PS5 players won't get future Bethesda games

silvagti · 13 Mar 2021 at 09:15

https://www.techradar.com/uk/news/ps5-players-wont-get-future-bethesda-games

Guess it's not going to come as a shock to anyone, given the recent Microsoft acquisition, but it's still disappointing for the Fallout and Elder Scrolls fans out there on Playstation.

silvagti · 14 Mar 2021 at 18:46

McBain said:
Elder Scrolls 6 being on MS only is pretty big.

Yeah, that game is going to be a system seller that I'm sure many who don't own a pc would buy an Xbox to play it and Microsoft know this.

I'm sure most of the folk on this forum are enthusiasts and will either own a gaming pc or not be overly bothered by the idea of spending £200 on an Xbox series S to play Elder Scrolls. Disappointing for the Playstation casual gamers though.

What annoys me most isn't so much that it's happened but that when Microsoft bought Bethesda they specifically said the games wouldn't be exclusive to Microsoft platforms. It didn't take them long to break that promise.

silvagti · 14 Mar 2021 at 19:14

CHokKA said:
When did they promise that?

https://www.businessinsider.com/bethesda-xbox-exclusive-game-pass-games-first-playstation-5-2020-11

This was the article/comment I recalled but perhaps it wasn't an overly official statement. It implied 'timed' exclusives rather than console exclusives.

silvagti · 14 Mar 2021 at 21:08

Yeah, reading it back again as you say the wording is very deliberate. It's clear that Bethesda titles were always going to become Microsoft exclusives post acquisition!

silvagti · 21 Mar 2021 at 14:16

BowdonUK said:
I was around in the 80s and 90s and always the aim was to make a game to be played on all systems, even if certain systems only managed ports of other systems.

I guess the difference in this situation is the makers of the machines are more powerful than the software houses these days.

For the record so far I've not got the PS5 due to a lack of supply, so I am still open to buying either machine i.e. I'm not a PS5 moaner that I've bought a machine that I can't play Skyrim 6 on.. if this is the case I'll end up buying both systems.

Nintendo (in particular) and Sega were both just as bad back in the 80s 90s to be fair for platform exclusives.

I guess it's just an essential part of selling consoles and making your system look more appealing that competitors. Especially now when the Xbox series/one and PS4/ps5 are basically the using near enough the same internals so there's very little between them.

I'm not happy about it but obviously Microsoft feel they'll make more money selling xbox's than they'll lose by not making Bethesda titles available on Playstation.

silvagti · 21 Mar 2021 at 14:54

That's the thing I suppose. Elder Scrolls being an xbox exclusive wouldn't make me ditch my Playstation to buy an Xbox.

Personally I'd spend the money upgrading my PC to play it but I guess whether it's Xbox or Windows Microsoft keep you on their platforms and in the Microsoft ecosystem so they win either way.