doncabesa

Congrats to the team on another great year of GotY content!

Of everything I reviewed this year this is the one I want to go back to and play again the most. What a fantastic game in a truly fantastic year for people who play them. (sadly not for those who make them...)

@bigsocrates: we're two months in and it's still 8th most played on the platform, not the norm for a single player title. it's doing great

@bigsocrates: most big games score between 82 and 88. The focus on MC/OC by the industry is toxic. Tying it to performance bonuses is insane to me. SM: MM was a better game than the first but it scored 3 points lower and was an 84. It's all subjective from a small group of people using wildly different scoring systems that are mashed into a 100 point aggregate.

@bigsocrates: Is an 85 on OC a critical shrug? We put far too much weight into review scores, and I say that as someone with 230 of them on OC/MC myself. There is no "maybe it's performing well". It's been in the top 5 or 6 games played since it launched on the Xbox platform. It's a BGS game, they always do well. It's like with Diablo IV, people are trying to start a narrative that it was a failure but it wasn't. Starfield is doing fine, Xbox is doing really well. Hell every platform and most publishers are doing great, which is why it's so infuriating that all these layoffs keep happening.

@bigsocrates: At the investor's call the CEO said Starfield drove "the most subscriptions in one day of the service's history". As far as I can tell, from player count, to how many are playing it every week the game is doing great. They even said it's the most successful launch in BGS history despite being a single console and in a sub service.

@ll_exile_ll: They wanted a game that would get people to sign up for game pass and keep playing it. It's done that. Their metrics/focus are different because of that subscription service focus.

https://www.trueachievements.com/xbox-chart

I know the way the media talks about the game makes public perception seem "mixed" but the game has been consistently in the top played charts every week since release. As a single player game that is not the norm.

Starfield was massively successful. This reorganization is more about bettering communication between studios as far as I can tell. Bethesda is still run by Jamie Leder, who reports to Matt now alongside Phil.

@wardcleaver: It's a bad demo because the fun part of the game is going to be the higher level areas with more powers/build variety.

@thepanzini: that's why they have 23 first party studios and 40+ teams. constant content with a mix of sp, mp, co-op, all the genres they can etc.