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Eschalon: Book III

Whiran

Magister
Joined
Feb 3, 2014
Messages
641
Isn't Eschalon's "established market" the same market that Spiderweb has?
Oh, I thought the two series (eschalon and avernum) were made by the same development team.

My bad. I probably should have paid attention.

As to Basilisk Games running out of money - they have only themselves to blame on that count. Selling games at a net of less than a dollar per copy is not a viable strategy if you don't sell millions of units. They kinda went off the deep-end when it came to selling their game via bundles. Sure, lots of units moved but very little revenue generated. That only works if you are wanting to create a loss leader or can pop out a new game every nine months to a year (depending on the volume that is being moved.)
 

Jack Dandy

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Divinity: Original Sin 2

Infinitron

I post news
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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
The way I see it, Vogel has a loyal following (like Bioware but on a smaller scale). Offering a game that looks similar (but has very different gameplay mechanics) won't get you in. Vogel does open world (Avernum) and factions (Geneforge) extremely well. That's why his audience keeps buying his games over and over again. Basilisk went into a different direction, which proven to be, um, less successful.

But another thing is that Jeff releases games annually, or close to it.

We'll see how things work out for him in the long term now that good shit is coming out.
 

StaticSpine

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Shadorwun: Hong Kong
I don't get it.

The devs put thir games into bundles voluntarily, but later they are bitching that the revenue is low. And they sound like they were forced to do that. WTF?
 

SuicideBunny

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Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Torment: Tides of Numenera
I don't get it.

The devs put thir games into bundles voluntarily, but later they are bitching that the revenue is low. And they sound like they were forced to do that. WTF?
if your game is selling badly, you might feel forced to put it into some bundles assuming (wrongly) that it will at least make some money or increase exposure.
 

Gord

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Well,it does make money, but considerably less than from normal sales. Question is if he would have made more without bundles. I doubt it, as the last game didn't leave a big impact anyway and there had been plenty of alternatives then. It might have been smarter to create some interest and an increased potential customer base in the months before release of part three by discounting the first two games then.
 

Infinitron

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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
http://basiliskgames.com/thank-you-for-a-great-2014

Thank you for a great 2014!
Dearest Fan/Customer/Friend:

The staff at Basilisk Games want to thank you for a wonderful 2014. The final Eschalon game was launched last February and marked the end of a long road for us. Thank you for being part of it!

As for 2015 and beyond, all we can say right now is that a number of projects are brewing here in the studio. We’ll be working on a few smaller titles outside the Basilisk Games label while we continue to develop our next RPG franchise. There is also a growing number of requests from fans to see the Eschalon series rebuilt with a HD widescreen engine, additional content and extended storyline. Anything is possible; the future is bright with unlimited possibilities, much like it was when we started Book I development back in 2005!

Thanks again for your support. We will see all of you next year!

More from that thread: http://basiliskgames.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=9388#p58407

As we near Thanksgiving here in the U.S., I reflect on our fans both old and new, and appreciate all you guys have done for Basilisk Games. Prismatic can be upset all he wants, I still love the guy and deeply appreciate all the support he has given us over the years.

I wish Eschalon could have been all everyone expected. We did our best. Yes we- there are artists and additional programmers and alpha testers and beta testes, all of whom contributed to making this trilogy. In the end, the biggest problem was that the engine just couldn't support our goals. I take that blame.

Eschalon is not dead. It continues to sell, and new fans contact me on a regular basis. In time, we may yet see Eschalon reborn/remade into the series it was supposed to be. Or...all the lessons learned from making it will go into making the next RPG that much more incredible.

Thank you all for being part of this with me.

http://basiliskgames.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=9349&hilit=three+years&start=15#p57987

Rushed? No. Book 3 took nearly threeyears to make. If it were rushed you would have had it back in 2012.

What happened was I reached the limits of the engine, and some of my original design goals were cut because they couldn't be implemented. In the end, I had blown away our production budget by going a year over the schedule and I had to finish it a different way.

Did that change the overall story? Not really. Instead of fighting a single dragon at the end, you get to be part of a large battle with hundreds of combatants. Other than that, the storyline is essentially as I originally wrote it.

Should the end area have been longer? Yes, probably. But after scrapping months of work trying to get a large dragon sprite to work within our engine (including spending several thousand dollars for an artist to model & animate this dragon), Basilisk Games was simply out of money and we had to release it as is. A good map zone takes a month of work to make (longer if there is has a town and/or lots of NPC dialog) and so adding three map zones would have added 3-6 months on to the development schedule, which I just couldn't afford to do.
 
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Gord

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http://basiliskgames.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=9349&hilit=three years&start=15#p57987


Rushed? No. Book 3 took nearly threeyears to make. If it were rushed you would have had it back in 2012.

What happened was I reached the limits of the engine, and some of my original design goals were cut because they couldn't be implemented. In the end, I had blown away our production budget by going a year over the schedule and I had to finish it a different way.

Did that change the overall story? Not really. Instead of fighting a single dragon at the end, you get to be part of a large battle with hundreds of combatants. Other than that, the storyline is essentially as I originally wrote it.

Should the end area have been longer? Yes, probably. But after scrapping months of work trying to get a large dragon sprite to work within our engine (including spending several thousand dollars for an artist to model & animate this dragon), Basilisk Games was simply out of money and we had to release it as is. A good map zone takes a month of work to make (longer if there is has a town and/or lots of NPC dialog) and so adding three map zones would have added 3-6 months on to the development schedule, which I just couldn't afford to do.

So he does at least admit now that the ending was not what it was supposed to be originally.
He still needs to admit to himself though that he's working too inefficiently. Book 3 simply doesn't look like 3 years of work, considering he recycled most of the artwork and engine since Book 1.
Also it wouldn't have been necessary to add three more maps, imho. Book 3 had enough maps. He would have just needed to add some better and extended end-game content to them.
 
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Infinitron

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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
Interview at RPGWatch: http://www.rpgwatch.com/show/article?articleid=285

Couchpotato: Thank you for agreeing to answer a few questions for RPGWartch, so lets start by having you introduce yourself to the community?


Thomas Riegsecker: I am the founder / head honcho at Basilisk Games.



Couchpotato: Can you tell us a little bit about your studio Basilisk Games? For example, how was it founded, and what are your goals?

Thomas Riegsecker: Basilisk Games is an indie game studio founded in 2005 with an initial goal of producing an RPG trilogy, which we completed in February of 2014. We are best known for our Eschalon series, which is a stat-heavy, turn-based isometric RPG.

Right now we are working on a brand new RPG as well as another game that is not role-playing specific.



Couchpotato: If you could pick five RPG games that inspired you to make your own games, what would they be?

Thomas Riegsecker:
Certainly the Ultima series, Dungeon Master, the Might & Magic series, and pretty much all the Elder Scrolls games. That's more than five I suppose! Most specifically, I remember first sitting down with Ultima 2 on an Atari 800 computer, back in 1983, and feeling as if it was a life-changing experience.



Couchpotato: I was curious if you could describe what your daily job is like at Basilisk Games?

Thomas Riegsecker: My responsibilities have shifted over the years. Originally, 100% of my job was to develop our games from morning to night. As the games were released and the business grew, I have had to spend more time running operations and less time doing the fun, creative stuff. But fortunately I am moving back into a development role where I can focus more time on developing our next game.

The process of developing a game shifts day to day between coding, writing, doing graphic work, and testing. The best part is that I get to decide how I want to spend my day depending on what I feel like doing when I get to the studio.



Couchpotato: . One question I always love to ask developers is what's your opinion on the current state of the game industry?

Thomas Riegsecker: Man, this is a tough question because the industry is always changing. The real innovation is definitely coming from small indie studios right now, and has been for a number of years. That's not to say that there isn't anything good coming from the big guys, but the truly unique stuff is being made by small teams on shoestring budgets without corporate oversight.

I think emerging VR technology like Oculus Rift has the ability to revolutionize the game industry, and I am excited to be working with it.



Couchpotato: A follow-up to the last question what's your opinion on modern RPG games?

Thomas Riegsecker: Generally, I think most mainstream RPGs are just plain bad, although Bethesda still makes decent RPGs that maintain a somewhat classic feel. Many other modern games that call themselves RPGs are really not; those of us who grew up D&D, Wizardry or Might & Magic expect role-playing to be more than what is currently offered up by triple-A developers.

Indie RPGs are usually much better because they adhere to the standards of classic computer RPGs- Grimrock being a recent and great example.



Couchpotato: You have been in business for close to ten years as an Indie developer. Can you share what lessons you have learned over the years?

Work smart, not hard. I suffered from a great deal of stress and burnout over the years from not having healthy work habits. I'd work 7 days a week and long hours each day, and it's a horrible way to live. After Book III was released, I took a long vacation and had to relearn how to relax!

Couchpotato: With the rise of crowd-funding have you ever thought about doing a new kickstarter game?


Thomas Riegsecker: I've considered it, but my motto has always been "never take money from customers until you have something to sell". We've never done pre-orders either. If I took money from customers before I was done with a game, that would triple the amount of stress I'd feel about getting the game done by a specific release date. Kickstarter is no different. I don't want to be included in the growing number of vaporware titles that have been funded and never materialize. A developer can never regain customer trust after failing to deliver a product that he/she took money for in advance.



Couchpotato: Congratulations on releasing Eschalon: Book 3 last year. How has the game been received, and did the launch errors affect sales?

Thomas Riegsecker: Thank you. Book III has done as well as the other two games, although yes, the botched launch negatively affected the first week of sales, which is arguably the most important. To counter that bad launch, we ran some early promotions on Steam and GoG which was good for unit sales, but of course the amount earned per game has be notably less. It has sort of all balanced out now.



Couchpotato: Last year there was talk about a new expansion for Eschalon: Book 3. It that still a possibility, or has it been scrapped?

Thomas Riegsecker: Anything is a possibility down the road. Eschalon has been good to us, and we'd love to give fans some of the updates and additional content that has been discussed over the years. The plan right now is to continue developing our next game, and after that we will absolutely consider giving the trilogy a fresh update and add new content. We'll let the Eschalon fans decide if an updated trilogy with new content is something they'd want us to spend our resources on.



Couchpotato: I believe the modding tools for Eschalon III are not very popular. Was the creation of such a tool very time consuming, and do you feel it was worth it?

Thomas Riegsecker: Well, that is not our tool. That was a fan made editor. Our own tool set is not really ready for public use- it has a lot of quirky features and is very fickle about how it's used, so I never released it. Fixing our tools and updating the game for flexible modding would have used up a lot of our limited resources, so we've backed out of those plans in order to pursue our next game. However, if anyone is interested, there are a number of third-party tools out there to make your own Eschalon adventures and there are several really nice fan made mods available through our forums.



Couchpotato: Your latest update on your website talks about a new game engine, and new projects in development. Can you share any details yet?

Thomas Riegsecker: I wish I could! It's always so motivational to have fans excited about the projects you are working on, but it is too early to reveal anything right now. I will say that our next game will have a 100% new engine; we are not reusing anything from the Eschalon series, nor are we revising that world. What we are working on is brand new!

As I mentioned a few questions back, we are also working on another game that would not be considered an RPG. I am not sure if this other game will be released under the Basilisk Games label or something else, but we'll be sure to let our fans know when it's available either way.



Couchpotato: That's all from me today so once again thank you for your time. I was wondering if you have anything to add before we finish the interview?

Thomas Riegsecker: Thank you for asking some great questions, and thanks to the crew and community of RPGWatch for being supportive of us over the years! We'll be sharing some cool news with everyone later in 2015.
 

Hobo Elf

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I'm guessing that by classic feel he means that Bethesda is not trying to be overly edgy and progressive with their games, which is true. Also, for all the faults that Eschalon had, at least Basilisk isn't a tiresome hack who will reuse his engine, assets and resources ad nauseam like a certain other indie RPG developer.
 
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getter77

Augur
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Oct 12, 2008
Messages
861
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GA, USA
Was it a specifically blobber next? I was under the impression that the "next game" was reckoned long ago to be Sci-Fi...though that was long before all the turbulence with Book III's release and whatnot.
 

Jaesun

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Was it a specifically blobber next? I was under the impression that the "next game" was reckoned long ago to be Sci-Fi

When he first started on Book 1 of Eschalon, he posted quite a bit about a blobber that he wanted to do (and it was a fantasy setting IIRC). Though things could have changed since then, I really have not kept up with his posts for years.

A sci-fi cRPG or blobber would be fucking awesome.

:takemymoney:

Wish the dude would come visit us though.
 

Tigranes

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Jan 8, 2009
Messages
10,350
Wow. Well, I enjoyed Book 2 a bit, but... this guy is just as colourless and bland as his games. Zero personality.
 

almondblight

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Aug 10, 2004
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We have another engine (it's true 3D, but mechanically it functions like an advanced Dungeon Master / Eye of the Beholder first-person engine) that we've been working with for quite some time. We have a storyline, some game mechanics in place, and even a title logo. It will be hard-line sci-fi (meaning no magic or voodoo like "the force", although it will feature fringe science). It will not be post-apocalyptic. We are drawing inspiration from an existing "old-school" sci-fi RPG from way back.

(from 2008)
 

roshan

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Hi everyone. Is this series worth playing? Which is the best of the Eschalons? I don't really care to play it in order, just want to play the best first and see if I like it...
 

Scroo

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Codex 2014 Codex Year of the Donut Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2
Hi everyone. Is this series worth playing? Which is the best of the Eschalons? I don't really care to play it in order, just want to play the best first and see if I like it...

It's ok-ish, it's very slow (literally. The walking speed is horrible) and it doesn't help that the world is quite empty. Combat is turn based but simplistic, since it is only one character you control. The game invites you to some heavy save scumming, but I won't tell how so you can easier resist it - you'll find out by yourself ;) It has a fun skill system tho, stat rolling if you are into that and the dungeons are enjoyable imho.

I only played 1 and 2 and liked Eschalon 1 better, I think the consensus is that Eschalon 2 is the best tho. The third seems to be a bit of a letdown.
 

Doctor Sbaitso

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Regarding Walking speed, switch away from the directx renderer and the problem goes away, allowing you to move more than acceptably quickly.

Mechanically I find the Eschelon games to behave like roguelikes in that movement and combat is sequenced single action turns. Without forced perma-death and with the ability to reload at any time between turns, you could technically cheese your way to the very end without ever being in real danger. Still, I like the art style and I found the these to be a nice distraction though I only played one.
 
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