Interview Fallout 3 interview at Shacknews

[Volourn]

I always knew you had a decent IQ. Soemtimes.

 

[elander_]

Yeah, I can't really... It becomes an issue of "Yes you did, no you didn't." They say that we dumbed down our game, that it isn't as complex as Morrowind or that it isn't as good as [The Elder Scrolls II:] Daggerfall. I say, the same people that made Morrowind made Oblivion. There were maybe three or four people total that worked on Morrowind that didn't work on Oblivion. We had designers that had key roles in Daggerfall that designed those same systems for Oblivion. The same ones that people said we dumbed down from Daggerfall were the ones that those same guys made.

Add this to the list of Pete Hines lies.

It's the vision of a group of folks. Much like The Elder Scrolls, it starts with Todd Howard who drives everything, but then there's definitely the lead designer, lead artist, lead programmer.

Yes but who pulls the strings on Todd Howard? I wouldn't mind looking at its employee contract. We have seen this talk before with Oblivion. They are trying to convince everyone that this is a team with creative autonomy. Bullshit. This is team of lap dogs and employees.

 

[taxacaria]

As Fallout fans and guys who make roleplaying games and have for over a decade, we have pretty good ideas about what we want to do and how to do it.

...about what WE want...

I thought games are made for gamers.

 

[Dementia Praecox]

It's probably his mother who told him Oblivion is a good RPG.

Haha, it cracked me up picturing Petes mom telling him "but you have to prove that you aren't going to screw up this beloved franchise."

Edit: Even more than this:

I thought games are made for gamers.

 

[Kingston]

What pisses me off is that its "far into development", and yet the fallout fan community has not heard a single word from Bethseda. They have given us no chance to voice our opinions.

They keep on insisting that they are true hardcore Fallout fans and have several copies installed on the same harddrive, huge posters aswell and they probably drive the "Highwayman" car from F2. And yet they do not care what their fellow fans think.

I'll bet you that when they start talking to communities it'll be on their Oblivion boards 'cos thats what they're marketing at anyway.

And for crying out loud, the way he dismisses actual job applications from the original creators is just egotistic. "Job inquiries and what have you..." You'd think that being a true hardcore Fallout fan he'd be drooling at the chance to work with the original geniouses that made Fallout. "BUT OH NOES HE WIL TAEK MY PLAIZ AND I WONT BE TEH LEEDER NOE MORE!"

Fallout 3 is gone with the blastwave...

 

[Jason]

I'll bet you that when they start talking to communities it'll be on their Oblivion boards 'cos thats what they're marketing at anyway.

Emil did post at DAC for a short while, but I guess gave up on it. Maybe he'll be back for more love/abuse when details are released.

 

[merry andrew]

u cant criticiez tis gaem! u haevnt playd it yet!!!

Seconded.

 

[Bradylama]

Emil also posted at NMA for two days. Exactly. 2 posts for one, 2 for the next. Since then a year's worth of silence.

He seemed interested in talking, so I'm leaning more towards a policy change than he was actually angry at us, which is what was levelled at MrSmileyFaceDude in regards to the Codex.

If he does start talking again, make sure to ask him about this.

 

[Brother None]

He seemed interested in talking, so I'm leaning more towards a policy change than he was actually angry at us, which is what was levelled at MrSmileyFaceDude in regards to the Codex.

Angry? Everybody replied to his posts politely, I don't think there was even a hint of a flame towards Emil/Lohan anywhere. Though I did give him a Lindsay Lohan av to pester him. Maybe he got upset over that?

 

[aries202]

I was concerned when I saw Hines mentioned roleplaying --- I was ??? and my glasses nearly
felt off !

Neither Morrowind, Oblivion or any of the other TES games have been great at roleplay, story-telling and the like. THey are still fun games, but maybe a bit more over in the hack n slash department ?

 

[franc kaos]

A few Todd Howard quotes in interview
http://www.duckandcover.cx/content.php?id=66

What, in your mind, are some of the things that differentiate the Fallout games (ignoring FO: Tactics and FO: Brotherhood of Steel, which didn't happen) from the Elder Scrolls series of RPGs?
Outside of the obvious flavor and setting, the number one thing is stronger characters. Fallout really set the standard for me on believable people, good dialogue, and character choice and consequence. With Elder Scrolls, we do aim for something enormous, and we simply can't focus on say - 20 to 40 really deep strong characters and just do them. With Oblivion, we're doing a much better job than we've done before, but the scale of game is so different that without sacrificing some of what makes The Elder Scrolls what it is, I don't think we'd be able to have the same level of characterization in NPCs Fallout did. So with Fallout 3, that's something we want to do well, a limited number of super-deep NPCs.

What are your thoughts on the timeframe and location for the game? By the end of Fallout 2, the world had changed a lot from the way it was when first emerging from the vault at the start of Fallout 1.
Ok, I can say it takes place after Fallout 2. But it's much more in the Fallout 1 flavor. I'm not sure if that makes sense without the specifics, but Fallout 1 is more our role model than Fallout 2.

Will you be using the SPECIAL system in Fallout 3?
Yes, we have rights to it and plan on using it.

What's your opinion of the Fallout fanbase?
The response we've gotten from everyone has been incredible. It seems like almost every gamer and press guy is a fan of the original, and are really looking forward to what we're going to do with it, and really looking forward to seeing Fallout return to a new era of gaming. I think the hardcore fans are incredibly misunderstood, and frankly, have been mistreated in the past.

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/t/theel ... livion.htm

Xbox.com: One of the coolest parts of the game is the hyper-intelligent NPCs. Mind describing a few characters we'll meet and just how smart they are?

Howard: I wish they weren't so smart, actually. We spent forever making them really smart, and probably the last few months making them dumber, because they like to go off and do things that really mess the world up.

http://uk.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/theelders ... ews&page=2

TH: Oblivion has been in development since 2002, so getting the Fallout license recently hasn't changed our plans for Oblivion at all. By their nature, I don't think they compete with each other. They will be very different games--not just in style, but in how they play. Also, for some time our plan had been to use this technology in other games, and Fallout is a great fit for that.

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/ar ... ?id=142458

Is it hard avoiding contradictions with stuff from previous adventures?

Todd Howard: We have to be careful about that, as there's so much of it in previous games. We have people here who research Elder Scrolls lore, 'Lore Masters', just to make sure we're not saying anything that isn't true.

In Oblivion, a lot of the story revolves around the amulet of kings, so we put a lot of research into how the amulet has been mentioned in previous games - some of them attribute certain powers to the amulet, for example. We have three or four people who check all this full-time, plus we have ways of searching the text we've put in our games too - but it does take some time...

Unfortunately they did a piss poor job of it then.

Choice & consequence, deep NPCs, SPECIAL. If he is in charge, and been listening, and Emil is the lead designer... Maybe?

 

[Durwyn]

We should have faith... it's Fallout in the end... No man is so stupid to not learn a lesson from oblivons shittnes, even though it appealed to xBoxorz kiddies.

 

[Creepy17]

WE'LL DO WHAT WE DO BEST GODDAMMIT

And if you don't like it, you're just stuck in the past. You have to EVOLVE! Welcome to the FUTURE OF GAMING!

Actually, you have to ERODE.

 

[taxacaria]

We should have faith... it's Fallout in the end... No man is so stupid to not learn a lesson from oblivons shittnes, even though it appealed to xBoxorz kiddies.

Every man is so smart to learn that shit can turn into many bucks if delivered to the adequate customers.

 

[Bradylama]

Ash didn't let Pikachu evolve into Rychu, just like Fallout fans. Ash is a shit pokemon trainer.

 

[aries202]

Maybe, Just Maybe....

Emil being the lead designer and all and Todd Howard being in charge.

To me, Todd really is sincere about this project.
I really do hope that his visions on Fallout 3 will be allowed to shine through the game.

I mean --- what if Tood & CO. actually delivers, and makes a great game, and then Hines & staff got a look at it and say: 'hey - it's not console like enough.' 'We'd need to take this out and & put
that in the game just in order to sell millions of
games.'

It sounds like they are using the RAI-system again, and that they, again, quite can't control their characters (yet). Maybe, they should try coding the characters another way.

If the game is released as Todd's visions are presented here, my best guess is that the whole
Oblivion console segment would run & by this game, thinking it is 'oblivion with guns'. And then complain a lot about the game being to hard and stuff.

 

[Durwyn]

We should have faith... it's Fallout in the end... No man is so stupid to not learn a lesson from oblivons shittnes, even though it appealed to xBoxorz kiddies.

Every man is so smart to learn that shit can turn into many bucks if delivered to the adequate customers.

Fuck, making shitty games must be a hard work... You must constantly think where to add bloom, super FX effects and shaders to cover overall shittnes. Think how to not do somethin stupid (something that could please real RPG lovers) It's a hard work, but very profitable indeed.

 

[Texas Red]

God damn, I cant believe some people failed their check at detecting motive.

 

[Jasede]

Ash didn't let Pikachu evolve into Rychu, just like Fallout fans. Ash is a shit pokemon trainer.

Actually, Pikachu can learn better attacks than Raichu if you don't evolve him as soon as possible, eventually leading to the possibility of breeding a pokemon with the elusive Volt Tackle ability...

Damnit, someone shoot me.

Nice avatar, Creepy.

 

[Brother None]

To me, Todd really is sincere about this project.
I really do hope that his visions on Fallout 3 will be allowed to shine through the game.

:shock:

That seems to indicate that Todd (the interview is with Pete, by the way) was also sincere when he said he did his best on Oblivion.

If that's his actual intention, that's his best effort, then he is apparently incapable of making a decent RPG.

And that's even more scary than him doing this out of greed or because Pete pulls the strings anyway.

It sounds like they are using the RAI-system again

No it doesn't. That'd be a shitty pr move, too, Radiant was some overhyped disappointment. Generally you see such things return under a different name and presented as "reformed" or "reworked" or whatever.

 

[Dementia Praecox]

God damn, I cant believe some people failed their check at detecting motive.

That'll be sense motive. You even fail at being a nerd.

 

[elander_]

I mean --- what if Tood & CO. actually delivers, and makes a great game, and then Hines & staff got a look at it and say: 'hey - it's not console like enough.' 'We'd need to take this out and & put that in the game just in order to sell millions of
games.'

If Todd made a great game by accident (look at Morrowind and Oblivion) he would immediately throw it on the garbage just because it wasn't consolish enough. It doesn't take much to spell choices and consequences and to know that the Fallout fans prefer the first game.

It sounds like they are using the RAI-system again, and that they, again, quite can't control their characters (yet). Maybe, they should try coding the characters another way.

Don't expect any role-playing because role-playing is considered bad design. These guys have their sacred statistics which allow them to dictate their idiotic game design mistakes like if it was some unquestionable and scientifically validated truth and they all follow it like blind men adoring their own sacred pillar of crap.

If the game is released as Todd's visions are presented here, my best guess is that the whole Oblivion console segment would run & by this game, thinking it is 'oblivion with guns'. And then complain a lot about the game being to hard and stuff.

Console players aren't stupid by definition. They just don't have any good rpg references. The best thing they have is Zelda and Final Fantasy.

 

[Jasede]

God damn, I cant believe some people failed their check at detecting motive.

That'll be sense motive. You even fail at being a nerd.

...which is like failing at failing.

 

[Dementia Praecox]

God damn, I cant believe some people failed their check at detecting motive.

That'll be sense motive. You even fail at being a nerd.

...which is like failing at failing.

It's like proving Murphys law by failing to prove Murphys law.

 

[Section8]

It kind of has that same feel, that people are saying, "Yeah, I liked Oblivion, and you guys are good at roleplaying, but you have to prove that you aren't going to screw up this beloved franchise." We think we can do it.

I know some nice young ladies who, for a price, are good at roleplaying, and they don't have to prove anything to me, god bless 'em.

A few Todd Howard quotes in interview[...]

Oh snap. This is my favourite:

I think the hardcore fans are incredibly misunderstood, and frankly, have been mistreated in the past.

"There is nothing to worry about. We at Japan Toy Company are in awe of your large penis."

It's pretty fucking easy to say the right things, but it's pretty fucking hard to trust anyone in bed with the gaming media. Also...

It seems like almost every gamer and press guy is a fan of the original, and are really looking forward to what we're going to do with it, and really looking forward to seeing Fallout return to a new era of gaming.

I'd say about 90% of the Australian population over the age of about sixteen are fans of alcohol, and look forward to drinking it again. The vast majority of that demographic would happily drink just about anything. It's the connoisseurs that you have to work hard to please.