Interview Chris Avellone Sugarbombed Interview, Part Two

[l3loodAngel]

Duh...

 

[Roguey]

Metacritic is easily susceptible to score-bombing. Now the simple binary of Steam reviews otoh

Fallout 4: 77% (over 50,000)
New Vegas: 95% (over 40,000)

Do you have some examples of other Osbidian employees who quit and are now 'Obsidian VIP's?

Fenstermaker https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/89393-is-eric-fenstermaker-still-at-obsidian/page-2
Chapman https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/53986-tony-evans-leaving-obsidian-for-bioware/page-4#entry1298792

 

[an Administrator]

casual

[kazh-oo-uh l]

adjective
1.
happening by chance; fortuitous:
a casual meeting.
2.
without definite or serious intention;careless or offhand; passing:
a casual remark.

adjective
3.
seeming or tending to be indifferentto what is happening; apathetic;unconcerned:
a casual, nonchalant air.
4.
without emotional intimacy orcommitment:
casual sex.

 

[Lurker King]

this is true, causals do none of those things because causals aren't people

for someone who harps so much about casuals and traitors you'd think you'd at least get the word right. i thought it was a typo at first but nope, you always spell it that way, which leads me to believe you think that's actually the right way to pronounce it too. which makes me think you have no idea what the word even means, because calling someone a 'causal' makes no sense, so the term you so casually use in every fucking dumb post you make is just something you picked up but never bothered to actually learn. Just goes to show how full of shit you are.

leave this place and never return you fucking causal

Typos are common when you are typing fast. The fact that you have to resort to insults regarding typos shows how completely devoid of any ideas you are. Do you have any objections agaisnt my descriptions about popamoles besides one typo? No? Sorry.

 

[hpstg]

Typos are common when you are typing fast. The fact that you have to resort to insults regarding typos shows how completely devoid of any ideas you are. Do you have any objections agaisnt my descriptions about popamoles besides one typo? No? Sorry.

It's wrong to resort to insults for typos. It's only ok for combat systems and for not recognizing the perfect Ar Pee Gee you have in your head, right Lurker King?

 

[Somberlain]

I will repeat this for the millionth time "Your Gods (Avellone, Cain, Fargo, etc.) are either causals, or traitors, or both".

Give them some credit. It is not just marketing. They also did some empirical research regarding causals' preferences.

The causals are not complaining about the lack of reacitivity or skill checks. They also think that FO3 is better than FNV. Would you say that this proves that FO3 has better writing than NV? Of course not. One thing has nothing to do with the other.


I could literally spent the whole day collecting quotes from causals saying idiotic stuff about F:NV. Whatever is that makes some causals criticize FO4 is not something that would be corrected by Avellone.

Causals don’t know who Avellone is. Causals don’t care about writing. Causals hate skill checks (see F:NV criticisms) and they don’t understand what is C&C because they want trash mobs to kill. What some people here need to understand is that it is not enough to have Chris Avellone in order to make a good cRPG. Either you need him working with other talented people in an interesting project (FO2, MotB) or you need to give him more control and time to attach the gameplay to the writing (PS:T). The likes of PoE and W2 reminds us that Avellone participation doesn’t amount to much without these conditions.

Clearly typos from typing too fast and totally not for being an illiterate manboon.

 

[Diggfinger]

He seems to indicate that New Reno was actually part of the draft the Troika team left behind before leaving. Interesting.

 

[Shilandra]

Wait a minute, isn't "causals" a real thing though? Like, it doesn't have any relationship to the actual word "causal" like in causal relationship, but is actually a deformation of the word "casual" that's meant to give it more insulting overtones.

Sorta like how instead of people typing get good they type git gud.

 

[Ivan]

sorry honey, your casual taste in gaming was too much to bear. i'm leaving you.

 

[Jedi Master Radek]

I could literally spent the whole day collecting quotes from causals saying idiotic stuff about F:NV

And I can spend the whole day collecting quotes from people claiming the earth is flat. This definitely proves that science casuals thinks that!
You should really spend some time reading about cognitive biases, the proper way of doing science research and so on. Nothing can be more enriching than understanding those.

 

[Sordid MCA/Prosper Hybryd]

When it was morning, our beloved Prophet MCA, who was a sea of compassion, said "Pete Hines is great!"
Shame on those who dare to doubt the wisdom of the Prophet.
Henceforth all of us should truly believe that Pete is great!
Those who do not agree with the wisdom of MCA should be beheaded.

 

[Somberlain]

C&C, bitches.

 

[CyberWhale]

MCA's new title starts with S, but the word you're looking for isn't senpai, it's sellout.

 

[Somberlain]

Fagellone's next title depends on whether he beats Infinitron in their shilling competition for that job at Bethesda.

 

[DeepOcean]

Avellone should make a kickstarter called: "The real PoE: what would be before Sawyer destroyed fun by Chris Avellone."

First stretch goal: "I will make a character named Josh Sawyer and make him die over and over again being attacked by wolves."

I would back the fuck of this kickstarter. It would be cathartic schadenfreude.

Why wasting your time on Zionmax, Chris, if you could be fueling enough butthurt to last a century?

 

[Somberlain]

Second stretch goal: God King Josh Sawyer has his golden throne sitting on one side of a gigantic, decorative weighing scale. The scale is in perfect and delicate balance since the other side is filled with the precisely correct amount of colorless, odorless and flavourless nondescript objects. You play as a cheeky troll called MCA who's goal is to sneak up to the scale, take a dump on one side and watch the God King's throne crash and burn.

 

[circ]

No developer understands C&C, that I've seen anyway.

Oh no, I picked the cookies, now I can't have milk with them.

 

[Azarkon]

Why do people keep acting as though Avellone's main problem with Obsidian is with Sawyer? He might not be friends with Sawyer, but he's named the upper level management several times now, specifically, as the villains in his eyes, while he's given a pass to the developers.

Feargus Urquhart, Darren Monahan, and Chris Jones. Those are the guys who Avellone likely has a problem with. Sawyer is at best their loyal servant.

 

[Somberlain]

Eh, Sawyer hate is mostly a Codex meme. He probably has nothing to do with Avellone's departure.

 

[Fairfax]

Why do people keep acting as though Avellone's main problem with Obsidian is with Sawyer? He might not be friends with Sawyer, but he's named the upper level management several times now, specifically, as the villains in his eyes, while he's given a pass to the developers.

Feargus Urquhart, Darren Monahan, and Chris Jones. Those are the guys who Avellone likely has a problem with. Sawyer is at best their loyal servant.

MCA and Sawyer go back a long time, since the Black Isle days, and they have very different philosophies. Sawyer also became the go-to Project Lead and now has MCA's job. I do believe the two had a falling out and don't see eye to eye, but I don't think having differences with Sawyer made him leave. You're right that it's clear the partners were the problem, I'm just explaining why people may find the potential rivalry story entertaining.
There's also the fact Sawyer hate was already established, but we didn't know much about Feargus or the other partners.

 

[Roguey]

Second stretch goal: God King Josh Sawyer has his golden throne sitting on one side of a gigantic, decorative weighing scale. The scale is in perfect and delicate balance since the other side is filled with the precisely correct amount of colorless, odorless and flavourless nondescript objects. You play as a cheeky troll called MCA who's goal is to sneak up to the scale, take a dump on one side and watch the God King's throne crash and burn.

"Lack of balance is the great destroyer"--Chris Avellone

 

[Fairfax]

Second stretch goal: God King Josh Sawyer has his golden throne sitting on one side of a gigantic, decorative weighing scale. The scale is in perfect and delicate balance since the other side is filled with the precisely correct amount of colorless, odorless and flavourless nondescript objects. You play as a cheeky troll called MCA who's goal is to sneak up to the scale, take a dump on one side and watch the God King's throne crash and burn.

"Lack of balance is the great destroyer"--Chris Avellone

That's a bit misleading. He was talking about the player having overpowered tools to the point that combat was too easy and didn't need tactics. He's also said this:

And his definition of balance is that every option should be valuable:

That may sound kind of self-evident, but there's a lot of game balance that needs to go into making sure that each skill, trait, and attribute score is valuable, and an RPG has to deliver on that. If you're going to give the player a chance to specialise in or improve a certain aspect of their character, there needs to be value for that in the gameworld.

 

[Roguey]

And his definition of balance is that every option should be valuable:

That is also Sawyer's definition.

He also said this

Players typically respond well to difficulty that moves on a "rollercoaster" over the course of the game. If a single weapon or set of weapons allows the player to crest and effectively coast through rest of the game, it's often a less enjoyable experience.

 

[Sentinel]

Why do people keep acting as though Avellone's main problem with Obsidian is with Sawyer? He might not be friends with Sawyer, but he's named the upper level management several times now, specifically, as the villains in his eyes, while he's given a pass to the developers.

Feargus Urquhart, Darren Monahan, and Chris Jones. Those are the guys who Avellone likely has a problem with. Sawyer is at best their loyal servant.

MCA and Sawyer go back a long time, since the Black Isle days, and they have very different philosophies. Sawyer also became the go-to Project Lead and now has MCA's job. I do believe the two had a falling out and don't see eye to eye, but I don't think having differences with Sawyer made him leave. You're right that it's clear the partners were the problem, I'm just explaining why people may find the potential rivalry story entertaining.
There's also the fact Sawyer hate was already established, but we didn't know much about Feargus or the other partners.

Really? Sawyer is CFO, lead writer and creative director now?
AFAIK Sawyer was promoted to Lead Designer. He didn't take Avellone's job.

 

[Fairfax]

And his definition of balance is that every option should be valuable:

That is also Sawyer's definition.

He also said this

Players typically respond well to difficulty that moves on a "rollercoaster" over the course of the game. If a single weapon or set of weapons allows the player to crest and effectively coast through rest of the game, it's often a less enjoyable experience.

The execution is very different, though. For instance, Sawyer wants as many attributes as possible to be important. IIRC he wanted at least 4 to be important to every class in Pillars. I don't know if MCA agrees, but it is not something you see in PS:T/KOTOR2/AP, as all 3 have optimal builds that are highly specialized. Not that you can't ignore some stats in PoE, but it wasn't Sawyer's intent.

Why do people keep acting as though Avellone's main problem with Obsidian is with Sawyer? He might not be friends with Sawyer, but he's named the upper level management several times now, specifically, as the villains in his eyes, while he's given a pass to the developers.

Feargus Urquhart, Darren Monahan, and Chris Jones. Those are the guys who Avellone likely has a problem with. Sawyer is at best their loyal servant.

MCA and Sawyer go back a long time, since the Black Isle days, and they have very different philosophies. Sawyer also became the go-to Project Lead and now has MCA's job. I do believe the two had a falling out and don't see eye to eye, but I don't think having differences with Sawyer made him leave. You're right that it's clear the partners were the problem, I'm just explaining why people may find the potential rivalry story entertaining.
There's also the fact Sawyer hate was already established, but we didn't know much about Feargus or the other partners.

Really? Sawyer is CFO, lead writer and creative director now?
AFAIK Sawyer was promoted to Lead Designer. He didn't take Avellone's job.

I mean Design Director, which seems to be just a different name for the Creative Director role.