People News Troika co-founder Jason Anderson has (re-)joined inXile

[Infinitron]

Tags: Chad Moore; inXile Entertainment; Jason Anderson

Jason Anderson is the most low-key member of the trio that created Fallout and went on to found Troika Games. For the past eight years he's worked for multiplayer shooter studio Turtle Rock, creators of Left 4 Dead and the failed Evolve, and for a long time it seemed that the RPG world had lost him forever. The gaming industry has been undergoing many changes in recent months however, and it looks they finally reached him. Thanks to a tweet from Chad Moore, another Troika vet who recently made the same move, we learned yesterday that Jason has joined inXile Entertainment.

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Against all odds, the Troika has been reassembled under Microsoft, albeit split between two different studios. Was this your plan all along, Phil Spencer? Jason actually briefly worked at inXile a decade ago, so this is a homecoming in more than one way. Let's hope he and Chad are working on something good.

 

[Paul_cz]

Hah, no shit. Leon and Tim at Obsidian, Jason at inXile, both under MS. Hilarious. Let's see if anything worthwhile comes out of it.

 

[Ismaul]

I don't think we know that much about Jason, his contributions to Fallout and his ideas about game design, unless I'm forgetting an interview or something. Plus, Tim and Leon often talk about each other, reminiscing and shit, but I don't remember a time where they were "oh yeah Jason did that, suggested that". So it's hard to take this news as anything but meh. Unless I'm wrong.

 

[Duraframe300]

I don't think we know that much about Jason, his contributions to Fallout and his ideas about game design, unless I'm forgetting an interview or something. Plus, Tim and Leon often talk about each other, reminiscing and shit, but I don't remember a time where they were "oh yeah Jason did that, suggested that". So it's hard to take this news as anything but meh. Unless I'm wrong.

Well, lots of what Leonard did, they did together so a lot of what we know is overlap.

Some quotes from his NMA interview

In the beginning, I supplied Tim with art to test out with the graphics engine he was building. Even though I was only hired on as an artist, Tim ran a very open team and everyone was encouraged to contribute. I attended all of the design meetings and ultimately I designed the way the art would be implemented into the Fallout engine.

The team was small at first, so there was a lot of diverse work to be done. I created a good part of the opening movie, modeled and animated approximately half of all of the creatures, including the female humans and the mutants. I also created many of the landscape tiles and wall sets and built the interface. In the end, I helped a lot with design as well, especially in regards to the story and the quests. Fallout was a great project to be a part of.

After Fallout Tim, Leonard and I went off and formed Troika Games. Our first project, Arcanum was made with only 14 dedicated employees - so once again, everyone contributed to all portions of the game and I again did art, movies, design, dialog and this time I got to try my hand at scripting, music and sound effects as well.

Next, I worked on Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines concentrating on game design, level design and creation, sound effects, and of course interface and artwork design and implementation.

Ultimately, I became the Technical Art Lead on the project, creating a majority of the tile sets, 1/2 the wall sets, 1/3 of the characters, lots of the interface art, lots of the creatures, the opening movie and vault overrun movie and a few of the end game shots. Near the end of production I also wrote a lot of dialog and designed quests in order to make the game feel more complete.

 

[LibertyRansom]

If I recall correctly, there was an interview given where it is stated that Jason was primarily responsible for pulling off the haunted house in Vampire Bloodlines.

 

[serch]

Microsoft casts raise the dead over Troika. If this leads to something Melcar may have to uninstall linux forever

 

[Ismaul]

Thanks for clearing my shitty memory guys. The NMA interviews were more than a decade ago. It's archived here if anyone wants to read it.

Shiieeet, he was responsible for the Fallout 1 ending, one of the best of all time IMO (spoilers obviously):

Leon made the comment that, through the whole game, the vault dwellers are completely xenophobic... I mean, why would they even *let* you in? And I responded, well, then we should just have the movie being them kicking you out.

It was so funny. Over and over again we said we can't do that! But we absolutely loved the idea - it was just so cool! So we went to tell Tim. Tim wasn't sure of the idea. He thought it would flop with the fans, nothing like that had ever been done. But he finally gave in (we could be pains in the asses when we wanted something our way.) That movie is one of my favorite parts of the whole game - the returning hero getting kicked out. Absolutely perfect!

 

[Humanity has risen!]

If I recall correctly, there was an interview given where it is stated that Jason was primarily responsible for pulling off the haunted house in Vampire Bloodlines.

That part of the game is so incredibly overrated. Ohhhhh, a bunch of scripted poltergeist scenes and whispers in a house that people tell you is haunted. How scary!

 

[Major_Blackhart]

We'll see how things go. I have hopes for the guy.

 

[Duraframe300]

If I recall correctly, there was an interview given where it is stated that Jason was primarily responsible for pulling off the haunted house in Vampire Bloodlines.

That part of the game is so incredibly overrated. Ohhhhh, a bunch of scripted poltergeist scenes and whispers in a house that people tell you is haunted. How scary!

To be fair its well enough done and paced, but in the end its just a linear romp that barely makes use of the games systems.
Yeah, never got the hype either, other quests were (imo) way more memorable for me.

 

[Diggfinger]

I don't think we know that much about Jason, his contributions to Fallout and his ideas about game design, unless I'm forgetting an interview or something. Plus, Tim and Leon often talk about each other, reminiscing and shit, but I don't remember a time where they were "oh yeah Jason did that, suggested that". So it's hard to take this news as anything but meh. Unless I'm wrong.

Yes, you are wrong. This guy is a f---ing genious, but unknown to the general public indeed.

Read my Wiki to learn all that you need to know about JDA:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_D._Anderson


*inhales deeply*
FFFFFF I'M EXCITED ABOUT THIS!!!!!

 

[Diggfinger]

OK so Anderson's first day was March 26th, this news is litteraly right out the oven.

Will try to get Chad Moore on Matt Chat, he has an interesting background from Interplay/Troika.
Moore joined InXile this January (came from Carbine), so fresh starter also.

Fun fact: an Arcanum developper article written by Chad.
+ Arcanum portait that Leon did for him:

 

[Monkey Baron]

If I recall correctly, there was an interview given where it is stated that Jason was primarily responsible for pulling off the haunted house in Vampire Bloodlines.

Here's the presentation where Leonard calls him out for it. He even mentions that he doesn't believe Jason gets enough credit for his contributions.

I personally love the Ocean House Hotel. It does lose a bit of it's magic on repeated playthroughs, but the moment right before you retrieve the locket is probably my favorite moment in the entire game.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Against all odds, the Troika has been reformed under Microsoft, albeit split between two different studios. Was this your plan all along, Phil Spencer?

Yes, this was the plan all along. Microsoft bought two studios just to have the Troika people hired.
And yes, of course, having them split among different studious it means that Troika has reformed.
Can you be more of a shill than this, I wonder?

InXile probably hired him just so they can use him for a bait&switch again.

 

[MurkyShadow]

The next announcement will be, after each of them is finished with their current
projects, there will be new RPG sub-studio formed under Microsofts umbrella, with
complete autonomy. With the only position unknown to the public being the lead.

As the mystery is unveiled, it is no other then Master Chris Avellone.
And lo and behold, a new golden age of RPGs dawns upon human kind...
But until this becomes a reality, I'll stay firmly barricaded in my iron tower,
watching the age of decadence from there, just leaving to get what I
need, on my expeditions with my battle brothers, in the underrails.

But for real, the track records from the legends of old don't
inspire much optimism. If they inspire any at all that is.
Except of course, you're just fabulously optimistic.

 

[luj1]

Wo wee. I don't know why we are obsessing over these old, legendary devs. Every one of them has, at some point, made a masterpiece, and fair play to them, but name me one person who is able to produce masterpieces all the time. Let's stop being naive.

 

[Duraframe300]

The next announcement will be, after each of them is finished with their current
projects, there will be new RPG sub-studio formed under Microsofts umbrella, with
complete autonomy. With the only position unknown to the public being the lead.

As the mystery is unveiled, it is no other then Master Chris Avellone.
And lo and behold, a new golden age of RPGs dawns upon human kind...
But until this becomes a reality, I'll stay firmly barricaded in my iron tower,
watching the age of decadence from there, just leaving to get what I
need, on my expeditions with my battle brothers, in the underrails.

But for real, the track records from the legends of old don't
inspire much optimism. If they inspire any at all that is.
Except of course, you're just fabulously optimistic.

No thanks.

At least not as long as Avellone hasn’t gotten over his midlife-crisis.
Afterwards sure.

 

[GrainWetski]

Wo wee. I don't know why we are obsessing over these old, legendary devs. Every one of them has, at some point, made a masterpiece, and fair play to them, but name me one person who is able to produce masterpieces all the time. Let's stop being naive.

inXile will clearly stop making trash now that they've hired another has-been. It's only been a mere 15 years of nothing but garbage, but now that will all change!

 

[Deleted Member 22431]

Wo wee. I don't know why we are obsessing over these old, legendary devs. Every one of them has, at some point, made a masterpiece, and fair play to them, but name me one person who is able to produce masterpieces all the time. Let's stop being naive.

inXile will clearly stop making trash now that they've hired another has-been. It's only been a mere 15 years of nothing but garbage, but now that will all change!

How many times these studios advertised hiring a veteran dev that made something great in a distant past? How many times said legendary veterans failed miserably? They are different now, these studios are also different from Troika. They had it and they lost it. This name dropping is just like hiring Avellone as a freelance. It makes you excited the first 20 times until you realise it never has any meaningful impact in the final game.

 

[Sigourn]

 

[Wunderbar]

Yes, you are wrong. This guy is a f---ing genious, but unknown to the general public indeed.

Read my Wiki to learn all that you need to know about JDA:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_D._Anderson


*inhales deeply*
FFFFFF I'M EXCITED ABOUT THIS!!!!!

found Jason Anderson's account.

 

[Van-d-all]

Wo wee. I don't know why we are obsessing over these old, legendary devs. Every one of them has, at some point, made a masterpiece, and fair play to them, but name me one person who is able to produce masterpieces all the time. Let's stop being naive.

After Evolved failed in such a spectacular manner, it's no wonder he joined a studio riding mostly on former dev glory.

 

[hexer]

All the best to Mr. JDA!
I always liked him, he seems as a man of many talents.

 

[Goral]

Hopefully he will get the chance to work on something really interesting but it makes me wonder how come he went to inXile and not to Obsidian? Was Obsidian not interested in someone as talented and experienced as JA? Was JA not interested? Or maybe he just knows inXile is a fun place to work at (since he did work there before) and with Microsoft money on the table he can get as high salary as at Obsidian and more creative power.

Also, why do it now? Maybe he has some great idea which he pitched to Brian first because he knows him and because of the Microsoft deal.

 

[Infinitron]

Hopefully he will get the chance to work on something really interesting but it makes me wonder how come he went to inXile and not to Obsidian? Was Obsidian not interested in someone as talented and experienced as JA? Was JA not interested? Or maybe he just knows inXile is a fun place to work at (since he did work there before) and with Microsoft money on the table he can get as high salary as at Obsidian and more creative power.

Also, why do it now? Maybe he has some great idea which he pitched to Brian first because he knows him and because of the Microsoft deal.

It seems he's working on Chad Moore's project, so I don't think it's his idea.