Obsidian General Discussion Thread

oh man, the nostalgia, it's killing me

dork farces was tremendous fun

 

Still is

 

There will be a talk about dialogue editor at GDC in March: https://schedule.gdconf.com/session/technical-tools-for-authoring-branching-dialogue/862202

 

I liked the dialogue in that quest. Especially since how brutal some of what you can say to the prostitute is.

 

Yeah I have nothing bad to say about that quest other than remembering the rage other people had over all the quests in Defiance Bay that required seeing all those loading screens.

Now, whoever made the quest that made VD rage committed a true crime against common sense (the one where you're nearly murdered and have to kill people over prostitute prices of all things).

 

I don't think microsoft has actually thought what exactly it is they want, they just realized, to their horror, that they were outgunned and outmanned in the field of development studios and sony was paddling them in sales, popularity and viability. At least to me, it looks like microsoft is just buying up everything and anything they can grab to even the divide between the two giants.

 

I don't think Microsoft will interfere with creative direction for now, it'd be foolish to rock the boat so early. However, considering the state in which some of their recent exclusives have been released, it seems they're still strict about deadlines. Obsidian has always struggled with deadlines, so it'll be interesting to see how they'll handle their first MS projects.

 

Matt Campbell https://www.linkedin.com/in/matt-campbell-b682a114/ is one of their recent hires. Has history at Inxile and Blind Squirrel Games. Obsidian also hired some other dev from Blind Squirrel Games, but since my search function is limited (for this month) on LinkedIn I can't recheck who it is.

Anyways, they've definately ramped up hiring people as of recent. Project Mississippi is getting it's staff.

 

Who's leading it?

 

That's the milllion dollar question.

 

Isn't Josh done with PoE games? maybe him or the guy that did Stick of Truth.

I kinda hope its Josh, kinda want to see what he'll make if its not PoE like and hopefully maybe AAA like.

 

Josh said he was done with Pillars of Eternity. Seeing how Brandon Adler is leading the DLC, it's quite likely that the possible finishing act would be lead by Adler.
Josh hopes to create that medieval/tactical rpg of his. From what he's said about it, it would seem like a smaller project for the company.
Parker wants to create Skyrim of his own. Someone claimed that Josh has been playing a lot of Skyrim lately, which could hint that Josh is on board with Parker's game.
Brian Heins is doing something in the shadows or working on Outer Worlds.

 

He has, but then he's /always/ playing a lot of Skyrim.

 

managing a half decent skyrim modlist is the only thing that comes close to poe balancing with about the same level of disappointment

 

Obs' not making a fucking fantasy game in a row would be too incline(for me), so Mississippi's gotta be fantasy and if so it would be set in Eora/3rd action PoE, right?

 

I thought this was because he was being moved to Outer Worlds? And wanted to give feedback on combat from a First Person Perspective or some shit.

 

Studying Skyrim to give feedback on FPS combat? that's kinda funny.

Combat in Outer World kinda reminds me a little bit with Bioshock games (Didn't play them tho so not that sure), wouldn't those games be better for that or maybe some of the gun shooters games if it was for Outer World.

 

Being able to hang out with Rekke in 3rd person graphics and braid each others hair would be too good!

 

Sherry i found your friend

 

Nah, Josh has said that he's involved purely in a consultative capacity as the studio's design director. Avellone said Feargus tried to make Sawyer an executive producer on TOW to pad the bill for Private Division, but apparently that didn't stick. Tim Cain calls him the team autist.

Also according to Avellone, Chris Parker (Obsidian's second in command) wants to use Microsoft's money to make something like Skyrim. Given that Sawyer already directed a Bethesda style game for Obsidian, I'd be very surprised if he's not on this project.

 

So, he has poor taste in games

 

Josh is a weirdo, but you’re clearly just being edgy considering the man lists Darklands, PoR, and Fallout as his favorite games (as I’m sure you know).

More likely, he’s just being a good capitalist stooge.

 

Crackdown 3 was supposed to release in 2016.

 

Yeah, but it's an odd case. It seemed to be in development hell, and it was a collaboration between multiple studios. One was bought by Epic, one was closed as a result (most went to Epic), then Sumo became the main developer, with help from another 2-3 studios IIRC.

I was thinking of recent releases that were buggy and/or lacked content at launch, like State of Decay 2, Sea of Thieves, and Halo Wars 2.