Elder Scrolls Todd Howard Appreciation Thread

[Wunderbar]

Dreamland? Not that fucking fraud MMO is it?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dreamland_Chronicles:_Freedom_Ridge

 

[Wulfric Pinewood]

Long live Todd and prosper!

 

[FriendlyMerchant]

Was he even in the chess club?

I see. No wonder he's good at lying.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

I see. No wonder he's good at lying.

He always seemed more the type to me even the chess club nerds would beat up.

 

[Tihskael]

Can't make this shit up

 

[Puukko]

The kids at the chess club made fun of him for the final time.

 

[*-*/\--/\~]

Appreciation? I'd like to see the fucker crucified for every gaming lie he has told.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

Appreciation? I'd like to see the fucker crucified for every gaming lie he has told.

Already been tried:

 

[TheHeroOfTime]

yea i was in the ches club

 

[FriendlyMerchant]

Todd did a good job in morrowind. Too bad he screwed everything up in Oblivion.

 

[Bruma Hobo]

https://old.reddit.com/r/gayfortodd/

 

[aweigh]

 

[Quillon]

https://clips.twitch.tv/SpinelessDoubtfulPelicanStinkyCheese-Mgf9QgCaBAYWuypd

 

[vortex]

 

[Tihskael]

Todd seems to have aged slightly. I believe he might have taken 76's mixed reception badly.

 

[Butter]

Todd you gave them 4 days notice. You think someone won't crack your password in that time? Hint: there's a 50% chance his password is maiqtheliar.

 

[Roguey]

Todd's gained weight, hopefully he stops himself before becoming Avellone-sized.

 

[BruceVC]

I used to dislike Bethesda after Oblivion and Fo3, but now that triple-A RPG industry is in the gutter, Todd seems like the only savior.

You all know the history. Bioware sold out to EA and immediately went gay, each of their new games after DAO turned out to be worse than the previous one. Obsidian sold out to MS, and judging by The Outer Worlds, they took the same path as Bioware. Spiders are basically Bioware wannabies, the only reason they haven't gone gay is because they don't have the money to do so. Piranha Bytes are basically re-making iterating on the same game over and over. CDPR? It is evident that the Poles were never interested in making RPGs, all they wanted was to earn big buck by making cinematic action games. The Witcher 1 - soul; Witcher 2 - no soul, consolefied and overly streamlined dodge-roll fest; Witcher 3 - a full blown designed-by-committee decline, and now Cyberpunk 77 - whackamole trash where you can pick pronounces during a character creation. Sven? Ugh don't even get me started on Larian and their talking vegetables.

Meanwhile Todd. Todd went to a chess club, played DnD as a kid, was a fan of Ultima when he was younger. He's a 100% nerd, the kind of type who gets bulled by school jocks. Todd doesn't have any social media accounts, he never posts virtue-signalling political horseshit, Todd's games are for the most part free of current day poz. I bet he voted for Trump.

Since the 90s, Todd's been participating in development of games with an emphasis on systemic emergent gameplay in the spirit of Ultima. Morrowind had an amazing hand-crafted world, Oblivion had stunning visuals and mindblowing (for its time) physics engine, Skyrim introduced perks and better combat. Players complained about Morrowind's combat where the player misses the enemy despite standing right in front of it, then Oblivion fixed it. Players complained about Oblivion looking super generic and bright, and then Skyrim fixed it. Players complained about Fo3 combat and gunplay in particular being bad, and then Fo4 had great gunplay, good weapons animations, vastly improved enemy AI and multi-layered level design.

After having an enourmous financial success, any other studio would try to expand, hire hundreds of new employees and try to develop multiple projects simultaneously. After Skyrim sold gangbusters, Todd didn't expand and didn't turn The Elder Scrolls into some annual franchise like Ubisoft of Activision would've undoubtly done. Todd isn't looking for an easy way to make money.

Who came up with an idea of adding an inter-party drama and romancing NPCs? Who started giving your blank-slate protagonists fully voiced lines? Who started adding cutscenes and other cinematic BS? I'll tell you who DIDN'T start this, it was Todd. Todd was literally the last RPG dev who gave us romancing, cutscenes and fully voiced protagonist, and even then he was likely forced to do that because it was trendy and because Zenimax is run by a bunch of jews. Who still develops games on a proprietary engine instead of lazily licensing Unreal? Todd!

Here's the photo of Todd from the early 00s.

Spoiler

and here's another photo of him made a couple of months ago

Spoiler

The loveable rogue didn't age a bit!

Meanwhile look at Marcin Iwinski, CD Projekt Red developer

Spoiler

that's what i call Karma. It's like he was smitten by a God himself for being a hack.

Anyway, Todd. Todd's a good guy, i hope he doesn't retire and will stick with Bethesda for a few more games. I'm hyped for Starfield, and you should be hyped too.

Great post and very fair poll, I am glad you asked a question with reasonable responses because their is nothing worse than polls that arent objective or dont provide valid different responses. And this question is nuanced and complex and you will get a myriad of opposing views which is normal for this type of ostensibly controversial question

I love Bethesda and I play all their games, my favorite being Elder Scrolls with lots of mods. I also enjoyed the entire Dishonored series so I am definitely a huge and committed fan

Todd Howard has played mostly a hugely positive role in the journey and success of Bethesda but he is not inextricably connected to its future success. I would hate for him to leave Bethesda but the company will survive and continue great work on ESO and future games like Elder Scrolls 6

Oh and I have worked at Microsoft and I personally believe the buyout was a good thing as Microsoft is committed to its gaming development so this has many advantages to Bethesda like access to seriously qualified developers

 

[Tihskael]

Todd always struck me as one who obsessed with minor details. Look how he worked Sir Patrick for a fucking 10 minute part. Absolute master of his craft, the Todd.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Todd about his top 10 most awaited videogames (originally posted in september 6, 2000).

fun fact - two years later Bethesda will serve as a publisher for Sea Dogs 2 (rebranded as a Pirates of the Caribbean movie tie-in).

SWG is excellent, Todd confirmed for good taste.
Easily would still exist to this day if it wasn't forced to shut down to make way for SWTOR.

IMO there's a conspiracy against games that use radial menus so that the world never fully understands their superiority.

 

[jackofshadows]

there's a conspiracy against games that use radial menus so that the world never fully understands their superiority.

Or... OR radial menus are obnoxious and should be forgotten forever.

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

Todd has great intentions, and there are no other studios that can make Bethesda style RPGs. Besides their IPs are great. I think they took some missteps with 76 and the way the handled Fallout 4, but I still think Skyrim is one of the most freeing gaming experiences out there. There aren't any other fully realized open-world games with complete AI control over the NPCs.

 

[tritosine2k]

Imagine releasing Rage2 at less than half baked state because you want to cash-in on some woke mad max flick hype and Todd is either powerless or in on it. Keep dunkin' the kool aid guys.

 

[FriendlyMerchant]

Todd has great intentions, and there are no other studios that can make Bethesda style RPGs. Besides their IPs are great. I think they took some missteps with 76 and the way the handled Fallout 4, but I still think Skyrim is one of the most freeing gaming experiences out there. There aren't any other fully realized open-world games with complete AI control over the NPCs.

It's a shame they stopped making rpgs after Morrowind though.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

Oh and I have worked at Microsoft and I personally believe the buyout was a good thing as Microsoft is committed to its gaming development so this has many advantages to Bethesda like access to seriously qualified developers

And still ask them to make games for your most common generic gamer, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. (great quote, and so fitting these days)
If you honestly think it is going to improve the actually quality of the content, then you really misplace your hopes.