Former Bethesda marketing and comms boss Pete Hines has said that subscription services are having a negative impact on game developers. 

Speaking to DBLTAP, the industry vet said that the current ecosystem isn't doing enough to value and reward creators for their work. Hines does admit that his views are perhaps out of date as it's been some time since he worked at Bethesda. 

“Subscriptions have become the new four letter word, right? You can't buy a product anymore,” Hines said. 

“When you talk about a subscription that relies on content, if you don't figure out how to balance the needs of the service and the people running the service with the people who are providing the content – without which your subscription is worth jack s*** – then you have a real problem.”

He added: “You need to properly acknowledge, compensate and recognise what it takes to create that content and not just make a game, but make a product. That tension is hurting a lot of people, including the content creators themselves, because they're fitting into an ecosystem that is not properly valuing and rewarding what they're making.”

Hines left Bethesda in 2023 after 24 years at the company.