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

[thekdawg21]

Hey Chris Avellone, I just wanted to say thank you for your awesome body of work. Your influence is sorely missed in newer Obsidian games (PoE2) where the writing is competent at best, but dull and uninspiring. Can't wait to see what's in your future projects. I want to get excited about an RPG that's more than party building and combat simulator.

Glad to hear you got yourself out of a toxic situation but I can't help but ask: In what order do you think a game dev company should be aiming to please: fans, investors, it's employees, it's owners? Anyone else? The obvious answer is "all of them", but the primary focus of a company is getting it's owners and investors paid, with employees gaining some mutual benefit from it. If you ran a studio, what would your priorities be?

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

Posting to say I finally speed-scrolled through to the end of this trainwreck and all I got was this lousy hat:


(The hat keeps calling me a "cuck". Is this an intended feature or a bug?)

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

To me it always seemed Obsidian were quite willing to experiment. Maybe not in terms of organizational structure and stuff, but certainly with the games.

KoToR2 has done some freaky stuff with Star Wars setting that I'm sure George Lucas never anticipated. Although the best Expanded Universe novel, Stover's Shatterpoint starring Mace Windu, touched upon many similar themes.

Dwarves certainly sounds experimental even if it never got made.

MotB goes without saying.

South Park - it had to take a lot ingenuity to make it actually look like a cartoon.

Alpha Protocol - unique setting, with some cool innovation dialogue innovations.

PoE2 Deadfire - arguably the most experimental and setting for an RPG since...either Lionheart or Arcanum, I guess? We had plenty of comedy/wacky pirate games. But never a pirate game played straight and exploring some of the most grim themes of the colonial era, slavery, exploitation of native tribes, corporations fighting for trading rights. That was quite a gamble to make a sequel in such a risky setting, as opposed to PoE1 clone, aka, generic medieval RPG with magic.

So I'm not sure what Chris means by having to travel outside the US to find some experimental projects. I guess it means gameplay experiments not narrative experiments, am I getting this right?

 

[Cross]

Alpha Protocol - unique setting, with some cool innovation dialogue innovations.

How on earth is a cinematic cover shooter about the dangers of private military companies (i.e. the plot of almost every triple-A shooter) 'experimental'? And it was originally going to be even more of a low effort game before Sega forced them to add in stealth and more RPG elements.

South Park - it had to take a lot ingenuity to make it actually look like a cartoon.

Maybe, but the actual game design is bog standard and a rather uninspired way to translate South Park to a game. Though to be fair to Obsidian, this was likely the result of the South Park creators being heavily involved in development and dictating their own bad ideas.

PoE2 Deadfire - arguably the most experimental and setting for an RPG since...either Lionheart or Arcanum, I guess? We had plenty of comedy/wacky pirate games. But never a pirate game played straight and exploring some of the most grim themes of the colonial era

 

[fantadomat]

To me it always seemed Obsidian were quite willing to experiment. Maybe not in terms of organizational structure and stuff, but certainly with the games.

KoToR2 has done some freaky stuff with Star Wars setting that I'm sure George Lucas never anticipated. Although the best Expanded Universe novel, Stover's Shatterpoint starring Mace Windu, touched upon many similar themes.

Dwarves certainly sounds experimental even if it never got made.

MotB goes without saying.

South Park - it had to take a lot ingenuity to make it actually look like a cartoon.

Alpha Protocol - unique setting, with some cool innovation dialogue innovations.

PoE2 Deadfire - arguably the most experimental and setting for an RPG since...either Lionheart or Arcanum, I guess? We had plenty of comedy/wacky pirate games. But never a pirate game played straight and exploring some of the most grim themes of the colonial era, slavery, exploitation of native tribes, corporations fighting for trading rights. That was quite a gamble to make a sequel in such a risky setting, as opposed to PoE1 clone, aka, generic medieval RPG with magic.

So I'm not sure what Chris means by having to travel outside the US to find some experimental projects. I guess it means gameplay experiments not narrative experiments, am I getting this right?

Play more games!

 

[MajorMace]

i actually liked risen 2
until bugs made it absolutely unplayable that is

i had to confess

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

To me it always seemed Obsidian were quite willing to experiment. Maybe not in terms of organizational structure and stuff, but certainly with the games.

KoToR2 has done some freaky stuff with Star Wars setting that I'm sure George Lucas never anticipated. Although the best Expanded Universe novel, Stover's Shatterpoint starring Mace Windu, touched upon many similar themes.

Dwarves certainly sounds experimental even if it never got made.

MotB goes without saying.

South Park - it had to take a lot ingenuity to make it actually look like a cartoon.

Alpha Protocol - unique setting, with some cool innovation dialogue innovations.

PoE2 Deadfire - arguably the most experimental and setting for an RPG since...either Lionheart or Arcanum, I guess? We had plenty of comedy/wacky pirate games. But never a pirate game played straight and exploring some of the most grim themes of the colonial era, slavery, exploitation of native tribes, corporations fighting for trading rights. That was quite a gamble to make a sequel in such a risky setting, as opposed to PoE1 clone, aka, generic medieval RPG with magic.

So I'm not sure what Chris means by having to travel outside the US to find some experimental projects. I guess it means gameplay experiments not narrative experiments, am I getting this right?

Play more games!

I played that - for total of 30 seconds and then I immidiately uninstalled it the moment first VO started to speak. So try again, bub.

 

[fantadomat]

To me it always seemed Obsidian were quite willing to experiment. Maybe not in terms of organizational structure and stuff, but certainly with the games.

KoToR2 has done some freaky stuff with Star Wars setting that I'm sure George Lucas never anticipated. Although the best Expanded Universe novel, Stover's Shatterpoint starring Mace Windu, touched upon many similar themes.

Dwarves certainly sounds experimental even if it never got made.

MotB goes without saying.

South Park - it had to take a lot ingenuity to make it actually look like a cartoon.

Alpha Protocol - unique setting, with some cool innovation dialogue innovations.

PoE2 Deadfire - arguably the most experimental and setting for an RPG since...either Lionheart or Arcanum, I guess? We had plenty of comedy/wacky pirate games. But never a pirate game played straight and exploring some of the most grim themes of the colonial era, slavery, exploitation of native tribes, corporations fighting for trading rights. That was quite a gamble to make a sequel in such a risky setting, as opposed to PoE1 clone, aka, generic medieval RPG with magic.

So I'm not sure what Chris means by having to travel outside the US to find some experimental projects. I guess it means gameplay experiments not narrative experiments, am I getting this right?

Play more games!

I played that - for total of 30 seconds and then I immidiately uninstalled it the moment first VO started to speak. So try again, bub.

Allergic toward decent games i take it. Seeing how you managed to play twice that shit deadfire.

PS:Even broken game like Risen 2 is far better one than Deadfire....and have better writing. Not a single description in the whole game!

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Yeah, Risen 2 especially excels in art direction.

It literally looks like they run out of money, so they took the male face, added lipstick, make-up and gigantic tits and that's how Risen 2 got its main romantic interest.

Quality craftsmanship, that.

 

[fantadomat]

Yeah, Risen 2 especially excels in art direction.

It literally looks like they run out of money, so they took the male face, added lipstick, make-up and gigantic tits and that's how Risen 2 got its main romantic interest.

Quality craftsmanship, that.

Bad taste in games and bad taste in women....what a surprise.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Even broken game like Risen 2 is far better one than Deadfire

negus plz

 

[Alienman]

Yeah, Risen 2 especially excels in art direction.

It literally looks like they run out of money, so they took the male face, added lipstick, make-up and gigantic tits and that's how Risen 2 got its main romantic interest.

Quality craftsmanship, that.

Ehm, it's his sister.

 

[fantadomat]

Even broken game like Risen 2 is far better one than Deadfire

negus plz

Which one?

Negus (Ge'ez: ነጉሥ, nəgūś IPA: [nɨguːɬ]; Amharic: nigūs; cf. Tigrinya: ነጋሲ negus) is a royal title in the Ethiopian Semitic languages.[1] It denotes a monarch,[2] such as the Bahri Negus (Lord of the Seas) of the Medri Bahri kingdom in pre-1890 Eritrea, and the Negus in pre-1974 Ethiopia.

Or

Negus is the name of a drink made of wine, often port, mixed with hot water, oranges or lemons, spices and sugar.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Yeah, Risen 2 especially excels in art direction.

It literally looks like they run out of money, so they took the male face, added lipstick, make-up and gigantic tits and that's how Risen 2 got its main romantic interest.

Quality craftsmanship, that.

Ehm, it's his sister.

*unzips*

 

[Riddler]

(Lastly, I don't know what the VO cost of PoE or PoE2, but it would depend on using union actors or non-union actors, among other things. I'd love to see the numbers myself - voicing PoE2 sounded like a late decision, and it sounded like an owner decision, not a Project Director position, based on Josh's posts.)

They used at least 8 union actors for the majority of the VA + a few (perhaps 8 more) others, who may or may not have been union, for lesser parts.

 

[Roguey]

I played that - for total of 30 seconds and then I immidiately uninstalled it the moment first VO started to speak.

"I don't have gold enough" is a great line.

 

[Aeschylus]

Yeah, Risen 2 especially excels in art direction.

It literally looks like they run out of money, so they took the male face, added lipstick, make-up and gigantic tits and that's how Risen 2 got its main romantic interest.

Quality craftsmanship, that.

That is from Risen 3 , which was more egregiously awful than 2 in most ways.

 

[Shilandra]

Alpha Protocol - unique setting, with some cool innovation dialogue innovations.

How on earth is a cinematic cover shooter about the dangers of private military companies (i.e. the plot of almost every triple-A shooter) 'experimental'? And it was originally going to be even more of a low effort game before Sega forced them to add in stealth and more RPG elements.

South Park - it had to take a lot ingenuity to make it actually look like a cartoon.

Maybe, but the actual game design is bog standard and a rather uninspired way to translate South Park to a game. Though to be fair to Obsidian, this was likely the result of the South Park creators being heavily involved in development and dictating their own bad ideas.

PoE2 Deadfire - arguably the most experimental and setting for an RPG since...either Lionheart or Arcanum, I guess? We had plenty of comedy/wacky pirate games. But never a pirate game played straight and exploring some of the most grim themes of the colonial era

There's no way that's real. Is believe a screenshot showing a "choke the bitch" option before I be live that's actually in deadfire.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

PoE2 Deadfire - arguably the most experimental and setting for an RPG since...either Lionheart or Arcanum, I guess? We had plenty of comedy/wacky pirate games. But never a pirate game played straight and exploring some of the most grim themes of the colonial era, slavery, exploitation of native tribes, corporations fighting for trading rights. That was quite a gamble to make a sequel in such a risky setting, as opposed to PoE1 clone, aka, generic medieval RPG with magic.

So I'm not sure what Chris means by having to travel outside the US to find some experimental projects. I guess it means gameplay experiments not narrative experiments, am I getting this right?

So I guess you didn't play Risen/2?

Risen 1 was fun. Others, nah.

 

[MajorMace]

Risen 1 was about colonialism ? I remember there were mages, smugglers and the bad guy's crew, but who's supposed to be the colonizer or the colonized there ?
It's been almost a decade I've played it, all I remember is that the men of the Don would salute me once I became his captain and the main quest making the player roam the island to find pieces of whatever. Twice.

 

[Cael]

Which one?

This one:

 

[MajorMace]

I'm a proud second class citizen of the hollywood empire. The homeland takes its tribute now and then by the application of extraterritorial laws. I'm perfectly aware that whites can be colonized.

But I thought the inquisition was on the island to find something specific. I had no memory they were actually settling.

 

[Alienman]

They were but imposed their own rules on the population, even forced them into service in the temple.

 

[Quillon]

Chris Avellone I remember you wanting to make The Wire RPG. How were you imagining it would pan out in terms of gameplay? Since there should be little combat in it.

 

[agris]

Chris Avellone I remember you wanting to make The Wire RPG. How were you imagining it would pan out in terms of gameplay? Since there should be little combat in it.

I've always imagined it to be like No Truce With the Furies, +25 years, - 3 blots of LSD.