Interview Interview with David Gaider

[franc kaos]

I do agree that dialogue shouldn’t weigh down the story. It should be concise enough to get across what’s needed – for those who want to explore the dialogue in more detail, the ability to do so should be there, but it shouldn’t be mandatory

Absolutely loved this line, something I've been thinking for ages, let the ADHD generation finish their game in 5 hours, but offer the depth and complexity for it to play with multiple layers - you never know, those same MTV 5 second attention spans might be engaged and start to think again. (don't know if that makes sense).

Excellent interview - to both of you. Playing PS:T for the first time and loving the dialogue options, and so far, the combat's ok, I think I def. prefer paused based combat.

 

[Elwro]

Absolutely loved this line, something I've been thinking for ages, let the ADHD generation finish their game in 5 hours,

Yeah, but if they do, they'll bitch about how short the game is. So you have to put lots of combat and long-distance walking in the game. That's what I fear.

 

[Kamaz]

Strange, after this interview Gaider suddenly doesnt feel like mega-uuber villain idiot who has limited mental capibilities and is fixed on destruction of everything good in RPG genre. Why didn't I get this enlightment after another 20 interviews made with him?

 

[hiciacit]

Wow, good interview!

 

[DarkUnderlord]

Strange, after this interview Gaider suddenly doesnt feel like mega-uuber villain idiot who has limited mental capibilities and is fixed on destruction of everything good in RPG genre. Why didn't I get this enlightment after another 20 interviews made with him?

Probably because all the other places that interview him ask mega-uuber villain idiot who has limited mental capibilities and is fixed on destruction of everything good in RPG genre type questions.

... and just a note saying I approved the interview and edited VD's news post to take most of it out of there. So the rest of the interview is now found if you follow the link in the news post.

I was disagreeing in part with some of VD's points in the questions and came off as being more defensive than I liked.

Pansy.

 

[Vault Dweller]

I was disagreeing in part with some of VD's points in the questions ...

You cut the best stuff then - disagreeing is what the Codex is all about. If you still have those answers, please post them here unofficially.

Thanks for the interest, VD.

Thanks for doing it, David. Really appreciate the quality of the answers

If someone *really* wants the answers to those other questions, I suppose I can think about it some more and write something for them later.

Did you even have to ask? Of course, we do. Bring it on.

 

[ichpokhudezh]

Lots of thanks to VD for the insightful interview.

At any rate, I'm glad some people found it an ejoyable read. Thanks for the interest, VD. If someone *really* wants the answers to those other questions, I suppose I can think about it some more and write something for them later.

Thank you, David. While the questions were without doubt loaded, it will be definitely intriguing to read your answers to or comments on them
(well, maybe not the #7 - Mission's uniqueness on Telos was not skill-related and where would a Star Wars related narrative be without a definitive robot-moment?... )

 

[Vault Dweller]

While the questions were without doubt loaded...

Again the loaded stuff. *sigh* You guys have been brainwashed by all the vanilla interviews you've been reading for years.

well, maybe not the #7 - Mission's uniqueness on Telos was not skill-related...

I could be wrong then. Please specify. I thought she is the only one who can open that force-field by using the console that could have been hacked.

... and where would a Star Wars related narrative be without a definitive robot-moment?... )

My point was that there could have been another way for a robot to open that door, by connecting to the system through a small dataport, for example, which is very Star War-sy, btw.

 

[MrBrown]

This interview made me think about linearity and non-linearity again, so I made a new topic on General RPG disuccion: http://www.rpgcodex.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=180518

 

[kris]

D. Gaider

There was one thing I would like answered. I in comparison to a couple of others here are a bit more positive about Bioware games, but there is one thing I would want more of. That be more consequences in conversation and more coupling between your actions/character. In your (Bioware) games you have local effects (area changed a bit), good/evil, gender and ending consequences due to action/conversation from what I recollect.

So the question would be, what more things would you like to have in your games when it comes to consequential conversations and character build feedback in conversations?

(I know that the background vinettes in Dragon age may contain at least something of what I want.)

Fallout and Arcanum being good games to take examples from, especially in how character build affect your play and conversations.

 

[Volourn]

Interviews where the questioner lies, makes shit up, and is inconsistent in their belives may be entertaining; but they ae also laughable.

R00fles!

 

[Vault Dweller]

Interviews where the questioner lies, makes shit up, and is inconsistent in their belives may be entertaining; but they ae also laughable.

R00fles!

Didn't you, like, said it 10 times already? It's a sad cry for attention. Don't worry, Volly, we love you.

 

[Volourn]

HINT: I'm not the only one repeating myself in this thread. More hypocrisy. YAHOO!

P.S. Admit to your sinful lies, and ignorance!

 

[Mefi]

Yeah, but if they do, they'll bitch about how short the game is. So you have to put lots of combat and long-distance walking in the game. That's what I fear.

True. But then if you're appealing to the gad-fly attention span market then your whole game is going to be based on combat and walking in any case. It's a kind of self-fulfilling prophesy which is tied up to marketing studies and risk aversion. And as the cost of making a game spirals upwards, we're going to have to turn to indie developers more and more to get the games we want to see. And as they become successful, they'll become mainstream, and we'll look to the next generation of indies. Until the industry decides that it can no longer sustain the "graphics over everything" costing and looks to an older market who want something more cerebral then we're pretty much stuck with this, I guess.

@dgaider - we know you weren't being evasive. Your other answers showed that you had put a lot of time and effort into the interview. Thank you for that. It's brilliant to have someone in the industry willing to sit down and actually treat their audience as adults. It's been a long time since I've read an interview with a developer which didn't just recycle buzz words and hype but actually went to the core of the issues being raised.

 

[FrancoTAU]

Just reread the interview again since i kind of flew through it last night and I caught Dave's opinion on combat. I'm guessing Dragon Age is going to end up with Real Time w/Pause between Dave's opinion and Bioware's history

Otherwise, everything else I either shared similar thoughts or close enough not to really bother me.

 

[Avin]

man, you gotta admire these game companies dudes that come here, read and post sometimes.

codex is love.

strangely obsidian dudes didn't show here a lot. why is that?

 

[Volourn]

Because. They don't want to. Duh.

 

[Avin]

Because. They don't want to. Duh.

have you changed your panties after gaider's interview?

if i wanted your opinion i'd kill myself first. twice. just in case.

 

[Shevek]

Question:

7. Going with party mechanics again, in Knights of the Old Republic some NPCs had unique abilities, which made playing without them impossible, thus forcing players to have them in the party (only T3-M4 can open the Sith base, only Mission can open that force field, etc.) At the same time, the nature of those abilities was hardly unique: all characters had access to Security or Computer Use skills, yet your skills, no matter how high, would be useless in the above mentioned circumstances. Do you feel it was the best way to make NPCs more important?

Answer:

-

Haha.

 

[LlamaGod]

I dont get why RPGs still even have classes.

It's like the only things that have "evolved" in genre are fancy graphics and real-time combat instead of turn-based.

Still use the same classbased shit thats been around forever, still have the same settings, same plots, same characters, same monsters.

There's been like 3 RPGs that actually evolved and surprise, they are the best ones.

 

[FrancoTAU]

I dont get why RPGs still even have classes.

It's like the only things that have "evolved" in genre are fancy graphics and real-time combat instead of turn-based.

Still use the same classbased shit thats been around forever, still have the same settings, same plots, same characters, same monsters.

There's been like 3 RPGs that actually evolved and surprise, they are the best ones.

Okay...i'll bite. What 3 RPGs are you talking about?

 

[Azarkon]

I don't see how skill-based systems constitute a "progression" from class-based systems. The two have existed side by side almost since the beginning. If class-based systems are old, so are skill-based systems, and it seems to me that they're more like two options than Old Cliche and Teh Innovacion.

 

[Drain]

I dont get why RPGs still even have classes.

Because they act as skeletons for roles. Classes provide easy and simple way to define a character in terms of what s/he can and cannot do, especially in the case of underdeveloped skill and advantages/disadvantages systems(e.g. PS:T). On the other hand, underdeveloped skils and A/D systems may be the result of having classes in the first place.

 

[galsiah]

I don't see how skill-based systems constitute a "progression" from class-based systems.

Perhaps not a progression in terms of time, but a progression in theoretical terms.

A class based system puts characters into a discrete number of categories (usually a fairly small number). A skill based system allows a continuous range of character builds. A skill based system is more versatile in this sense (a good thing I think).

A class system has two benefits that I can see (feel free to come up with more):
(1) It provides a character with some sense of identity from the start: you are an X, and Xs have all this interesting stuff in common, a load of history... A player can of course manually place his character into a such a "class" in a skill based system, but with a class based system it's more clear cut.

(2) It allows a basis for decisions which have to have discrete answers (often yes/no). E.g. can the player cast this spell / use this power / use this skill... - if he's of class X, yes otherwise no. It's pretty easy for a player to make character building decisions when such abilities are grouped into premade classes. It's also easy for designers to make sure that each class is reasonably balanced and interesting to play.

Personally I don't think either of these compensate for the versatility of a skill based system. With a skill based system the whole process provides more options and is more complex. It also relies on the player to provide any interesting backstory... for his character himself - he can no longer automatically say "This character is an X".
If a class based system becomes this versatile it loses everything that made it a class based system.

I see class based systems as closer to adventure type games than skill based systems (not necessarily a bad thing). I prefer the versatility of a skill based system for RPGs.

Having said that, I was one of the "XCOM real time with pausing?? How terrible!" people, who ended up never playing turn based - so perhaps I'm just wrong again.
On this issue, is RTwP really the enemy? I always played XCOM Apocalypse on RTwP, and enjoyed it. Having said that, I have fonder memories of the original UFO missions - there always seemed more strategy involved.

 

[kingcomrade]

Turn based is about making decisions, real time with pause is about telling your guys what to do, then watching a screensaver.