With the release of sci-fi RPG "Starfield" upon us, I'm looking back at Bethesda Game Studios's body of work. In the 22 years since they split off as a separate division from Bethesda Softworks, they've put out some genre-defining games as well as some disappointing clunkers.
Today, I'm going to rank them based on their overall importance and my personal taste in the year 2023. Undoubtedly, some folks will disagree, and they're welcome to share their ranking in the comments below.
5. 'Fallout 4' (2015)
This is hands-down the most disappointing game Bethesda ever made. It looks better than their older games in certain ways, sure, but it felt absolutely ancient upon release. And considering how the Obsidian-developed spin-off "Fallout: New Vegas" laid out the path on how to improve on the formula, there was depressingly little innovation happening here.
It's also worth mentioning that this game was seemingly the breaking point for tolerance of "Bethesda jank." It shipped in a pretty sorry state on certain platforms back then, so I do want to give them credit for not shipping a broken mess with "Starfield."
4. 'The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion' (2006)
"Oblivion" benefited from releasing just a few months after the Xbox 360 launched, so it was a nice beefy way to test out the new hardware. It reviewed well, but it was clearly a frustrating step back in a number of ways.
First, it leans away slightly from the impressive open design of the previous installment, so series diehards hit the ground running in a bad mood. Second, the notorious horse armor DLC was a dark omen of the changing game monetization landscape. Besides, it sits between two much-better games in the series, so it can't rank any higher than this.
3. 'The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim' (2011)
I'm sure most folks would put "Skyrim" at the number one position, and the sales certainly point in that direction. However, I've always been a bit of a "Skyrim" skeptic. It's undoubtedly popular and jam-packed with content, but it always felt like an unsalted meal to me. I can tell there's something tasty here, but I can barely detect it.
While it's not entirely fair to blame the game for what other studios do, I can't help but be a little frustrated by the intensity of "Skryim" chasing other RPGs ended up doing to varying levels of success. For example, I love the "Dragon Age" series, but some of the worst parts of 2014's "Inquisition" are due to BioWare's attempt at filling out an open world with trivial quests. Influence is fine, but maybe not everything needs to be "Skyrim," folks.
2. 'Fallout 3' (2008)
Unfortunately for my inbox, I'm in the camp that thinks very little of "Fallout 3's" main storyline and its implementation of "meaningful choices." Just about every criticism I've heard has some level of validity, and it's pretty hard to go back to these days. With all that said, its success helped popularize a style of RPG that was previously fairly niche. That's not nothin'.
If "Fallout 3" didn't help broaden the open-world RPG fanbase in the late aughts, I'm sure some of my favorite games of all time would have never gotten the green light. Of course it opened the floodgates for terrible games too, but I'll take the good with the bad.
1. 'The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind' (2002)
"Morrowind" was peak Bethesda. The quirks and issues that the studio is known for are here, for sure, but the ambition on display has never really been exceeded. The push for non-linearity and a vast number of intricate systems cohere into something truly special.
It's also worth mentioning that this is the first of the main Bethesda RPGs to make its way on consoles. Expanding beyond the traditional CRPG audience was vitally important for the future of the company and genre, so huge ups for making this massive game run on the original Xbox.
Is Bethesda's space RPG "Starfield" actually worth playing? Find out what critics think.
[Image: Bethesda Game Studios]
