Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

People News Leonard Boyarsky at SINFO 24 - A Life in Video Games

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,232
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Tags: Arcanum: of Steamworks and Magick Obscura; Black Isle Studios; Blizzard Entertainment; Diablo III; Diablo III: Reaper of Souls; Fallout; Fallout 2; Interplay; InXile Entertainment; Leonard Boyarsky; Obsidian Entertainment; Stonekeep; Temple of Elemental Evil; Troika Games; Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines; Wasteland 2

The esteemed Leonard Boyarsky, who joined Obsidian last April and is now apparently their Creative Director, gave a talk today at the Portuguese tech conference SINFO. With a title like "A Life in Video Games", it's tempting to view the talk as Leonard's formal reintroduction to the gaming world following his decade-long exile at Blizzard. For over an hour, he recapped his entire career - his humble origins as a background illustrator and his start at Interplay with Stonekeep, the creation of Fallout and his early contribution to Fallout 2 before leaving the company, the developments of Arcanum and Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines at Troika, his short involvement with one of inXile's pre-Kickstarter attempts at making a Wasteland 2, and finally his work on Diablo III and its Reaper of Souls expansion.



The talk is a treasure trove of anecdotes, with a particular focus on art and design, and it should be a real treat for oldschool Codexers. Watch for the reference to a certain Codex newspost! What the talk doesn't contain, however, is any details about the game that Leonard and Tim Cain are currently working on at Obsidian, which we now know is codenamed Project Indiana. But maybe it means that an announcement isn't far off.
 

SCO

Arcane
In My Safe Space
Joined
Feb 3, 2009
Messages
16,320
Shadorwun: Hong Kong
Man, this is awkward.


Lol. 'If we're running on NT microsoft wants us to fail'.
 
Last edited:

Goral

Arcane
Patron
The Real Fanboy
Joined
May 4, 2008
Messages
3,552
Location
Poland
He forgot to mention he's of prestigious Polish descent though.

Edit:
Saying that not including DRM is stupid... :decline:
 
Last edited:

KILLER BEAR

Educated
Joined
Sep 2, 2016
Messages
133
So it's confirmed that he works as Creative Director for the new Obsidian game. See 41:47.
 

Goral

Arcane
Patron
The Real Fanboy
Joined
May 4, 2008
Messages
3,552
Location
Poland
Leonard Boyarsky saying that Codex article is the highpoint of his career (around 1 h 25 min. 30 s):

0L44Jvt.jpg


In general a really, really great presentation with lots of interesting stuff I didn't know about. And anyone who's saying that Arcanum is shitty should watch this video, things they've done then were ahead of their time and I don't know any other game which even came close in replicating some great ideas they had. Also, TimCain and Jason Anderson are genius (Leonard too but he's a modest guy).
 

HoboForEternity

sunset tequila
Patron
Joined
Mar 27, 2016
Messages
9,175
Location
Disco Elysium
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Watched till he talked about diablo. It just makes me respect him and the team more.

Also makes me appreciate arcanum alot more. I realized that the singke play trough i have played is just scratched the surface of what i can experience in the game
 

Flou

Arbiter
Joined
Mar 23, 2016
Messages
869
Location
Hellsinki
He forgot to mention he's of prestigious Polish descent though.

Edit:
Saying that not including DRM is stupid... :decline:

Interplay did end up losing shitloads of money due to that decision. So many kids in my high school played Fallout, yet hardly anyone actually bought it. Though I don't know if any DRM would have made a real difference.
 

Jazz_

Arcane
Joined
Jun 13, 2016
Messages
1,069
Location
Sea of Ubiquity
I think that Bloodlines was finished before HL2 but Activision could not release it because of some stipulation with Valve that didn't allow them to release it before HL2. It was incredibly moronic of Activision to release it the same fucking day of HL2 tho.
 

Goral

Arcane
Patron
The Real Fanboy
Joined
May 4, 2008
Messages
3,552
Location
Poland
One of the reasons Troika games are so great was the good atmosphere within the firm and the way they treated their employees. Leonard has mentioned about it in the presentation (1:29:53) but we also have it confirmed by the other side in an article which made me lurk the Codex (in 2006): http://www.rpgcodex.net/content.php?id=130

Michael Sean McCarthy (one of Troika designers) said:
Tim, Leonard, and Jason really saw a lot of problems occur at Interplay regarding salary, royalties, and general team understanding of how and why decisions were made. They wanted to make sure nothing was in the dark at Troika Games. I don't think many people know this, but on Arcanum, everyone at the company made the same salary and had the same percentage of royalties. Anyone at the company could look through the books at any time and see exactly how much we cost to run. Even on the production side, anyone could question any decision made. There were pro's and con's to this, but in general I still hold a lot of that original Troika sentiment. If you hire a small group of intelligent, experienced people, you can keep everything in the open. It builds a level of trust and feeling of truly belonging to a family. You really feel like you are working together to create something.

Wesp5
You were mentioned (although not by name).

Watched till he talked about diablo.
Watch the Diablo part too, it's interesting and pretty short.
Later there are questions from the audience which are also interesting.

Interplay did end up losing shitloads of money due to that decision. So many kids in my high school played Fallout, yet hardly anyone actually bought it. Though I don't know if any DRM would have made a real difference.
I doubt that but then again I'm from Poland and in here piracy was probably much more common than in USA and there weren't many who could afford paying 50$ or more for a game when the average wage was something around 250 USD in 1997 (and median much lower).
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,232
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
I think that Bloodlines was finished before HL2 but Activision could not release it because of some stipulation with Valve that didn't allow them to release it before HL2. It was incredibly moronic of Activision to release it the same fucking day of HL2 tho.

lol, did Bloodlines feel like a finished game to you?
 

Jazz_

Arcane
Joined
Jun 13, 2016
Messages
1,069
Location
Sea of Ubiquity
lol, did Bloodlines feel like a finished game to you?

then I have it backwards, they forced them to rush it so that they could launch it as soon as legally possible (meaning: the same day of HL2), I remember reading about that stipulation with Valve somewhere tho.
 

Goral

Arcane
Patron
The Real Fanboy
Joined
May 4, 2008
Messages
3,552
Location
Poland
There's one thing I don't get, why can't they talk about their new, author project? Wouldn't it be more beneficial to start the hype already? Unless there's almost nothing done yet.

Odd that no one in the audience had played Fallout 1 tbh
They've played, at least one of the people who asked a question said that it's his favourite game and I doubt they would be in that room only because of Diablo.
 

Jazz_

Arcane
Joined
Jun 13, 2016
Messages
1,069
Location
Sea of Ubiquity
Yeah I did remember well, the game was ''finished'' (read: frozen by idiotic Activision) months before HL2 shipped, unbelievably moronic how the project was mishandled by Activision.

TciivlN.jpg


Bl0i0lm.jpg


9vzGF4o.jpg
 

Bester

⚰️☠️⚱️
Patron
Vatnik
Joined
Sep 28, 2014
Messages
11,003
Location
USSR
Really great video. Followed by cringe worthy questions from the audience as always.
 

KILLER BEAR

Educated
Joined
Sep 2, 2016
Messages
133
There's one thing I don't get, why can't they talk about their new, author project? Wouldn't it be more beneficial to start the hype already? Unless there's almost nothing done yet.

They don't want to split the attention from Deadfire.
 

Goral

Arcane
Patron
The Real Fanboy
Joined
May 4, 2008
Messages
3,552
Location
Poland
Yeah, plus they might want to go with KS themselves and want to save all the information for the campaign. It's their author original idea and I doubt they would allow some publisher to have the rights again and end up with Arcanum/Fallout situation.
 

Goral

Arcane
Patron
The Real Fanboy
Joined
May 4, 2008
Messages
3,552
Location
Poland
Maxie
Noticed that later too but "Boyarsky" (or "Bojarski") is a Polish surname not Ukrainian (and a lot of today Ukraine territory belonged to Poland, including Lviv for example).
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom