Incline Chris Avellone Appreciation Station

[AArmanFV]

I wonder if MCA gets a massive ego boost from reading this thread or if it's more like disgust over all the speculation and obsessive details.

Ask him if he like to know there are people here who masturbate seeing his photo and posts about him. (?)

 

[Sannom]

Icewind Dale design team circa 2000 :

 

[Sacred82]

Roguey

 

[Infinitron]

That's a different version of this photo that's been floating around for a while: https://www.gamestm.co.uk/wp-conten...-avellone-john-deiley-reg-arnedo-1024x734.jpg

 

[Fairfax]

Speaking of old pics, I was looking for some pics for the interview and found this one:

Bonus:

Spoiler

 

[Infinitron]

Yeah we've seen that photo before. Chris managed to lose weight pretty quickly after finishing PS:T, he looks pretty trim in the IWD photo.

 

[LESS T_T]

http://swedengamearena.com/conference/

CHRIS AVELLONE
Freelance, working on three projects
Track: Design

Talk: “Cautionary Tales and (More) Design Lessons Learned

This presentation outlines a series of design lessons accumulated through mistake and error (and a little success), all with the intention of helping developers and designers avoid the same mistakes and, hopefully, improve the overall quality of one’s games. From early foundations in school to managing scope on company projects, this presentation runs through a series of topics that may help the workflow and quality of a game you’re working on now. And if there’s something you’re curious about, we’ll fight to leave time for questions as well!

Take Aways:

1. Managerial development advice (details on managing upwards and downwards in a dev team).
2. Discussion of good/bad practices for game scoping and how to manage it to improve the quality of the game.
3. What it’s like to apply design methodologies to a game that’s already designed (the System Shock 1 Reboot will be used as an example, along with other games in my career).

Short bio: Chris started his career at Interplay’s Black Isle Studios division and worked on Planescape: Torment, Fallout 2, the Icewind Dale series, Dark Alliance, Knights of the Old Republic II, Neverwinter Nights 2, Mask of the Betrayer, Alpha Protocol, Fallout: New Vegas, FNV DLC: Dead Money, Old World Blues, Lonesome Road, and South Park. His more recent work includes Wasteland 2, FTL: Advanced Edition, Pillars of Eternity, and Torment: Tides of Numenera. He is currently working on Prey with Arkane Studios, Divinity: Original Sin II by Larian Studios, and is part of the successful Kickstarter reboot of System Shock with Night Dive Studios.

TIME: 15.45-16.15
Place: Hall A

Speaker: Chris Avellone, Freelance (Design)

Talk: Cautionary Tales and (More) Design Lessons Learned

His talk is 3 hours later. No livestream or whatsoever. Also it coincide with reveal of Nintendo's new hardware.

 

[LESS T_T]

 

[Infinitron]

 

[Infinitron]

 

[LESS T_T]

MCA will do keynote at Shawnee State University game conference in November 4th: http://www.shawnee.edu/game-conference/

Recently, Chris worked as narrative designer on inXile's "Torment: Tides of Numenera" and Arkane Studios' "Prey." Currently, Chris is working with Larian Studios on "Divinity: Original Sin II", and the successful reboot of "System Shock" with Night Dive Studios.

Hm, this description sounds like his work on Prey is already done.

 

[Chateaubryan]

He was one of the partners, yes, but it sounds like he felt ostracized over time:

"Your perspectives narrow when you're continually in that same environment";
"As much as you might make assumptions about them, they certainly starts to make assumptions about you";
"You know, Chris could never make interface design, Chris could never explore systems, [deepens voice] what Chris does is...we want Chris to write, and if Chris starts talking, Chris should probably just write some more! [laughs] eventually you kind of just get tired of it, and I just wanted to do new things";

And in another interview, he said he sometimes felt like "working at the sausage factory while being a friend of the pigs".

Looking at Grieving Mother's wiki page today, it kinda crossed my mind that she was some kind of embodiment of how Chris (supposedly) felt at the time of PoE development : ignored by other NPCs/staff members, grieving over the stillborn babies/what-could-have-been projects.
There's no actual banter between GM and the other members of PoE's cast : even on a workflow standpoint, it's quite uncanny. Well, the most important thing is that the only character GM still talks to is the player's. Let that sink in for a while.
If there's any relevance to that kind of analysis, I'd wonder how much did he put of himself into Durance.

 

[Starwars]

Will this man ever make something worth caring about again or are we stuck with interviews and talks?

 

[Infinitron]

He was one of the partners, yes, but it sounds like he felt ostracized over time:

"Your perspectives narrow when you're continually in that same environment";
"As much as you might make assumptions about them, they certainly starts to make assumptions about you";
"You know, Chris could never make interface design, Chris could never explore systems, [deepens voice] what Chris does is...we want Chris to write, and if Chris starts talking, Chris should probably just write some more! [laughs] eventually you kind of just get tired of it, and I just wanted to do new things";

And in another interview, he said he sometimes felt like "working at the sausage factory while being a friend of the pigs".

Looking at Grieving Mother's wiki page today, it kinda crossed my mind that she was some kind of embodiment of how Chris (supposedly) felt at the time of PoE development : ignored by other NPCs/staff members, grieving over the stillborn babies/what-could-have-been projects.
There's no actual banter between GM and the other members of PoE's cast : even on a workflow standpoint, it's quite uncanny. Well, the most important thing is that the only character GM still talks to is the player's. Let that sink in for a while.
If there's any relevance to that kind of analysis, I'd wonder how much did he put of himself into Durance.

Hiravias sometimes briefly notices GM. I think he's the only companion who does - I wonder what exactly their logic for that was.

 

[Roguey]

Hiravias sometimes briefly notices GM. I think he's the only companion who does - I wonder what exactly their logic for that was.

She tells you herself that the Watcher is the only person who can see her as the Grieving Mother. Everyone else just sees a peasant woman, and she purposely clouds their minds so they aren't able to think about her too much. You get the Hiravias dialogue beacuse he's the only one who offers his opinions about other companions.

There's also this scene

 

[Infinitron]

Hiravias sometimes briefly notices GM. I think he's the only companion who does - I wonder what exactly their logic for that was.

She tells you herself that the Watcher is the only person who can see her as the Grieving Mother. Everyone else just sees a peasant woman, and she purposely clouds their minds so they aren't able to think about her too much. You get the Hiravias dialogue beacuse he's the only one who offers his opinions about other companions.

There's also this scene

I was actually talking strictly about companion banters: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=az0ldAuUKsQ&t=1288

In normal dialogues there are probably other times where she's noticed, yeah.

 

[Kev Inkline]

Will this man ever make something worth caring about again or are we stuck with interviews and talks?

The Codex effort in this thread.

 

[Sannom]

Hiravias sometimes briefly notices GM. I think he's the only companion who does - I wonder what exactly their logic for that was.

I always thought he saw her through the Wael's Eye on his eyepatch. Like she's supposed to be in his blindspot but he manages to somehow "see" her.

 

[Sizzle]

Hiravias sometimes briefly notices GM. I think he's the only companion who does - I wonder what exactly their logic for that was.

I always thought he saw her through the Wael's Eye on his eyepatch. Like she's supposed to be in his blindspot but he manages to somehow "see" her.

Interesting interpretation, but Eder also sees her. I think those are the only two that do see her (though I haven't played much with a couple of characters such as Kana), but both he and Eder only seem to perceive her when you draw their attention to her.

 

[Infinitron]

In the case of that banter, you didn't draw his attention.

Maybe it's because of Wael, maybe has heightened Orlan senses(tm), maybe it's something to do with being a druid, maybe it's because he's more extroverted than the others, maybe it's because his libido makes him notice all women, maybe all of the above

 

[J_C]

Hiravias sometimes briefly notices GM. I think he's the only companion who does - I wonder what exactly their logic for that was.

She tells you herself that the Watcher is the only person who can see her as the Grieving Mother. Everyone else just sees a peasant woman, and she purposely clouds their minds so they aren't able to think about her too much. You get the Hiravias dialogue beacuse he's the only one who offers his opinions about other companions.

There's also this scene

How do you get all this screenshots? :D It's like you make a billion of them so you have one for every question.

 

[Sizzle]

In the case of that banter, you didn't draw his attention.

Maybe it's because of Wael, maybe has heightened Orlan senses(tm), maybe it's something to do with being a druid, maybe it's because he's more extroverted than the others, maybe it's because his libido makes him notice all women, maybe all of the above

In that banter (first time I saw it, btw, even though I often played with both of them in the party) I got the sense he bumped into her or something and was apologising.

 

[Fairfax]

He was one of the partners, yes, but it sounds like he felt ostracized over time:

"Your perspectives narrow when you're continually in that same environment";
"As much as you might make assumptions about them, they certainly starts to make assumptions about you";
"You know, Chris could never make interface design, Chris could never explore systems, [deepens voice] what Chris does is...we want Chris to write, and if Chris starts talking, Chris should probably just write some more! [laughs] eventually you kind of just get tired of it, and I just wanted to do new things";

And in another interview, he said he sometimes felt like "working at the sausage factory while being a friend of the pigs".

Looking at Grieving Mother's wiki page today, it kinda crossed my mind that she was some kind of embodiment of how Chris (supposedly) felt at the time of PoE development : ignored by other NPCs/staff members, grieving over the stillborn babies/what-could-have-been projects.
There's no actual banter between GM and the other members of PoE's cast : even on a workflow standpoint, it's quite uncanny. Well, the most important thing is that the only character GM still talks to is the player's. Let that sink in for a while.
If there's any relevance to that kind of analysis, I'd wonder how much did he put of himself into Durance.

Interesting theory. I'll ask him about it.

 

[Lacrymas]

Pretty interesting analysis actually, even if that isn't true for Chris himself it can be true in general and that's what art is.

 

[Neanderthal]

and that's what art is.