Fallout: London's project lead Dean Carter is obviously a fan of Bethesda's RPGs, having spent years working on one of the biggest and bestest conversion mods to hit the already-very-modded post-apocalyptic series. But he's also not sure if Bethesda Game Studios should continue making The Elder Scrolls and Fallout titles without improving on its writing.
"With the greatest respect to Bethesda, I feel like they've probably gone one game too far," he tells Esports.net when asked about what the studio should do to remix its formula. "I feel like it's time to go off into the sunset and look at selling off your IP because people like the franchise, I'm just honestly not sure it's in the right hands, and it really hurts me to say that because I love Bethesda."
One of Carter's criticisms is that "the writing has just gone downhill" in the company's recent output. "I reckon if they could inject in the quality of some good writers, then the next Elder Scrolls game will be great and the next Fallout game will be great but they need better writers, honestly," he adds.
The other point of contention comes from how Bethesda has adapted Fallout's tone, which has always had an absurd, slightly aloof but still violent sense of humor. "Everything has its own pros and cons but the one thing we agreed on with Fallout: London is that we wanted to make it more dark and gritty because that's what Fallout actually is," Carter argues, "and I think Bethesda are taking it in the opposite direction."
Bethesda and, by extension, Microsoft are unlikely to willingly part with some of their biggest money makers, especially with The Elder Scrolls 6 and Fallout 5 - eventually, maybe closer to the heat death of the known universe - in the pipeline. Fingers crossed the devs can stick the landing and brush off the flak that's followed their recent stuff.
"I don't think Bethesda hates Fallout," says New Vegas lead, "they just don't fully understand its roots and arguably, don't care."
