Bethesda doesn’t have ‘the engineering know-how’ to remaster Fallout New Vegas, former Obsidian CCO says
Chris Avellone claims Bethesda doesn’t have the source code and has “no idea how to reassemble it”
Bethesda may not be able to remaster Fallout: New Vegas because it lacks the “engineering knowhow” to do it without the source code, according to a former lead on the game.
Chris Avellone, who co-founded New Vegas developer Obsidian Entertainment and served as chief creative officer during its development, told YouTube channel TKs-Mantis that he didn’t think it would be possible for Bethesda to remaster the game from scratch.
“Just really simply, I don’t think Bethesda has the engineering know-how to make a remaster of New Vegas at all,” Avellone said.
Avellone added that he hadn’t played last year’s remaster of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion but said he had heard that “people enjoyed some of the visuals, but overall it seemed the reception was kind of negative”.
Oblivion Remastered was co-developed by Bethesda and Virtuos, and used the Gamebryo engine from the original game as its core, while using Unreal Engine 5 to enhance the visuals.
TKs-Mantis suggested that it’s currently rumoured a Fallout 3 remaster would potentially use the same method, and that people want the same to be done with Fallout: New Vegas.
“Well,” Avellone replied, “I mean, just pragmatically, it would make more sense to try out that process with Fallout 3 before going to New Vegas, just to see what all the problems and issues are as a result.”
“And you think, other than that, fundamentally it would be an impossibility for them?” TKs-Mantis asked.
“Yeah, for one reason,” Avellone replied, claiming that Obsidian studio head Feargus Urquhart chose not to give Bethesda the original game’s source code after development had ended.
“The very last milestone for New Vegas was ‘please deliver all the source code and the ability to make the build and we’ll pay you, like, $10,000 for that milestone’. Now, what that milestone really meant was if all those assets are given to Bethesda, that means they can recreate the game at any time.
“So, for reasons unknown to me, but I have suspicions, Feargus decided not to cash out that milestone and did not deliver it.”
He added: “It’s not a strange decision if you feel – which would not be out of the realms of possibility – that he felt that the New Vegas experience cheated him out of X amount of money, in which case cutting off the revenue stream from that product for a time would be a possibility. I could certainly see that, and I’m not saying that’s the case.”
“So Bethesda doesn’t have the source code for New Vegas?” TKs-Mantis asked, seeking clarification.
“They may have aspects of the code, but everyone that I talked to after that period of time said they had no idea how to reassemble it”, Avellone replied.
Before its release, the remaster of Oblivion was originally accidentally revealed in court documents, which also made reference to a Fallout 3 remaster. Since then, speculation that a Fallout 3 remaster is in the works has continued, but no official announcement has been made.
