George Ziets opening a new RPG studio - Digimancy Entertainment

[Lyric Suite]

Does that include say Messianic complex?

Hurr durr.

But, to answer seriously, i don't like megalomaniac villians, because that involves a certain degree of self delusion, where as someone who is attempting to obtain true power would have to be aware of the limits of his own being and the necessity to find a way to go beyond those limits.

 

[fantadomat]

The most wholesome thread on the Codex.

Mind Flayers porn incoming.

Spoiler

Is there any official word on whether mindflayers keep their genitalia?

Of course they keep them. How else fat tranny nerds could make fanfics and hentai?

 

[santino27]

The most wholesome thread on the Codex.

Mind Flayers porn incoming.

Spoiler

Is there any official word on whether mindflayers keep their genitalia?

Of course they keep them. How else fat tranny nerds could make fanfics and hentai?

Erogenous tentacles and growth spells, obviously.

 

[G Ziets]

G Ziets

What are some motivations that turn a character into a villain? Or do you think villainity is relative to the goals of the PC.

It could be nearly anything. I’ve often portrayed villainous characters as people who take misguided or morally questionable actions in pursuit of a greater goal, but that goal need not be selfish or evil. In Mask of the Betrayer, the Founder was willing to subject an innocent person (the player) to a horrific curse. She wasn’t cruel or sadistic, but she justified that decision to herself because she was trying to save her lover from a fate that was (literally) worse than death. In Dungeon Siege 3 (not a great narrative, but it did have a “gray” villain), Jeyne wiped out the Legion because they had betrayed and murdered her father, the former king, and then she went to war against her niece because she genuinely believed she would make a stronger queen… and maybe she was right. The key is to make villains multidimensional characters with admirable qualities to balance their flaws, and that will usually make them more believable and sympathetic to players.

Alternatively, you can have a story like Fallout: New Vegas, where two or more factions have conflicting, mutually exclusive goals and the player has to decide who to support and who to oppose. In other words, the player gets to decide who their adversary is. In FNV, Caesar’s Legion ended up being portrayed as fairly “evil,” but it’s not necessary for one side to be presented that way. They could be portrayed in a more sympathetic light, making the decision even harder for the player.

 

[G Ziets]

What are your thoughts on Age of Decadence?

How would you rank; Morrowind, Oblivion, or Skyrim?

What did you do on Lord of the Rings Online?

I enjoyed AoD, but it’s been a long time since I played, and it’s hard to remember details. Background system was great – I played a non-combat Loremaster, felt like my experience was tailored for my playstyle, and was impressed that I could pretty much avoid combat, focus on what I was good at, and still succeed in the game. It seemed like the story could have gone in many, many ways, which is very cool. I only played through it once, but recall that I ended up with a fairly “good” ending.

Morrowind >>> Skyrim > Oblivion

On LOTRO, I designed some quests and zones, including the human / hobbit newbie area, wrote a lot of dialogue, and developed the main story on Shadows of Angmar (though I left to take a job at Obsidian before the game shipped, and I suspect the story evolved further after I left).

 

[d1nolore]

What are your thoughts on Age of Decadence?

How would you rank; Morrowind, Oblivion, or Skyrim?

What did you do on Lord of the Rings Online?

I enjoyed AoD, but it’s been a long time since I played, and it’s hard to remember details. Background system was great – I played a non-combat Loremaster, felt like my experience was tailored for my playstyle, and was impressed that I could pretty much avoid combat, focus on what I was good at, and still succeed in the game. It seemed like the story could have gone in many, many ways, which is very cool. I only played through it once, but recall that I ended up with a fairly “good” ending.

Morrowind >>> Skyrim > Oblivion

On LOTRO, I designed some quests and zones, including the human / hobbit newbie area, wrote a lot of dialogue, and developed the main story on Shadows of Angmar (though I left to take a job at Obsidian before the game shipped, and I suspect the story evolved further after I left).

The Hobbit start was really well done, very immersive and fun. The whole Shire area was well done.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

G Ziets What did you do when you worked at Zenimax Online Studios?

 

[Prime Junta]

G Ziets I just want to tell you one thing, mostly because I really enjoyed your work in Mask of the Betrayer.

Whatever you set out to do, do it because you love it. Don't do what almost everybody in the games business does these days -- triangulate what they think the fans want to get maximal market coverage.

You have the talent, the skill, and the passion. Ride them. Your public will follow.

Spoiler

This isn't to say that you shouldn't sanity-check your ideas of course, we all gotta make rent. But do try not to lose sight of why you started making games in the first place. Pretty please?

 

[Sentinel]

I don't know what can change the nature of a man, but I think we found the man that can change the nature of the Codex.

 

[agentorange]

ArtStation is quite a place. You click on a random name and find something like this.

Spoiler

The problem with artstation is that if you stare at it long enough, 90% of the art blends together and you realize that very few artists have a distinctive style

This. Everything posted there is absolute snorecore. If you need an artist or art director or whatever then make sure to get someone with a brain and a real unique vision, and someone who shares a similar mindset to you that you can converse with, rather than one of the endless amounts of these nameless freelance concept illustrators that pump out the same looking hackneyed paint by numbers crap. Get someone who takes inspiration from mostly classical art rather than from comic books and other concept art.

 

[samuraigaiden]

Or just make some Anime bullshit

 

[Life of the Party]

Spoiler

 

[agentorange]

Or just make some Anime bullshit

With waifus. Even if the game is shit on every level, it will still sell (Persona 5).

To be more serious, one element I do wish Western and Eastern developers took from the Japanese is how, very often, every part of their game is stylised, including elements like the UI, and how they blend together (also Persona 5).

They don't have to take anything from Japanese games for that, Western and Eastern games also used to have great thematically appropriate UI designs.

I miss these types of UI, they made you feel that the developers took time and put care into making the whole game fit a specific vision, and absolutely hate how every single game now regardless of setting, art direction, etc insist on using the exact same, streamlined, one size fits all style of UI.

 

[Darkzone]

G Ziets

What are some motivations that turn a character into a villain? Or do you think villainity is relative to the goals of the PC.

It could be nearly anything. I’ve often portrayed villainous characters as people who take misguided or morally questionable actions in pursuit of a greater goal, but that goal need not be selfish or evil. In Mask of the Betrayer, the Founder was willing to subject an innocent person (the player) to a horrific curse. She wasn’t cruel or sadistic, but she justified that decision to herself because she was trying to save her lover from a fate that was (literally) worse than death. In Dungeon Siege 3 (not a great narrative, but it did have a “gray” villain), Jeyne wiped out the Legion because they had betrayed and murdered her father, the former king, and then she went to war against her niece because she genuinely believed she would make a stronger queen… and maybe she was right. The key is to make villains multidimensional characters with admirable qualities to balance their flaws, and that will usually make them more believable and sympathetic to players.

Alternatively, you can have a story like Fallout: New Vegas, where two or more factions have conflicting, mutually exclusive goals and the player has to decide who to support and who to oppose. In other words, the player gets to decide who their adversary is. In FNV, Caesar’s Legion ended up being portrayed as fairly “evil,” but it’s not necessary for one side to be presented that way. They could be portrayed in a more sympathetic light, making the decision even harder for the player.

I also had once this gray area opinion about villians and heros, but the real world taught me that this is also political. You cannot be apolitical, like you cannot not communicate, but you can choose what to communicate.
Let me take your answer and show you what you communicate in one simple example:
"I’ve often portrayed villainous characters as people who take misguided or morally questionable actions in pursuit of a greater goal" That is a left leaning modern position that implies that a person can be educated into not being a villain.
The leftist have the same position about misquidence and education. Hence they push all the transsexual agenda with their pedophiles Trannies to schools and mentaly vulnerable underaged childeren, for the sake of education of tolerance. While at the same time they show no tolerance towards other opinions and traditional european values. And this is not misguided, it implies villainous vice.
I'm not here criticising you and i'm not implying that you have similar traits. I'm only showing what is implicit within a statement, even if the statment seems to be very harmless. I could have used not so krass example and i could have talked here about the deconstruction and destruction of traditional white male heroes in modern myths and media, like in comics and film ( recent examples are Star Wars and Terminator ). But it is the same medal.

Nowadays i have grown older and wiser and therefore i prefer the aristotelian school of thought about Storytelling, Heroes and Villains. Heros have virtues and Villains have vices, and while the Hero ascends through his circle of virtues of Prudence, Justice, Fortitude and Temperance , the Villain descends because he lacks at last one of them. A hero makes the right decisions based upon his virtues and his decision is always self sacrificing, because he knows that there is something that stands above him. The villain sacrifices others for his goal. Notice why Superman stands for Truth, Justice and the American Way (Freedom).
I know that to disagree in this form with you, i will earn here much critique. And who am i to disagree with you? A Nobody. A ghost on the internet. Nevertheless i think, that you should think about it or you discard whatever i have writen here. And that is your decision.

 

[samuraigaiden]

Here's an idea. You begin the game with no UI at all and every new mechanic, skill, option, etc., introduced adds a UI element, until by the end of the game it's like playing Doom on the 3DO.

 

[The Great ThunThun*]

The entire idea that one can not be apolitical is a terrible misunderstanding. Every act is a human act. It is a product of human belief. Political is a subset of those acts where one tries to leverage their position in society specifically to gain influence over it as a whole. To try and claim that every theft, every expression of love, hate, belief is political is itself a political act to change the discourse of society to push a specific narrative. Don't fall for it.

 

[Egosphere]

The entire idea that one can not be apolitical is a terrible misunderstanding. Every act is a human act. It is a product of human belief. Political is a subset of those acts where one tries to leverage their position in society specifically to gain influence over it as a whole. To try and claim that every theft, every expression of love, hate, belief is political is itself a political act to change the discourse of society to push a specific narrative. Don't fall for it.

double negation. almost disagreed with that first sentence.

 

[G Ziets]

G Ziets What did you do when you worked at Zenimax Online Studios?

I worked on Elder Scrolls Online during preproduction. My title was Lead Quest Designer, but the role was more of a narrative lead. Since their MMO is set during a much earlier historical period, and they had never fully defined the state of the world at that time, most of my work was world-building – writing early drafts of the main story and zone stories, establishing important characters and factions, breaking the continent into zones, and helping the artists define the look of the world and factions. The main story of ESO changed a fair bit after I left, but they appear to have used a number of the characters and other elements I set up, which makes me happy.

I departed at the end of 2008 to return to Obsidian and work on Baldur's Gate 3… but that licensing deal fell through after I got back to California, and the team shifted onto Dungeon Siege 3 instead.

 

[lophiaspis]

G Ziets for a question on the more practical side of development, what are your thoughts on how to avoid the Fidelity Trap?

By which I mean the tendency to stuff games with more and more high fidelity presentation: 3d in place of simple 2d, more complex 3d models, more voiceacting, and so on, until (a) the budget balloons together with devtime and (b) ironically, the game becomes less immersive than it would have been without all these superfluous elements.

The best recent example is Battle Brothers versus Phoenix Point. Battle Brothers’ graphics are more immersive than Phoenix Point’s despite probably costing one tenth or less. Battle Brothers has to pay one artist, Phoenix Point has to feed 30+ Bulgarian slaves that still produce a worse result than the single 2d artist. And this issue has been a curse on games for decades, with too many examples to mention. Imagine if KODP or its sequel had gone with 3d models instead of 2d screens. Imagine if RimWorld had been 3d: it would have taken twice as long to make, run like shit, lost its hyper-moddability and still looked far worse than it does. If you add any element to the game, it has to be excellent, otherwise it will detract from the game, so if you can’t make it excellent then it’s better to leave it out. And yet this is the type of design decision that gets made all the time. Keeping shit simple is one of the developer’s most important skills and it’s strange that it so often gets forgotten.

How do you propose to keep your representation lo-fi enough that it stays in the ‘sweet spot’ of immersion? (And budget)

Edit: And I should emphasize that the main problem with this Fidelity Trap is that higher fidelity forces you to *cut back features* both for direct budget/time reasons and because you need to dumb down the game to recoup the bigger budget with a bigger and dumber market. For instance, Phoenix Point is far inferior to 1994’s X-Com in terms of features. In fact, there hasn’t ever been an X-Com clone that has feature parity with the original, besides, arguably, Apocalypse. I can only assume this is because they all had to sacrifice some core gameplay to the ‘awesome’ (shit) 3d graphics. Imagine how mechanically deep Phoenix Point could have been if it had Battle Brothers style sprite graphics.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

The best recent example is Battle Brothers versus Phoenix Point. Battle Brothers’ graphics are more immersive than Phoenix Point’s

 

[lophiaspis]

Spoiler

I have to second this. The problem with Planescape and Dark Sun is that we already have great games in those settings, so anything George could do would feel like a bit of a retread. And Ravenloft just has too much B-movie schlock in it. And none of those settings have any real surprises for old PnP gamers. But Symbaroum is a very well designed and written modern dark/weird fantasy setting that lets you dungeoneer with artistic flair. Probably the best PnP setting from the last decade, and gives a lot of the same vibes as MotB so right up GZ alley.

 

[Nano]

I departed at the end of 2008 to return to Obsidian and work on Baldur's Gate 3… but that licensing deal fell through after I got back to California, and the team shifted onto Dungeon Siege 3 instead.

The bitterness here is palpable.

 

[Lyric Suite]

"Political" in current year means:

1) Social revenge against those who are deemed to hold "privilege", according to some warped Marxist racism and sexism where the skin color and genitalia of some individuals are seen as synonymous with "class" and must be attacked accordingly to rectify perceived "injustices" perpetrated by those possessing those immutable qualities.
2) 2+2=5 propaganda, which is essentially propaganda to push a nominalistic world view:

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x27d5ku

Compared to those, the kind of "leftism" one found in a game like Torment is old hat. I don't know what political leanings Ziets has, but i would recommend he remains within the bounds of the anachronism that is now 90s politics and not try to use his little indie game as a platform to bring about some kind of social revolution. Devs need to chose whether they want to be artists and entertainers or whether they want to be activists and alienate their audience in the process.

 

[Lyric Suite]

more voiceacting

Is there a place for a game with just text in current year? Because i can't think of anything that would limited writing more than having to voice act everything.

 

[Lyric Suite]

The entire idea that one can not be apolitical is a terrible misunderstanding. Every act is a human act. It is a product of human belief. Political is a subset of those acts where one tries to leverage their position in society specifically to gain influence over it as a whole. To try and claim that every theft, every expression of love, hate, belief is political is itself a political act to change the discourse of society to push a specific narrative. Don't fall for it.

This is an abuse of language you guys are engaging in, because a world view is one thing, but political action is another, because the latter will always have a "meta" aim.

Thus, Linda Hamilton in T2 was a product of a world view, one which was based on the 2+2=5 notion that men and women are the same, but the character itself was organic to the story and was not thus "political". Linda Hamilton's screed in the same movie about how "men" don't know what it actually means to create was however political, because it expressed a specific ideological talking point that was completely inconsistent with both the character and the story (i'd like to think that scene was Linda Hamilton's own idea because i refuse to believe Cameron was that retarded).