Eww... Witcher 3.
Personally I hope for something more akin to Skyrim, but still with better storytelling and developement and world exploration.
Can't beat making a custom character.
Okay yes, I agree about making your own character. That is very important to me too, and I am sure that will be the case with Avowed. But overall Witcher 3 was way better than Skyrim for me. Skyrim is the only RPG I have ever played that I did not finish and have not had any motivation to return to.
I enjoyed Skyrim a lot, did almost all there was to do, but from start to finish I found myself thinking "this thing here is bad game design". It's a great, fun game, but it's very flawed. Then I went on to play Dragon Age: Origins and often had the thought of "this is how it should have been done in Skyrim" (even if the subgenres are different).
So for Avowed, I hope they have what makes Bethesda games fun - interesting, vast open world with lots of freedom and tons of lore behind it - as well as Obsidian's approach to quest design and CDPR's overall quality. Add to that captivating main plot and great atmosphere and voila, a great game is born. Let's hope.
I'm curious how they're going to approach character customization - Bethesda-style MC is a total blank protagonist, but maybe they'll do something more interesting while still giving the player lots of freedom.
I hope for the opposite. Witcher 3 is a great RPG in terms of world building, writting and quest design, but it has a huge flaw that apparently goes unnoticed becase of the spectacle, which is gameplay and customization. Playing Geralt always feels the same, he always has the same moves and fighting style, the combat sucks when it tries to copy Dark Souls but putting you against 10 enemies, no iframes and 1 hit deaths if hit from behind. Also no weapon choice, always the same signs etc.
Bethesda RPGs nail immersion and gameplay, which to me are the most important. Sneaking and shooting an arrow onto an enemy's face feel so good, so does decapitating, shield bashing, crafting OP gear. They just need more polish, which I'm sure Avowed will have, given that it is the only thing that Outer Worlds has.
Oh, and the magick system in Skyrim sucks. More spells and scalling spell damage please.
I wouldn't say set protagonist is a flaw in The Witcher - it's a different approach that also works, though of course one can prefer one or the other. For Bethesda-style RPG of course customization is very important. Gameplay in The Wicher is hardly stellar, though it didn't bother me too much. But I'd strongly disagree that combat gameplay and crafting are good in TES; the only thing that is better than in TW3 would be the variety. Combat itself I'd say is even worse than TW3, with the exception of sneaking, which is a lot of fun (if ridiculous).
Regarding magic - bring back Morrowind's system. It was great, if somewhat janky. Even Oblivion's was better than Skyrim's. One thing I liked in Skyrim magic was the Detect ___ spells, those were done very well imo.
Bethesda games sucks hard at storytelling and characters. Everything else is great though
The newer ones are bad with storytelling - but Morrowind actually had a great main storyline. Oblivion had meh-at-best main quest and good-to-great faction storylines. Skyrim... yeah, not great, with some exceptions. I'd also say there's quite a lot of problems in general with Bethesda games, even if I do enjoy them. :P
I hope they step it up for TES 6.
I was pessimistic about this until Microsoft acquired Zenimax. Acquisitions suck most of the time, but in this particular case it might be for the better. I have a lot of problems with Microsoft, but their gaming department seems quite reasonable under Phil Spencer. (And better MS than EA, that's for sure.)
Interestingly, Microsoft is now holding all "Bethesda-style RPG" cards, having both Obsidian and Bethesda as subsidiaries. (There's indie Isles of Adalar in the making, but it's hardly competition, as much as I wish them success. And I guess Piranha Bytes, but it's quite low-profile for now.)
