Interview Emil Pagliarullo interviewed by Playstation Magazine

[Elwro]

Tags: Bethesda Softworks; Fallout 3

A <a href="http://boards.gamefaqs.com/gfaqs/genmessage.php?board=918428&topic=40266346">transcript</a> of a recent interview with Emil Pagliarullo, Fallout 3's lead designer was posted on the <a href="http://boards.gamefaqs.com/gfaqs">GameFAQs forums</a>. Here's a snippet:<blockquote>PTOM: Your resume includes the "Thief" series and "Oblivion" (particularly Dark Brotherhood quests,) so you like the sneak-and-stab style of gameplay?
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EP I love the subtlety of that type of gameplay, taking a break from the frenetic action to approach a scenario more methodically. So yeah, playing the sneaking, back-stabbing type of character is very possible in "Fallout 3." In fact, there's a particular stealth tactic made infamous in the previous "Fallout" games, and we're really psyched to have that in "Fallout 3." I'll give you a hint- it involves pockets and explosives.
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</blockquote>I remember how smart I felt when I did this for the first time, to Metzger in the Den. (And then the game crashed.) Anyway, I wonder if Bethesda is going to improve Oblivion's stealth system...
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Spotted at: <A HREF="http://fallout3.wordpress.com/">Fallout 3: A Post Nuclear Blog</A>

 

[Kingston]

Avoid "..." in a newspost, unless its something sarcastic.

I hope they aren't only taking the lulzy stuff from Fallout, but this is certainly good news. I hope it isn't too overpowered though. I wonder how stealth and inventory interaction is gonna work.

 

[Micmu]

Avoid "..." in a newspost, unless its something sarcastic.

"Bethesda" ... "going to improve" ... Sarcasm or not, eh?

 

[thesheeep]

Whats so wrong about "..."? I use it all the time. I likey....

Anyway, the stealth system in Oblivion was not THAT bad, IMHO. Of course, theres still much space for improvements...

 

[Nedrah]

Oblivions stealth system not so bad, eh?

Yeah, sure, if it's the first game you play using any kind of stealth aspect whatsoever, it might be slightly less annoying, I suppose. Seriously, wtf?

No real comment other than that, but thanks for bringing some news Elwro, I haven't found anything worth a post in the last few days.

 

[Briosafreak]

<3 Elwro

 

[Rohit_N]

So last year.

EDIT: Oh, it was posted last year. Still old, though.

 

[denizsi]

I wonder how stealth and inventory interaction is gonna work.

Same as last two Beth games. Go into stealth mode. Click "activate" on character. Both your and target's inventories show up. So you either steal, or plant objects. What was there to wonder? They might put some effort this time by taking the additional step to create a separate interface for items like explosives while in inventory. I can imagine them boosting about how they pulled that off, totally next-gen style, a first in gaming.

edit: Thinking again, I imagine them throwing off a party when they first implement the basic WASD controls.

 

[OSK]

Wasn't this already in Oblivion? Just replace "explosives" with "negatively enchanted item."

 

[Section8]

I'm fascinated by the way Bethesda devs talk - it's very telling of their mindset and their culture:

"Fallout," as a franchise

Instant fail. For the lead designer to be thinking of the world he's creating as a "franchise" is doing it wrong. It shows more of a passion toward business and finance than a passion toward creativity.

There's good, there's evil, and there's everything in between.

Again, this clear compartmentalising of good, evil and "in between" is unhealthy. As soon as you artificially separate and account for each "ideology", then you wind up trying to shoehorn all motivations into a few limited and one-dimensional categories. Also, the very concept of "good and evil" is generally a childish perspective on morality, something that doesn't apply to Fallout, and needs to be far less prevalent in games in general.

So for the player, it's all about doing what you want, how you want.

No it isn't. The player should have freedom and a degree of authorship, but "what you want, how you want" is ultimately boring - see Oblivion. Without conflict and challenges, there's not much fun to be had by doing what you want. Even gamblers don't want to win all the time, because risk is such an important part of the experience.

There's always a greater good, a sense of nobility and selfless purpose that you can champion... if you want. If you wander through the rubble and be a complete ass, well, you can do that, too!

Greater good... nobility... champion... absolute drivel. These guys need to get high-fantasy cliches out of their heads and take a leaf out of The Witcher's "lesser evil" choices.

Women with the beehive haircuts were driving around with their robots in nuclear-powered cars- and then they all blew up.

Let me guess, they're all driving Corvegas with their trusty Mr Handy by their side because their husbands are off keeping the peace in the newly annexed Canada? You can (r)ape Fallout's icons all you like and still not understand the setting at all. Besides which, Beehives are '60s kitsch.

I love the subtlety of that type of gameplay, taking a break from the frenetic action to approach a scenario more methodically.

He should try turn-based games some time, they'd be right up his alley. I'd recommend Fallout as a starting point.

So for me, it's all about using the tech to make the worlds more believable. Shiny graphics help with that, but so does full audio for every character, our Radiant AI system for a full range of character behaviors with full 24/7 schedules, and the ability to make worlds as large as they want.

...none of which has any bearing on actual gameplay. Nice one. Also, I guess making Oblivion's Imperial City take up a few square metres and populating it with three people was "as large as they want(ed)":

For a game designer, that's a dream come true.

Take some zombie chocolate and dip it into the leper peanut butter and you've got a Ghoul.

What.

So we've got lots of existing "Fallout" creatures, from the vicious Deathclaws to the brutish Supermutants. For those classics, our job is making sure we do them justice, making sure we bring them to life on next-gen platforms in ways that are consistent and respectful to the source material.

...neither of which have any business on the east coast - which would be neither consistent nor respectful to the source material. Great example.

I'll admit I've become much more of a graphics whore than I used to be,

Telling.

but I still take rich gameplay experiences and immersion over anisotropic filtering and specular mapping any day.

Further telling that he can only produce meaningless buzzwords as a supposed "preference" over graphics.

Every time I see one of these posts, I try to stay away and just let them play game developer, but they make it so easy to dissect their naive ramblings. I've brought shame on myself for preying on the weak again.

 

[thesheeep]

Oblivions stealth system not so bad, eh?

Yeah, sure, if it's the first game you play using any kind of stealth aspect whatsoever, it might be slightly less annoying, I suppose. Seriously, wtf?

I meant not THAT bad if compared to the other failures of Oblivion.

I played a Rogue-like thing in Oblivion and stealth was.. well.. working out. You push the button, you see the eye-thing, you try to remain silent. Its not that stealth is anything more than that. Of course, stabbing and pickpocketing were utter failures, but I don't consider them to be part of the stealth system directly.

Really, whats so wrong about it? Sure, its not Sam Fisher, but what did you expect?

 

[Brother None]

Anyway, I wonder if Bethesda is going to improve Oblivion's stealth system...

It didn't look improved in the demo, but like HtH combat, that's probably something they're working on.

 

[DraQ]

There's good, there's evil, and there's everything in between.

Again, this clear compartmentalising of good, evil and "in between" is unhealthy. As soon as you artificially separate and account for each "ideology", then you wind up trying to shoehorn all motivations into a few limited and one-dimensional categories. Also, the very concept of "good and evil" is generally a childish perspective on morality, something that doesn't apply to Fallout, and needs to be far less prevalent in games in general.

Have all the people at Bethesda got hit by some mysterious stupid rays from outer space which made them mutate and become mentally deficient?

Even Morrowind was inherently ambiguous when it came to moral matters, then Oblivious came and there was all this overdone good VS evil farce all over again.

I love the subtlety of that type of gameplay, taking a break from the frenetic action to approach a scenario more methodically.

He should try turn-based games some time, they'd be right up his alley. I'd recommend Fallout as a starting point.

Make this Wizardry 8. You shouldn't introduce people to 2d iso, TB and post-apocalyptic retrofuturistic SF that abruptly and all at once. It might kill them or at least traumatize them so badly that they'll no longer able to do anything but stare at generic sugary landscapes shrouded by soothing bloom and listen to familiar chit-chat about mudcrabs.

So for me, it's all about using the tech to make the worlds more believable. Shiny graphics help with that, but so does full audio for every character, our Radiant AI system for a full range of character behaviors with full 24/7 schedules, and the ability to make worlds as large as they want.

...none of which has any bearing on actual gameplay. Nice one. Also, I guess making Oblivion's Imperial City take up a few square metres and populating it with three people was "as large as they want(ed)"

Now you're stretching it. I clearly remember at least four. :D

Take some zombie chocolate and dip it into the leper peanut butter and you've got a Ghoul.

What.

Attempt at humour I believe. Failed of course, but still better than anything passing for humour in oblibians, maybe save for Arvena Thelas or whatshername.

 

[Kingston]

...so the radiation has managed to affect even the most mundane animal and insect.

I thought it was the FEV in the atmosphere. I'm no Fallout buff, so can someone tell me the right answer?

. We had such a great roster of baddies to draw from already; the selection process was actually pretty smooth. So we've got lots of existing "Fallout" creatures, from the vicious Deathclaws to the brutish Supermutants.

Do Supermutants have to be baddies?

And any time we've created a new character, we've been bound by the same principles. Does this fit into "Fallout?" Does this match the vibe of our unique world?

Really. I mean really? Did they do this for the Fatman and everything else? Oh wait, I just noticed the "our unique world".

Of course, I always think my stuff is brilliantly funny, and someone usually proves me wrong. But in this case, I'm right! I hope.

I'm just wondering, who designed the arena fanboi in Oblivion?

 

[Brother None]

...so the radiation has managed to affect even the most mundane animal and insect.

I thought it was the FEV in the atmosphere. I'm no Fallout buff, so can someone tell me the right answer?

An area of contention. Tim Cain preferred to explanation that huge animals, deathclaws and ghouls were radiation, while supermutants, centaurs and floaters were FEV. Chris Taylor preferred the FEV explains everything explanation. MCA's Fallout Bible leaned towards Chris Taylor first, but later switched to Tim Cain's explanation, which has since become roughly accepted canon by the fans, and apparently by Bethesda too.

I always preferred Cain's version of things because using FEV as a magic explain-all felt a bit weak to me, besides, Fallout is based on certain 50's paradigms and having radiation transform people and animals is perfect in that sense (see: Them! The Amazing Colossal Man, the Incredible Shrinking Man). Y'know. Science! I'm glad Bethesda is going with this explanation.

 

[Jeff Graw]

In fact, there's a particular stealth tactic made infamous in the previous "Fallout" games, and we're really psyched to have that in "Fallout 3." I'll give you a hint- it involves pockets and explosives.

Great, the most abusable tactic from Fallout is back in!

And knowing Bethesda, they'll point the tactic out to every player (maybe making it part of the tutorial) and make it super easy to pull off.

 

[the_Consumer]

Don't forget the achievement you'll get for it.

 

[Müg]

I wonder how stealth and inventory interaction is gonna work.

Same as last two Beth games. Go into stealth mode. Click "activate" on character. Both your and target's inventories show up. So you either steal, or plant objects. What was there to wonder? They might put some effort this time by taking the additional step to create a separate interface for items like explosives while in inventory. I can imagine them boosting about how they pulled that off, totally next-gen style, a first in gaming.

edit: Thinking again, I imagine them throwing off a party when they first implement the basic WASD controls.

I laugh at how you think they're even remotely focusing on the PC.

 

[Nedrah]

Really, whats so wrong about it? Sure, its not Sam Fisher, but what did you expect?

Shades of grey between "completely invisible" and "everyone comes running at you" would have been a start - as would "enemys do NOT go into magical GPS mode as soon as you take one shot" have been.

 

[Seboss]

Great, the most abusable tactic from Fallout is back in!

Stimpacking someone to death seems much worse to me. Can't remember if it's applicable to all non-hostile NPCs though.

 

[Dogar]

There's always a greater good, a sense of nobility and selfless purpose that you can champion... if you want. If you wander through the rubble and be a complete ass, well, you can do that, too!

Greater good... nobility... champion... absolute drivel. These guys need to get high-fantasy cliches out of their heads and take a leaf out of The Witcher's "lesser evil" choices.

Even The Witcher had clear cut good/bad scenarios, hell, Fallout was simply stuffed with them. You could free slaves and hostages, help the police maintain the law(3 times, no less), help people overthrow their oppressors et cetera. There's even a karma trait called "Champion of the Wasteland" or something which was given to you once you'd performed so many viruous deeds. Merely presenting the player with the choice to be an all-around good guy doesn't seem like much of a deviation from the original game.

 

[Section8]

Even The Witcher had clear cut good/bad scenarios, hell, Fallout was simply stuffed with them. You could free slaves and hostages, help the police maintain the law(3 times, no less), help people overthrow their oppressors et cetera.

There are things in Fallout that ought to be improved upon, and this is one of them. Saying "Fallout had it, so Fallout 3 must have it" is lunacy. There are arguments to be made for both sides, but it's hard to argue that the Gizmo/Killian or Decker/Greene conflicts are anywhere near as interesting as the situation in the Boneyard or Necropolis.

There's even a karma trait called "Champion of the Wasteland" or something which was given to you once you'd performed so many viruous deeds. Merely presenting the player with the choice to be an all-around good guy doesn't seem like much of a deviation from the original game.

That's mostly true - see above. But you have to keep in mind that there's more to the situations in Fallout than who wins in the end. I have grave doubts that Fallout 3 will even reach this minor level of ambiguity.

 

[thesheeep]

Shades of grey between "completely invisible" and "everyone comes running at you" would have been a start - as would "enemys do NOT go into magical GPS mode as soon as you take one shot" have been.

You are right, that would have been an improvement.But IMHO those are mistakes of the infamous Radiant AI...
Still, those things you mentioned didn't really disturb me. I usually wasn't discovered as I used an invisibility spell after I attacked ... Rogue + Illusion spells ftw!

Now that I think of it, if I had not used thsoe spells.. yeah that would have a pain.

 

[DraQ]

There are things in Fallout that ought to be improved upon, and this is one of them. Saying "Fallout had it, so Fallout 3 must have it" is lunacy.

<beth's mouthpiece>
See? We are making true to it's roots *real* Fallout(TM) post nucular aR-Pee-Gee!
</betth's mouthpiece>

Yeh, I wouldn't object to seeing karma system being flung out of the window.

There are arguments to be made for both sides, but it's hard to argue that the Gizmo/Killian or Decker/Greene conflicts are anywhere near as interesting as the situation in the Boneyard or Necropolis.

Gizmo/Killian (Zomg! it reads "Gizmo slash Killian" I want to pluck my mind's eye out now... The horror! The horror! ) conflict would be much better if it ended as intended.

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Shades of grey between "completely invisible" and "everyone comes running at you" would have been a start - as would "enemys do NOT go into magical GPS mode as soon as you take one shot" have been.

You are right, that would have been an improvement.But IMHO those are mistakes of the infamous Radiant AI...

AI stands for Artificial Inanity here, I believe.

Still, those things you mentioned didn't really disturb me. I usually wasn't discovered as I used an invisibility spell after I attacked ...

But then the attacked NPC (with an obligatory arrow sticking out of their bum) comments about it being the wind brutally shredding sad remnants of suspension of disbelief into bits of WTF.

 

[Section8]

You are right, that would have been an improvement.But IMHO those are mistakes of the infamous Radiant AI...

Nope, the AI basically did what it was supposed to do - see or not see the player. However, any remotely adequate stealth system will at least have more than two states of awareness, and varying degrees of visibility. That way the AI can actually account for situations like "something I can't see is attacking me" and trigger an action like "go look for attacker" or "run the hell away".

Gizmo/Killian (Zomg! it reads "Gizmo slash Killian" I want to pluck my mind's eye out now... The horror! The horror! Mad ) conflict would be much better if it ended as intended.

Okay, since I'm on a bit of a roll here - at this very moment, Wizball disproves Rule 34, though now that I've made mention of it...

But yeah, the alternate ending is pretty cool. There's not necessarily anything wrong with either, but they may not suit certain moral outlooks.