Fallout:76 - the TRUE face of Bethesda

[zanity]

I felt physically sick when watching Beth's E3 conference, but the understanding the industry from an inside perspective, I got the actually meaning of everything that was said there. I understand why VERY naive gamers are still pretty clueless about what is really going down at Bethesda now, and why false hope prevails in their minds. However here is today's Beth news...

 

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2018-06-22-bethesda-sues-warner-bros-claims-westworld-game-uses-fallout-shelter-code#comments

 

I have never read anything more sickening in my life. Beth is claiming ownership of the ENGINE code (in every respect) of a third-party dev they employed to code their monetised Fallout Shelter. The small dev, like too many small devs, would not have noticed or BELIEVED the relevance of obscene (and fully ILLEGAL) 'small print'' Todd slipped into the contract- Beth thinks it is now literally back where the music business was in the 1940s, where insanely dishonest music studios forced the singers to sign 'slave' contracts (later overturned by the courts) that meant the singers never received even 1% of the value of their music.

 

When you employ a third party dev to write a game for you, you DO NOT end up owning their working soul- the coding toolboxes that all coders will use as the basis of all coding work they do. No, you own the INSTANCE of the code that makes that game work, and probably the IP that the game represents. But you do not own the 'spanners' and 'screwdrivers' that were used by the dev to make the game.

 

But Zenimax, and by extension Bethesda, is as evil as the devil itself. They are taking action against this dev claiming they 'own' ANY output from this dev that uses any of the same tools used to manufacture Fallout Shelter- in other words anything this dev ever does again belongs to Beth.

 

The vile stink of the wicked music producers of the 30s, 40s, 50s, and 60s, who robbed the performers blind using similar (eventually overturned) 'legal' tricks (many world famous performers died peniless) is all over this latest Beth move.

 

And the relevance to Fallout:76? This is the company that YOU think will allow you to 'mod' THEIR new always online Fallout game? In all my time associated with the computer game biz, I've never read anything more despicable than this legal action. But what it represents couldn't speak more loudly.

 

The countdown for when Bethesda/Zenimax tries to sue The Nexus has begun. I know the owners of this site THINK they can reach an accomodation with Bethesda, but I know Beth merely wants written evidence it can produce in court in an attempt to end all unauthorised modding of its products.

 

I do not believe Beth can win with respect to existing Beth single player games where Beth has released modding tools. But they will never allow another game of theirs to be freely modded outside their own explicit control.

 

PS I get that many here know nothing about this industry or indeed any computer industry, so let me make the point crystal clear...

 

Beth eventually bought iD. John Carmack was one of the founders of iD and alo one of its lead coders, being the architect of Doom and the lesser code architect of the two designers of Quake. But after Abrash (the lead on Quake) left cos he wasn't an owner like Carmack, Carmack continued as the lead coder.

 

Carmack is an open honest coder, and has talked about his process on many occasions. He has stated that CODE REUSE is key to his process. Now iD had many companies publish their games (but was smart enough to keep legal owbership of most of its IP).

 

Now image Carmack was starting today at a small dev team he helped found. And imagine they were offered work for hire by Beth. Like the team that did Fallout Shelter. Well after this work, Beth would claim ownership of all variants of Carmacks codebases if any of them had been used to create the project- including future variants of these tool chains. End result- this 'new' Carmack can either agree to work as a code slave at Beth itself, or lose any ability to code in the future since Beth can always claim ownership of his future code output.

 

As I said, this is how wicked music producers/publishers trapped some of the planet's most talented musicians back in the 30s/40s/50s. At the beginning of their careers desperation and poverty lead then to sign any contract. Only decades later did the US government finally come down like a ton of bricks on these criminals and smash their rackets. Only decades later did successful musicians start getting a share of the profits.

 

It is time for the US government to turn its attention to the big game publishers. They have got away with murder for far too long (most of it so far tax avoidance via hidden profits). But like any industry that has avoided regulation, that industry becomes emboldened and finds worse and worse ways to abuse its power.

 

Beth/Zenimax tries to be clever, operating in the shadow of the other giants like EA, Activision, Ubisoft and Valve/Steam- letting the pack lead and thus take the risk of facing early government punishment. When the leaders of the pack successfully get away with murder, Beth then incorporates these established abuses in their corporate policies.

 

But the heads of Zenimax have their origin in the OLD Hollywood media, like music. And the heads of Zenimax remember the 'good' old days when you could write anything into a recording 'contract', and enslave the musician for the rest of their career. The heads of Zenimax now see coding like music creation was seen in the 30s/40s and 50s, so this new abuse is like nothing we have seen from EA etc. The heads of Zenimax consider that with the 'new' politics ruling in the USA today, it would take coders DECADES to reclaim justice and fair employment terms, and in the meantime Zenimax can bleed them dry.

Edited June 22, 2018 by zanity

[Rational314]

You don't need to make a new thread every time you come up with a new conspiracy theory about Bethesda.

 

Keep it all in one.

[AlarictheVisgoth]

Remember this my young Padawan:

 

Nuerotics build sandcastles in the air. Psychotics live in them. Psychiatrists pay property taxes and collect rent on them.

 

Now let's put this in perspective:

 

1. Bethesda once foolishly trusted the Exceptional A$$h@!es with technical stewardship of their Gridiron physics simulator back in the 1990's. Unsurprisingly, the Exceptional A$$h@!es bent them over a barrel the moment they saw the advantage. And ganked BGS up the derriere without the courtesy of lube. And being the creative Blackbeard software dev cannibals they've always been, The Exceptional A$$h@!es stole BGS Gridiron intellectual property towards the end of said venture and rebranded it Madden NFL.

 

2. Ever since then, Bethesda has been somewhat on the paranoid victim side. Also

 

3. Obsidian (the former software dev owner of Fallout 1&2) falling out with BGS over New Vegas, didn't help BGS state of mind either.

 

So IMO this is exclusively:

 

Pot. Meet Kettle. Lawsuit is the paradigm of what hypocrite cookware do to each other in the industry.....throwing charcoal shade. While hoping it sticks long enough for the fan bases to take notice and side with the more PC and morally superior cookware.

 

Or perhaps more likely Poetic Justice. Although it's not clear to which party said justice should be delivered.....

 

Either way, BGS transformation of the Fallout franchise with F76 caused them to ascend into that fetid Abyss that used to be the sole domain of the Exceptional A$$h@!es. As to how much lower they can devolve below that particular leviathan (particularly from their FUBAR of F76 with future online micro-transaction/Loot boxes) remains to be seen. All that's left for them to officially go public with is restricting all modded content to CC.

 

If F76 is as successful as FO4 in sales & longevity, expect these lawsuits to exponentially rise. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry industry publishers will be encouraging their Larry Indie devs to knock off F76 online formula.

 

Do not doubt me that if they take the Exceptional A$$h@!es or C-star's approach with F76, black hat modders/hackers will destroy the single player Fallout franchise. Just like they have with GTAO. And TES as well, if they're stupid enough to implement online AND PvP AND CC only mod features into TES 6. Because they're ALREADY moving to implement the craft & build feature into TES6 with Blades (that mobile TES game they announced at E3). And who can fault them? The popularity of RTS, customized homes and building mods like BYOH (Hearthfire was ripped off of this) are in the millions of downloads on Nexusmods.

 

First I've heard about this development btw. So thanks for sharing this info. The outcome of this should prove quite insightful.

Edited June 22, 2018 by AlarictheVisgoth

[taryl80]

The whole discussion is at this point just annoying. We are in a Fallout 4 forum afterall and so, well... Some less F76 threads would be nice, at least that is my opinion. And no, I am not a Fallout 76 fanboy. I will not buy this game and that is already everything you need to do and to say about F76, if you dislike the thought on a Fallout as it was presented on the e3.

 

Also I am not blind to both sides. I have make my statement to F76, but I still recognize that Bethesda always have give there games mod support and thanks to that, I was aible to build the fantasy world I always wanted to see (in Skyrim) and I still hope to do the same thing in Fallout 4 for the post apocalyptic setting.

 

Afterall, no company is forced to give there games mod support, but Bethesda decided to do so, over and over again and that is something no one can talk away.

Edited June 23, 2018 by taryl80

[sopmac45]

Personally I've never played an online game and I will not start with F76, so I do not really care at all about this game, so my money will remain inside my pocket till another offline game is out with the full permission from Beth to be modded.

I do have my doubts about the upcoming Elder Scroll VI to be allowed to be modded outside the Creating Club but the time will tell us the truth. It is too early to foresee what will happen and nobody can predict the future, so in the meantime, I will continue playing SkyrimSE and Fallout4 and any other game that I really like regardless if it can be modded or not.