Thread by @Mike_Laidlaw

Probably not a fresh take, but whatever. Let's talk about Fallout 76 for a minute, yeah? Specifically: Why didn't they make a proper sequel?
This is all based on my conjecture and some experience making RPGs, no insider insight.

I think we can take as a given that if Starfield and Elder Scrolls are presented as core single-player games, they are going to be in the same vein as the core Fallouts and Elder Scrolls games. Content-heavy, utterly massive worlds.

Presumably, Starfield has been in the works for some time, and has only recently hit it's production arc where the company is comfortable committing to its eventual release. That suggest to me that there's a team cranking on lots and lots of quests for it.

Also, it's going to be all-new art assets by default as it's not just a new IP, it's a new genre entirely. So we can assume design and art teams are largely allocated to its production, likely with a smaller incubation team working on the next Elder Scrolls.

It's also fair to assume that a sci-fi game would have different needs in terms of engine, and note that it was presented as "next generation" which strongly suggests an engine overhaul.

So that's the engineering team largely committed, right?

Now it's fair to pause and say "But why Starfield? Why not just make more Fallout core game?"

Well, I see it as a diversity play. Arguably all the people who are going to be "into" Elder Scrolls or Fallout are into it. There's lots.

But franchise fatigue is a very real thing, and people will tend to drop off between releases if rushed. So a third major new IP is a breath of fresh air, and a chance to pull even more people into the "Bethesda net" as it were (Yes, deliberate)

Not to mention that the company is clearly committed to spinoffs (mobile, cards, etc) which makes a third IP another huge potential market for those as well.

Which brings us back to "Why 76?"

Well, first, it's reusing assets, reusing engine, reusing setting and concepts.

This makes it relatively "cheap" to make in terms of raw asset generation. Further, by moving to a large system-based experience and letting emergent player action be what generates the stories, the cost of quest generation and so on goes way, waaaaay down.

In turn, this keeps the folks on Starfield and Elder Scrolls on them, while a smaller team works on 76.

Arguably, you could very easily (and probably correctly) say that this puts us in a place where you never had a choice between 76 or a full Fallout game. You had a choice between 76 and...waiting. A long, long time.

BUT, I think there's another reason they're making it too, and it's so apropos that it's about a vault, because they were fundamentally experiments, and I think 76 is one too.

Aside from the very-different MMO experiment with ESO, Bethesda has very little experience with making their style of game co-op. And any scientist will tell you an experiment changes only one variable.

In this case the variable is the co-operative play. The setting, gameplay, visual style? All are proven successful. So there's one big change at play: co-op mechanics and co-op storytelling. This is their test.

In a way, we're all entering the vault program by playing.

Thank you for reading.

We're all Vault Dwellers now.