Starfield Gameplay Shows That Bethesda Is Still Stuck In The Past

thegamer.com:

I might have been a baby gamer back when Fallout 3 came out, but I still remember the cynical and short-sighted argument that it was nothing more than ‘Oblivion with guns’ due to how it took Bethesda’s groundbreaking RPG formula and paired it with a new universe.

Existing fans might have felt they had a right to be sceptical, while newcomers who only recently jumped aboard had a new adventure to look forward to that was set to push the genre forward in all manner of ways. This uncharitable descriptor turned out to be nonsense, with Fallout 3 doing far more than just placing a gun in your hands and calling it a day. Granted, the engine remained untouched, and its dialogue system and quest design was awfully similar, but they were always going to be. Bethesda was on top of the world in 2008, and few were able to match its prowess when it came to creating experiences in worlds so huge and diverse.

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But times change, and you can’t depend on the momentum of past successes forever. Skyrim was the culmination of the studio’s ambition, and managed to become a cultural landmark that is still being remastered and modded to this day. It was in the right place at the right time to make maximum impact, and I imagine Bethesda has been seeking to replicate this unintended masterstroke ever since. Yet it has failed, both because it doesn’t wish to leave the shadow of Skyrim’s brilliance behind and arguably doesn’t even know how.

This was clear in Fallout 4, which despite years of hype and anticipation was released to a relative whimper compared to what came before. It relied too much on the systems of Fallout 3, and when it dared to push them forward its depth suffered as a