Obsidian and inXile acquired by Microsoft

[StrongBelwas]

Are there no rumors yet of any new Obsidian game coming now with Microsoft moneys?

Well Avellone said this :

The indications from Obs. is that Chris Parker is calling the shots for the next "AAA" project (his shallow take: "hey, I get to make Skyrim!"), so I'm already done even if ol' "hope my employees guess frame of mind today" Chris Parker's management style wastes countless dollars and time.

I wonder how much patience Microsoft will have with that management style with Sony's current lead on them.

 

[Sigourn]

Is Wasteland 4: Las Vegas out yet?

 

[Nano]

Obsidian's received a lot of criticism on glassdoor for not promoting from within (and also for not promoting women but ehhhhhhhhhhh). A decision like that wouldn't be ideal.

That's what they get for hiring so many mediocre writers.

 

[hexer]

• he is dismissive of players that played and analysed these games to death, including players that have more gameplay experience and knowledge than him, being on the Codex or not; never mind that these players remained faithful to Obsidian when nobody cared about them, which also makes him ungrateful;

Exactly! Here's his quote from GDC Europe 2011 talk regarding CRPG players expressing their opinion publicly

Another problem is that "we listen to the vocal players, who in many cases are wrong-headed."

The rest of the article offers additional insight into his confused mind...
https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/126595/GDC_Europe_Obsidians_Five_Hard_Lessons_Of_RPG_Design.php

 

[Roguey]

That's what they get for hiring so many mediocre writers.

Well everyone thought Fensty was great because of his work on the trial in NWN2, Mask of the Betrayer, Vault 11, and Beyond the Beef but we saw what happened when he became lead. Zyklon Beekers accurately predicted something like this would happen too.

http://www.nma-fallout.com/threads/...s-honest-hearts-coming-17th-may.195553/page-2

Fenstermaker is a good writer but that doesn't mean he should be handed a project director position. Obsidian has regular folk for that, like Sawyer and Avellone.
...
Anyway, my world works as in "the right people for the right job". Don't make dedicated writers team leaders. Gaider has been BioWare's #1 (or #2) writer for years now yet he's never bumped up beyond "lead writer" because that's what he's best at. You make it sound as if it's a knock on Fenstermaker to let him do what he's great at.

Also, just so we're clear, Twinks, the project lead is not always the one responsible for the initial concept or creative direction of a DLC. Well, responsible in the business sense, yes, but it doesn't tell you Fenstermaker couldn't be given a big chunk of creative work.
...
That's true. It doesn't necessarily make him a good fit to lead anything

Sorry. I just have a thing about over-promoting people until their specific talents no longer fit what they're asked to do. It happens too much, especially in the gaming industry.

 

[Deleted Member 22431]

That's what they get for hiring so many mediocre writers.

That's what they get from believing that cRPG writer is a profession. If you don't have a solid grasp of cRPG fundamentals and development, you shouldn't get anywhere near a cRPG.

 

[Deleted Member 22431]

The indications from Obs. is that Chris Parker is calling the shots for the next "AAA" project (his shallow take: "hey, I get to make Skyrim!"), so I'm already done even if ol' "hope my employees guess frame of mind today" Chris Parker's management style wastes countless dollars and time.

I wonder how much patience Microsoft will have with that management style with Sony's current lead on them.

The guy that ruined Alpha Protocol and doesn't help with anything will be the lead of the next AAA project. Hilarious shit.

 

[Fairfax]

Another example of classic Josh arrogance https://rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/sawyer-and-toee-troika-bis-and-bio.2282/

If I abandon my team, I don't know if I'd be able to respect myself.

I wonder if he respected himself after abandoning IWD2.

(I'd agree with him except Troika was constrained by having to adapt a lousy module, though the lousy module choice was theirs, as was the dull dialogue)

The original adventure isn't bad. It's overrated as a whole, but T1 is pretty good, and the dungeon is ok (if the DM is good). I agree that it was a bad choice, though. It doesn't work very well in a video game conversion, and 3.5E makes it a drag.

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

Sawyer obviously made a lot of mistakes. He was overconfident. But I can’t believe how many people are angry at him for doing what we do here every damn day.

He has strong opinions about RPGs? The horror! He thought he was right about things that he turned out to be wrong about? Unforgivable! He disagrees with people who don’t share his design philosophy? The nerve!

Wouldn’t it be worse if he didn’t have strong opinions on game design? I mean, ideally they’d be the right opinions, but someone who’s passionately wrong about a few things can still make good games. Someone who has no passion for this stuff would have no business making games in the first place. If Sawyer was more open minded, who’s to say he’d listen to Roxor and not simply give more credence to the idiots on SA?

Anyone who fails at something will seem like they were full of hubris in retrospect. Sawyer’s real problem is asperger’s. I’m not kidding. It explains his complete lack of tact. It explains why he doesn’t understand how neurotypical people play games or what they value. It perfectly explains his Comic Book Guy vocal inflection and his intense fixation on the minutia of bicycle repair.

***

My beloved Megan Starks has written for more than two games. She designed content for Fallen Earth and Wildstar before coming to Obsidian. She’s bad at making companions, but other than that her stuff can be pretty good (she wrote the best part of Deadfire for fuck’s sake).

 

[Thonius]

It's simple really. Codex just demands apologies from Sawyer. That's it. In verbal, written and youtube format. He must admit that d20 systems are superior, denounce his d100 (or whatever it was), compose notarial statement with his lawyer present that he won't try to dethrone d20, ever.

 

[Shadenuat]

I think Sawyer would leave before being made to direct BG3. I don't think he likes these types of games at this point.

 

[pomenitul]

I've always had a particular fondness for genre films made by directors who have nothing but contempt for said genre (e.g. Tarkovsky's Solaris, which is only nominally science-fiction) so I sympathize with Josh's predicament. His strategy of dissatisfaction, disenchantment and disillusion is especially violent when applied to fantasy RPGs, however, since they tend to thrive on nostalgia and an ultimately child-like willingness to suspend disbelief. Some will appreciate the irony, others less so. Regardless, it is ultimately in line with the tried-and-true Obsidian staple of deconstruction, with the proviso that Sawyer takes it a step further by applying it to the sub-genre as a whole, not just to its tropes. He does so with a mercenary's dutiful single-mindedness to boot, partly despite himself, which only serves to heighten the oxymoronic contrast between sheer fantasy and historical verisimilitude ('you think you can defeat the resurrected divinity qua towering statue? well, that's just not very realistic now, is it?').

Oh, and as an addendum to my previous post about déjà vu, I'd like to point out that I have made this exact same argument repeatedly since first signing up two years ago. Please help.

 

[PorkBarrellGuy]

Oh, and as an addendum to my previous post about déjà vu, I'd like to point out that I have made this exact same argument repeatedly since first signing up two years ago. Please help.

If you're looking for someone willing to teach you new tricks, you might have come to the wrong place.

 

[Thonius]

Please Help!
-Sawyer circa 2018

 

[Brancaleone]

What Josh says in the presumably arrogant post is being completely misunderstood. Hilariously misunderstood. I wouldn't believe it possible.

He is using ToEE's development cycle and end result to attack the previous poster's method of drawing conclusions. Not attacking ToEE or Tim Cain, but the opposite. He even explains that further below in the linked thread.

I fail to see what he thinks he's achieving by that comparison. He's talking ToEE which was (and I speak as a Troika-fan) an unmitigated disaster when it comes to 1) content and 2) bugginess, both of which completely undermined the great system that was implemented, which basically leaves graphics/sound as only positive aspects (at least, on release). And he's comparing such an unmitigated disaster to what his team had to do with IWD, which was comparable to what Beamdog did with Siege of Dragonspear in terms of difficulty.

I've always had a particular fondness for genre films made by directors who have nothing but contempt for said genre (e.g. Tarkovsky's Solaris, which is only nominally science-fiction) so I sympathize with Josh's predicament. His strategy of dissatisfaction, disenchantment and disillusion is especially violent when applied to fantasy RPGs, however, since they tend to thrive on nostalgia and an ultimately child-like willingness to suspend disbelief. Some will appreciate the irony, others less so. Regardless, it is ultimately in line with the tried-and-true Obsidian staple of deconstruction, with the proviso that Sawyer takes it a step further by applying it to the sub-genre as a whole, not just to its tropes. He does so with a mercenary's dutiful single-mindedness to boot, partly despite himself, which only serves to heighten the oxymoronic contrast between sheer fantasy and historical verisimilitude ('you think you can defeat the resurrected divinity qua towering statue? well, that's just not very realistic now, is it?').

Well, it would only add to his legacy to think that he convinced PoE's backers to give him money in order to be free from the evul publishers and finally be able to demolish the genre that those very backers loved.

Or, instead, we can simply apply Occam's razor and assume he's just clueless about why people like IE games/what makes IE games work.

 

[Flou]

Hiring a new lead writer is an option, you know.

No shit, Sherlock. Doesn't seem like Feargus has wanted to do that though (at least not for Pillars of Eternity). They did end up hiring Chris L'Etoille (spelling?) for Project Indiana. Not sure if he is the lead on it, or whether that role is Boyarsky's.

 

[Flou]

My beloved Megan Starks has written for more than two games. She designed content for Fallen Earth and Wildstar before coming to Obsidian. She’s bad at making companions, but other than that her stuff can be pretty good (she wrote the best part of Deadfire for fuck’s sake).

What parts did she write and which characters/companions?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

My beloved Megan Starks has written for more than two games. She designed content for Fallen Earth and Wildstar before coming to Obsidian. She’s bad at making companions, but other than that her stuff can be pretty good (she wrote the best part of Deadfire for fuck’s sake).

megan starks is a qt

 

[pomenitul]

The whole kickstarter thing was them banking on continued interest in fantasy CRPGs all the while being utterly unable to muster the slightest bit of enthusiasm for what they perceived as a mere phase one overcomes by the age of 16 at the latest. Believing their target audience, primarily made up of specimens from the same generation, would feel the same, they incorporated their (literally) atheistic approach to CRPGs in the narrative arc itself, which only worked the first time around insofar as most gamers were all too happy to briefly relive the feel of discovering the Infinity Engine, without paying too much attention to the details (Codex notwithstanding, unsurprisingly). Indeed, their ruse – the mise en abyme of disappointment, as if to say 'yes, we are aware that the magic is gone, obviously; how old are you, anyway?' – proved too clever by half, since barely anyone made it to that point in the story and many of those who did couldn't care less for the grand anti-revelation to begin with. Contrast this with Owlcat's more orthodox approach (in keeping with their Russianness), which assumes – much like the 'Dexian hive mind itself – that the faith is still there despite decades of wear and tear and that hyper-critical discourse is but the necessary flip side of a lingering, loving adoration. Those who have given up on the creed completely aren't here, nor do they give these matters any heed. Or, of course, they're paid to keep up the pretence, like the skeptic hierophant that is J.E. Sawyer (please help).

 

[2house2fly]

Why ignore criticism / free advice from people obsessed with RPGs?

How do you know he ignored it?

he thinks that being a professional developer makes him a spokesman of what is good and bad in cRPGs;

• he is dismissive of players that played and analysed these games to death, including players that have more gameplay experience and knowledge than him, being on the Codex or not; never mind that these players remained faithful to Obsidian when nobody cared about them, which also makes him ungrateful;

• he is openly dismissive about many classics of the genre, which is indicative of his superficial mindset and sets a bad example for other developer

Let's see... No he doesn't, no he isn't, and no he isn't. 0 for 3. Impressive.

('you think you can defeat the resurrected divinity qua towering statue? well, that's just not very realistic now, is it?')

It has nothing to do with being realistic; in Sawyer's own words: "In the case of Deadfire, it just didn't feel appropriate to fight Eothas."

 

[Brancaleone]

The whole kickstarter thing was them banking on continued interest in fantasy CRPGs all the while being utterly unable to muster the slightest bit of enthusiasm for what they perceived as a mere phase one overcomes by the age of 16 at the latest. Believing their target audience, primarily made up of specimens from the same generation, would feel the same, they incorporated their (literally) atheistic approach to CRPGs in the narrative arc itself, which only worked the first time around insofar as most gamers were all too happy to briefly relive the feel of discovering the Infinity Engine, without paying too much attention to the details (Codex notwithstanding, unsurprisingly). Indeed, their ruse – the mise en abyme of disappointment, as if to say 'yes, we are aware that the magic is gone, obviously; how old are you, anyway?' – proved too clever by half, since barely anyone made it to that point in the story and many of those who did couldn't care less for the grand anti-revelation to begin with. Contrast this with Owlcat's more orthodox approach (in keeping with their Russianness), which assumes – much like the 'Dexian hive mind itself – that the faith is still there despite decades of wear and tear and that hyper-critical discourse is but the necessarily flip side of a lingering, loving adoration. Those who have given up on the creed completely aren't here, nor do they give these matters any heed. Or, of course, they're paid to keep up the pretence, like the skeptic hierophant that is J.E. Sawyer (please help).

I really don't know if I can be of any help: I'm afraid nowadays' Art degrees are pretty much irreversible.

 

[pomenitul]

I really don't know if I can be of any help: I'm afraid nowadays' Art degrees are pretty much irreversible.

Wait till you see that guy who graced us with a Lacanian reading of the cuckoldry trope in Western CRPGs.

 

[Fairfax]

Sawyer obviously made a lot of mistakes. He was overconfident. But I can’t believe how many people are angry at him for doing what we do here every damn day.

Who's angry?

He has strong opinions about RPGs? The horror! He thought he was right about things that he turned out to be wrong about? Unforgivable! He disagrees with people who don’t share his design philosophy? The nerve!

Codexers criticizing opinions and decisions by an RPG designer. Truly shocking.

Wouldn’t it be worse if he didn’t have strong opinions on game design? I mean, ideally they’d be the right opinions, but someone who’s passionately wrong about a few things can still make good games. Someone who has no passion for this stuff would have no business making games in the first place.

Sure, it's good that he's passionate. The reason people are harsher on him is the amount shit he talked about sacred cows (D&D, IE games), RPG traditions, other developers, and so on. I personally think that's fine. However, once you do that, you must accept the same amount of scrutiny. Most people here don't think he backed it up, so it's only natural that the backlash is relatively stronger.

If Sawyer was more open minded, who’s to say he’d listen to Roxor and not simply give more credence to the idiots on SA?

How much more credence can he give? He just made a game for goons.

(she wrote the best part of Deadfire for fuck’s sake).

 

[Latelistener]

Please Help!
-Sawyer circa 2018

Just a little bit more of Sawyer in this thread and soon I'll need help too.

Spoiler

 

[Brancaleone]

I really don't know if I can be of any help: I'm afraid nowadays' Art degrees are pretty much irreversible.

Wait till you see that guy who graced us with a Lacanian reading of the cuckoldry trope in Western CRPGs.

Christ Almighty, let me equip my Ring of Resistance to Critical Analysis (20/Structuralism)