To my understanding, Skyrim was actually decent at launch. Then they released patch 1.2 (which, due to Steam, was a forced update so you *had* to install it to play if Steam knows the patch exists), which introduced the bugs that you'd normally expect from a Bethesda game at launch. (Things like, you know, dragons flying backwards, and elemental resistance not working (have fun burning flame atronachs while your Nord is getting frozen to death (your 50 frost resistance does nothing)!).)

The fallout (no, not the game) from this unfortunate patch was as follows:
* The 1.3 patch for Skyrim was mostly just a regression fix (in other words, it fixed things that were broken by the 1.2 patch)
* Steam added the beta channel after this incident, so players could opt in to a beta before it became mandatory; this would have made the 1.2 patch less catastrophic, as players could have chosen to not install the patch, and the patch could have been pulled once everyone realized how bad it was.

I read that, apparently, a bug made one Fallout 76 player's character invincible, with no way top turn it off. Also, MMOs and other multiplayer games meant to be played with strangers can't really be modded, as doing so could give a player an unfair advantage over other human players, or could lead to desyncs (when different computers have a different ides of the game state).

Edit: Why is this post "low rated"?

Well yes modding an MMO seems iffy, but considering it's an old engine, old bugs that never get fixed, but also.. NO NPCs... everything that isn't a player, is an enemy/mutant or robots. among other things. It's just not fun going to a computer with your fetch quest or having to read all the lore from a computer terminal.

Then there's VATS, which in 76 is a glorified badly done auto-aim bot, one frame could give you 95% and the next 0%.

Safe to say, Fallout is a bad match with multiplayer of this kind. Maybe if it was the original fallout turn-based design where everyone on the map goes into turn based at the same time, and you have like 15 seconds to make your decision and the game merges everyone's choices at the same time, yeah that might work better.

I have no idea how Bethesda could mess this up even further.

Oh wait! I know how!
https://kotaku.com/bethesda-support-leaks-fallout-76-customer-names-addre-1830892930

Fallout 76, the gift that keeps on giving...
...just like herpes!

Unsurprisingly, somebody had a similar idea:

[url=https://falloutmods.fandom.com/wiki/FOnline:_2238]https://falloutmods.fandom.com/wiki/FOnline:_2238[/url]

Unfortunately, while it was technically sound, the amount of administrator interference in favor of some groups/individuals, and just general overwhelming presence of Russian players (you probably know the type) meant a horrific game experience.

The amount of dickhattery was staggering, including blatant exploitation. Hell, I was a literal witness of one of the developers "assisting" their favored group in setting up an ambush against PUGs, then porting the participants away to their hideout because they had so much loot on them (mostly from low-level clueless players) they couldn't legitimately move.

But, anyway, in terms of game mechanics, it did work.

(GOG forum won't let me get the link clickable... or even non-derpy. I give up. Baquette!)

Love Bethesda games, hate Bethesda.

I wouldn't call something that requires unpaid hobbyist work to be "good" or even just "playable" to fall under the category of "good."

They make nice "scenery porn." Their combat system is just reshuffling of stuff they did in bloody Daggerfall. In fact, at least Daggerfall had the innovative, at the time, "slash the screen with your cursor for different attacks" implementation. Their characterization is next to nonexistent. They can't manage to bring "life" to their creations, either - mostly you operate in the "vacuum" of a specific location, and that's it.

Doesn't help that they keep dumbing down the RPG elements of their games (see Fallout 4), either.

But they got a yuuge marketing budget, and there will always be plentiful gamers going for the sparklies, never mind gameplay depth.

I hope that Fallout 76 was a wake up call for Bethesda. For years they have been able to get away with poor optimisation and gitches a' plenty due to the community finding it endearing.
It's a sad state of affairs when a massive AAA publisher can put out a mess of a game that's been in development for years, only for modders to fix major problems in just a few months after release.

However now, they've managed to put out a game that's so bad that every bad aspect of their game and/or engine has been thrown right into the line of fire.

I been around from the original Arena, Daggerfall, Redguard up to Skyrim.

Their games have always been potentially awesome, but actually generally broken.

The only one that distiguished has been Fallout vegas, that has used Bethesda engine, but developed by Obsidian (?).

I'm not surprised if they end like this.
Moreover, no company last forever.

Lots of giants who've gotten so big that the economics department ended up taking decisions previously made by people who had their hands in development one way or another. Seems to be quite common.

Man, all of a sudden I'm hungry for some KFC.

Don't. it's fatty.

I quit smoking, I quit drinking, don't take fat away from me!

The vatican doesn't have KFC anyway :p