500mbs of ram?

Haha, that's what I took away from the story. I'll stick with my 12,000mb.

 

[faspxina]

What if you let the areas reset completely when you leave them? Wouldn't be realistic but atleast it would be playable in the long run.

 

[Pipotchi]

What exactly leads you to believe "they are getting away with it"?

I've seen 3 or 4 different responses on this thread alone snidely remarking about them copping out.

Plus, they have every right to get a free pass. It's Bethesda. They make good big games. They're gonna have problems like this.

And this is exactly the sort of attitude which creates these problems in the first place.

Bethesda charged people full price to play Skrim on their PS3, without telling them that the game is fundamentally broken on the system.

Either Bethesda should have spent the time and effort coding Skyrim to make sure it works on the PS3, or they simply should have kept it to the PC and 360. PS3 gamers are finding themselves unable to play the game they paid for, not through any fault of their own, but because Bethesda couldn't be bothered to code their game properly.

This is not a new problem. This has been occuring for gamers ever since Oblivion was released on the PS3. Bethesda knows that there is a fundamental problem with the way the Gamebryo/Creation engine runs on the PS3, yet they've done nothing to get rid of the problem.

It doesn't matter how large or fundamentally good your game is. If you're selling a broken product, then people have every right to complain and ask for their money back. Other developers manage to get their RPGs working on the PS3 just fine. You don't hear about Dark Souls becoming unplayable after 20 hours. Why should Bethesda get a free pass when practically every other developer works harder to make sure their RPGs are playable? Does that mean we should applaud mediocrity? Skyrim has sold more than practically any other RPG this generation, yet it's also made with some of the weakest coding and generally cack-handed design. What message does that send to the industry? That we gamers demand quality in our products? Or that we'll rush out to buy any buggy piece of crap as long as there are dragons in there?

We reap what we sow. If we allow developers to get away with shit like this, then we have no-one to blame but ourselves when publishers start bending us over and shafting us from behind.

This is my mindset exactly, I'm not saying Skyrim has to be released on PS3 or that it has to be flawless. I would rather they cancelled the PS3 version than let me buy it, get thirty hours in and then realise its bugged to hell.

Also you cannot just say all Bethesda's games are like this, loads of people wouldnt have bought the previous game or bought them on other systems.

If you sell a product it should work as described otherwise you are fully entitled to get a refund (at least here in the Uk) If Bethesda doesnt make an announcemnt relatively soon its going back to the shop under that issue.

All their blog witters on about is the release of the creation kit for the PC, no real admission that this is even a real problem with the PS3 release. Backwards dragons and the occasional bug are fine even expected in an open world game. A engine problem rendering the game unplayable? Thats not gonna fly

 

[Rack]

Hang on, doesn't Skyrim use the Creation engine, not Gamebryo? I'm sure they share a similar base, but still.

I heard the Creation engine Bethesda made for Skyrim was heavily based off Gamebryo but I'm unsure how true that is.

It's the same as the Gamebryo engine being based off the NetImmerse engine, the engine Morrowind uses.

So basically, it's as much of a difference from the Gamebryo engine as the Gamebryo engine is a difference from the NetImmerse engine. Personally, I see it all as iterations of a core engine. A core engine that seems to be broken, by the looks of it. And yet they're still selling it.

If anyone else sold a broken product like this, the backlash would be insane. Not sure why or how Bethesda gets away with it so easily.

Because herp derp Skyrim dragons GotY.

Dazzling display of logic and grasp of the issues you have there.

I could've explained it far more eloquently, but why do that when I can sum it up in three words and a phrase? I mean, that is why Bethesda is getting away with it. Which unless I completely misunderstood his post, was his possibly rhetorical question that I answered anyways.

Except it isn't, so you made a stupid point in a stupid way. Was Lair GotY? Drakkhen? Two Worlds? The dragons in Skyrim are a nothing reason for it being GotY next to the vast amount of content, massively refined systems and fantastic design. Even the PS3 version the problem is that it has performance issues after 65 hours on the same save. Nothing else even comes close to offering that level of entertainment. If Bioware want to be cut the same level of slack they could spend years developing a title for a core audience of fans without throwing in any asshole business tactics. Or they can develop crummy shooters with awful plots then try and make a fast buck by tacking on multiplayer and obnoxious DLC and watch as their fanbase abandons them for developers who are still interested in making good games.

 

[Pipotchi]

Just an update, Bethesda have updated their blog in answer to the hordes of PS3 users hounding them on their forums and Twitter.

Not much but its a start http://www.bethblog.com/2011/12/01/skyrim-what-were-working-on/

 

[Shamanic Rhythm]

You don't need a working knowledge of how to create a game engine to see that when a company advertises a game as having a new engine that it's not often completely new, and frequently some of the core architecture gets preserved between different iterations of tech. All you need to see that is a little critical thinking.

Yea but when do you actually see something completely new without having it's base in something that's already been created? Fact is, it is a new engine and most of the time new things are far from perfect. Skyrim is still a great game and it looks beautiful, I just get a little ticked when more then a few claim foul like they did something horrible.

I hadn't actually heard anyone else say anything about ram space until skyrim's lag issues, so I think it's good that it's been high lighted as an issue for developers (and console developers too) to work on.

I beg your pardon? Did I say anywhere it was a bad game or it looks horrible? I think it's a great game. I just find it cynically amusing that after all this hype about a new engine Bethesda couldn't use the opportunity to fix an architectural problem that was apparently endemic to the previous engine. No need to go all white knight on me.

 

[Demix]

I beg your pardon? Did I say anywhere it was a bad game or it looks horrible? I think it's a great game. I just find it cynically amusing that after all this hype about a new engine Bethesda couldn't use the opportunity to fix an architectural problem that was apparently endemic to the previous engine. No need to go all white knight on me.

I didn't say you did, I was simply expressing my personal opinion. Nobody is going "white knight" on you. I could've held back my first comment true but I was a bit annoyed. The engine is a big improvement and you're right it does have quite a fatal flaw, nobody is saying it doesn't. Personally I hope in the future they come up with a way to solve the ram issue or game developers increase the amount of ram the systems can hold. Now that it's a well known issue, something can be done about it.

I suppose at the time I thought so many people were complaining but how many of them even thought or knew about that before all this came up? How many could actually fix the problem instead of pretending to have an actual opinion. Like I said, I was a little ticked off.

 

[Shamanic Rhythm]

I beg your pardon? Did I say anywhere it was a bad game or it looks horrible? I think it's a great game. I just find it cynically amusing that after all this hype about a new engine Bethesda couldn't use the opportunity to fix an architectural problem that was apparently endemic to the previous engine. No need to go all white knight on me.

I didn't say you did, I was simply expressing my personal opinion. Nobody is going "white knight" on you. I could've held back my first comment true but I was a bit annoyed. The engine is a big improvement and you're right it does have quite a fatal flaw, nobody is saying it doesn't. Personally I hope in the future they come up with a way to solve the ram issue or game developers increase the amount of ram the systems can hold. Now that it's a well known issue, something can be done about it.

I suppose at the time I thought so many people were complaining but how many of them even thought or knew about that before all this came up? How many could actually fix the problem instead of pretending to have an actual opinion. Like I said, I was a little ticked off.

Well personally I'm not pretending to have an actual opinion. "The 'new' engine is really just an updated and polished version of Gamebryo" is my actual opinion.