Back in 2002, Morrowind was a stuttering mess for basically every player. Back then, you’d use FPS optimizer, which increased and decreased your view distance according to your FPS, and absolutely everybody had the fog right under their nose in Balmora. And still it was played and loved.
I think we will be okay with 30 fps in a Bethesda game.
I respect stylistic choices as much as the next guy, but capping the game’s FPS to 30 seemingly completely arbitrarily is stupid design, especially on PC where most people want 60 minimum.
As long as it’s a consistent 30 fps, then I am fine with this decision.
Tears of the Kingdom has convinced me that as long as the performance is consistent, the only thing that matters is the gameplay.
But it is Bethesda we are talking about here lol.
What exactly do you mean by your Tears of the Kingdom comment? That game was constantly dropping frames. Any time you used ultrahand or fuse, the game would drop to <15 fps. I still really enjoyed the game despite that, but the performance was really poor and inconsistent. Breath of the Wild had similar issues, but it felt less severe. Or maybe I’m misremembering, since it has been 6 years since I played BotW on the switch.
I don’t get the controversy over 30fps. Like I played RDR2 at 30fps and didn’t even notice it.
The gameplay itself is far more important and on that front Bethesda has been second to none. There isn’t even one single game that comes close to what they have achieved in The Elder Scrolls. Kingdom Come: Deliverance was close but much smaller in scope (which makes sense given the size of the studio).
I’ve played every single one of their games since Morrowind and while Fallout 76 was a flop and Fallout 4 was perhaps a bit disappointing, at least without DLC, almost all of their games have been incredible.
In Todd we trust.
30fps is not a stylistic choice, it’s due to hardware limitations. A higher framerate with no motion blur is preferable in nearly all circumstances.
Sure you ‘get used to it’, but I could say the same thing for playing games while in a room with a strobe light flashing in my eyes. Yeah my gaming experience isn’t materially different, but I’d be a lot more comfortable in better circumstances.
Once you’re used to higher framerates, 30fps is a big downgrade, with motion blur smearing things around to keep it from looking like a slideshow.
Good performance is what allows good gameplay to shine. 30 fps might be fine for you, but anyone playing on PC with M&K will attest that 60 fps is the bare minimum.
The minimum requirements for this game are very high,and that’s for running it at 30fps. Add that AAA always have problems at release + it’s Bethesda… So I bet the game is going to run terribly.
(Also I’d rather have 60fps and last gen graphics than 30fps for a game with shooting and fast-paced action)
It’s much less noticeable on LCD screens than it was on CRT’s back in the day. And like I mentioned on another post on the subject, a consistent 30 fps is way better than higher but inconsistent framerates.
Plus this is a single player game where you’re not competing with other players who might have an edge with better framerates than yours.
The truth is if you keep asking developers to push the envelope on graphics, framerates will suffer. 30 fps isn’t great, but it’s a compromise.
I have to wonder if part of the reason is that even the upgraded engine still struggles with physics at higher frame rates. Skyrim had issues with objects not playing well with higher FPS. 30fps may just be a sweet spot for the engine that it looks “good enough” and doesn’t struggle to keep objects settled in the ground.
