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RPG Codex Interview: Chris Avellone on Pillars Cut Content, Game Development Hierarchies and More

Morgan Ramsay

Educated
Joined
May 10, 2012
Messages
4
Location
San Diego, CA
PS I recall Scott mentioning that he replaced Feargus as a playtester at Interplay on Castles 2, so Feargus wasn't always a business guy. At some point he got paid to test games. Just think about that and realize that you should never attribute to malice what can satisfactorily be explained away by...anything that could give you more peace of mind. Peter Principle is a bitch.
All the owners, except Avellone, started their careers in QA.
  • Urquhart went into production and then studio management.
  • Parker went into production.
  • Monahan went into programming and then production.
  • Jones went into programming.
All these transitions happened ~20 years ago. We all start somewhere.
 
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santino27

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Oct 1, 2008
Messages
2,678
My team has the sexiest and deadliest waifus you can recruit.
I "bought it"? Dumb ass, I didn't just spin up an account last week. I've been active here for years. I know exactly what the Codex is. Yes, there are some people using the Codex as an excuse to not talk about Avellone's accusations. But all you have to do is read this thread to understand that it's entirely accurate to say that the forum in which his accusations are being documented is a genuine problem in the real world.

I'd dearly love to see an actual journalist (and there are one or two serious game journalists) interview Chris and press Feargus for his side of the story. Sadly, we'll likely never see that because the venue has poisoned the message.

Gaming journalism has a symbiotic relationship with publishers and developers (notice how Avellone said Obsidian coffers are empty come review time), they won't bite the hand that feeds them over a disgruntled ex-employee (or co-owner in this case) testimony. That it originated on the Codex is largely irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, it just a handy excuse for people to dismiss it but they would have done so anyway.

Hey guys, so we've been following this on TechRaptor and talked with Chris as the above link showed. We've tried to get to Obsidian - in fact before we posted the first story but they have not responded to us. We have been working at getting what we can but there's nothing from Obsidian that we can share at this time, though some of that may be because we're smaller there.

Regarding the empty coffers come review time comment I think you're reading a bit too much there. Review time is also just before a game is releasing meaning that you've been pressing, you're possibly bringing in people to do QA fix especially given Obsidian has tried to focus on that more or have to send it to external, depending on contract may need to deal with consoles and the fees there as well as advertising depending on how that is split in spend - and no that generally isn't sending to publishers. You may see some direct buys but even there a lot is through networks and detecting interest of people or through parent companies that do business and own several sites. Essentially you're coming up on the end, or a major transformation point on a contract and during this period your expenses are higher (you also may be having to travel more, for example, to do pitches or line up your next job).

I'm a bit confused by this... 'review' time in America is generally the annual performance review wherein employees are hoping for some sort of a raise, promotion, or guidance, and I assumed that's what Chris Avellone was referring to. That's not tied to game development schedules and is very different than 'pre-launch game review and regression' which is what you appear to be describing.

I don't work in the gaming industry though, so maybe they do things differently, and that's what MCA meant. Would love a clarification from him, if so!

Edit: Also, if people would just ignore the off-topic posts, they'd likely go away. Most of this shit is done for attention, after all.
 

felipepepe

Codex's Heretic
Patron
Joined
Feb 2, 2007
Messages
17,274
Location
Terra da Garoa
Finding people willing to volunteer for an RPG community site is always difficult
It sure seemed a lot easier 3-4 years ago, when we had so many volunteers that there was fights over the order in which to publish reviews, articles and the likes... we used to have more quality content in a month than we had this entire year.

Gotta ask yourself what happened since.
 

agentorange

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Aug 14, 2012
Messages
5,256
Location
rpghq (cant read codex pms cuz of fag 2fa)
Codex 2012
Finding people willing to volunteer for an RPG community site is always difficult
It sure seemed a lot easier 3-4 years ago, when we had so many volunteers that there was fights over the order in which to publish reviews, articles and the likes... we used to have more quality content in a month than we had this entire year.

Gotta ask yourself what happened since.
Crooked bee left and Infinitron became editor-in-chief
 

mondblut

Arcane
Joined
Aug 10, 2005
Messages
22,205
Location
Ingrija
Given a world where we have relatively cheap and easy access to: Twine, GameMaker Studio, RPG Maker, AGS, NWN Modules, etc. What would be the most responsible and effective way to generate a body of narrative design work in order to be hired by Obsidian work as a narrative designer, and someday be able to freelance in (or not in) our underwear (and eventually spearhead a spiritual successor to Covert Ops: Nuclear Dawn on Indiegogo)?
Pink hair and tumblr career.

You forgot "gender" "change", it's a key to success.
 
Joined
Jan 18, 2018
Messages
1,301
Grab the Codex by the pussy
You also failed to mention Avellone's own posts. Like calling IHaveHugeNick a "fucking shill", but yet you neglect to mention Avellone himself?
Please, the guy is ignoring or distoring all criticisms since page 1. Non-stop. We are in page 173 for fucks sake. He keeps repeating the same fucking bullshit, with insults on top of it. He is insulting Avellone all the time. He deserves all the heat and then some. People in this forum having being tagged and banned for less.
 
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JBro

Arbiter
Joined
Dec 12, 2016
Messages
701
Finding people willing to volunteer for an RPG community site is always difficult
It sure seemed a lot easier 3-4 years ago, when we had so many volunteers that there was fights over the order in which to publish reviews, articles and the likes... we used to have more quality content in a month than we had this entire year.

Gotta ask yourself what happened since.

All these authoritarian SJWs in positions of power made people realize how embarrassing it is to volunteer for some dumb website.
 

Maculo

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Jul 30, 2013
Messages
2,533
Strap Yourselves In Pathfinder: Wrath
Finding people willing to volunteer for an RPG community site is always difficult
It sure seemed a lot easier 3-4 years ago, when we had so many volunteers that there was fights over the order in which to publish reviews, articles and the likes... we used to have more quality content in a month than we had this entire year.

Gotta ask yourself what happened since.
Are you stating that DU only started this policy 3-4 years ago?

You also failed to mention Avellone's own posts. Like calling IHaveHugeNick a "fucking shill", but yet you neglect to mention Avellone himself?
Please, the guy is ignoring or distoring all criticisms since page 1. Non-stop. We are in page 173 for fucks sake. He keeps repeating the same fucking bullshit, with insults on top of it. He is insulting Avellone all the time. He deserves all the heat and more. People in this forum having being tagged and banned for less.

I am not defending nick, but rather the point is that if we are going to chase after "legitimate" discussion and news, then we have acknowledge that we are dealing with an unfiltered Avellone. I do not think that is a bad thing, but it is a joke to be angry over how "legitimate" the thread discussions are, when Avellone is calling a poster a fucking shill.
 
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fantadomat

Arcane
Edgy Vatnik Wumao
Joined
Jun 2, 2017
Messages
37,083
Location
Bulgaria
Given a world where we have relatively cheap and easy access to: Twine, GameMaker Studio, RPG Maker, AGS, NWN Modules, etc. What would be the most responsible and effective way to generate a body of narrative design work in order to be hired by Obsidian work as a narrative designer, and someday be able to freelance in (or not in) our underwear (and eventually spearhead a spiritual successor to Covert Ops: Nuclear Dawn on Indiegogo)?
Pink hair and tumblr career.

You forgot "gender" "change", it's a key to success.
Nah mate,that way you are blowing all your cards in the first turn. You have to think in perspective,promotions don't come magically ;). Just look at battletech and HBS.
 

SerratedBiz

Arcane
Joined
Mar 4, 2009
Messages
4,143
Finding people willing to volunteer for an RPG community site is always difficult
It sure seemed a lot easier 3-4 years ago, when we had so many volunteers that there was fights over the order in which to publish reviews, articles and the likes... we used to have more quality content in a month than we had this entire year.

Gotta ask yourself what happened since.

Can you please stop fucking derailing the Avellone thread with your inane fucking posts about derailing? No one gives a shit.

There. We've come full circle.
 

a cut of domestic sheep prime

Guest
It sure seemed a lot easier 3-4 years ago, when we had so many volunteers that there was fights over the order in which to publish reviews, articles and the likes... we used to have more quality content in a month than we had this entire year.

Gotta ask yourself what happened since.
Life, jobs, the endless stream of kickstarter shilling and predictable disappointments that followed?

Also, I am always volunteering to be moderator. Sadly, you didn't listen. You never listen.

7qTnhGm.png
 

Coboney

Scholar
Joined
Oct 27, 2010
Messages
143
Dead State Torment: Tides of Numenera
I "bought it"? Dumb ass, I didn't just spin up an account last week. I've been active here for years. I know exactly what the Codex is. Yes, there are some people using the Codex as an excuse to not talk about Avellone's accusations. But all you have to do is read this thread to understand that it's entirely accurate to say that the forum in which his accusations are being documented is a genuine problem in the real world.

I'd dearly love to see an actual journalist (and there are one or two serious game journalists) interview Chris and press Feargus for his side of the story. Sadly, we'll likely never see that because the venue has poisoned the message.

Gaming journalism has a symbiotic relationship with publishers and developers (notice how Avellone said Obsidian coffers are empty come review time), they won't bite the hand that feeds them over a disgruntled ex-employee (or co-owner in this case) testimony. That it originated on the Codex is largely irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, it just a handy excuse for people to dismiss it but they would have done so anyway.

Hey guys, so we've been following this on TechRaptor and talked with Chris as the above link showed. We've tried to get to Obsidian - in fact before we posted the first story but they have not responded to us. We have been working at getting what we can but there's nothing from Obsidian that we can share at this time, though some of that may be because we're smaller there.

Regarding the empty coffers come review time comment I think you're reading a bit too much there. Review time is also just before a game is releasing meaning that you've been pressing, you're possibly bringing in people to do QA fix especially given Obsidian has tried to focus on that more or have to send it to external, depending on contract may need to deal with consoles and the fees there as well as advertising depending on how that is split in spend - and no that generally isn't sending to publishers. You may see some direct buys but even there a lot is through networks and detecting interest of people or through parent companies that do business and own several sites. Essentially you're coming up on the end, or a major transformation point on a contract and during this period your expenses are higher (you also may be having to travel more, for example, to do pitches or line up your next job).

I'm a bit confused by this... 'review' time in America is generally the annual performance review wherein employees are hoping for some sort of a raise, promotion, or guidance, and I assumed that's what Chris Avellone was referring to. That's not tied to game development schedules and is very different than 'pre-launch game review and regression' which is what you appear to be describing.

I don't work in the gaming industry though, so maybe they do things differently, and that's what MCA meant. Would love a clarification from him, if so!

Edit: Also, if people would just ignore the off-topic posts, they'd likely go away. Most of this shit is done for attention, after all.

Probably me messing it up - I was thinking there he was saying they don't do reviews really much for employees. And my side is a bit different as I think of reviews and I think from my perspective trying to do things there that way often. Safe to guess I probably messed up there which, sadly does happen.

As for stuff like the off-topic conversations I've just learned to apply a codex filter on a lot of stuff here - its a survival trait in the past and especially the last week with this thread :)
 

Cael

Arcane
Joined
Nov 1, 2017
Messages
20,287
Come now. You act as if one of your mods don't do the same. He has been called out on it by multiple posters, including, if it means anything at all, someone who has been here for a very long time.
I'm well aware of the inadequacies of various members of staff. :smug:
Good, but there is an inherent... well, not really hypocrisy, at least perhaps not a conscious version of it here. Let's call it a divergence from what you say you are aware of, the outcome you wish to achieve and what you are allowing to happen.

Everyone has their bias. And a point at which there are things they won't tolerate. Even me. Finding people willing to volunteer for an RPG community site is always difficult and you take the good with the bad. Nobody is perfect. You can alleviate some of that with guidelines and clear rules, but then others will take that too far. Rex used to have the same criticism levelled against him, as did VD, as did Saint_Proverbius, along with all those inbetween. Ideally we'd have a couple of mods / news posters so that it's not all one person's view, but the history of the Codex shows it's always been one main person modding / posting news until they get exhausted and we move on to the next one out to burn them out too eventually.
Granted that it is difficult because it is a completely thankless job (been there, done that, and it wearisome to have to be impartial all the time). However, a modicum of professionalism should be expected of mods. Yes, it is difficult to hold your tongue because your position of authority means you have to watch what you say regardless of whether you are allowed to say it or not, and it is hard to be impartial when the natural human tendency (known and exploited by sjws, natch!) is to attack those that disagree with him, but to allow it to be so blatant as to be called on it by multiple people is another matter.

I generally try not to judge the quality of the debate. To me, a forum topic is like any natural conversation. You might start talking about Trump winning the Nobel Peace Prize but by the end of it, you're discussing Penguins in Madagascar and wondering how you got there, with many half-made and dropped conversation points along the way. You can't control that. At what point do you decide that a derailing around communism is unacceptable but you're own which has lead to a discussion about forum moderation is ok?
And this is where the divergence I mention above manifests. You want it to be a natural conversation and want it to flow and yet, your mod moves entire conversations to an area of the Codex where most of the people having that conversation has no access to. He is de facto censoring the conversation and giving his flunkies an advantage in that they can now say whatever they want and "win" the conversation without most of they naysayers having a say. To top it off, you have to know that he deliberately gives troll titles to those conversations as an added insult when he moves them to the restricted area if you are aware of his inadequacies. Bullying and harassment by a mod is no small thing because of that position of authority.

While perhaps not as serious as abuse of position in a real company and favouritism resulting in bullying and harassment that cannot be addressed because of said favouritism, let us not turn a blind eye to how bullying and harassment by a figure of authority in a forum would naturally lead to the very kind of self-censorship and lack of free speech that you are trying to avoid.
 

mondblut

Arcane
Joined
Aug 10, 2005
Messages
22,205
Location
Ingrija
You realize how hypocritical that sounds when just a few hours ago you forbid Kit Walker from using the same avatar as MCA since it was confusing readers, right?

You realize he did it for lulz?

This has nothing to do with politics, no one is asking you to ban the attention-whores spamming low-effort shitposts - you just don't have to keep them in this thread. Otherwise what's the point of having GD and its sub-forums?

Someone is panically desperate to keep all these literally hitlers where their pink-haired friends won't see them.

Too late, buddy. You have 16 thousands posts on a known gribblergrubbler forum. You'll have much explaining to do to your femquisitors.
 

agentorange

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Aug 14, 2012
Messages
5,256
Location
rpghq (cant read codex pms cuz of fag 2fa)
Codex 2012
Usually "going off topic" is what is known as a carrying on a natural and organic conversation. Imagine you and some friends are having a discussion about a certain topic, one friend mentions a certain subject that may not be central to the overall topic but is an organic off-shoot, everyone finds it interesting so the course of discussion naturally shifts--then some asshole walks out of nowhere and starts yelling in your faces that you aren't allowed to change the topic, and proceeds to drag away the one friend who made the "off topic" remark.
 

Bester

⚰️☠️⚱️
Patron
Vatnik
Joined
Sep 28, 2014
Messages
11,000
Location
USSR
Oh yeah, and the posts about communism here are totally legit and lead to some amazing debate, is not just attention whores trolling on the Codex's most popular thread in years...
They're not trolls, nor attention whores. At the risk of sounding melodramatic, they're people who get hurt easily.

I used to shitpost about communism a lot. And it was horrifying to see the threads where I did it turn to shit, but there was nothing I could do about it. It always started innocently enough, "I'll just make one post and that's it", but that's never it. I got banned on the obshitian forum twice for it. It's very disturbing to see misrepresentations, blatant lies, propaganda about your beloved ideology. I can related to both sides of the communism shitposting here.

I only learned to "let go" after I turned 30. I'm thankful for this serenity that I acquired. These people will get it too, and the more they see the devastation they cause by letting themselves be provoked, the sooner they'll grow. It's a learning experience for them at least, even if we have to suffer through it.
 

DarkUnderlord

Professional Throne Sitter
Staff Member
Joined
Jun 18, 2002
Messages
28,343
Finding people willing to volunteer for an RPG community site is always difficult
It sure seemed a lot easier 3-4 years ago, when we had so many volunteers that there was fights over the order in which to publish reviews, articles and the likes... we used to have more quality content in a month than we had this entire year.

Gotta ask yourself what happened since.
That's easy, Crooked Bee left.
 
Joined
Jan 18, 2018
Messages
1,301
Grab the Codex by the pussy
Usually "going off topic" is what is known as a carrying on a natural and organic conversation.
I will save this quote for future reference. You guys just give me the perfect excuse to shitpost and derail all I want. Let's call this the shitpost-derail card. Beautiful! Let's see how organic and natural this thread will feel by page 300, you fucking cretin. Avellone will probably already left by then seeing that no one can read this stuff amidst the garbage.
 

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