RPG Codex Interview: Chris Avellone on Pillars Cut Content, Game Development Hierarchies and More

[Quillon]

If AP got cancelled instead of AC, Avellone would have had directed FNV :D

I... knew it!

 

[Killzig]

Have a hard time believing anyone would jump at the chance to buy Obsidian itself if it doesn't hold the rights to Pillars. What would you even be buying at that point? And how did Feargus expect to sell the company without disclosing that? This isn't a loot box.

 

[aweigh]

I don't understand: how can Obs not own PoE?

 

[lophiaspis]

 

[Fowyr]

Chris Avellone
I'm glad that you not only survived Obsidian, but made some nifty games while working in it. And I'm twice as glad that now you flourish.
You really brought "Endure. In enduring, grow strong" to life.

P.S. This thread is probably wildest Codex's ride for quite some time.

 

[Glaucon]

I don't understand: how can Obs not own PoE?

Another company owned by the owners of Obsidian liceneses the IP to Obsidian in the same way any company can license their IP (like Bethesda licensing Fallout to Obsidian).

 

[Killzig]

So is there a licensing fee Obsidian has to pay to Dark Rock where Feargus can siphon out whatever funds he wants? Woo boy.

 

[Prime Junta]

/me catches up

Okay Chris Avellone the penny finally drops on your "clear hierarchy" stuff. You're not demanding it so you can make underlings do their thing. You're demanding it to stop higher-ups from interfering in specifically delegated responsibilities.

That makes a lot more sense. I still think it's fundamentally misguided but it makes sense in context. From where I'm at Obsidian doesn't need an org chart: it needs new top management, rigorous factory-floor practices, and /then/ clearly-defined roles and responsibilities. But if your org chart has more than three levels in it, you're fucked from the start.

 

[Quillon]

Unfortunately, being assigned to Alpha Protocol also hurt chances of having a shot at doing Project Director work on New Vegas, so that was an added disappointment (although to be fair, Feargus never asked me or brought it up with discussion with the owners, instead, Josh came to him and asked for it first and Ferg agreed - this isn't a negative, as I think Josh did a good job, but I would have loved to work on it, especially after all the Van Buren work. I should have camped out outside of Ferg's office.)

You and Sawyer are probably more passionate about Fallout than Tim & Leo.

 

[Latro]

orc-heart is definitely lawful evil, he uses the law every time. parker is also a clear neutral evil.

 

[Chris Avellone]

Sorry for back-answering, but I'm going through the posts trying to find the one asking me about working on Wasteland/FTL/outside projects at the end of my time at Obsidian. But I saw this, and wanted to answer:

Mmmm hmmm, and yet, I think Chris' earlier response to me suggests that he was in fact willing to put up with all sorts of management failures if he thought it was for a worthwhile cause - an inspiring cause.

That wasn't it (although it would have helped). The issue was I felt loyalty and indebted to Feargus.

To explain, for a long time, I thought Feargus had protected me from my early management failures back at Interplay (I definitely made some as a first lead on Torment) and watched out for me when I was under stress and working double-time on Fallout 2/Torment - and he told me as much, which I thought was a noble thing for a manager to do, so I resolved to support him as best I could because he clearly had my back.

During the last year at Obsidian, however, one of the breaking points (and I think he didn't realize how much his Interplay protection had meant to me personally) was he then told me he had actually done the exact opposite of what he said he'd done and that he hadn't done anything at all, and in fact, encouraged some of the troubles I had experienced. Other Obsidian employees have experienced similar revelations of past actions that turned out not to be true by Feargus's own admission.

It was a big shock to me, but I made sure to double-check with him to make sure I'd heard him right, then went back to my office and thought for a while. One big problem with this revelation was it was one of the reasons I'd defended him at Interplay, gone with him to Obsidian, and then defended all he'd done for there for the past 9 years... because I thought he'd stood up for me and made sacrifices for me as an employee. But he hadn't. It was like a chunk of my life had been derailed, and I felt sick about it. After this, I stopped defending him to others (although I didn't attack him) and I became more aware of other things he did that were causing problems. It didn't cause anger, it was just like having a veil pulled from your face and you started seeing things around you more clearly. I also started being a bit more blunt when I saw things going wrong (reviews, feedback, lack of clarity in decisions, pipeline wastes in time, resources, and money), which I imagine went over less well when compared to my previous behavior of being careful bringing these things up.

Overall, I just wanted (and still want) Feargus to be a good manager, treat people fairly, take a breath before doing something to alienate publishers until he doesn't need publishers anymore, and show some empathy for the states of his employees - and realize how his behavior can hurt them, either directly, or by example. Even if he may do other things to help them, it can't be hit or miss or be carelessly affect their lives (repeated sudden layoffs, favoritism, not dealing with immigration problems properly, not paying employees back, not trying harder to prevent project collapses without working hard on a back-up plan, and more). A lot of the problems we had (ex: Stormlands) could have been avoided, or we could have made a better plan - before doing another round of layoffs. And each problem made our situation more and more desperate (until PoE1, although PoE1 didn't save the company, it just helped our image and company morale - Armored Warfare actually kept things afloat for a long time, although the team wasn't given much thanks for that, imo).

That said, the only other thing I wanted from Feargus? Was a plan. Where in the hell was the company going or supposed to go?

Fargo had a plan when I talked to him when I started working on WL2 part-time at inXile... he had a five-year plan that was very clear, made a lot of sense, and clicked. In all the years at Obsidian (no shit), there wasn't a sense of where the company should go, would go, or how it would get through the next few months.

Part of this can be explained by the financial desperation, but not all of it, and the frustration wasn't mine alone - the other owners (esp. Jones) would get extremely frustrated there wasn't some sort of compass guiding our efforts, and it showed. We just kind of reacted to things vs. planning them, which didn't help our stability.

It could be crowdsourcing may be the plan now, or making similar games to PoE and Indiana but it wasn't the 5-year plan at the time of my departur - and doing the same thing repeatedly may not help Obsidian in the long run without other changes. Also, I've noticed Feargus is taking more and more non-Obsidian roles (Fig, Zero Radius), and I'm worried those might be stepping stones for a future, final step from selling the company - which is good for him, but I don't know about everyone else.

 

[Trashos]

Chris Avellone I am not in game dev but your experiences remind me so much of my current workplace it's painful to read. Thank you for posting your story; because of you I am finally going to take the step of looking for a way out of this dump. No one deserves to be treated like this.

....
Another reason to try and leave for at least a while: Some of the biggest raises at Obsidian didn't come internally - it came from people who left, then came back and got a jump in pay (yes, Anthony is correct, some people did return - like Brandon, and I'm sure he got a substantial raise for returning - and he deserved it).

The problem with this is that this wasn't equalized among the people who had stayed with the company (this isn't uncommon in the game industry). If you pull up a chart, you can likely see the discrepancies in people who stayed vs. those who remained, and usually, the titles and responsibilities of the people who stayed are much lower, too. On the other hand, leaving and coming back does usually imply you've gotten more experience at another company, which should equate to some additional value for the perspective.
....

Right, changing jobs is the easiest way of getting a raise (incl. situations where one leaves and comes back). This is standard in all industries, and makes sense.

Chris, if I understand correctly, you are hinting that plenty of people are thinking of leaving Obsidian at this point in time. Any particular reason that this (people thinking of leaving) is happening now?

 

[Chris Avellone]

Chris Avellone , since there is a new round of questions, I'll just ask again my last one:

I have inspected the manual and credits of IWD, but I never was able to find who specifically should I be thankful to for the tight and evocative fantasy prose style in the introductions to the chapters, the cinematics, and the longer expositions which single characters were giving the player. I just can't get enough of that style, and I wanted to know who was behind the writing and editing, in case you still remember.

Alas, I cannot remember who wrote the intro chapter prose, but it wasn't me (although I may have reviewed it for grammar or fixes).

 

[Chris Avellone]

These are totally different situations like working in some fake school or some hospital. Read the shit you're posting instead of googling "ghost employee frauds" and dumping first results.

Since FU never hid the fact that his wife is on a payroll (since it's public information and every Obsidian employee knows about it apparently) he must have paper trail that would protect him from IRS. If he went the "purple prose" route you can be sure he would have all the documents needed.
And yes, his wife could have been paid for writing and write it much later and because no one besides CEO would see it there would be no way to prove it was done after the fact.

I don't think many people (at the time of my departure) knew his wife was on the payroll, but it can be spotted if review Excel sheets that are sent out forget to delete her entry. Also, I don't think anyone knew the CEO/CFO's contract accountant, or our tax preparer, either. It may not have been hidden, but it wasn't exposed to the employees for sure.

 

[lophiaspis]

Chris, how do you think Obsidian can best be saved/improved? Is it as simple as changing the management?

 

[Prime Junta]

I'm worried those might be stepping stones for a future, final step from selling the company - which is good for him, but I don't know about everyone else.

It sounds unlikely that the new management could be worse. Perhaps that would be the best thing that could happen for the genuine talent still working at Obsidian.

Maybe they'll find some East European oligarchs with money to launder to take Obsidian into their kind, warm, loving embrace.

 

[Latro]

During the last year at Obsidian, however, one of the breaking points (and I think he didn't realize how much his Interplay protection had meant to me personally) was he then told me he had actually done the exact opposite of what he said he'd done and that he hadn't done anything at all, and in fact, encouraged some of the troubles I had experienced. Other Obsidian employees have experienced similar revelations of past actions that turned out not to be true by Feargus's own admission.

total baatezu move

 

[karoliner]

Now that Chris is making a lot more posts i find myself in a constant state of:

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

orc-heart is definitely lawful evil, he uses the law every time. parker is also a clear neutral evil.

Feargus can't even keep his own lies straight! That's not lawful behavior. He has an arbitrary and capricious management style, too. They'd rip him a new asshole in Baator.

D&D really needs a third axis for its alignment system, because more than anything else this all sounds like stupid evil. Incompetence with malicious intent.

 

[Quillon]

It was a big shock to me, but I made sure to double-check with him to make sure I'd heard him right, then went back to my office and thought for a while. One big problem with this revelation was it was one of the reasons I'd defended him at Interplay, gone with him to Obsidian, and then defended all he'd done for there for the past 9 years... because I thought he'd stood up for me and made sacrifices for me as an employee. But he hadn't. It was like a chunk of my life had been derailed, and I felt sick about it. After this, I stopped defending him to others (although I didn't attack him) and I became more aware of other things he did that were causing problems. It didn't cause anger, it was just like having a veil pulled from your face and you started seeing things around you more clearly. I also started being a bit more blunt when I saw things going wrong (reviews, feedback, lack of clarity in decisions, pipeline wastes in time, resources, and money), which I imagine went over less well when compared to my previous behavior of being careful bringing these things up.

Would you have liked to direct FNV base game instead of the Design Director? Does it bother you that people associate him with Fallout, as much as, if not more than they do you atm? Do you think he's favorited in the company more than he deserves? Did it trouble you that he became the go-to guy for overseeing the most important games company was gonna make? If so was knowing all this made you more aware of the problems in the company which you prolly justifiably used to stir up the pen half-expecting you'll leave the company/they'll make you?

I wasn't too far off the mark I guess

 

[Chris Avellone]

Hey Chris Avellone thanks for taking the time to answer questions here.

Can you talk at all about the Orlan detective companion that (I think) morphed into the NPC of Kurran? When initially reading about him I thought he was a pretty interesting and unique character concept, and upon learning he had been cut as a companion I hoped that he might show up as MCA companion for PoE2.

What was your original vision for the character and his arc in PoE, and what ultimately caused him to be discarded in favor of (again, I think) The Grieving Mother? Was it entirely your decision, and, if so, how did that come about?

Thanks!

George (even though he didn't write a companion) and I would often push for being able to design companions without Josh providing summaries of them, since that could rob some of the fun out of creating them (and it also made them less yours, which isn't a great idea if you're going to be spending a lot of weeks writing that character). When we did Van Buren, my directive to each companion designer was "your companion needs to be a prisoner on the run, but beyond that, send me what you'd like to do with that in mind," since I felt it would make them own the characters more (and they should, if they're doing the work).

Originally, the Cipher character was proposed to be an orlan, but once I realized it was important someone speak to the severity and perspective on the Hollowborn crisis, I felt it would be distracting if the person in question was an orlan (it's hard to explain, but the fact they're an orlan AND a Cipher is pushing too many themes, since it's a new race and a new class, and one of the big things in the character should be the Hollowborn angle - just like Durance had the god importance angle). I also wasn't really interested in the detective concept for the first game, and I was more interested in the psychic midwife, even if it didn't go over as well as hoped - still, gave it my best shot.

 

[Chris Avellone]

Hey MCA was this shit evident from the beginning or was there a distinct change in the way things were handled at some point?

It got worse over time, and the closer you got to the source - as things got more financially desperate (even if they improved) they got worse as well.

 

[Edmund Spenser]

Would you be at all interested in any kind of reconciliation or is there too much to reconcile?

 

[Chris Avellone]

The Codex dilemma: the guy who wants sexy women in video games also wants bog-standard save-the-land storylines.

Katarina's approved concept was initially done as a rebellious attempt to go overboard and get Feargus to reject her concept by completely oversexing her (since there were constant requests to "sex her up"), but the rebellious act backfired when Feargus approved it.

 

[Chris Avellone]

Some of his management stories (more the tactics to push people out once they fall afoul of management than the outright fraud) remind me very much of many of the jobs I've had over the years. Bad management, nepotism, and 'evil' corporate practices are hardly the sole domain of game development. In my experience, I'd even say they are the norm rather than the exception.

Obsidian was my first experience with it - not even Interplay was like this, but then I was reminded I wasn't in senior management there, so my perspective was likely different than what was actually going on a high level.