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Vault Dweller Soapbox: How to Survive the Indiepocalypse in 5 Easy Steps

Cadmus

Arcane
Joined
Dec 28, 2013
Messages
4,264
VD for president 2016

I don't like these snarky commentaries on how to become successful but VD snark is fun every tim

btw I havent been following the updates, is AoD complete now? Should I replay? Or is there more planned?
 

zwanzig_zwoelf

Graverobber Foundation
Developer
Joined
Nov 21, 2015
Messages
3,085
Location
デゼニランド
VD, I didn't follow the CSG updates much, but have you considered replacing standard healing potions/temporary stat boosts with drugs of all kinds? Honestly, sniffing cocaine to get past a complex fight and face the consequences (e.g. paranoia, lowered stats because of drug craving, etc) would be rather unique compared to 99% of other games with medpacks/health potions/boosters/etc... wait, I think drugs are more suitable in the urban settings, but overall they would give a nice touch to the colony ship-like setting, but I might be stretching a bit.
We're planning to have synthetic drugs but I don't think they'd replace medpacks and such.
What about medpacks having potential side effects?
E.g. in a fantasy setting some herbs used for healing purposes could have a slight chance of poisoning the character.
 

ERYFKRAD

Barbarian
Patron
Joined
Sep 25, 2012
Messages
28,237
Strap Yourselves In Serpent in the Staglands Shadorwun: Hong Kong Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
VD for president 2016

I don't like these snarky commentaries on how to become successful but VD snark is fun every tim

btw I havent been following the updates, is AoD complete now? Should I replay? Or is there more planned?
AoD is pretty much done. Go on and play it.
For best gear, look up Militiades in Teron. Costs a mountainload but worth it.
 

hivemind

Guest
One thing I find funny is that VD just links this in the AoD news thread and then Infinitron makes a new thread about it.
 
Unwanted

Endlösung

Unwanted
Joined
May 1, 2016
Messages
340
You're awfully fixated on our experience, ignoring games like Legend of Grimrock, Underrail, Stasis, Battle Brothers, etc - games that would never be possible even 10 years ago.
You are awfully polemic, you flip flopping kike. You said today is the BESTED TIME OF ALL TIME to do crunch time and eat ramen. Which is true if you have no life.

I tried to explain to you and your slavesquad that back in the good ol days you could have a wife a child a house a car a vacation and be a game dev with certain restrictions on creative control. Up to around Xbox. To which you replied with idiotic garbage: ah teh good ol day, who needs real wages lol, shareware loool, awesome lol!. Which is ofcourse highly intellectual jew speak.

You know, just before games market crash, money was being made. Just after it, money was being made. 90s, money made. Businesses that were created then, the bestes of all the times, still live. People who worked in the bestest of all game dev times could have made millions. They employed dozens of people and not a hungy collection of dumbfucks.
You know the guy who wrote Doom? How about his compatriots? Hmm... Unreal? Fallout? Doctor Brothers? You are ignoring a bunch of classics, I'd say.

And then you flip flop in your typical fashion. Games that were not possible 10 years ago? hurr durr. Thats what I said, consolitis.
 
Unwanted

Endlösung

Unwanted
Joined
May 1, 2016
Messages
340
Btw, all those 4 games are self funded, all with a custom engine too. I dont ignore them. They are treading on the same indie mill and share your experience. They keep the IP but the only hope they have is to win the lottery like Minecraft.
The goal here is to survive the indiepocalypse and build a real studio, right? Right? Bestest of all teim?
 
Self-Ejected

Lurker King

Self-Ejected
The Real Fanboy
Joined
Jan 21, 2015
Messages
1,865,419
You know, just before games market crash, money was being made. Just after it, money was being made. 90s, money made. Businesses that were created then, the bestes of all the times, still live. People who worked in the bestest of all game dev times could have made millions. They employed dozens of people and not a hungy collection of dumbfucks.

It is curious that you are talking about this, because I was thinking about this topic these days. When we say that the past was best, what we are actually doing is a nostalgic reconstruction of the past in our heads and comparing it with the present in the most simplistic fashion, for instance, we do something like this: (1) consider all the best games in all the past years combined, ignoring all the bad games released at that time; (2) compare decades of these games with the worse games of the past decade, which is unfair; (3) ignore the advantages of the present time (cost-free distribution, cheap engines, internet, etc.) because we are too butthurted by triple-A games selling millions; (4) ignore that oldschool games never received the same attention of Triple-A games even in their prime time, because all things were different back then, including the size of the game media, etc. To sum up, I think that we do a lot of superficial chair sociology when we make these comparisons because we are too blinded by nostalgia towards our old memories and game discoveries and present resentment towards popamole gaming.

HOWEVER, you do have a point when you say that medium studios stop getting contracts because game consoles took everything. That is a good argument, even if they also have Kickstarter and steam nowadays. However, complaining about this today is like complaining that jazz or classic musicians were popular in the past. It’s silly. Good cRPGs were never intended for the masses. If developers earned big contracts with them at some point, they were lucky.

In this case, Vault Dweller’s statement is correct but only if you have indie studios in mind. This is the best time to make a cRPG if you are an indie. Ironically, you are pointing fingers at consoles when you should also blaming the players themselves. Most oldschool players nowadays couldn’t play a decent cRPG if their lives depend on it. They just don’t care anymore. They have wives, work and a bunch of other stuff that took their energy. I know players who help fund games with Kickstarter, but never played any of them. The real challenge it’s to create a new generation of good connoisseurs.
 

Vault Dweller

Commissar, Red Star Studio
Developer
Joined
Jan 7, 2003
Messages
28,024
You're awfully fixated on our experience, ignoring games like Legend of Grimrock, Underrail, Stasis, Battle Brothers, etc - games that would never be possible even 10 years ago.
You are awfully polemic, you flip flopping kike. You said today is the BESTED TIME OF ALL TIME to do crunch time and eat ramen. Which is true if you have no life.
Which is true if you want to be a game developer.

I tried to explain to you and your slavesquad that back in the good ol days you could have a wife a child a house a car a vacation and be a game dev with certain restrictions on creative control. Up to around Xbox. To which you replied with idiotic garbage: ah teh good ol day, who needs real wages lol, shareware loool, awesome lol!. Which is ofcourse highly intellectual jew speak.
These "real" wages were pitifully low, the shareware model wouldn't sell more than a couple of thousand copies. Creative control? Tim Cain had to leave Interplay and Fallout 2 because he had zero creative control, etc.

You know, just before games market crash, money was being made. Just after it, money was being made. 90s, money made. Businesses that were created then, the bestes of all the times, still live. People who worked in the bestest of all game dev times could have made millions. They employed dozens of people and not a hungy collection of dumbfucks.
:what the fuck am I reading:

You think Avellone made millions in Interplay? Tim Cain? That's the dumbest fucking thing I've ever heard of.
 

Vault Dweller

Commissar, Red Star Studio
Developer
Joined
Jan 7, 2003
Messages
28,024
You know, just before games market crash, money was being made. Just after it, money was being made. 90s, money made. Businesses that were created then, the bestes of all the times, still live. People who worked in the bestest of all game dev times could have made millions. They employed dozens of people and not a hungy collection of dumbfucks.

It is curious that you are talking about this, because I was thinking about this topic these days. When we say that the past was best, what we are actually doing is a nostalgic reconstruction of the past in our heads and comparing it with the present in the most simplistic fashion, for instance, we do something like this: (1) consider all the best games in all the past years combined, ignoring all the bad games released at that time; (2) compare decades of these games with the worse games of the past decade, which is unfair; (3) ignore the advantages of the present time (cost-free distribution, cheap engines, internet, etc.) because we are too butthurted by triple-A games selling millions; (4) ignore that oldschool games never received the same attention of Triple-A games even in their prime time, because all things were different back then, including the size of the game media, etc. To sum up, I think that we do a lot of superficial chair sociology when we make these comparisons because we are too blinded by nostalgia towards our old memories and game discoveries and present resentment towards popamole gaming.

HOWEVER, you do have a point when you say that medium studios stop getting contracts because game consoles took everything. That is a good argument, even if they also have Kickstarter and steam nowadays. However, complaining about this today is like complaining that jazz or classic musicians were popular in the past. It’s silly. Good cRPGs were never intended for the masses. If developers earned big contracts with them at some point, they were lucky.

In this case, Vault Dweller’s statement is correct but only if you have indie studios in mind. This is the best time to make a cRPG if you are an indie. Ironically, you are pointing fingers at consoles when you should also blaming the players themselves. Most oldschool players nowadays couldn’t play a decent cRPG if their lives depend on it. They just don’t care anymore. They have wives, work and a bunch of other stuff that took their energy. I know players who help fund games with Kickstarter, but never played any of them. The real challenge it’s to create a new generation of good connoisseurs.
Remember how many studios EA killed, long before consoles started taking over? Remember Wiz 8 that no publisher wanted to touch even after the game was completed? Sure, it would have been great to work at Looking Glass Studios for those 8 years it was in business, much like it would have been great to work at Troika during 7 years it was in business, but nobody there made millions. In fact they struggled to survive and depended on the publishers' goodwill not to fuck them over (which lasted only so long). Those who managed to start large companies like Brian Fargo made good money but there are people like that in any period. Claiming that working for a publisher 15-20 years was great and made you millions (or even fully provided for your family) is fucking idiotic.
 

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
The only sense in which Endlosung is correct is that there was more low-hanging fruit in the old days - major types of games that hadn't been popularized yet, technologies that hadn't been exploited yet - allowing pioneer developers who would be seen as "indie" today to grab them and become empires. For example, there were no first person shooters, so "indie" id Software invented them and became giants.

But we're not living in that age anymore and haven't been since the late 90s. The frontier is closed, the borders have been drawn.
 
Self-Ejected

Lurker King

Self-Ejected
The Real Fanboy
Joined
Jan 21, 2015
Messages
1,865,419
Remember how many studios EA killed, long before consoles started taking over? Remember Wiz 8 that no publisher wanted to touch even after the game was completed? Sure, it would have been great to work at Looking Glass Studios for those 8 years it was in business, much like it would have been great to work at Troika during 7 years it was in business, but nobody there made millions. In fact they struggled to survive and depended on the publishers' goodwill not to fuck them over (which lasted only so long). Those who managed to start large companies like Brian Fargo made good money but there are people like that in any period. Claiming that working for a publisher 15-20 years was great and made you millions (or even fully provided for your family) is fucking idiotic.

You are right, that makes more sense. It's not as if publishers were more humanitarian back than and we had millions of grognards to buy cRPGs and make developers rich.
 
Last edited:
Joined
Dec 12, 2013
Messages
4,229
I was surprised that even now a game like Age of Decadence has been added to the list of forbidden games on one of the Polish catholic sites due to occultism present in the game: https://gloria.tv/article/8P32ZSaSquHF1cqxQ7jtsPJHZ
I have no idea how such obscure title was spotted, especially since it's hard to find any occultist elements in it. I guess they didn't like summoning "gods" from other planes.

My intelligence went down after visiting this site. Please do not do it again.

One thing I find funny is that VD just links this in the AoD news thread and then Infinitron makes a new thread about it.

Those brofists won't earn themselves you know:p
 

Vault Dweller

Commissar, Red Star Studio
Developer
Joined
Jan 7, 2003
Messages
28,024
The only sense in which Endlosung is correct is that there was more low-hanging fruit in the old days - major types of games that hadn't been popularized yet, technologies that hadn't been exploited yet - allowing pioneer developers who would be seen as "indie" today to grab them and become empires. For example, there were no first person shooters, so "indie" id Software invented them and became giants.
I think that id Software is an exception rather than the rule. The other genre founders or notable companies didn't fare so well. MicroProse, for example. Or New World Computing, established in mid 80s.

The good ol' days were good because for a long time the industry was still young and catered to geeks (the only people who had computers). It went downhill not because of the consoles but the moment computers became household items, affordable and easy to get into. How many casual players would be able to handle the memory puzzle? You bought a game but you don't have enough conventional memory so you need to free it up by moving shit to upper memory blocks. The industry was always controlled by the publishers and the moment the market opened up the publishers started dreaming of selling first hundreds of thousands, then millions (and now tens of millions) of copies.
 
Unwanted

Endlösung

Unwanted
Joined
May 1, 2016
Messages
340
These "real" wages were pitifully low
Source me. There are dozens of mismanaged game dev companies that payed good money to hacks, money that came from publishers. Those people were paid.
the shareware model wouldn't sell more than a couple of thousand copies
Shareware is not there to sell games. It grabbed attention for your quality product because the rest was a sea of shovelware like Steam today. Apogee came about there.
You think Avellone made millions in Interplay? Tim Cain? That's the dumbest fucking thing I've ever heard of.
Putting words in my mouth again, you fucking jew. People who worked in the bestest of all game dev times could have made millions, like Blizzard, like ID, like Tim Sweeney. And your examples are dumber than you are. Avellone is a writer! He is worthless. And Tim Cain is seemingly a pathetic manager.
Remember how many studios EA killed, long before consoles started taking over?
Who gives a fuck. You as a game dev never wasted your money. Grimrock devs are industry vets paying for dev themselves. You could form a Troika-like company in the best time of all time and become what Rockstar games is today. You think your or Grimrocks chances at a midsized studio today are better than in 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000? Fuck no.
Claiming that working for a publisher 15-20 years was great and made you millions (or even fully provided for your family) is fucking idiotic.
You are fucking idiotic. I never claimed that. Ascaron was a mismanaged shithole in the 90s and payed good wages in Germany in the 90s to dozens of people. There are countless (ALL OF THEM) examples of companies that had pitched ALL KINDS of games to publishers and found funding. Virtually no one worked out of their own pocket (Ascarons founder did when the company was in its death throes, but he didnt have to).

In conclusion.
In the good old days you found a job that payed you if you wanted to be wageslave game dev.
In the good old days you founded a company and looked for a publisher. While today you are starving and selfpublishing and praying.

Today is the worst of all time to be a small game dev. Yet THE BEST TIME OF ALL TIME according to a guy who worked 10 years for free. And btw, I think its a minor miracle that AoD sold soo much while visually looking like shit.
 
Last edited:
Unwanted

Endlösung

Unwanted
Joined
May 1, 2016
Messages
340
In this case, Vault Dweller’s statement is correct but only if you have indie studios in mind. This is the best time to make a cRPG if you are an indie.
No its not. And its not what he said. He said: Overall, I don't think there was EVER a better time to be a game developer. Which is like claiming that arriving at Klondike in 1900 is the very best timing. Being a game dev at any point in history before today, is a better opportunity at life and success. He believes that all the masses of Steam users and the independence from the a publisher help his existence as an indie game dev. While in reality he works for free, while in reality a million and 1 indie devs cry online about their income - which would have been better before Xbox.

Ironically, you are pointing fingers at consoles when you should also blaming the players themselves.
I dont blame anyone, I dont care. Consoles are just a historical point. Just as the market crash, just as the 90s rush as retold in Crawfords Dragon speech.
 

Mustawd

Guest
Being a game dev at any point in history before today, is a better opportunity at life and success.


Lol, you are so full of shit. You're basically pointing at people who won the lottery back then and are saying, "See! It wasn't hard to be a millionaire!! You just needed $2 to get rich back then!"

Your whole premise ignores all the failed studios and indie devs in that era. Yeah, good job responding to VD's points with absolutely nothing of substance.
 
Unwanted

Endlösung

Unwanted
Joined
May 1, 2016
Messages
340
Your whole premise ignores all the failed studios and indie devs in that era.
Another moron. I dont care about failed studios. Your failed studio employees got paid. You had a chance to make GTA 1. If your indie studio fails, your free work is gone, and you havent earned a living wage. Your chances at being Blizzard are nill.
 

Mustawd

Guest
Also, it takes a true dumbass to compare employees in a studio to being an indie dev. Christ, by definition an indie dev is a fucking owner. You're trying to make fun of VD for 10 years of free work, but you don't realize that all the rewards he reaps after the costs are all his.

Yah, go be a cog in a wheel somewhere. How is being a line employee in Blizzard going to make you wealthy? A living wage? FFS, working as a McDonald's manager gives you a living wage.
 

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