WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:06.080 The year is 2002. I approached the desk at the rental store with a freshly minted copy 00:00:06.080 --> 00:00:11.120 of the Elder Scrolls 3 Morrowind. After handing over my change and scurrying home, 00:00:11.120 --> 00:00:17.280 I proceeded to play for roughly 24 hours straight, more captivated by this finely crafted world 00:00:17.280 --> 00:00:23.440 than anything I had seen in my entire 11 and a half years of life. Even boobs. 00:00:23.440 --> 00:00:28.560 I woke my dad up the next morning by professing my love of this game and begging him to buy 00:00:28.560 --> 00:00:33.520 a real copy of it to replace my rental version. To my surprise, he agreed. 00:00:33.520 --> 00:00:37.920 My dad and I would take turns playing on a shared save file where one of us would read 00:00:37.920 --> 00:00:42.080 through the player's guide and direct the other who would control the character. 00:00:42.080 --> 00:00:45.440 These are some of my favorite gaming memories ever. 00:00:45.440 --> 00:00:48.960 We use that player's guide so much it barely holds together at this point. 00:00:48.960 --> 00:00:53.920 The cover has been missing for decades. I was driven to get into software development 00:00:53.920 --> 00:00:59.760 because I wanted to work for Bethesda for Todd Howard. I wanted to make things like Morrowind, 00:00:59.760 --> 00:01:04.800 this piece of art that means so much to me. To say this is my favorite game ever would be 00:01:04.800 --> 00:01:10.880 an understatement. Fast forward 21 years to Starfield's release and I tried with every fiber 00:01:10.880 --> 00:01:16.800 of my being to find that diamond in the rough, but it just wasn't there. I bought the collector's 00:01:16.800 --> 00:01:20.640 edition. I tried to fight off the haters. I streamed it to try to add to the hype, 00:01:20.640 --> 00:01:27.200 but it just fell flat. What went wrong? I don't really know. I work here, not in the gaming industry, 00:01:27.200 --> 00:01:31.680 and there are people out there that have deconstructed Starfield far better than I can. 00:01:31.680 --> 00:01:36.160 I suggest Nakey Jakey's video on the topic he shares nearly identical views to me 00:01:36.160 --> 00:01:43.040 and is a better presenter, so just go watch that. What I want to talk about today isn't actually Starfield itself, but the machine 00:01:43.040 --> 00:01:48.640 and the environment that made it. The industry is sick, not just Bethesda. 00:01:48.640 --> 00:01:53.520 Off the top of my head, other studios that have fallen from grace include Activision, 00:01:53.520 --> 00:02:00.240 Ubisoft, Blizzard, EA, 343 Studios, and more. All titans of the industry that used to be known 00:02:00.240 --> 00:02:06.160 for releasing generational bangers over and over again, but now seem to just fart out 00:02:06.160 --> 00:02:14.000 quadruple A grade trash. And it's not just bad games, it's bad culture, bad PR, bad management. 00:02:14.000 --> 00:02:19.600 From the very serious sexual harassment issues at Blizzard, EA claiming egregious microtransactions 00:02:19.600 --> 00:02:25.440 are there to enable a sense of pride and accomplishment and rampant layoffs. It's clear 00:02:25.440 --> 00:02:31.600 something is wrong, and no, I'm not here to suggest a fix, but I am here to identify a pattern. 00:02:31.600 --> 00:02:36.960 See, we've seen this before. Look at Atari and Activision from back in the late 70s. 00:02:36.960 --> 00:02:43.360 Atari's leadership was floundering, and some of their key talent broke off, freeing themselves 00:02:43.360 --> 00:02:50.720 and forming Activision. I might be grasping at straws here, but it feels cyclical. Many giants 00:02:50.720 --> 00:02:56.000 of the 90s and early 2000s are losing their spark, and in some cases, splinter teams are 00:02:56.000 --> 00:03:00.160 starting to form. Some examples of this would be Dreamhaven and Frost Giant, 00:03:00.160 --> 00:03:04.720 Splinters from Blizzard, or Stoic Studio, a splinter from EA. There are others as well, 00:03:04.720 --> 00:03:10.720 and more are forming all the time. And you can feel it too, right? It's not just those, 00:03:10.800 --> 00:03:17.040 a new dawn seems to be rising. Steam records are getting smashed left and right unexpectedly. 00:03:17.040 --> 00:03:24.000 Arrowhead Studios, the makers of wildly successful Helldivers 2, proudly proclaims on their website 00:03:24.000 --> 00:03:30.400 that a game made for everyone is a game made for no one. From Software unabashedly sticks to their 00:03:30.400 --> 00:03:36.240 guns when it comes to difficulty and game design, eventually releasing the utterly jaw-dropping 00:03:36.240 --> 00:03:42.800 Elden Ring. Larian Studios takes a risk releasing a D&D format game in 2023, something many people 00:03:42.800 --> 00:03:48.480 and studios balked at. Yet gamers can't get enough, and it easily won Game of the Year, 00:03:48.480 --> 00:03:54.560 continues to receive endless praise, and their leader, Sven Vicki, seems to be incapable of 00:03:54.560 --> 00:04:00.160 saying or doing anything, not completely based. The future is bright, it's a great time to be a 00:04:00.160 --> 00:04:06.240 gamer, try not to sweat the failures of the old gods, and instead enjoy the successes of the new 00:04:06.240 --> 00:04:11.840 ones. Thanks for listening to me ramble, thanks for being subscribed to Flowplain, and I'll see you next time.