Incline The End Of The Dark Age

[lophiaspis]

Obsidian Entertainment defined the Dark Age of CRPGs like the Byzantine Empire defined the Middle Ages. It was a shitty, broken, mismanaged, tired little has-been holding on beyond all reason. And yet, in those dark years after the fall of Troika, in that cold age of tragedy, betrayal, and want, Obsidian was all but the only living remnant of the glories of the past, and the only dim glimmer of hope for the future.

That future, long derided by weary cynics as a pipe dream, has arrived. Even if only Owlcat Games existed, prospects would still be brighter than at any time in the past 15 years. But Owlcat is just one star in a galaxy of talented CRPG studios brought to the forefront by new and wondrous technology: ZA/UM. Whalenought. Larian. Inn Between Worlds. Stygian. These are some of the studios that have not only absorbed the wisdom of the ancients, but are taking it in new and fascinating directions, something that would have been inconceivable just 7 years ago. If Troika had been around for the Kickstarter and Steam age, it would have taken its rightful place among them. And there is no reason to doubt that there are many more to come.

The Dark Age is over. Long live the Age of Incline.

 

[Lilura]

Troika's worth far exceeded the combined worth of Larian, Owl Cat, Obsidian and the entire post-Renaissance taken as a whole.

Don't compare garbage with Troika, pls.

 

[Neanderthal]

Hope is the first step on the road to disappointment.

 

[Beastro]

Obsidian Entertainment defined the Dark Age of CRPGs like the Byzantine Empire defined the Middle Ages. It was a shitty, broken, mismanaged, tired little has-been holding on beyond all reason. And yet, in those dark years after the fall of Troika, in that cold age of tragedy, betrayal, and want, Obsidian was all but the only living remnant of the glories of the past, and the only dim glimmer of hope for the future.

It is if you look on Obsidian as a direct successor to Black Isle and Troika, especially Troika, but it lacks the age for this comparison.

The Byzantine Empire fought tooth and nail until it was ground into the dirt, then became the framework from which the Ottomans built their own successes from. Obsidian is more Troika cept it traded a longer life for less memorable games.

 

[The Brazilian Slaughter]

Except the Eastern Roman Empire was pretty cool, whereas Obsidian made RTwP games.

 

[jf8350143]

By Owlcat you mean the studio that make a game where everything fun and exciting is from the PnP system it based on, while the devs was desperately trying to ruin your experience by messing the game up with their endless bugs, awful game design choices and shitty balance?

 

[Tigranes]

"Hey look, an RPG company died! The end of the dark ages!"

The true incline was heralded by the likes of Styg and VD actually going out and making good games. It didn't have much to do with Obsidian, or with dumbasses who obsess about companies and developers instead of the actual games.

 

[fantadomat]

Obsidian haven't made a good game in 7-8 years,the last good thing they put out was New Vegas.

 

[IncendiaryDevice]

Who?

 

[aweigh]

obsidian made MotB, KOTOR 2 and F:NV. they suck now, during your so-called age of incline (i.e. kickstarter); they did not suck during your "age of darkness".

EDIT: Re-reading your post in its entirety is really :cringe:

"wondrous new technology"
"fascinating new directions"
"wisdom of the ancients"
"...larian..."

ayyy lol

 

[Grauken]

He writes some good copy, clearly angling for a marketing position

 

[Whiny-Butthurt-Liberal]

All of the studios you listed are much worse than obshitian and ineptile.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

Meh, Obsidian never defined anything. It lived in the gray area between the retardation of the mainstream decline and the actual achievement of quality, never embracing the former and never reaching the latter. It was like the promising son of a genius (Black Isle) who did a couple of things in life (F:NV, MotB) to avoid complete infamy, but never lived up to its true potential, and faded away into history, as other, more talented studios took over the niche markets.

To be fair, being that hindsight is 20/20, we could've seen this coming in the details. At Black Isle, their premium talent worked on Fallout, Fallout 2 and Planescape: Torment, 3 of the greats, while Sawyer and other more junior members of the studio worked on the Icewind Dale games, which were relative trash. Most of the prime talent then left for Troika (where to be fair, they had their own issues), and only Avellone remained. At Obsidian, Avellone gradually moved away from his area of expertise (writing), and thus was Black Isle's entire prime treasure squandered. Most of the Obsidian games were made by what would be 2nd rate BIS talent.

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

Troika's worth far exceeded the combined worth of Larian, Owl Cat, Obsidian and the entire post-Renaissance taken as a whole.

Don't compare garbage with Troika, pls.

To be fair, if Obsidian had gone bankrupt in a blaze of glory six or seven years ago, they’d have a much better reputation here and people would pine for all of their lost potential (still not in the same ballpark as Troika, I know). If Troika had decided to stay in business for ten more years they would’ve had to decline just to keep the lights on, too. Not sure whether they should be praised or condemned for refusing to bend and committing corporate seppuku; like the French Revolution it’s still too soon to tell.

PS. Play Kingmaker. Believe me, it’s better than writing about twinks.

We have many options, and the above are by no means super-twinks; just quick and dirty rush-jobs to get through Normal mode.

Here is another comparison to show the power of twinking...

Although this made me laugh so hard I spat out my dinner.

 

[Shaewaroz]

What a great time to start a thread about the Age of Incline, with Inxile's and Obsidian's last agonizing screams still echoing in the dark hallways.

 

[laclongquan]

Your Russian overlord has come so obviously the Dark Age has ended.

 

[Shaewaroz]

felipepepe I think it's time for a new RPG Codex Chronicles video, the last one seems a little dated now (although it's still awesome).

 

[Monkeyfinger]

Troika was a C level developer. PoE1 > all troika games put together.

 

[TemplarGR]

Troika was a C level developer. PoE1 > all troika games put together.

Troika was trash, i concur. But nostalgia is a hell of a drug... And being a sperg too...

 

[Luckmann]

Troika was a C level developer. PoE1 > all troika games put together.

Troika was trash, i concur. But nostalgia is a hell of a drug... And being a sperg too...

Kill yourselves.

 

[evdk]

Troika was a C level developer. PoE1 > all troika games put together.

I mean, in the long run PoE1 is cheaper than Ambien, so I guess?

 

[Lilura]

To be fair, if Obsidian had gone bankrupt in a blaze of glory six or seven years ago, they’d have a much better reputation here and people would pine for all of their lost potential (still not in the same ballpark as Troika, I know).

I honestly personally wouldn't. At that point, all they had made were a few mods (MotB, New Vegas, KotoR 2).

They were always the newfags that came after Interplay, Black Isle and Troika.

One of their key "designers" was a guy who started in the industry as a fucking web designer. In a dev studio, at around that time, that was one step up from emptying the wastepaper baskets and making people coffees when they click their fingers at you. Now, he thinks he's a big RPG theorist and gives seminars to all the 'tards that want to go to uni in order to learn a craft that Tim Cain learned by himself on an 80s micro-computer.

If Troika had decided to stay in business for ten more years they would’ve had to decline just to keep the lights on, too. Not sure whether they should be praised or condemned for refusing to bend and committing corporate seppuku; like the French Revolution it’s still too soon to tell.

Three games that now have cult status (and the rep of those games grows every year), is good enough. At the end of the day, it's enough.

 

[Rahdulan]

The true incline was heralded by the likes of Styg and VD actually going out and making good games. It didn't have much to do with Obsidian, or with dumbasses who obsess about companies and developers instead of the actual games.

I am inclined to agree with this. We're kinda past the age of RPG titans of old ruling the scene like they used to, and we have for quite a while now been in an era where independents actually get to develop their own projects. Are they all 10/10 GOTY material? Not necessarily, but you can basically find a lot of stuff that suits your particular taste and let's not forget that pretty much all of the new devs/studios are precisely that - newcomers. Give them time to polish their craft a bit and who knows what masterpieces we might get.

 

[Commissar Draco]

Your Russian overlord has come so obviously the Dark Age has ended.

Trojka and Obsidian have fallen now Owl Cat and Atom Team are Third Rome.

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

To be fair, if Obsidian had gone bankrupt in a blaze of glory six or seven years ago, they’d have a much better reputation here and people would pine for all of their lost potential (still not in the same ballpark as Troika, I know).

I honestly personally wouldn't. At that point, all they had made were a few mods (MotB, New Vegas, KotoR 2).

They were always the newfags that came after Interplay, Black Isle and Troika.

One of their key "designers" was a guy who started in the industry as a fucking web designer. In a dev studio, at around that time, that was one step up from emptying the wastepaper baskets and making people coffees when they click their fingers at you. Now, he thinks he's a big RPG theorist and gives seminars to all the 'tards that want to go to uni in order to learn a craft that Tim Cain learned by himself on an 80s micro-computer.

If Troika had decided to stay in business for ten more years they would’ve had to decline just to keep the lights on, too. Not sure whether they should be praised or condemned for refusing to bend and committing corporate seppuku; like the French Revolution it’s still too soon to tell.

Three games that now have cult status (and the rep of those games grows every year), is good enough. At the end of the day, it's enough.

But they’re not actual newfags, the original Obsidian crew were the heart of Black Isle. When Troika was in business, proto-Obsidian was making PS:T, IWD 1 + 2 (the latter had your despised web designer as its design lead—good encounter design for a webmaster!), and KOTOR2 (I figure we split the baby on Fallout 2). Those are some pretty great mods (Jesus, everything from BIS was essentially a mod...)!

My point is that when Troika was making great games, so were the guys who later formed Obsidian (well, good to great). Troika went out of business because publishers no longer wanted to fund the kind of games they wanted to make, which meant Obsidian couldn’t make those types of games either.

When the Obsidian guys were at Black Isle during the Renaissance, they made high quality stuff. When Cain and Boyarsky left Troika, they went on to make junk for years. Troika and Black Isle were the right guys at the right time. Old Obsidian were the right guys at the wrong time. New Obsidian feels like the wrong guys at what may be the right time again.