A long dream.

Last time bethesda made a single player game it sold like shit and everyone made fun of them. Not saying you HAVE to like starfield (i didn't play it either), but why would microsoft allocate the resources for bethesda to create another single player if everything amounts to the public going "lul bethany esda"

Fallout 76 PRINTS money. Some might find this odd but FO76 has a very small but dedicated fanbase, and games like these thrive on whales. For things like live services, gachas, even TCGs it is far more worth to cater to the handful of guys that waste 200€ on the game every month rather than hope the average player buys a skin/booster pack/whatever. The average bethesda employee has been chained to their desk producing FO76 content for years, why would microsoft ever let them take a break.

No one plays the other obsidian games. I'll be so real with you, obsidian has been living off of the good will of new vegas since 2010. No one played pillars of eternity. No one played tyranny (which is THE BEST obsidian game idgaf). No one even played the outer worlds, the so called fallout killer. Avowed sold like ass, the outer worlds 2 sold like ass, the only obsidian game that's more or less thriving is grounded, their live service ip. Again, I'm not saying you HAVE to buy their games on release (who has the money for all these games), but companies only see numbers.

People haven't shut the fuck up about new vegas for 16 years. People need to go play another game. Of course microsoft was going to see all the hype and go "hmmmm let's cancel all those other flop projects and turn obsidian into a bethesda subsidiary fallout slop studio!"

So here's my prediction: doesn't matter if the game is good or bad, because at the end of the day, microsoft is going to hold obsidian hostage. If the game does well, good! Obsidian is bethesda's little bitch forever (rip ALL the studios that activision-blizzard-king pulled to "support the call of duty franchise" and ended up being consumed like a male anglerfish). If the game does bad, then well, microsoft is most likely going to look at the poor reception and go "see, people just don't like single player games :/ let's dissolve the studio to cut costs". If the game does well, MAYBE we'll get lucky and see another low cost niche project like Pentiment again. But most likely obsidian is just going to be absorbed into producing Content TM for FO76.

I've already written this far, so I'm going to keep going. I'd like to make the connection to another video game series that's very dear to my heart, dragon age. When bioware released dragon age: the veilguard, tumblr, the so called leftist website, devoured the devs alive. "Oh how could they have done this" "oh these devs don't know what they're doing" "oh this isn't the game we wanted" and as soon as the news came out that the entire dragon age team had been fired, the first response was people going "omg larian should do dragon age games now!". I've you've read this far and you were one of the people excited for the news of a new obsidian fallout game, I'd like to ask you to please think about the working conditions of these people. CEOs are not regular people like you and I, they don't play these games and they only see numbers. And social media, for whatever reason. EA saw the immense negative response veilguard had from both haters AND fans and went "oh, whatever, employees are just a number on an excel sheet". Microsoft firing 60 employees from obsidian and then cancelling all of their projects to focus on fallout is just numbers on a sheet. Fallout is not real to them, it's just a name that gets people to buy stuff. That's why fallout 4 (and skyrim) are ported for every platform, from the switch to idk, a smart fridge. Brands are not your friends. Play the games made by the PEOPLE you like. Follow the PEOPLE that make the games you enjoy, not the name of a studio. And treat game devs with kindness, even the devs from studios you don't like. Especially devs from the studios you don't like, because I can guarantee you they're not making any meaningful decisions. Yes, even Todd Howard.

If you like new vegas, that's okay, but know obsidian isn't going to make new vegas again. The vast, vast majority of the original team isn't at the studio anymore. Look at what you liked from the game, find out who wrote it and go follow that person. Here, I'll go first: my favourite new vegas character was written by a man i cannot in good conscience reccommend, but besides that I really like House and the families, written by John Gonzalez, who then went on to design the narratives for horizon:zero dawn and horizon:forbidden west (people who follow this blog will know I've written 2 or 3 different posts about this).