Vapourware Planescape: Purgatorio mod for NWN2

[Dorateen]

All that work wasted on NWN2

Better than wasted on DA:O, I suppose.

 

[Fairfax]

After this post, I tried to find more info on what happened to the mod. I found someone on reddit called "Lanessar", who claims to have worked on the mod and had something interesting to say about it:

Hi there. They made a release version 2, and then the team went dark.

Essentially what happened is that the people working on the mod for the most part were hired by the original Lead Dev (Monty Markland) over to Obsidian Entertainment to work on their next project. They continued on in the industry since.

Tides of Numenara was essentially the story and game they envisioned, realized into completed form and far more fleshed out than what the team could do as a small (ten or so people) group.

MLMarkland, any truth to that? Did TTON use some of Purgatorio's concepts/content?

 

[MLMarkland]

After this post, I tried to find more info on what happened to the mod. I found someone on reddit called "Lanessar", who had something interesting to say about it:

Hi there. They made a release version 2, and then the team went dark.

Essentially what happened is that the people working on the mod for the most part were hired by the original Lead Dev (Monty Markland) over to Obsidian Entertainment to work on their next project. They continued on in the industry since.

Tides of Numenara was essentially the story and game they envisioned, realized into completed form and far more fleshed out than what the team could do as a small (ten or so people) group.

MLMarkland, any truth to that? Did TTON use some of Purgatorio's concepts/content?

I would not draw so directly a parallel.

Purgatorio was scheduled to be an expansion pack for Neverwinter Nights 2 with Atari until Hasbro killed it in 2008 because "Planescape is a dead license" (direct quote).

Lawrence Liberty championed the NWN2: Planscape Purgatorio project as head of product development at Atari. He then moved to produce Aliens: Crucible at Obsidian Entertainment. He then formed Killspace Entertainment with me in 2009 (along with producing Fallout: New Vegas). He is currently the executive producer of Apocalypse Now video game adaptation (https://apocalypsenow.com/updates).

Lawrence and Kevin Saunders and Chris Avellone were the primary people who helped me secure at job at Obsidian Entertainment in 2007.

The 2013 success and plans of the Torment kickstarter is certainly not disconnected, as Kevin Saunders, Avellone and other Black Isle and Obsidian gents conceived of and launched it and I was hired within 30 - 45 days of successful funding.

I quit inXile in 2014 after shipping Wasteland 2 (and helping TTON shift from pre-production to production) in order to focus on three video game projects as an independent director (and directed a feature film in this time period).

I am comfortable saying that I did not like the creative direction of the TTON project, but that had a lot to do with the underlying intellectual property.

"Numenera" is nowhere near as deep and well thought out and specific as "Planescape." The lack of deep, specific and comprehensive world building and lore in Numenera is one of the 2-3 primary drivers behind TTON being less than what it should have been. Numenera is also obsessively politically correct which makes it terrible.

Planescape Purgatorio emphasized a faithfulness to the Planescape canon above all else. I played the Planescape setting in high school prior to PST's release, and so it had broad interest to me from both PnP and the video game.

I am happy the mod was released in some form years ago. I know that there are as many as 15-20 people who work in the video game business today as a result of their involvement with the Planescape mod. That is a very cool outcome.

Once Hasbro nixed Atari & our plans for a Planescape expansion pack, my continued work with Obsidian-Atari and then Killspace-Atari precluded me from helping finalize the original mod.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Jeez, and then they said Planescape is available for licensing during or after the TTON kickstarter, can't remember now.
Guess it's not dead if they could get SOME money out of it?

Numenera is also obsessively politically correct which makes it terrible.

Never forget:

Very important information to be delivered in a game book.
Next I would like to know about Gigax's eating habits.