Bethesda’s signature RPGs, namely Skyrim and Fallout have long set the standard for open worlds in fantasy and even sci-fi video games. However, this notion might have been a double-edged sword for the video game industry, according to a former Starfield dev– he even went as far as attributing Skyrim and Fallout‘s popularity and success to the current open-world fatigue that gamers are experiencing right now.
The former Bethesda developer in question is none other than William Shen. Shen has had a long and colorful history with Bethesda since he worked on titles like Fallout 3, Fallout 4, Skyrim, and even Bethesda’s latest RPG, Starfield as a Lead Quest Designer. Even so, Shen left Bethesda back in October 2023, one month after Starfield‘s release date.
Since then, Shen has been working for Unknown Worlds Entertainment as a Lead Designer and was recently interviewed by Kiwi Talkz. One of Shen’s main criticisms of the game industry as a whole is how it kept following popular trends to the point of burnout and over-saturation.
Thus, Shen mentioned Skyrim and Fallout‘s staggering success as one of the driving factors for open-world copycats.
“Part of what happened was the success of games like Skyrim and Fallout 4. These really big titles that you can play pretty much forever– there are still a lot of people who play Skyrim…
The idea of these evergreen games where you could sink thousands of hours into– that hit the industry… All of a sudden, games like Skyrim really hit their stride with enough content to get past the tipping point that you can kind of play it forever.
And so that became the trend in the games industry… All of a sudden, every game needed 40+ hours of content and depth and progression systems. Now we’re reaching a point where people are fatigued at investing 30+ or 100+ hours in the game.
So we’re seeing this resurgence of short games,” according to Will Shen.
Here’s the full interview for those who want to hear what else William Shen has to say:
Are Short Games More Preferred Now?
Shen further explains that shorter games tend to have more engaged communities since most of the players of said games can actually finish such games and initiate a discussion. Such a factor is important for accessibility and keeping most of the gaming community involved.
Hence, it might be no coincidence that Astro Bot won Game of the Year at The Game Awards 2024, considering it’s a relatively short and casual game.
As for William Shen, he’s also currently busy working on his own historical fantasy RPG called Wyrdsong. The former Starfield dev was widely in the Bethesda games community known for being the lead designer for Fallout 4: Far Harbor and of course, Starfield‘s quests.
