Interview The Outer Worlds Feature at Game Informer: Art, Companions and Tone

[Infinitron]

Tags: Carrie Patel; Leonard Boyarsky; Megan Starks; Nitai Poddar; Obsidian Entertainment; The Outer Worlds; Tim Cain

Time for a roundup of the rest of this week's The Outer Worlds features at Game Informer. On Wednesday there was an article about the game's visuals, offering a glimpse at some of its concept art, character models, and most notably, loading screens inspired by Arcanum's famous newspapers. On Thursday there was an article about the game's companions that introduces three of them - Ellie the easygoing mercenary pirate and Felix the brash young rebel-without-a-cause, both of whom we also saw in December's gameplay video, as well as Parvati, a naive mechanic. Finally, on Friday there was a surprisingly extensive interview with Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky about the game's comedic tone. Tim and Leonard's goal is to have a good balance between comedy and seriousness, and apparently they're exercising a good deal of oversight to make sure the writing team gets it right. The video of the interview was uploaded to YouTube today:

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So that was the third week of Game Informer's Outer Worlds bonanza. One more week to go.

 

[Space Nugget]

Cutest gay couple ever.

Spoiler

Jason, you are sorely missed.

 

[BlackAdderBG]

I didn't catch it, is it dark?

 

[Space Nugget]

I didn't catch it, is it dark?

It has its "ups and downs", gets a more serious tone as you progress in the story.

 

[Grotesque]

[yawn]

 

[Jedi Master Radek]

There is a dump path if you have a below average intelligence.

 

[Mr. Hiver]

There is a big difference between the low Int gameplay in Fallouts and this iteration which is actually just stupid.

A dumb character in Fallout, even if not being able to form sentences correctly, most of the time reacted properly and seemed to understand the crux of the problem in the style of idiot savant - forest gump type of character.
In this case, the sentences you get as dialogue options are just stupid.

And thats not funny at all.

 

[Tigranes]

There's no big statement that the game is super-grimdark or super-funny. I don't think that's what they're gunning for, just seems like they're trying to do what seems nicely mixed (trying being the operative word).

Random imprecise quotes:

"It's gotta be situational [...] it needs to come from the story you're telling [...] not just writing funny things for the sake of being funny, [it needs to] explain something about the character, the world..."

"I want them to avoid inside jokes [...] some of our jokes are visual references (like from a movie) [...]

"Your character is situationally unaware [...] things that the player is getting, your character is not."
"[The dumb character is] very dense, doesn't understand social situations, doesn't understand some words [...] tries to make it seem like they understand more than they do...

So not necessarily a guy that has an actual language disorder, but that they might be a more credulous and thick-headed type. I'm OK with either - what matters is the execution, and how other characters respond to the Chosen One being a "hey guys these Scientology guys are real nice to us!" type.

 

[Mr. Hiver]

I never said anything about game aiming to be completely grim dark or completely funny...
Why is it that in every fucking other post on codex i have to clarify i didnt say something at all?
This is a rhetorical question.

In any case, there is a clear difference between two implementations.
In Fallouts it was funny and interesting, here its just stupid - according to what weve seen so far. If it remains that way its going to end up being dull, tiresome, and annoying.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

I interpreted the [Dumb] line as [Playing Dumb] tbh

 

[Tigranes]

I never said anything about game aiming to be completely grim dark or completely funny...
Why is it that in every fucking other post on codex i have to clarify i didnt say something at all?
This is a rhetorical question.

In any case, there is a clear difference between two implementations.
In Fallouts it was funny and interesting, here its just stupid - according to what weve seen so far. If it remains that way its going to end up being dull, tiresome, and annoying.

I wasn't talking to you, don't worry.

 

[Mr. Hiver]

phew...

 

[Duraframe300]

There is a big difference between the low Int gameplay in Fallouts and this iteration which is actually just stupid.

A dumb character in Fallout, even if not being able to form sentences correctly, most of the time reacted properly and seemed to understand the crux of the problem in the style of idiot savant - forest gump type of character.
In this case, the sentences you get as dialogue options are just stupid.

And thats not funny at all.

Sorry what? When does that happen in Fallout? Also low intelligence dialouge in Fallout were 99% simple grunts adding no indication either way with the humor developing over the NPC's reactions.

As the master himself says



additionally

 

[Bastardchops]

This game looks like boring Bioware console hogshit.

 

[Mr. Hiver]

Duraframe300
OK, maybe it was a bit more involved in fallout 2, and i dont mean that as if the dumb character understand everything fully, rather the general gist of the situation.
Also, those seem like selected examples of the worst dumb dialogue. And its still not like the stupid options here.

 

[Jezal_k23]

I think those are enough examples to conclude your dumb character is not really aware of what is happening around him.

 

[Mr. Hiver]

 

[CyberWhale]

I think it will be decent and worth at least one playthrough. Good enough for me.

 

[Delterius]

The best game of the decade.

 

[Outlander]

SteamDB says it releases on August 6th.

 

[markec]

On August 1st it will become Epic store exclusive.

 

[luj1]

This game looks like boring Bioware console hogshit.

That's because it is

 

[Diggfinger]

Hope Leonard's moroseness balances out Tim's silliness

 

[AwesomeButton]

Man, I'm so hyped after watching this. I love those people.

Send Josh back to webmastering and let them direct everything from now on!

 

[CyberWhale]

Sawyer's historical autism can come in handy if you don't give him absolute power.