5/8/2023 0 Comments Ultima iii exodus picsHoward remembers the 1983 game Ultima III: Exodus as a turning point: It was a role-playing adventure that introduced the type of strategic decision making that’s now the core of games such as Fallout. The games you could play on it-Pac-Man, Space Invaders-didn’t allow players many choices you advanced through a series of levels until you reached the end or ran out of turns. Howard fell for gaming back in 1977 when the Atari 2600 came out. It’s a living landscape that reacts to your every move. Characters you meet down the road may thank you with gifts or avoid you. Fallout 3 responds to your choices between the righteous path and the selfish one. Howard wants players to make tough decisions. The game presents you with a choice: Will you come to the wanderers’ aid or stay back for your own safety? Or maybe you decide to enter the fray, dispatch bandits and innocents alike, and take the water for yourself. In the distance you see a group of wanderers cornered by bandits who want the clean water they carry. Picture yourself in a post-apocalyptic Chevy Chase, the streets lined with bombed-out houses. Says Howard: “It’s a good time to be making games.” Now, following the release of the latest edition, the studio’s hallways are buzzing with excitement and the sound of saws expanding the workspace. But the company shipped 4.7 million copies of the $60 game in its first week, making it one of the year’s top sellers. Its release eclipsed both the biggest movie launch ever, 2008’s The Dark Knight, which had a $158-million opening weekend, and the final Harry Potter book’s launch, which brought in around $200 million.įallout 3’s debut in 2008 wasn’t quite as big. In 2009, the game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 made history when it took in $310 million in its first 24 hours. Gaming brought in $22 billion in 2008, almost as much as the film industry’s worldwide box-office take of $28 billion. Game Developer magazine ranks Bethesda Softworks seventh on its list of the world’s top game publishers, ahead of Microsoft and Disney Interactive. When he arrived 15 years ago, it was a mom-and-pop studio, but today it’s a major player. Howard is the highest-ranking person at Bethesda Softworks who works on games.
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