Incline Chris Avellone Appreciation Station

[Nano]

Chris wrote it in the thread about the next Obsidian game, outer worlds. Can't remember the page.

"Chris Avellone said [whatever]" =/= "Sawyer got slammed by Leon Boyarski"

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

Chris wrote it in the thread about the next Obsidian game, outer worlds. Can't remember the page.

"Chris Avellone said [whatever]" =/= "Sawyer got slammed by Leon Boyarski"

It's not that hard to run a search.

Yeah! And while he's still at Obsidian he can get Leon and Tim to share their success story about running a video game development business. It will be great!

Well, in an added bit of hilarity (which I learned from an upper management stupid admission while they were complaining about their own decision putting them out - sorry, dummies, maybe you should manage?) Josh is now the Exec. Producer (what) on Tim and Leonard's project, replacing Rich Taylor (nooooo, he was good whyyyyyyyyyyyyyy).

But (and here's the 2nd kicker), Josh started his EP'ing off by F'ing off a month off to go do talks elsewhere, so... why does this position exist again? Does the Lead Producer do nothing?

Tim... Leonard... leave already. Reitre. Both. They don't deserve you.

Note I don't blame Josh so much for having a vacation, as it was likely his vacation he had in place once Pillars 2 had shipped (and I don't think Rich's resignation was planned for at all)... BUT, if you are Exec. Producer on a game that may be on its final stages, going on extended vanishing vacation = nope.

(Apparently, the amount of attention Josh gave to the project on his first week was pretty dismal, though, so it may for the best. It even got to the point upper management got complaints - as was relayed to me, the Leads called Josh out on his behavior, which I would have loved to have seen - esp. if Leonard was involved in the raking-across-the-coals.)

I do blame whoever thought it was fucking brilliant to make Josh an Executive Producer when a Design Director should already have enough to do... but whatever, I can guess why: a Design Director you can't charge Take-Two for, but an Executive Producer you can charge Take-Two for to offset your new house costs.

God, what garbage. I hope Take-Two knows Josh is gone for a month when you send them the "budgets", Feargus.

AFAIK the leads are Tim and Leonard.

 

[fantadomat]

kind eyes and cute smile

 

[Chris Avellone]

Sawyer didn't "latch on" to the game, he was latched onto it by Feargus Urquhart after he'd already said he was burned out and didn't want to work on a game for a while

This is the most plausible and likely scenario - I seriously doubt Josh would want an EP position. The situation is far more likely, "I have an expensive director (who is worth that salary, that's not the point) and it would be convenient for someone else to pay for him (which is more the point)."

This occurred when hiring for Skyforge - Obsidian was happy to hire employees for Skyforge because the publisher was paying all the bills for them, for example. The problem becomes what do you do when Skyforge goes away.

But back to the EP role on Indiana, I don't think Rich Taylor requested his role, either (he was a PD coming off Armored Warfare, so he had to be put somewhere, and he was worth keeping on for sure).

Still, both are expensive (and deservedly so) and it's easier to have Take-Two pay for an expensive employee that can be conveniently assigned to an EP position - I just question the position itself.

Admittedly, I'm biased b/c I always thought Obsidian had too many producers and not enough of the right ones (Adler, Singh), and it's a very production-heavy company (even at the owner level).

From all I've heard, though, Josh isn't doing production stuff, he's helping designers finish off remaining design tasks, which is a Senior Designer role - but I expect you can't charge as much for that (or you really have to argue it).

I would question if Ferg told Private Division Josh would be off the books for a month when Josh was put on the project, though - but I'm sure Josh, Tim, or Leonard would be quick to correct that missing info if Take-Two didn't know.

 

[Grauken]

Have in-game development tools improved over the years, comparing to when you started in the gaming industry, or is it a case-by-case thing and depends on the company?

 

[Chris Avellone]

Have in-game development tools improved over the years, comparing to when you started in the gaming industry, or is it a case-by-case thing and depends on the company?

Depends on the product and depends on the engine, the engine focus, and how many times a developer uses the same engine. When I started in the industry, tools were hit or miss because you didn't have as many non-core people implementing content (Blizzard didn't have a designer position, for example), but even then, there were some amazing tools: The Descent engine mapmaker was incredible, for example.

In short, if you make the same type of game using the same engine several times over, there's an increased likelihood of having better tools - but even that can depend on if the studio has tools programmers (sometimes that's a luxury, like having an editor for a RPG, that a studio can't afford).

We got lucky at Obsidian - Dave Szymczyk authored a great dialogue tool, but we also had to do a bunch of games with the same style of dialogue in order to know what to ask him to put in the tools that would be helpful, if that makes sense. By the time we got to Pillars, we had a lot of requests, and he handled them like a pro.

 

[U-8D8]

I can understand why Avellone said it, but it'd be stupid to think anything good would come from it. Most it'll do is just muddy the water.

However, none of those mongoloids on reddit can take any sort of moral high-ground when this was the top comment on the thread they had when this all blew up.

"Ya, I know that the guy had the sickness of a family member leveraged against him and was basically booted from the company he built, but the real tragedy here is that I won't get any more vidya from 'em."

 

[Don Peste]

I don't remember seeing this here (Atomic, 2012)

 

[Quillon]

What makes a game, a game?

 

[MRY]

What makes a game, a game?

Getting played. It's like game development, in that regard.

 

[Wunderbar]

Chris Avellone, what do you think about "interactive movies" (stuff like heavy rain)?

 

[A horse of course]

 

[Latro]

It's a win for me either way. Just can't stand his golden boy status in the gaming media.

Don't be jealous of his boyish good looks, kind eyes and cute smile.

sawyer is a man cat lady

 

[Haba]

I have an expensive director

What is considered "expensive" when it comes to those positions (just general ballpark is fine)?

As an example, in software development, I've seen cases where a senior programmer may be ten times as productive as a "normal" programmer (not even talking about fresh out of school juniors). At the best I've seen those "crackerjack programmers" getting 2x the salary. Expensive? Not really.

 

[Chateaubryan]

"What can change the nature of a man?"

Too many years at Obsidian, apparently.

 

[Quillon]

"What can change the nature of a man?"

Too many years at Obsidian, apparently.

Hire the devs, fire the chaff at the top.

A few years outside of Obs HQ, he's talking like your usual codexer; demanding decisive action from people outside of his reach. Which means any one of us can become Chris Avellone if we start working for Obs, yes.

 

[Prime Junta]

Ho, what are the Deadfire sales figures? The public has the right to know.

 

[Chateaubryan]

Either way, I can't see this tweet bringing good things to anyone. I can't picture Microsoft as anyone's saviour, nor I can envision a better future for Obsidian's devs because of it.

Now some things have to be made public to insure the state of the industry improves (ie crunch, work conditions, bad management decisions) - but this one feels like a genuine circumstance (Obsidian devs) tainted by personal prejudice.

 

[ArchAngel]

Ho, what are the Deadfire sales figures? The public has the right to know.

Pathetic.

 

[Prime Junta]

Ho, what are the Deadfire sales figures? The public has the right to know.

Pathetic.

Yes, but HOW pathetic?

 

[ArchAngel]

Ho, what are the Deadfire sales figures? The public has the right to know.

Pathetic.

Yes, but HOW pathetic?

This pathetic: https://rpgcodex.net/forums/index.p...s-analysis-thread.121823/page-75#post-5872328

 

[Prime Junta]

Ho, what are the Deadfire sales figures? The public has the right to know.

Pathetic.

Yes, but HOW pathetic?

This pathetic: https://rpgcodex.net/forums/index.p...s-analysis-thread.121823/page-75#post-5872328

 

[BEvers]

Ho, what are the Deadfire sales figures? The public has the right to know.

DSO Gaming has the scoop:

Pillars of Eternity 2 has flopped really hard, sold only 110K copies worldwide until September 2018

It appears that the sequel to Pillars of Eternity, Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire, has sold poorly. According to reports, the game has only sold 110K copies worldwide until September 2018. And while the WRPG market is a niche one, this number feels really low and may explain the rumours that surfaced about Microsoft purchasing Obsidian.

Dylan Holmes has invested $1000 in getting Pillars of Eternity 2 made and according to the first FIG figures, the game has sold 110K copies until September 2018.

As said, Obsidian aimed to sell 580K copies at $50 in order to break even; a huge number especially when talking about a WRPG that targets a small group of gamers. This basically means that Pillars of Eternity 2 flopped really hard.

https://www.dsogaming.com/news/pill...d-110k-copies-worldwide-until-september-2018/

 

[Jarpie]

110k copies sounds really low compared to the number of players we've seen before. Did they have any advertisements at all in gaming sites, youtube etc at all?

 

[ArchAngel]

110k copies sounds really low compared to the number of players we've seen before. Did they have any advertisements at all in gaming sites, youtube etc at all?

Those are copies that actually made them money. They don't include backers and refunders and free copies given to people for whatever reason. Also it is a guess based on Fig payments. But those are based on some assumptions that might be a bit different. The real number might be a bit bigger, but it will not be bigger than 150 000 copies.