Interview Brian Fargo answers some questions

[Vault Dweller]

Tags: Brian Fargo; InXile Entertainment

<a href=http://ledsnake.zdns.net:880/index.php>Tiger's Claw</a> asked <b>Brian Fargo</b> from <a href=http://www.inxile-entertainment.com>InXile</a> some questions and posted the <a href=http://ledsnake.zdns.net:880/ArticleDetail.php?id=41>answers here</a>.
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<blockquote><b>Tiger's Claw:</b> How did Interplay get into the financial trouble? We heard that Interplay stock holders were about to sue you for that.
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<b>Brian Fargo:</b>Interplay was a very successful PC publisher but the console market took over pretty quickly. Interplay did not make the transition fast enough and was caught in a declining PC market. I started kicking off console games like the Matrix, Hunter and Dark Alliance but it was a bit late. Fortunately the stock holders understood and did not sue anyone.
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Tell it to Blizzard, Brian.
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Spotted at: <A HREF="http://www.rpgdot.com">RPG Dot</A>

 

[Otaku_Hanzo]

Do you guys pull these websites out of your ass or something? Until I clicked on the link, I was sitting here thinking "What the fuck is a Wing Commander fansite doing interviewing Brian Fargo?" :shock:

 

[EEVIAC]

Or Maxis, or iD, or Firaxis, or Troika, or Spiderweb... They lost Bioware, which would have been a massive money maker for the company, someone has to take responsibility for that.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

I think Interplay's problem wasn't with having more PC titles than console titles. I think Interplay's big problem was with the declining quality of their PC games. SFC did very well, better than most of Interplay's console games - but SFC2 was a bug ridden disaster and was released before the biggest new feature of the sequel was finished. Giants took three years to develop and was very buggy when it was released, almost unplayable. Fallout Tactics was extremely buggy as well, and still is even after a token patch. Interplay didn't do a very good follow up on any of these games in terms of patching, either. SFC2 got lots of patches, but only because Interplay was funding SFC: Orion Pirates and Taldren was using that money to fix up SFC2 since it was the basis for Orion Pirates. If SFC:OP hadn't been contracted, SFC2 would have died a sad death even though SFC did very well.

Interplay was known for quality games from the 1980s up through the mid1990s, but in the late 90s, Interplay just wasn't producing quality games. If the games were quality games, they were often buggy like SFC2 and Giants. Those buggy ones were never quite fixed either, because Interplay seemed to patch once and then dump the title and move on.

Another problem with Interplay under Fargo was that they had only two studios they considered golden boys and they funnelled most of the money towards them. BioWare was one and Shiny was the other. Shiny really sucks. They'd get a HUGE budget for a game and then make a flop like Messiah or Sacrifice. BioWare was about the same, only their games made money. The problem with BioWare was that Neverwinter Nights went way over budget and took much longer than originally planned and budgetted.

A lot of the other developers, smaller ones, Interplay just treated like crap and screwed over. Just go to fatbabies.com and search around for Galleon tidbits. Then again, this trend didn't end with Fargo, Interplay is still pretty shady when it comes to third party developers.

Oh, and Interplay also passed up on publishing Doom 2, if you can believe that. They didn't want to publish something competing with Descent.


So, basically, that's what I'm trying to say here - Interplay didn't fuck up by not getting in to consoles quicker, they fucked up by doing a lot of bad things in the PC market. I don't think getting in to console would have helped Interplay at all, since I'd say they would have made the same mistakes in the console market they did in the PC pne. The main difference is that if they made the same blunders in the console market, they would have gotten their asses handed to them because they were new to the market compared to the Capcoms out there and there's more competition in the console development arena. Interplay was successful in the PC market in the 1980s through mid90s and they managed to screw that up. I can't see them stepping in a market new to them and becoming a top notch company.

 

[Volourn]

Actually, if all is to be beleived, Interplay even treated their "Golden Boys" like crap. Interplay jsut screwed up. Cancellation after cancellation doesn't help at all. Releasing buggy games doesn't help though I didn't think FOT was buggy. mind you, I didn't like the game on its own (lack) of merits.

 

[Vault Dweller]

So, basically, that's what I'm trying to say here - Interplay didn't fuck up by not getting in to consoles quicker, they fucked up by doing a lot of bad things in the PC market.

Precisely.

 

[Volourn]

VD is precise in his agreement with SP.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Actually, if all is to be beleived, Interplay even treated their "Golden Boys" like crap.

Making Baldur's Gate does not entitle a development studio to ALL THEIR EARTHLY DESIRES like a super duper extended development cycle and having 75 people working on the project.

Interplay jsut screwed up. Cancellation after cancellation doesn't help at all.

Like TORN and that Star Trek adventure game that seemed to be pretty well anticipated by Star Trek fans, especially considering it was the last actiing job DeForrest Kelly had before he died? The latter one was a big mistake.

Releasing buggy games doesn't help though I didn't think FOT was buggy. mind you, I didn't like the game on its own (lack) of merits.

There were ten perks that didn't work in the game, including a couple of big ones like Swift Learner and Sniper. Lots of crashing and freezing. It was never tested in turn based which made some of the timing puzzles break completely - play through Preoria in turn based sometime, you'll see what I mean. There were lots of seams and things in the floors and walls enemies could shoot through. Pathfinding would often break on obstacles, causing enemies to get stuck on them - get a deathclaw between you and a fence when you're standing next to the fence, he won't use the gate to get to you even though it's a few tiles away.

Those are just the ones from memory that are still in the game after the final patch.

 

[Sol Invictus]

The sound bug existed even after the final patch was released and was never fixed because Interplay didn't want to release a newer version of the Miles Sound System drivers used in the game. I don't know what the reason was but it probably had something to do with licensing issues. Someone had to release an unofficial fix to stop the crashes on SoundBlaster Live! cards. There are a lot of people who returned the game simply because it crashed after a few minutes of play - something Interplay could have easily remedied by putting it in a quick patch. It was just one tiny little MSS32.DLL file.

It's both funny and sad to think that a simple file may have amounted to millions of losses in profits.

 

[Volourn]

Sp; despite the long devlopment cycle and icnrased costs, did NWN make enough money to be cosndiered successful? That's all that should matter to Interplay. Obviously, they felt it wasn't worth it. However, considering the state of BIO, and the sate of Interplay; it's obvious who wa son the right track.

Not to mention, in that statement I wans't even referring to NWN. I was referring to how BIS was supposedly screwing BIO over royalties supposedly owed them over BG2.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Sp; despite the long devlopment cycle and icnrased costs, did NWN make enough money to be cosndiered successful? That's all that should matter to Interplay. Obviously, they felt it wasn't worth it. However, considering the state of BIO, and the sate of Interplay; it's obvious who wa son the right track.

Not to mention, in that statement I wans't even referring to NWN. I was referring to how BIS was supposedly screwing BIO over royalties supposedly owed them over BG2.

You do know this is the part where I throw your argument about Troika shouldn't accept contracts with deadlines they can't meet back in your face, right?

 

[Diogo Ribeiro]

Oh, and Interplay also passed up on publishing Doom 2, if you can believe that. They didn't want to publish something competing with Descent.

:shock: I didn't know that one. Another display of idiocy for historians to catalogue, it seems.

 

[Otaku_Hanzo]

Oh, and Interplay also passed up on publishing Doom 2, if you can believe that. They didn't want to publish something competing with Descent.

:shock: I didn't know that one. Another display of idiocy for historians to catalogue, it seems.

I remember reading that in a PC Gamer article many many moons ago. Interplay has been going downhill for awhile and they cannot use the console excuse. Some of the first PS1 games were from Interplay for christ's sake. I know of some SNES games developed by them. They were not late in getting into the console market. They were just stupid about doing the things they did.