Pete Hines has had quite a week. Bethesda Softworks’ vice president of PR and marketing may have a relatively prosaic job title, but the honest and affable 45-year old has become the human face of the Washington-based video games publisher behind The Elder Scrolls and Fallout. At E3 2015, Bethesda decided to host its own press conference for the first time, buoyed by a strong lineup that included Fallout 4, Doom and Dishonored 2.

Hines was the host, stitching together meaty developer presentations with pace and poise. The showcase was a success. Surely now, Bethesda can count itself as part of the top table?

When I meet Hines in an immaculate white room at the back of Bethesda’s booth, he is visibly exasperated at the idea that this was the publisher’s ‘breakout year’. “The fact that we did a showcase and we did it pretty well makes it a logical thing for people to bring that up.” he says. “Because that’s what the big companies do and in the past we haven’t done it and now people are saying ‘now you’re in that conversation.”

He sighs. And you can understand why. Bethesda has been developing and publishing video games since 1986, and was behind the creation of The Elder Scrolls, a series that has produced huge-sellers such as Morrowind, Oblivion and Skyrim. A subsidiary of Zenimax Media, the publisher has also acquired studios like id Software and Arkane Studios. Clearly it doesn’t feel like a ‘coming-of-age party’ to Hines?

Pete Hines on stage at E3 Credit: Reuters

“To me it doesn’t. We’ve always felt like we’ll find our own way and do our own thing.” he says. “If we’re going to do a showcase, we’re going to do it our way. No celebrities involved, no famous people coming up there.

We’re not going to use lots of buzzwords or jargon or put up our growth charts for you or whatever. We’re here to talk about games — so here’s one, here’s another, here’s another, here’s another and we’re done. Have a good night.”

The lean nature and substantial developer presentations of Doom and Fallout 4 were indeed a big reason that fans reacted positively to Bethesda’s showcase. But if not a celebration of Bethesda’s apparent ascendancy, why do the showcase this year?

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“It felt like more than we could accomplish in a booth, “ says Hines. “More importantly, no matter what we do in our booth, we only get a subset of people that attend E3. I’m not sure what the attendance is this year but let’s say 40,000. There’s no way we’re getting 40,000 people to our booth to see everything. You’re lucky to get four.

"So part of it was if we do have this line up and feel good about it we need to do it in a way that everybody can see it whether they’re here or not. Anybody who wants to can see what we have to show about Fallout 4. There’s no mystery, we’re not trying to hide anything or exclude people. Whether it’s press or retail or fans or whomever.”

The biggest trade-show in the industry, E3 in Los Angeles tends to be the arena in which many publishers announce their plans for the next 18 months. Nowadays there tends to be fewer big surprises —notwithstanding Sony’s extraordinary PlayStation conference — as publishers now announce their wares throughout the year.

Hey remember that time you said I must be happy Fallout 4 was announced 'cause people would "leave me alone now?" Remember? #ItsNotWorking — Pete Hines (@DCDeacon) June 23, 2015

E3 has become more of a show-and-tell event, a parade of video game demos, essentially— and as such has become more consumer focussed. Many big publishers, including Bethesda, have aired developer interviews and behind the scenes E3 videos directly to its fans. A sign of our more connected times.

“It wasn’t that long ago streaming on Twitch or YouTube was a completely foreign concept,” says Hines. “When I was playing the original Sim City or Civilization, there was no internet. You didn’t go online or watch someone else for tips. You spoke to your buddies, got on the phone with them, ask how they get through this or that.

"It shifted from that to a super connected world where watching other people play games is a common form of entertainment now. I have two boys, 16 and 11, who both have their favourite YouTube and Twitch personalities.

My oldest watches League of Legends video religiously and my youngest watches Minecraft videos religiously and that’s how they view entertainment. And given that’s the world we’re in, it seems odd for a show to wall it off and say it’s still only for trade and business. To be at least somewhat inclusive.”

Only somewhat?

“Only somewhat. I hope E3 doesn’t become another PAX,” says Hines, speaking of the US-wide series of public game festivals. “We already have PAX, we already have Eurogamer, Paris Games Week and Gamescom and lots of shows that are for the public.

I think taking a show that still has a very important role as a trade/industry event needs to maintain that. And not suddenly say: here’s another 20,000 fans to throw in. It’s already kind of a mess. There are already lines and it’s difficult to get around.”

The contrast of Bethesda’s lavish press conference and pared-back booth space cement this kind of thinking. In years past Bethesda Games Studios (BGS) director Todd Howard would reel off several demos per day behind closed doors. Whether it was for the Elder Scrolls or Fallout, the two marquee series the studio develops. This year Fallout 4 was there for all to see, with just one demo at the showcase.

It’s been a long time coming for a new BGS-developed Fallout, with Fallout 3 released in 2008. The developer's last single player adventure was The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim, a hugely successful fantasy. That was released in 2011. It is unusual for a studio to be given that amount of time in a fast-moving industry.

“It’s rare to have franchises like the ones we have and to have people joking about “when is Skyrim 2 coming out?” says Hines. “The reason they say that is because generally speaking that’s what you’d be getting with another publisher in charge. They’d be spitting out a Skyrim 2 the year after or two years later. That’s just not how we view it. We’re not the sort of publisher that focusses on 'what’s our 25 titles for 2015'.

"We do smaller stuff, we don’t publish to scale, we try to publish to quality. Make sure everything we do is noteworthy. Our approach to that hasn’t differed. Here and there we might change our approach to how it’s presented but we’ve still stuck to who we are.”

And Bethesda are a publisher that certainly has a certain ‘type’ of game, focussing on adult themes and often oodles of blood. The presentation for Doom at Bethesda’s press conference came under fire somewhat for its relentless brutality. “We make mature games. We make games for grown-ups. Or at least 17 and up,” say Hines. “That is our target audience for sure.

"If you look at what we have… even BattleCry, online free-to-play but visceral, bloody, decapitations, dismemberment. We know who our audience is and we haven’t wavered from that. We make games for an older audience because that’s what our devs know. They make the games they want to play.”

Bethesda’s cosmopolitan suite of developers has grown in recent years. In addition to the in-house Bethesda Games Studios, the publisher has acquired id Software (behind Doom and the idTech engine); Arkane Lyon (Dishonored); MachineGames, a Swedish studio working on Wolfenstein and founded by ex-Starbreeze staffers; Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami’s Tango Gameworks (The Evil Within); and BattleCry Studios.

Doom Credit: Bethseda

While each studio feels part of Bethesda’s ‘mature’ focus, they are apparently totally autonomous and manage to hit on a variety of styles. Fantasy, shooters, stealth, horror. Hines says its down to Bethesda to support each studio with marketing that stays ‘true to the game’.

“We’re not particularly known for survival horror, nor have we done a ton of games with Japanese developers,” says Hines, referring to The Evil Within. “But at the same time it does fit a fundamental philosophy we have which is find talented developers with a proven track record and have established themselves. And let them make what they’re passionate about.

In that way The Evil Within is no different than the other stuff we have. It’s exactly the same as Dishonored in that respect. Experienced guys who know what they’re doing. Just because we haven’t made power-fantasy assassin games before doesn’t mean that those guys can’t.”

Bethesda has now completed successful projects with each of its studios, and are starting to look at a second wave. It has, says Hines, built up a structure of trust between the publisher and its developers.

Dishonored 2 being unveiled Credit: Reuters

“It doesn’t matter how well you know somebody or how long you’ve known them, it isn’t until you’ve gone through crunch mode and addressing feedback and fought the battles over this versus that that you come out the other side of it understanding each other better,” says Hines. “It’s impossible to overstate how you can’t replicate that any other way.”

These relationships and the culmination of work started years ago has lead Bethesda to a point where they are comfortable presenting their wares on stage, under a spotlight. It might not be a coming-of-age party to Hines, but there is little doubt that Bethesda are continuing to grow, publishing more high-end games as well as branching into other markets such as mobile with Fallout Shelter and Elder Scrolls Legends. So where next? Can we expect Bethesda’s showcase to be a regular fixture of E3?

“I don’t know if we’ll do one next year,” says Hines. “I don’t know if we’ll do one again. This year felt like the right time to do this kind of thing. Honestly, that’s where my focus is: A. execute on this stuff that we’re talking about and B. work with the MachineGames and Tangos and all the other studios to say 'ok how do we do the next thing with you guys even better?' What does that look like? And how do we push ourselves forward?'”