Skyrim from Like/Hate

[Jonathan Meer]

I don't care how ambitious or expansive or complex a game is, I except it to be as polished and QA'd as it can be. Releasing games with as many bugs as Bethesda games have is nothing short of sloppy, and there is nothing you can say that will change that. Fact of the matter is, Bethesda just chooses to go for a quicker release rather than polishing their game. Obviously it works for them, but I for one can't help but be massively disapointed in them every single time. Hell, they've made like 5 games of this scale now, you'd think they would've refined their production methods to allow for more effective QA and bugfixing.

You have no evidence that Bethesda actually skimps on their testing process. As I've argued, Bethesda games are far more complex than most other video games (and may indeed be the most complex video games, in terms of programming, structure and content that there are).

The testing phase must necessarily be limited by cost. Considering the scope of a typical Bethesda game, even the most involved and intensive testing process would let a number of bugs through, including some that are fairly obvious.

If this makes you QQ, then just wait a year or two. The community, which has unlimited resources and is not constrained by budget, will release an unofficial patch that will cover all of the major bugs, and thousands of minor ones that you probably would never have noticed. If instead you're like me and don't run screaming the moment some graphical oddity appears in the game world, you can enjoy it for what it is: an achievement and a damn fun game.

And aside from being able to pick up just about every object, I disagree that Bethesda games have some of the most complex gameplay around. By comparison to a great deal of other RPGs, the leveling and combat system of Fallout3/NV and Morrowind/oblivion/skyrim is child's play.

The leveling and combat system is only one facet of Skyrim's complexity. I'm referring to the actions and reactions of the NPCs, the graphical design, the audio design (with environmental noise, with ambient music in caves and dungeons, with dynamically generated musical themes to accentuate certain experiences such as stepping up to a cliffside), the sheer hand-crafted detail of every house in every city across 16 square miles, to name a few. Name one other game that comes close to this scope.

You can't. There aren't any.