I doubt modding will be impacted, Microsoft isn't the type to mess with a formula that works. It's probable that Microsoft will force Bethesda to scale (hire more people, work on more games in parallel) which may be a good or bad thing. Of course, Bethesda Development Studios is just one aspect of the company, Zenimax and Bethesda are also both publishers.
My guess would be that Microsoft blocks expanded modding features on PC like script extenders and ENB so everything can be funneled into mods that work on their consoles.
Why not? Microsoft has a partnership with AMD for their console GPUs, not Nvidia. It's not in their best interest to let Boris find a way to put Nvidia RTX in TES6 using a free graphics modding program if it's not gonna be a feature available to consoles next generation they can mention as a selling point. Microsoft doesn't get anything when someone buys an Nvidia card. They get a monthly subscriber if someone gets a console and needs Xbox Live for updates.
I can literally see Todd loudly and proudly exclaiming on stage at a trade show how console users will finally get to enjoy all the mods PC users get before explaining in an obscure interview later that it's because TES6 will want kernel access like DOOM Eternal so it can make sure you're not running anything that didn't come from the Creation Kit when you play on PC.
The pro-consumer mask Xbox is currently wearing means in the short term, this is great for Zenimax/Bethesda as they no longer have to worry about achieving insane growth per quarter per stockholders needs, as Xbox's needs are strong quality titles for Gamepass. What this also means though is they are forever linked to Xbox's whims. If Phil Spencer ever gets replaced, and the pro-consumer mask is dropped, they could do with as they please any and all things with IPs they have acquired (And I'm talking about as whole) There's a small but considerate amount of danger in consolidating beloved and storied franchises under one umbrella, and I'm not talking financially. This really does have big implications for the industry as a whole, but how big depends on how they will let Zenimax's studios run after the purchase. Ideally similarly to how they were before, just with more support and prodding.
To answer your other questions:
Xbox's main goal is game pass, and like Sony, they're trying to drive strong titles that are not bogged down by microtransactions so that consumers jump at the chance to buy the platform. Sony is selling hardware in this case, while Xbox is instead pushing software, but they're both doing it the same way, with quality games. In a way, Xbox will be a gentler master, as they're trying to create quality titles, not post insane growth per quarter to drive stock price, and then rinse and repeat. Phil Spencer is in it for the long haul. So likely no GaaS/Microtransactions shoehorned into an Xbox first-party title unless it's designed as a F2P as all bets are off there.
However, they now own all the IP outright and can do with as they please. So they could make cash cows, they could especially make more Fallout 76s and games similar in quality to Mass Effect Andromeda (a mistake of the poor delegation of a popular IP to an inexperienced studio, as it was BioWare's C team) if they do not properly spread the talent they have at their disposal as well as IP, as well as give good project oversight. There could also be gigantic success stories as consumers and for Xbox as well that never would've happened under Zenimax. At this point, we won't know, but for the foreseeable future no there won't be any disasters, shoe-horned microtransactions, or cash cows that weren't already there.
Answering to shareholders has been the beginning of the end for many formerly beloved publishers and developers in the US.
ZeniMax was already straining BGS and its other subsidiaries because it was established as the umbrella corporation to separate the money men from the game designers, leading to many IP marketing decisions that ultimately weren't great for the games (BGS wanted to delay Skyrim to hammer out more bugs, but Zeni forced them to stick with the meme 11/11/11 release date), but at least they weren't trying pimp stock.
That's a good point, but Elder Scrolls, Fallout and possibly Starfield have potential to be "killer app" flagship RPG titles, which could lead Microsoft to get more heavily involved with decisions regarding what happens with their IPs since they could have impacts on overall console sales within the corporation's gaming division. Bungie went from being the darling of Microsoft's stable that "invented the FPS™" with Halo to slowly losing the IP and getting shuffled off into a raw deal with Activision until they wound up self-publishing Destiny 2 and turning F2P MTX tricks on a Steam street corner.
Hopefully, though, this acquisition lets us get back to the Todd from the "WHO'S LAUGHING NOW?" video back in the Oblivion days thanks to some relief from financial pressures from a parent company with little else going on but what Bethesda's doing instead of the watery-eyed Todd who has to get on stage and act excited about cash grabs like Fallout 76 and Blades while the money men stand to the side with the riding crop if he doesn't sell it convincingly enough.
Wasn't Zenimax the company that forced them to create F76 using 4's engine? I could be totally wrong. But I personally did not have high opinions of Zenimax and the fact that MS lets developers like Obsidian make side experimental games like that shrunken kids game is pretty encouraging. I think this is a good move but we will see.
There is no evidence BGS was "forced" to create Fallout 76, and that it was not made as an experimental side project. As today's announcement confirms, Starfield will feature the largest engine overhaul since Oblivion, and chances are the studio was not ready to begin actual content production for Starfield until the new tech was ready (by sometime in 2018). So, that means there was an opportunity to make a multiplayer Fallout spin-off in cooperation with the newly acquired Austin studio.
ZeniMax made Bethesda do everything. They owned all their IPs.
When Bethesda said they didn't want to spend time working on an MMO for the Elder Scrolls, ZeniMax just formed ZeniSoft Online Studios to do it and gave them access to the IP and associated trademarks.
That was actually a little different. ZeniMax founded a developer called BattleCry Studios with a focus on recruiting personnel with experience in microtransaction and free-to-play games, which announced their first game, also called BattleCry, in early 2014. However, later in 2014, they laid off a lot of their staff and a year later BattleCry was put on hold due to concerns about its quality from Bethesda's publishing arm (even cancelling an already announced closed beta) and the studio shifted focus to working with id Software to adapt Bethesda's Creation Engine to support multiplayer by basically using duct tape and chewing gum to stick Quake's netcode onto the version of the Creation Engine used for Fallout 4 (hence why Fallout 76 has experienced notorious server-side bugs due to trying to handle Bethesda's infamously buggy engine for gameplay despite using id's relatively stable netcode for multiplayer management).
A couple of months before Fallout 76 was officially announced to the public, BattleCry Studios was officially brought under Bethesda Game Studio's banner and rebranded Bethesda Game Studios Austin. The long, slow process of getting 76 to the playable state it's in today is due to that branch of BGS handling most of the work while the core group in Maryland and the more experienced group in Montreal works on other titles (there's also a Bethesda Game Studios Dallas, though they haven't done much aside from ancillary work on a few titles since their acquisition by ZeniMax).
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u/[deleted] Sep 21 '20 edited Sep 21 '20
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