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

[Cosmo]

It potentially does mean a greater workload, yes, since you can't follow a fixed formula. But it also means a potentially greater payoff since it will give players some new surprises on replays, which will translate into positive word-of-mouth, which means the invested effort will have been worth it.

Color me sceptic.
I mean, can it really work when every RPG out there is starving for time and money ?
I can see a game following those lines ending up like Arcanum, stuck in the middle between being a clusterfuck an a masterpiece.

 

[Hoaxmetal]

Jason Liang
Care to explain your reasoning, or are you just going to drop off a rating and leave?

Only small and/or successful companies can afford to move. Good luck getting all those employees to move with the company.

 

[Infinitron]

Yeah, if you look at PS:T it's telling a deeply personal story centered on the player character, and yet at the same time it's also heavily focused on the world and its workings, and explored many themes of the Planescape universe without offering straight-up loredumps on how this universe works (you encounter things like the rule-of-three and how belief shapes reality first-hand, rather than being told about it).

Making your own IPs set in your own fictional worlds that you want to tell the player about does not neccessitate making the story revolve around the world, with the player only incidentally being a part of that story.

I think PS:T reflects some of the themes of its setting, but it doesn't really tell a story about it. A story about the Planescape setting would be something like the Sigil Faction War: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faction_War

 

[Chippy]

Bioware once said they couldn't remake BG2 with ME production values because it would cost too much, then we were told that these games could be made more efficiently with today's technology (Unity,etc). So far I'm not really convinced.

One crucial thing that could be done to cut costs is to move the fuck away from California. The needful hardware, software, and office space can be had absolutely anywhere. Studios can and have done it before.

This is a big issue with Kickstarted games and one that cropped up with the very first game that popularized it all, DoubleFine Adventure. Backers pay a premium for developers to live in California.

Heh - it seems those commie's in California have a high standard and cost of living...

 

[JarlFrank]

It potentially does mean a greater workload, yes, since you can't follow a fixed formula. But it also means a potentially greater payoff since it will give players some new surprises on replays, which will translate into positive word-of-mouth, which means the invested effort will have been worth it.

Color me sceptic.
I mean, can it really work when every RPG out there is starving for time and money ?
I can see a game following those lines ending up like Arcanum, stuck in the middle between being a clusterfuck an a masterpiece.

I'd gladly live in a world where we get more Arcanums, tbh.

But of course, it depends on how well the game's structure is thought-out and planned beforehand. If you know what you're doing and how much time the implementation will take, it might work.

Yeah, if you look at PS:T it's telling a deeply personal story centered on the player character, and yet at the same time it's also heavily focused on the world and its workings, and explored many themes of the Planescape universe without offering straight-up loredumps on how this universe works (you encounter things like the rule-of-three and how belief shapes reality first-hand, rather than being told about it).

Making your own IPs set in your own fictional worlds that you want to tell the player about does not neccessitate making the story revolve around the world, with the player only incidentally being a part of that story.

I think PS:T reflects some of the themes of its setting, but it doesn't really tell a story about it. A story about the Planescape setting would be something like the Sigil Faction War: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faction_War

But then, would creating your own Planescape-style setting neccessitate the story being more like the Sigil Faction War than the personal story of PST? Or can you do whatever you want with your setting and tell pretty much any kind of story?

 

[Blaine]

What do you guys even mean by symmetry here? Symmetry of power? You definitely don't need factions to be on similar power level. Symmetry in amount of content? You don't need that either.

You absolutely do need a roughly symmetrical amount of content in order for the two main factions to be equally attractive in a playthrough, particularly a first playthrough. It's not much of a choice when you have a half-empty magazine rack on the one hand a bookcase full of books on the other.

There are possible alternative solutions to this:

What I'd like to have seen for Caesar's Legion play would have been the Courier working as a specialized spy for Caesar, interwoven with other "normal" quest lines. For example, you could play There Stands The Grass (Vault 22) mostly normally for 90% of it, then have an additional scripted option to bring the research to Caesar instead, or to arrange to have Hildern kidnapped in the night (fade to black after ending the dialogue) and bring the whole shebang to Caesar.

In that way, the Legion content would have piggybacked on much of the "main" content, and in my view been much more exciting and satisfying, knowing that you were playing everyone else for a fool.

Of course, NPCs can psychically sense your reputation with other factions in New Vegas unless you're wearing a disguise, but that could have been tweaked to keep your Legion rep secret until late in the main story.

But that's neither here nor there at this juncture.

 

[DosBuster]

Seriously though, wasteland 2 novel??

 

[Blakemoreland Hybrid Boss]

Feargus’ reading list is something else altogether. It’s as though FU is deliberately trying to read every shitty, self-published, $2.99 piece of trash that Amazon tries to foist off on me in its “Sponsored Products” list.

You guys are too naive. Do you really think that a simpleton like him really read books? He just bought them and made a list to look like he has some knowledge in the subject. It's all fake, guys. When you criticise his taste you are giving him too much credit. I wouldn't be surprised if he suggested book passages and ideas out of the blue just to give the appareance that he has some cretive input. He never read these books. He probaby never read books. This is the type that only watch television. That is where you should be looking for to determine his taste.

I'm sure he gets tons of novel narrative ideas to help shape the design of such critically acclaimed masterpieces as Pillars of Eternity.

That would explain a lot.

Oh I found Obsidian's articles of incorporation and put them on scribd-> https://www.scribd.com/document/378532707/Obsidian-Entertainment-Inc-Articles-of-in-Corp.

This document has been removed from Scribd.

 

[Jason Liang]

Jason Liang
Care to explain your reasoning, or are you just going to drop off a rating and leave?

Sure. The majority of the computer gaming industry is based in Southern California for a reason. Not just for the weather and that Blizzard is also based in Irvine.

- California business and IP laws are specifically suitable to the hardware/software industry.
- Obviously close proximity to the Los Angeles media industry is a huge bonus. Can't get the contract if you can't take a business lunch.
- Californians are groomed to work in the entertainment industries from elementary school to college. From elementary school on, California public schools emphasize literature. That leads to a work force well suited to produce story-telling media, whether that is in film, television or gaming.
- California has an extensive network of public universities including both the UC system and the Cal State system to produce a workforce for software development, including gaming
- The film industry and the education system make California a desirable destination for "creative" producers. They want to live in California, not elsewhere.
- Californians are accustomed to investing in media ventures such as movies and games, rather than dump it in CDs or the stock market like the rest of the country. Being located in California allows game studios to meet with private capital investors far more easily than other states. I'm not talking about Peter Theils or Hollywood jews. Normal, middle class households with average household incomes between $100k-$300k are bread and butter investors in film and gaming.

None of this is stuff from me. I took a class when I was an EECS undergrad on California business and Software development, which is where I learned this.

The course I took was probably the precursor to http://haas.berkeley.edu/Undergrad/current/course/courses/fall2010/UGBA195T-1.pdf Different professor though.

For those interested, a quick search found these-

https://assets1c.milkeninstitute.or.../Entertainment-Software-Assocation-Report.pdf

http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/op-ed/soapbox/article200169194.html

Given our dominant positions in both entertainment and technology, it’s not surprising that California is far ahead of other states when it comes to the entertainment software industry. California is home to 27 percent of the domestic gaming industry, with more than 900 companies and 33,000 jobs – seven times as many as our nearest competitor, Texas.

 

[Bocian]

Imagine a forum in which a close knit group of racist regulars talked shit about X people all day long.

I don't know what kind of forum are you on, but suggesting that Codex is purely KKK forum (and looking at your post, you're implying that) is beyond retarded. I haven't seen any directly "racist" opinions, but to the contrary, SJW apologists are rather common and even receive acclaim looking at the ratings. The "politics" that pops up occasionally out of GD are minor remarks about obvious agendas that appear in modern gaming, and sometimes these are things that have to be addressed and pointed out for the sake of clarity. We can't pretend that it's raining when they spit in our faces.

The Codex prides itself on free speech, but the paradox is that this very policy creates a kind of censorship, not because the people who keep away hate free speech, as a concept, but because they hate the people who use free speech to abuse them, their race, their beliefs, etc.

It's not a paradox, it's a logical fallacy. "Free speech creates censorship because people who can't take the heat and are afraid of getting questioned and scrutinied for their beliefs will avoid the place". If twitter-twats are calling Codex a right-wing cesspool doesn't mean that it is actually one. Those that believe these opinions and subscribe to them, well, nothing of value is lost if they decide to keep away.
Disclaimer, I agree that we shouldn't be shitting MCA thread with our discussions, but the talk popped up and your post went fairly uncommented, so decided I'll do it myself.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

What do you guys even mean by symmetry here? Symmetry of power? You definitely don't need factions to be on similar power level. Symmetry in amount of content? You don't need that either.

You absolutely do need a roughly symmetrical amount of content in order for the two main factions to be equally attractive in a playthrough, particularly a first playthrough.

You do not even know if there's a symmetry in amount of content, until you played the game twice, once with each faction. So lack of symmetry has no impact whatsoever on your first playthrough.

 

[JarlFrank]

What do you guys even mean by symmetry here? Symmetry of power? You definitely don't need factions to be on similar power level. Symmetry in amount of content? You don't need that either.

You absolutely do need a roughly symmetrical amount of content in order for the two main factions to be equally attractive in a playthrough, particularly a first playthrough.

You do not even know if there's a symmetry in amount of content, until you played the game twice, once with each faction. So lack of symmetry has no impact whatsoever on your first playthrough.

It does have an impact if one path feels unfinished or like it lacks content, and that's the one you chose on your first playthrough.

 

[Cosmo]

Yeah, if you look at PS:T it's telling a deeply personal story centered on the player character, and yet at the same time it's also heavily focused on the world and its workings, and explored many themes of the Planescape universe without offering straight-up loredumps on how this universe works (you encounter things like the rule-of-three and how belief shapes reality first-hand, rather than being told about it).

Making your own IPs set in your own fictional worlds that you want to tell the player about does not neccessitate making the story revolve around the world, with the player only incidentally being a part of that story.

I think PS:T reflects some of the themes of its setting, but it doesn't really tell a story about it. A story about the Planescape setting would be something like the Sigil Faction War: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faction_War

But structurally Torment is way more "planescapy" than any story that would have only embraced this kind of surface events.
Hell, if you read the AD&D source material, Torment's is the only scenario that lives up to the universe.

As for Obsidian's focus on "world story", i don't think we have enough of a sample to make this kind of assumption ; for one (and for the time being) i really think it boils down to the lead's personal inclinations in this case, for example Sawyer's decision that the companion's stories should have an indecisive ending...
Also the alternative (avellone-type stories) are so extreme in their juxtaposition of a world and the hero's psyche that every other story would indeed seem to be indifferent to the protagonist.

 

[Blaine]

You do not even know if there's a symmetry in amount of content, until you played the game twice, once with each faction. So lack of symmetry has no impact whatsoever on your first playthrough.

I was expecting this response, but JarlFrank and Kit Walker already covered the replies. Thanks, fellas.

 

[Cael]

Yet some dumbfucks didn't see it coming, wished they were full companions, being surprised by their death

Nevermind those dumbfucks. What I want to know is who decided to kill off Aimee in NWN2? She was actually the nice and competent one and a pretty damned good generalist wizard to boot. Why couldn't they have taken Bevel instead ?

 

[DosBuster]

. I haven't seen any directly "racist" opinions

Then you aren't paying enough attention.

Regardless, Chris Avellone how was the experience of Obsidian working with Trey and Matt on South Park? I mean, I'm guessing you weren't directly involved but you probably heard/saw into that process at some point I'm guessing.

 

[Bocian]

Then you aren't paying enough attention.

Or you're just too sensitive, and think that addressing racial issues is "racist" by definition.

 

[Quillon]

Yet some dumbfucks didn't see it coming, wished they were full companions, being surprised by their death

Nevermind those dumbfucks. What I want to know is who decided to kill off Aimee in NWN2? She was actually the nice and competent one and a pretty damned good generalist wizard to boot. Why couldn't they have taken Bevel instead ?

Because having a tank at the start more important than having a wizard in case player's creating a squishy character.

 

[mondblut]

But the detail that will stick to me is that the interactions described at Obsidian basically sound like dealing with cRPG companion NPCs, endlessly interrupting the main quest with their interjections, all of which need to be responded to with the utmost obsequiousness in order to max out your relationship score with them. Is this a case of art imitating life, or life imitating art? (I wonder if the romance options there were similarly RPGish.)

That's why you are ought to roll your own party with none of those shit NPCs around.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

What do you guys even mean by symmetry here? Symmetry of power? You definitely don't need factions to be on similar power level. Symmetry in amount of content? You don't need that either.

You absolutely do need a roughly symmetrical amount of content in order for the two main factions to be equally attractive in a playthrough, particularly a first playthrough.

You do not even know if there's a symmetry in amount of content, until you played the game twice, once with each faction. So lack of symmetry has no impact whatsoever on your first playthrough.

It does have an impact if one path feels unfinished or like it lacks content, and that's the one you chose on your first playthrough.

I would argue that's almost always a quality issue first, not a quantity issue.

Take PoE. The Doemenels have pitiful amount of content if you would just compare the work that went to it. But it's really well done and it's the coolest faction questline to do.

​

Meanwhile, Crucible Knights have a huge fucking castle that had to take a lot of effort to design, they have their own unique look, they have unique monster class that attacks them during the course of a quest, overall I'm pretty sure they have more quests. And all of those quests suck gigantic dick.

 

[Cael]

Yet some dumbfucks didn't see it coming, wished they were full companions, being surprised by their death

Nevermind those dumbfucks. What I want to know is who decided to kill off Aimee in NWN2? She was actually the nice and competent one and a pretty damned good generalist wizard to boot. Why couldn't they have taken Bevel instead ?

Because having a tank at the start more important than having a wizard in case player's creating a squishy character.

It is level 3! Even 2 mages can take 'em! Well, 2 mages plus 2 familiars plus summons... :D

 

[Blaine]

Jason Liang
Care to explain your reasoning, or are you just going to drop off a rating and leave?

Sure. The majority of the computer gaming industry is based in Southern California for a reason. Not just for the weather and that Blizzard is also based in Irvine.

- California business and IP laws are specifically suitable to the hardware/software industry.
- Obviously close proximity to the Los Angeles media industry is a huge bonus. Can't get the contract if you can't take a business lunch.
- Californians are groomed to work in the entertainment industries from elementary school to college. From elementary school on, California public schools emphasize literature. That leads to a work force well suited to produce story-telling media, whether that is in film, television or gaming.
- California has an extensive network of public universities including both the UC system and the Cal State system to produce a workforce for software development, including gaming
- The film industry and the education system make California a desirable destination for "creative" producers. They want to live in California, not elsewhere.
- Californians are accustomed to investing in media ventures such as movies and games, rather than dump it in CDs or the stock market like the rest of the country. Being located in California allows game studios to meet with private capital investors for more easily than other states. We'll not talking about Peter Theils or Hollywood jews. Normal, middle class households with average household incomes between $100k-$300k are bread and butter investors in film and gaming.

None of this is stuff from me. I took a class when I was an EECS undergrad on California business and Software development, which is where I learned this.

Fair enough, thanks for clarifying. Nevertheless, California isn't the only show in town, perfectly good game development has been done elsewhere by more than one studio, and working by remote if absolutely necessary is more fashionable than ever. Maybe it's logistically impossible in some cases, and maybe it isn't.

I already knew one thing for certain, which is that many of them want to live in California, and frankly I think that's probably the biggest consideration by far. That's great, but they also ask for people's money to fund some of their games, so their desire to live on premium salaries becomes the business of potential backers. Where are those ripe-for-the-pickings private investors when it comes time for a new PoE? I guess crowdfunding on Fig is "investment" now too, though... not really buying that, never did, but hey.

Personally, and also in answer to Hoaxmetal, I'm inclined to believe that many employees would indeed move, because the great majority of people who work in game dev do so because they want to be game devs. There's a ton of competition for those slots, as I understand it. Good programming talent has already largely left the game development industry because it's famously dysfunctional and employee-antagonistic, and they can make a lot more money with far less hassle working elsewhere. People who specifically work on games don't have that luxury.

 

[JarlFrank]

What do you guys even mean by symmetry here? Symmetry of power? You definitely don't need factions to be on similar power level. Symmetry in amount of content? You don't need that either.

You absolutely do need a roughly symmetrical amount of content in order for the two main factions to be equally attractive in a playthrough, particularly a first playthrough.

You do not even know if there's a symmetry in amount of content, until you played the game twice, once with each faction. So lack of symmetry has no impact whatsoever on your first playthrough.

It does have an impact if one path feels unfinished or like it lacks content, and that's the one you chose on your first playthrough.

I would argue that's almost always a quality issue first, not a quantity issue.

Take PoE. The Doemenels have pitiful amount of content if you would just compare the work that went to it. But it's really well done and it's the coolest faction questline to do.

​

Meanwhile, Crucible Knights have a huge fucking castle that had to take a lot of effort to design, they have their own unique look, they have unique monster class that attacks them during the course of a quest, overall I'm pretty sure they have more quests. And all of those quests suck gigantic dick.

If we assume a consistent quality level throughout the game, with each faction being roughly on the same level quality-wise, the one faction with the least content will still be considered the least worthwhile playthrough due to quantity.

It's not about quality or quantity, it's about both.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Ignorance of how most people play games detected.

Why again would I give a rats how "most people" play? Every game I ever started, I start completely blind and I cut off all the outside information. It's me vs. the game. Once the game is beaten and it didn't suck, I might do another power playthrough where I look up builds and strategies and metagames and shit. But not on 1st save.

 

[Cyberarmy]

This thread've been to hell and back, and back to hell and back again. Such a ride.