Incline Chris Avellone Appreciation Station

[Cael]

He wrote 32 pages, with each page being the size of 10 regular pages.

One normal page:

One MCA page:

 

[Roguey]

https://twitter.com/ChrisAvellone/status/1090466660559908866

Fallout 2 is one of my favourite games and was one of the big inspirations for me to get in this industry and specifically work to become a designer. I know you feel, looking back, that it’s disjointed. I’m wondering if you have any ideas of how you’d “fix” it now?

Probably do a "smoothing" pass of the narrative elements for starters: often, the quests are fun, but I'd change the context for some to make them more 50s-ish, less silly/irreverent, and more coherent - in short, do a creative lead pass.

The central quest/threat of F2 is fine and would leave intact, but I’d add more opportunities to interact w/the Enclave and make a better "boss" than Horrigan (he could remain, but he’s too shallow to be a main figure – he’s a terrible villain & poorly designed/introduced).

I think F2 is a lot of fun, but a lot of the fun elements could be kept easily, design-wise, and nothing would be lost by making some parts more grounded in the lore and tone established by Fallout 1 - and it would have made for a better game, imo.

Funny thing is that original Fallout wasn't really 50s other than the old world tech design.

True Story: One of the best designers we had at Black Isle (Dave Maldonado) we brought up from QA on to Planescape: Torment because of how he wrote his bugs (which showed he understood narrative really well, and he wrote excellent bugs).

And then he went on to make some of the most obnoxious content in Icewind Dale II (the forest maze and the monk temple trials) because he thought the IWD fork of the Infinity Engine could support the same tricks the Torment fork supported.

 

[FeelTheRads]

The amount of 50s stuff in F2 is enough and consistent with F1.

The idea to dump in a lot of 50s crap with no logic behind it started with Van Buren. And then Bethesda came and, as Bethesda does, took it to full-retard level.

 

[2house2fly]

A few more opportunities to interact with the Enclave would be neat. It used to be that Avellone being that critical of a character was a clear sign that he himself wrote them, but now that he's Psycho Avellone, I'm not sure any more

 

[StaticSpine]

Frank may be shallow as a character but he looks so badass.

 

[Fairfax]

And then he went on to make some of the most obnoxious content in Icewind Dale II (the forest maze and the monk temple trials) because he thought the IWD fork of the Infinity Engine could support the same tricks the Torment fork supported.

It's not his fault the game didn't have a director anymore.

 

[Fairfax]

 

[Fairfax]

 

[Latro]

yen cucks you, triss loves you

pretty easy choice

 

[Fairfax]

He's chattery tonight:




In a Codex interview, MCA said that the Disciple wasn't meant to be like that:

JMR: Which of your famous characters have ended up going in a different direction?

MCA: Um... Ulysses did. Kreia didn't. Um... the Disciple in KotOR 2 did. He turned into kind of a big pussy, but that for some reason, that's how he came out.

He also wanted to allow Hanharr to become a Dark Jedi, but it was vetoed by Lucasfilm because Lucas didn't want Wookiees and Hutts to be Jedi (athough the EU had a few at that point).

 

[Nutria]

So the purpose of this thread is to look for wedge issues that will drive Chris Avellone & Josh Sawyer apart, right?

I have to agree about the misogyny of the Legion. There were a million other ways they could have played that. Maybe the Legion expects women to stay at home and respects them within the household. Maybe they want women to stay at home but there's a few who break from gender roles and are respected nonetheless, as has happened throughout history.

Making them just treat all women as property is cartoon villain territory. It's not consistent with how humanity has lived around the world over the ages and it explicitly tells you that these are the bad guys, so don't ever consider their viewpoints. That in turn ruins any character who is even slightly sympathetic to the Legion because it makes them fellow travelers to psychotic turbonazis while we're fighting total war against them.

 

[user]

Making them just treat all women as property is cartoon villain territory. It's not consistent with how humanity has lived around the world over the ages and it explicitly tells you that these are the bad guys, so don't ever consider their viewpoints. That in turn ruins any character who is even slightly sympathetic to the Legion because it makes them fellow travelers to psychotic turbonazis while we're fighting total war against them.

Yes, totally unrealistic, never happened in human history, only in human cartoon history (all bad guys were PC-friendly in human history after all) and it's totally irrational for a fascist/despotic and borderline delirious regime to treat people belonging to a most often physically weaker genre as property.

The real reason misogyny doesn't work is a completely different one.

And wtf is wrong with people that trust Pete Hines?!? Wtf is going on with the world...

 

[Cael]

Wtf is going on with the world...

Allow me to summarise all that is wrong with the western world:

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Making them just treat all women as property is cartoon villain territory. It's not consistent with how humanity has lived around the world over the ages and it explicitly tells you that these are the bad guys, so don't ever consider their viewpoints. That in turn ruins any character who is even slightly sympathetic to the Legion because it makes them fellow travelers to psychotic turbonazis while we're fighting total war against them.

 

[user]

Wtf is going on with the world...

Allow me to summarise all that is wrong with the western world:

Well, can't argue with that Aristotle dude, silence is this particular woman's glory.

 

[Orma]

Maybe they want women to stay at home but there's a few who break from gender roles and are respected nonetheless, as has happened throughout history.

Well, maybe the female courier is exactly that for Caesar's Legion?

I don't remember anyone even mentioning your sex other than the arena edgelord.

 

[fantadomat]

Wtf is going on with the world...

Allow me to summarise all that is wrong with the western world:

What is wrong with a pregnant woman?

 

[Roguey]

I joined the Legion on my third run, Chris is talking pure nonsense. Not everyone has your specific perspective. Additionally

Complete Render Unto Caesar. 3.8%

That's at least 76,000 people who had no problem with the Legion. The independent path has at least 200,000, so we're not looking at a massive gulf either. Josh himself has said he isn't surprised that the Legion has the least amount of completed playthroughs because evil paths just aren't popular with most people. Tyranny is further proof of this since the Scarlet Chorus ending is only slightly greater than the rebel ending (which requires a specific set of actions most people won't even consider to try).

It could have easily been an 85, make no mistake, and layoffs could have been avoided completely. That 1% made me do a hard evaluation about how Obsidian makes games, where the Directors' focus should be

Bus! Bus! Bus! Bus!

 

[Cael]

Wtf is going on with the world...

Allow me to summarise all that is wrong with the western world:

What is wrong with a pregnant woman?

Find out who it is, then get back to me

 

[2house2fly]

There are like two or three Legion members who are explicitly misogynist. That said they're an unappealing faction due to Caesar's plan of pitting two opposite forces against each other to create a middle ground that's greater than both being something that isn't really likely to bear fruit, and them not having many quests. But having them be joinable also lends weight to the player's choice to fight them- being good doesn't mean anything if you can't also be evil.

I guess Avellone's perspective that they shouldn't have been joinable explains why Ulysses still tells you how to defeat Lanius even when you're siding with the Legion.

 

[fantadomat]

Wtf is going on with the world...

Allow me to summarise all that is wrong with the western world:

What is wrong with a pregnant woman?

Find out who it is, then get back to me

Wrong forum mate,this the codex,post a pic of myron from fallout 2 and tell me to find who he is,not some slutty cocksucker celebrity or what ever she is.

 

[The_Mask]

Tyranny is further proof of this since the Scarlet Chorus ending is only slightly greater than the rebel ending (which requires a specific set of actions most people won't even consider to try).

I hate to go on a tangent here, especially when it comes to Tyranny, but I feel I must express my personal run-down of the game.

• So my first playthrough was with the Legion or whatever their name was, and with that I quickly realized that I was simply being a coward, and bid my time until unironically their leader (whatever his name was) simply stepped off because I turned to be him in the end.

I view that as the "lawful evil" playthrough.

• My second playthrough was with the Chorus. I appreciated that I kept my individuality through-out the game, but in the end I felt I became exactly what I hated the most in an "evil character" - murderous and chaotically stupid.

I view that as the "chaotic evil" playthrough.

• My third playthrough revolved around "what can I do to defeat the enemy overlord?", but essentially in the back of my mind I still felt the need to have allies. So I went with "corrupting" the Rebels, using them. Kept my sense of individuality. Wasn't a murderous idiot. But still evil.

I view that as the "neutral evil" playthrough.

• And now, obviously the best playthrough is the one where you realize that evil, true evil does not need allies. Power to do evil or be evil does not come from symbiotic relationships. It comes from within. Resourcefullness in the purpose of self. (that's the main idea - things are more complex on a philosophical level, but let's not go there)

So that's the "real" evil playthrough of Tyranny.



The fact that most people didn't get through the game enough to see these outlines is a bit sad, but contrasts even more with Sawyer's Legion of "Caesar", as your point so finely suggests. "Caesars'" Legion is cardboard generic unidimensional evil, akin with the same image Vlad Țepeș aka Vlad the Impaler has (people whom we don't like lie upon sticks in the air), and probably the weakest point of F:NV(albeit a good game), whereas Tyranny actually tries very hard to give dimensions to evil (in an albeit poor game).


tl;dr:

vs

 

[2house2fly]

It's Kim Kardashian, she's married to the rapper Kanye West. I think she's of Armenian descent? She owns a clothing company or something. I'm not sure which of those facts is pertinent.

 

[Fairfax]

I joined the Legion on my third run, Chris is talking pure nonsense. Not everyone has your specific perspective. Additionally

Complete Render Unto Caesar. 3.8%

That's at least 76,000 people who had no problem with the Legion. The independent path has at least 200,000, so we're not looking at a massive gulf either.

You missed his point. He's not saying nobody wanted to join the Legion. He's saying you should have factions that the vast majority would at least consider joining. The idea never crossed a lot of people's minds (especially female players), which he considers a failure in faction design.

Josh himself has said he isn't surprised that the Legion has the least amount of completed playthroughs because evil paths just aren't popular with most people. Tyranny is further proof of this since the Scarlet Chorus ending is only slightly greater than the rebel ending (which requires a specific set of actions most people won't even consider to try).

Yes, evil paths are less popular, but MCA's approach would be to have an evil/grey faction that's attractive to non-evil PCs as well. The original Legion was supposed to be like that.

Bus! Bus! Bus! Bus!

Already said that stuff in the interview thread.

 

[user]

I don't think evil can be multi-dimensional only if it's grey. That's rpghipster talk. And Vlad wasn't "cardboard generic evil" at all - he just did one of the most practical things one could do in his situation, seeing it from his point of view, and I believe that alone is both realistic and rational. Sometimes making things unrealistically complex is even worse than them being one-dimensional because they can just end up being plain ol' stupid.

Anyway, normally, when wanting to create a virtual universe, factions etc, real-life prejudice/ethics shouldn't get in the way of that (other than only for inspiration). But you have to take them into account - not to the point of being PC to an idiotic and unrealistic degree, but enough not to alienate others - because creating a joinable faction that none wants to join is obviously kind of a waste.