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The fact that there is an identifiable genre of "Spector game" and "Fargo game" means that they did exert some sort of influence, however elusive it might be.
I would say ultra-violence, cults of madmen, an overall macabre pulp sensibility. Lots of minute instances of reactivity with a focus on trying to generate memorable "water cooler moments". These are things that Brian often talks about. He has a definite preference for post-apocalyptic settings, Mark Morgan music, and puts SINGING in his games whenever he gets a chance.
I'm not saying he invented that approach whole cloth. Everybody's influenced by other people. For example, Warren Spector's design philosophy was clearly formed through his collaboration with people from Looking Glass Studios throughout the 1990s.
But I think Brian already had a preference for those things when Fallout was created. It's silly that people overlook just how similar the game was to Wasteland. TBH, there's kind of a contradiction between the idea of Fallout as Tim Cain's underground personal project that he and his friends made without anybody knowing, and how obviously it was an attempt to flatter the CEO's sensibilities.
(...) The only thing he actually did was approving the game, which was his obligation. His omissive behavior in ignoring Cain’s complaints about FO2 direction, and his megalomaniac projects that lead Interplay to the ground were an omen of what was to come. If anything, people like Fargo shows how ignorant most gamers are, how easy you can take credit for other people’s work in the game industry.
He is a sleazy guy but he's also rather passionate about games and I seriously doubt we would get such gems like Sacrifice, Giants: Citizen Kabuto, Messiah, MDK, Freespace, Shogo and other unique games that seemed very risky to develop if someone else was steering Interplay ship. Instead of going the easy way and making games for largest audience possible he allowed experiments which in the end destroyed his firm. But he gets a huge brofist from me for the games I've mentioned. Now add Fallout and Planescape: Torment into this and you have a guy who made a real difference in the gaming world.
But I think Brian Fargo already had a preference for those things when Fallout was created. It's silly that people overlook just how similar the game was to Wasteland.
TBH, there's kind of a contradiction between the idea of Fallout as Tim Cain's underground personal project that he and his friends made without anybody knowing, and how obviously it was an attempt to flatter Fargo's sensibilities.
"You started in the modern world," Cain said. "You traveled back in time, you killed the monkey that would evolve into humans, you went through space travel, you went to the future, which was ruled by dinosaurs, you were exiled to a fantasy planet where magic took you back to the original timeline that you restored to full, and came back to the modern world to save your girlfriend."
Okay, so. As much as I love the idea of a fantasy planet that magically returns things to how they were, allowing you to save your girlfriend, I think my favorite part about this is that you "killed the monkey that evolved into humans." What?
"It's weird to hear me talk about it now," Cain said, "but we really were going to go with this. And I think one of the other producers kinda slapped me and said, 'There's no way you're going to get this storyline made, it's not going to get through, you could work on it for years and no one would ever do it.'
Regardless, what led to it being a GURPS emulation was definitely of Cain's making.
People tend to blindly idolize rockstar developers and vilify producers and publishers, when the reality is that in many cases those people are responsible for the end result being as good as it is.
Hell, if X-Com was left to Gollop brothers, it would've been shit and would've never been made. MicroProse producers not only went against a cancellation order, but also are the reason that the game is something more than Laser Squad 2. It was the publisher that demanded that they expand the scope and scale, which led to the addition of battlescape.
He is a sleazy guy but he's also rather passionate about games and I seriously doubt we would get such gems like Sacrifice, Giants: Citizen Kabuto, Messiah, MDK, Freespace, Shogo and other unique games that seemed very risky to develop if someone else was steering Interplay ship. Instead of going the easy way and making games for largest audience possible he allowed experiments which in the end destroyed his firm. But he gets a huge brofist from me for the games I've mentioned. Now add Fallout and Planescape: Torment into this and you have a guy who made a real difference in the gaming world.
Who made a real difference in the gaming world were the developers, artists, programmers, etc., involved in these games, mostly people who you will never know, or don’t care to know, because you are too eager to give the credit to the car salesman that ruined the company. Fargo gave the green light to these games, because he green lighted everything, including cinematic games that led Interplay to the ground. The suggestion that the studio failed because it wasn’t able to move to consoles is just a euphemism for “We had a loom in charge”. Now he is doing the same thing at InXile and the result is less than stellar because he doesn’t has the talent, which just reinforces the notion that Interplay was great despite of him.
What made Fallout special was the use of skill/stat checks and the writing. The fact that people only talk about Wasteland because it is vaguely associated with Fallout is telling. Wasteland can die in a fire.
Following an unsuccessful attempt to transition into a console software business, Interplay ran into financial difficulties. By 2001 French company Titus Software had completed its acquisition of a majority control of the company. Fargo left soon after.
lol
I also prefer Fallout than Wasteland but Wasteland is exquisite and was ahead of its time. And Brian Fargo wasn't just a producer there:
Ken St. Andre said:
Brian Fargo jumped into the design process about midway thru. He wanted to set his stamp on somethings. The City of Needles is pure Brian Fargo work. To the best of my knowledge, that's all he did, but Needles is no small segment of the game, and it has some of the best puzzles in it. BF deserves his design credits. In addition, he was head honcho for the whole project--he sold the idea to Electronic Arts, paid the production team, reviewed work as it was done, cracked the whip to get more work done. kept me, and Stackpole, and Alan all hard at work. Fargo's an incredible guy with an amazing imagination, and he'll always have my respect.
And this is what Per has to say about Wasteland (and if you don't know who Per is then you should self-eject from the Codex):
Per said:
Need I introduce the game that everyone plays CONSTANTLY? Wasteland shows how darn right things go when PnP RPG design meets flawless computer game design. No 3D graphics. No little animated gibberlings that squeal as they slash at you. Just a low-res portrait of one of your foes, and the assurance that your 36 points of damage just made it explode in a shower of wheels and sprockets, or ground round as the case might be. "A silvery mountain of reptilian terror cocks its head, studies you for a moment, then attacks!" Those words put a more perfect image in my mind than any first-person polygon view. The design and interface were leagues ahead of anything that existed at the time, including that fantasy cousin The Bard's Tale. Oh, and the pervasive dark humour, the unforgettable scenario and sidetracks - but don't let me keep you, go back to playing Wasteland right
The important guy on the project was Michael Stackpole (who might have been able to evolve into a famed game designer if he'd stayed in the industry). But Brian Fargo knew what he wanted to make. He liked MSPE's skill-based system and wanted to make a CRPG like that.
I imagine that Wasteland comes across as unplayable and ridiculous if you played Fallout first, and groundbreaking and amazing (though not unflawed) if you played Wasteland first.
I would say ultra-violence, cults of madmen, an overall macabre pulp sensibility. Lots of minute instances of reactivity with a focus on trying to generate memorable "water cooler moments". These are things that Brian often talks about. He has a definite preference for post-apocalyptic settings, Mark Morgan music, and puts SINGING in his games whenever he gets a chance.
I'm not saying he invented that approach whole cloth. Everybody's influenced by other people. For example, Warren Spector's design philosophy was clearly formed through his collaboration with people from Looking Glass Studios throughout the 1990s.
But I think Brian already had a preference for those things when Fallout was created. It's silly that people overlook just how similar the game was to Wasteland. TBH, there's kind of a contradiction between the idea of Fallout as Tim Cain's underground personal project that he and his friends made without anybody knowing, and how obviously it was an attempt to flatter the CEO's sensibilities.
You're not wrong to link Wasteland and Fallout, but those are just two games. "Spector game" makes sense, since he was involved in a lot of games that took a smiliar approach to design in different directions. Whether he should be attributed with it is another matter, but the distinction makes sense.
But "Fargo game"? Sure Fallout was infulenced by Wasteland, but that's it. A thematic link between two games doesn't form a distinct design blueprint. And Fallout is more like a homage to Wasteland rather than a successor, the games are rather different.
Fargo was a producer on a lot of things, and from looking through the list on Wikipedia there is really no rhyme or reason to it.
After about 1990, his role/stature changed to the point where I wouldn't expect to see a heavy mark on things, but before that, there seems to be some theme of unusual settings -- Bard's Tale wasn't just generic fantasy, Wasteland, Neuromancer, even Tonetown... After that it just looks like the portfolio of a large 90s company.
Comparing Wasteland with Fallout is insulting to Fallout; comparing Brian Fargo with Warren Spector is insulting to Warren Spector; comparing Interplay with inXile is insulting to Interplay.
EDIT: I triggered Crooked Unicorn with this post. Achievement unlocked!
I imagine that Wasteland comes across as unplayable and ridiculous if you played Fallout first, and groundbreaking and amazing (though not unflawed) if you played Wasteland first.
That said, I still submit that aspects of WL don't hold up very well -- I've only played it for a little bit since the 80s, but there's all the silliness like attacking enemies with clips rather than weapons, or programming macros to rest, and it definitely lacks the narrative weight and accessibility of Fallout.
EDIT: To expand on this slightly, I guess what I'd say is that I'm skeptical that the game is very fun today unless you are able to engage in some kind of creative feat of imagination that you're playing it back in the 80s. Maybe I'm wrong, but to me there was a point in the mid-90s when games became consistently timeless, where as games older than that are pretty hit and miss. I would not call Wasteland timeless, though I would call it an amazing feat for its time.
Comparing Wasteland with Fallout is insulting to Fallout; comparing Brian Fargo with Warren Spector is insulting to Warren Spector; comparing Interplay with inXile is insulting to Interplay.
Comparing Wasteland with Fallout is insulting to Fallout; comparing Brian Fargo with Warren Spector is insulting to Warren Spector; comparing Interplay with inXile is insulting to Interplay.
There were some crazy bets like HardWar, some strange games like light and darkness, some LoL like BattleCruiser but alot of incline on this list. If Fargo was a megalomaniacal asshole, at least he allowed some good games to be made. The decline only started for reals by 2001.
Article from CNN Money from 1998: http://money.cnn.com/1998/03/31/technology/rho_interplay/
Although Interplay had revenues of $83.3 million, its losses amounted to $27.2 million for fiscal 1997. And of the $71.8 million to be raised, the company expects to use $27.5 million to repay amounts outstanding under a current bank line of credit. On top of that, it also expects to repay $6.1 million in subordinated secured promissory notes, and $1 million as an accrued bonus awarded to Brian Fargo, Interplay's chief executive officer, by the board of directors in 1994. Interplay also said it expects to use about $1.5 million to pay certain amounts due to Universal Interactive Studios under the terms of an existing distribution agreement.
While we're all for companies paying down their debts, it's apparent that Interplay is gearing up to do so with other people's money -- although one unnamed analyst says the company is hoping for a market capitalization at about 2-2.5 times revenues. If the market bites, then shareholders will have a healthy stake. Survivors win
But the gaming industry is about fun, not numbers, right? Not exactly. In a sector where the quality of a single title can make or break a company, you're only as good as your last game -- and everyone is at the mercy of retailers. Merely surviving might be deemed success.
In that sense, Interplay is a winner. Mr. Fargo is himself a longtime gamer, and his company dates back to the early 1980s. Compared to startups that count themselves lucky to get a single game distributed, Interplay has a solid history. "Interplay has a good sense of what's appealing, of what will work and what won't," says PC Gamer's Mr. Vaughn. "They've been around a while and know the industry and aren't afraid to experiment." Recent experiments include Descent, a big hit back in 1996. Other titles include Fallout, Stonekeep, and BattleChess. According to Mr. Lerner of Multitude, although Interplay didn't have much in terms of hits in 1997, "they're expecting a great year out of 1998."
And the gaming industry is a shelf-space business. "The more shelf space you have the more value you have," says Mr. Lerner. And while Interplay is the fifth largest in the business, to some, fifth may not be good enough for Wall Street. "The investment bankers see (the interactive gaming industry) as a giant battle for shelf space where the three finalists have already been chosen," explains Mr. Lerner. That said, he sees Interplay as less speculative than most because "they have real revenues, and depending on which quarter you look at, some strong earnings."
ut when we asked how many other gaming companies have gone public recently, Mr. Lerner responded, half in jest, "Listings? There have only been delistings for gaming companies." What a living
Mr. Vaughn and Mr. Lerner agree that Interplay should be around for a while. Despite the competition and steady and relentless consolidation, the industry is still growing at an average of 20-30 percent, according to 1996-97 PC Data statistics. And Interplay had the foresight to set up its own distribution subsidiary, which insulates it from the uneven revenues that plague lesser gaming companies. As such, the market may view this IPO as slightly less risky in an industry where doom lurks around every Christmas retail season.
So, by the time Interplay was to launch some of their most known and codexian loved games, they had some problems but most people seen them as estable and being able to easily capitalize themselves. Their biggest problems were the lack of hits on 1997 that let them on the red. So, at that time Interplay was seen as less risky than other gaming companies.
Computer-game maker Interplay Entertainment Corp. is sharply scaling back the size of its initial public stock offering.
The Irvine-based company, which said in March that it hoped to raise about $72 million in a public stock sale, said it now plans to raise $27 million, according to documents filed Tuesday with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
The company said it expects to sell 5 million shares of common stock, down from an original 6.25 million. The stock is expected to be priced at about $6 per share, according to the filing.
Market watchers had expected Interplay to launch the public offering nearly two weeks ago. The delay, as well as Tuesday's adjusted figures, reflect both the difficult nature of the IPO market and the ongoing difficulties other game makers have encountered on Wall Street.
"It's a really horrible time to be a game company that wants to go public," said Tom Taulli, stock analyst with IPO Monitor. "The gaming industry lately has been under a lot of pressure from investors. And the IPO market is not very forgiving unless you're in a very specific--and hot--Internet market."
Video-game stocks have been a mixed bag throughout 1998. Industry powerhouse Electronic Arts Inc. has performed well, with its stock price rising 40% over the last 12 months thanks to surging profits and a stream of best-selling titles. But Broderbund Software Inc., which is responsible for two of the four best-selling games for PCs last year, has watched its stock plunge as much as 32% this year.
"This is a hit-driven industry," said Derek Brown, a multimedia analyst with Volpe Brown Whelan & Co. in San Francisco. "When you couple that with the rising development costs and the constant fight for retail shelf space, you're starting to see a split market with a very small group of people at the top."
Interplay officials, who have not said when the company will launch its IPO, declined to comment Wednesday.
According to the most recent filing, proceeds from the offering will be used to repay $25.4 million in debts and $1.5 million to distributor Universal Interactive Studios.
Universal is the company's biggest shareholder at 49.4%. Interplay founder Brian Fargo, 35, owns 44.9% of the stock, according to the filing.
So, they reduced the IPO from 71 million to 25.4 million and the reason was complete lack of interest, at that time you needed to have hits to attract the attention from investors, no hits, no money, unless you were on some hot internet company that would go bankrupt when the dotcom bubble exploded. 1998 to 2000 was the decisive time, Interplay needed hits but the only hit it achieved , at least on RPGs, was with Baldur's Gate 1 but DnD belonged to the Wizards of the Coast and alot of this money would go to pay for the licence. Alot of other Interplay titles from that era would become known as cult titles but I bet most didn't sell all that well.
So, while Fallout 1 and 2 and Planescape Torment were very good games, they weren't commercial hits. Without hits, Interplay had no way to get loans from investors, remember, you don't only need a game to go well and pay its production but go well enough to pay for the future games budget. There is a reason why publishers expect a game to sell at least the double it costed to make, actually more than the double to pay for the infraestructure overhead.
By 2000, the situation got much worse than 1997, as a barrage of Interplay titles underperformed, remember, Interplay was a publisher and had a HUGE overhead infrastructure to distribute all those games on boxes around the world and all of this needed to be fed by HITS, not small hits but big ones. For each Fallout there must be at least a Baldur's Gate but I bet that wasn't reality.
Ironically, guess which other game by 2001 was a big hit? Baldur's Gate Dark Alliance that sold more than 1 million copies. It was hits like this Interplay needed but again, it was a licenced title, guess where alot of the money gone?
I guess it was pretty obvious by 2001 that Interplay needed to be a whole different company to stay alive as a publisher, focusing mostly on consoles to get easier and quicker money than trying to get blood from stone on the PC but it was too late, they had no money anymore and couldn't do anything about it.
Remember that at that time, I can only bet but it makes sense, the logistic chain for PC games was breaking down, a brink and mortar store could have a PC box section or a console box section as the console market was exploding I bet most decided to stick to the less risky bet and gone with the console games section with the PC games being pushed out. There is a reason why there are dedicated console games stores nowdays and PC gamming depends on virtual stores like Steam.
I don't like all InXile games, they are shovelware and I have fun shitting on Fargo but I think it is unfair to put all the blame on the dude when Microprose, Borderbund, Infogrames and other publishers at that time all kicked the bucket too. I bet if the situation was like it is today, with digital distribution and internet available everywhere, the whole story for PC gaming would be different and this drives me crazy because there is room for publishers making incline games but no one is willing to do the risky bet, especially not Fargo, the nostalgia peddler, and the guy that was on the best position to do it but that is to expect too much from an almost 60 year old guy.
