Incline Chris Avellone Appreciation Station

[The_Mask]

Vlad wasn't "cardboard generic evil" at all - he just did one of the most practical things one could do in his situation, seeing it from his point of view, and I believe that alone is both realistic and rational.

Hence why I mentioned his image, not him. Or, at least, let's say... his 20th century common man perceived image.



The rest of your post I either agree with, or respect it being your opinion.

 

[Curious_Tongue]

EDIT: Also Planescape: Torment didn't do bad, but it didn't do great, either, I wouldn't necessarily count that as a financial win for the studio as much as "well, it helped us tread water for a while."

Planescape was on the shelves of game stores (discounted) for years after it was released.

Do you have any clue how much the game has made over its lifetime?

 

[Cael]

It's Kim Kardashian, she's married to the rapper Kanye West. I think she's of Armenian descent? She owns a clothing company or something. I'm not sure which of those facts is pertinent.

None of them are. The fact she is worshipped by a large segment of westerners who hangs on to her every word is.

 

[Roguey]

He's saying you should have factions that the vast majority would at least consider joining. The idea never crossed a lot of people's minds (especially female players), which he considers a failure in faction design.

Something Josh said that I still agree with is that if you design games around things that subsets of players don't like, you won't have much left to play. It shouldn't be a goal to have every faction appeal equally to everyone.

Yes, evil paths are less popular, but MCA's approach would be to have an evil/grey faction that's attractive to non-evil PCs as well. The original Legion was supposed to be like that.

As for Chris's original intentions, I've already posted the Daughters of Hecate summary here. That's a faction I'd never help out on a non-evil playthrough. Would I want them to be completely hostile to any PC like New Vegas Fiends? No.

 

[Fairfax]

He's saying you should have factions that the vast majority would at least consider joining. The idea never crossed a lot of people's minds (especially female players), which he considers a failure in faction design.

Something Josh said that I still agree with is that if you design games around things that subsets of players don't like, you won't have much left to play. It shouldn't be a goal to have every faction appeal equally to everyone.

That's not what Chris suggested at all. He doesn't want factions that a significant portion of the players would never consider joining. He wants them to have enough qualities that players would at least be open to the possibility, and that definitely wasn't the case with the Legion.

 

[Roguey]

That's not what Chris suggested at all. He doesn't want factions that a significant portion of the players would never consider joining. He wants them to have enough qualities that players would at least be open to the possibility, and that definitely wasn't the case with the Legion.

This is a creatively limiting idea. I'm sure there are many players who would find the idea of giving into the spirit eater curse in Mask of the Betrayer utterly abhorrent (you can be evil without giving in).

 

[2house2fly]

Most evil options are probably used by a tiny minority of players anyway, and probably usually on a second playthrough when someone wants to see all the content. That's why Tyranny was cool, it made evil the default and made the good options something you have to put some effort in to opt into

 

[Trashos]

I generally agree that the Legion would have been much better with the women respected in the kitchen. It is hard to imagine why misogyny was chosen over this. Maybe Josh was worried that absolutely everyone would join the Legion in the former case.

I joined the Legion on my third run, Chris is talking pure nonsense. Not everyone has your specific perspective. Additionally

Complete Render Unto Caesar. 3.8%

That's at least 76,000 people who had no problem with the Legion. The independent path has at least 200,000, so we're not looking at a massive gulf either.

What are the numbers for NCR and House?

 

[Roguey]

Josh claims that the designers misunderstood his intentions.

I don't want to speak on behalf of John Gonzalez (who wrote Caesar), but while you are not necessarily supposed to DISlike Caesar, it was not our intention to make Caesar someone who is easy to like, nor his autocratic rule something that you react to by saying, "Oh, well it's totally justified."

If a person says, "I don't like Caesar," I wonder if that person doesn't like Caesar as a character or doesn't like Caesar as person. If you don't like Caesar as a person, that's not surprising. He's pretty unlikable for a variety of reasons. He is a domineering tyrant who runs things in a way where he is effectively unchallenged, and it produces a narrow vision in him. No one in the Legion *debates* Caesar, and he has ruled through brutality for so long that it's now just the way things work in Legion territory. Ultimately, Caesar is an educated tyrant living in an echo chamber of his own creation. Despite having a long-term vision for the future, he is quite short-sighted. If you were expecting Caesar to be grey and found him to be black, I'd argue that he's still grey, but he's intentionally a very dark grey. Tamerlane and Charles Taylor also had reasons for doing the things they did, but it doesn't make the things they did any less terrible.

On a related note, I've written before that I believe the gender roles in the Legion were not effectively communicated in the game. Through Legionaries, it is portrayed as misogyny, which was never the rationale I had in mind for Caesar's motivations. Caesar wanted women to stay out of battle because he wanted to produce as many Legionaries as possible as quickly as possible. It wasn't about the fighting (or other) capabilities of women, but the simple fact that women are the only ones who can bear children, so he wanted them doing that as much as possible. Unfortunately, I don't believe Caesar ever says anything about this directly, so the player is left with the very misogynistic statements of various Legionaries. It's still reprehensible, but for a different reason.

What are the numbers for NCR and House?

6.6 and 4.8 respectively (at least 132,000 and 96,000)

 

[Fairfax]

That's not what Chris suggested at all. He doesn't want factions that a significant portion of the players would never consider joining. He wants them to have enough qualities that players would at least be open to the possibility, and that definitely wasn't the case with the Legion.

This is a creatively limiting idea. I'm sure there are many players who would find the idea of giving into the spirit eater curse in Mask of the Betrayer utterly abhorrent (you can be evil without giving in).

I don't see the point of wasting a joinable faction slot on a cartoony evil one, especially in a Fallout game. If you have abundant resources and time, I suppose it's fine, but it was a waste in FNV's case. The Legion only appeals to evil LARPers and completionists, so they're strictly antagonists to the vast majority of players anyway.

Josh claims that the designers misunderstood his intentions.

Which goes back to what MCA said about Sawyer being distracted during development.

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

How most games portray evil: Ramsay Bolton.

How I wish games portrayed evil: Roose Bolton.

 

[2house2fly]

I wonder how many players went Dark Side for their first or only playthrough of KOTOR2

 

[The_Mask]

I wonder how many players went Dark Side for their first or only playthrough of KOTOR2

I wonder how many people went light side until they got Mira, then went full Dark. That one is probably less than 1%.

 

[Roguey]

I don't see the point of wasting a joinable faction slot on a cartoony evil one, especially in a Fallout game.

"Especially in a Fallout game"?

In Fallout you can join the Khans, Gizmo, and even the Master. None of 'em are remotely grey (I know they originally wanted to do a "Aaactually, helping out Gizmo helps Junktown!" but wiser people went against it since there's nothing that would have telegraphed that, it was just a player punch).

In Fallout 2 you can join the slavers (though doing so punishes you signficantly by locking you out of a bunch of content) and all those criminal gangs in New Reno designed by young Chris Avellone, only one which could actually be considered good.

 

[2house2fly]

You can't criticise anything Avellone does on same the basis as the things he criticises though, because his response will just be to agree that the thing he did was bad and apologise.

 

[Roguey]

I can't believe anyone would want to join such evil misogynistic factions.

"I agree. I'll never write anything like this again,"--Chris Avellone

(P.S. I love "Error" )

 

[Fairfax]

How most games portray evil: Ramsay Bolton.

How I wish games portrayed evil: Roose Bolton.

Roose is a rapist who enforces the first night, he's still way too evil for most players. As far as ASOIAF goes, I'd say a (slightly toned down) Tywin Lannister style would be much more interesting.

I don't see the point of wasting a joinable faction slot on a cartoony evil one, especially in a Fallout game.

"Especially in a Fallout game"?

In Fallout you can join the Khans, Gizmo, and even the Master. None of 'em are remotely grey (I know they originally wanted to do a "Aaactually, helping out Gizmo helps Junktown!" but wiser people went against it since there's nothing that would have telegraphed that, it was just a player punch).

In Fallout 2 you can join the slavers (though doing so punishes you signficantly by locking you out of a bunch of content) and all those criminal gangs in New Reno designed by young Chris Avellone, only one which could actually be considered good.

'Especially in a Fallout game' because of what you can do in the setting, not because of factions in previous games. In any case, these aren't comparable to the way factions were implemented in FNV (let alone the gameplay).

 

[Quillon]

Chris is slamming NV over Legion, the one that Josh himself admitted to be lacking nuance cos of cut content many times Tbf cut content didn't sound like it would make them less "evil" but if there was content much more than 76k people would have joined/tried Legion, if anything to see how it would be like.

Roose is a rapist who enforces the first night, he's still way too evil for most players.

If there was a Roose Bolton done right in an RPG, almost every player would be duped that he was on their side and maybe never learn his true nature.

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

Roose is a rapist who enforces the first night, he's still way too evil for most players. As far as ASOIAF goes, I'd say a (slightly toned down) Tywin Lannister style would be much more interesting

Tywin is a more palatable evil but only because he's very pragmatic and holds some sense of honor that makes it easy to relate with. Roose is more that guy who makes you think he holds something of value or has some pragmatic viewpoint but he's really all for himself. I've always regarded him as more interesting because he's very composed but also a complete mystery which makes him something of a loose cannon. Someone like Tywin has pride, but someone like Roose has cold ambition.

 

[Neanderthal]

MCA wrote Practical Incarnation as an evil done right, and that fuckers pulled some real shit.

 

[Latro]

I can't believe anyone would want to join such evil misogynistic factions.

"I agree. I'll never write anything like this again,"--Chris Avellone

(P.S. I love "Error" )

MCA talking street reminds me of breaking bad

 

[Grotesque]

(I know they originally wanted to do a "Aaactually, helping out Gizmo helps Junktown!" but wiser people went against it since there's nothing that would have telegraphed that, it was just a player punch

Wiser people? You mean the suits that in their wisdom thought that this sends the wrong message to the young generation - not all bad leads to greater bad?
You think they gave a fuck or knew anything about bad game design (as you see it) because not telegraphing information to the player?
That the player expectations or the player will be irked at the end because he just wanted to be an only good-doer knight in power armor?
The same suits that took out children from the game because there was an armed assault in a UK school at the time?

What's wrong with "player punch"?
Good design is the one that leaves a genuine impression.

I would argue even that Fallout was a "coming of age experience" for many where like in the real world, life it's imparting punches left and right that deflowers you as a person of the notions of absolute good or evil.
Fallout would've been a better game if they stuck with that ending.

 

[Rivmusique]

Retweeted by Sawyer.

 

[The Great ThunThun*]

Yes. Mr. Fenstermaker, who has so many great game writing credits to his name that appear on the all-star gallery.

 

[Butter]

Yes. Mr. Fenstermaker, who has so many great game writing credits to his name that appear on the all-star gallery.