Interview The Codex talks to Feargus

[Hazelnut]

What? You're not an alt? Unbelievable!

 

[Drakron]

Actually, the sci-fi horror thingy could work for a different kind of RPG, less epic and more atmospheric, psychological. Indeed, if i remember the Aliens movie right, it was the second and more "actiony" one.

1 and 3 are horror, 2 and 4 are action (4 is actionish ... it more like 3 for quite some time).

And "could" work is the main issue, action and adventure games work just fine ... most horror game operate in the sense of 3rd person view with combat because it works, RPG mechanics are not needed at all.

If it goes the AvP (games, please) way, then a single marine can mow down entire broods of the things, and so you have the usual "party vs hundred of ugly things" that seems to be the pilar of all things CRPGish.

Sad state for cRPG then ... never did like AvP to start with ...

Then, the isolation and hopeless situation can work some marvels in the "party interactions" department if some decent writing is to be had, and writing is one of the things i trust obsidian can manage to do in an acceptable level, at least.

I trust Obsidian to make shit up and ignore canon ... like KotOR2 were Chris Avallone decided Basilisk War Droid looked stupid and changed then to look like a Virago fighter.

I also expect "much ado about nothing" conversations with their ABSOLUTE retarded "influence system".

But then death should be real and permanent, and your party be able to react to the horrible ends their friends and companions are suffering - Freaking out, suffering emotional collapses, going hysterical, totally loosing it, et cetera. Someone could decide they are all going to die if you continue giving the orders, someone could just go berserk, someone could blow their brains out, someone could put your entire team's survival in danger in the more grotesque ways possible, et cetera. That could be interesting, but i doubt they will do that.

Fuck they did not even handled death in NwN2 were they are resurrection spells! why the hell you think they will do it on a universe were they are no such spells?

Party members deaths will be scripted at best and I seriously doubt THAT will ever happen.

It also has the potential for those "Moral dilemmas" they love to put in games lately, and maybe some of a more dark nature, with some interesting consequences since Aliens is, by itself, of an isolated nature.

First 3 Aliens movies pushed the "corporations are evil" line, there is no potential for that now and sould I remind you of KotOR2 "light/dark" choices?

Complex consequences, on a smaller and more inmediate and personal scale, should not be so hard to implement when all you have is some soldiers, a couple of civilians, a bunch of corporate assholes, and a run-down base/ship filled to the brim with things that want to kill them, inseminate them, or both.

They are since ... what was the last time we seen then?

So, i believe this has the potential to become what "The Thing" should have been. An atmospherical, violent, paranoic thriller where your companions actually are going freaking insane and you need not to just fend off the freaky gigerspawns and escape in one piece, but also keep your team in check and be prepared to face them as well in your quest for ol' good survival. And all this mixed with some RPG goodness, to round it up.

Everything have potential but they always end up as mediocre when trying to appeal to those dumbfuck Halo jock players.

Then, i believe this will be crap, but maybe this time i am wrong. After two games i have still to really lose my hope that obsidian will live to their potential for once.

You are right to believe this will be crap, Obsidian done nothing to make us think it will not be mediocre at best and they done two games ... no free rides.

 

[Crazy Tuvok]

I am only familiar with the Alien setting through the movies (and AvP 1 and 2 videogames) but it seemed to me like pretty standard sci-fi fare. That should give a good deal of freedom to Obsidian in terms of the IP. I mean really all that is absolutely necessary is well the aliens. So it seems to me that what they are really talking about is a sci-fi RPG whcih I think is great, too damn few. Again I don't know if the setting is further calcified in other media so...

As far as their track record *as Obsidian* ..<shrug>. I certainly enjoyed KoTor2 more than 1 and in fact enjoyed it period. Not the motherfucking end all, but not bad.
Haven't/don't want to play NWN2 so no comment.

Again, a good portion of the staff at Obsidian have been responsible for games that I really enjoyed the hell out of and so they still maintain the benefit of the doubt, if not a preorder.

 

[Drakron]

I am only familiar with the Alien setting through the movies (and AvP 1 and 2 videogames) but it seemed to me like pretty standard sci-fi fare.
...

Problem is things that had any significant fan base are ripe to be milked by "expanded" products ...

There are Alien comics and Alien novels, also at some point some ... idiots decided to crossover the Alien and Predator settings so things are a bit more complicated, also Alien 3 pretty such screwed up the Aliens comics.

As for "standard" ... H. R. Giger won a Oscar for his work in Alien, also Sigourney Weaver was the lead character and that if that is rare now ... it was far more in 1979, things should be see in their historical perspective, not by today standards.

Reason it looks a pretty standard sci-fic fare is because they copied Alien basic design.

 

[Volourn]

'a good portion of the staff'

Define 'good portion'.

 

[Ladonna]

Yes, I wonder who these people are myself.

And what games these people made?

 

[Volourn]

I'll bet he'll name no more than 20 or so Obsidianites who work for BIS in their heyday. The funny thing is Obsidian now numbers 100+ employees.

The only thing people cna hang on to is that relatively small number tend to hold senior positions or are owners at Obsidian so they have a lot of sway in Obsidian's direction.

But, to say 'good portion' or 'large number' like I've read is pure bullocks.

 

[elander_]

A good thing about the Aliens setting is that theres almost no setting so it's mostly a blank setting to fill with details. There's practically no information on the Aliens or the human civilization at the time, except for the ways the Aliens reproduce and some clues about the technological advancement of the human civilization. It's about time someone decides to create a sci-fi rpg setting. Mass Effect doesn't count, obviously.

 

[Zomg]

Room for what? They'll have to round the bases and drag out a bunch of decrepit Giger design to render the same imagination deadening shit ideas and imagery that've been sucking in games and movies since '92, and I'm sure they'll be forced to maintain the integrity of whatever terrible "extended universe" garbage has come out in brand comic books and novels. I'm genuinely puzzled that anyone could have a different reaction other than eye-rolling. It's a spent husk.

 

[elander_]

"and I'm sure they'll be forced to maintain the integrity of whatever terrible "extended universe" garbage has come out in brand comic books and novels"

That would be a good question to ask them in a future interview. Every Alien movie or comic book is just more of the same formula without adding practically anything. So they will have plenty of creative freedom to make interesting characters.

I only hope they keep the Aliens figure a mystery as it always has been. The Aliens were always the motivation to reveal human conflicts and not the main star of the show.

 

[Annonchinil]

Well, this is the first time an RPG developer from the Troika/BIS era teamed up with a good publisher. As far as I can remember.

 

[cutterjohn]

Hey! He wimped out on Q #16, wrt Bethesda attempting Fallout 3. (I say attempting as with the layesy Petey FO3 commentary we all now know for certain that it will be Oblivious with guns, and not really an RPG at all.)

Aliens: It always seemed like a property that would lend itself, primarily, to action games and FPS to me, although an RPG could be decent. i.e. AFAIK the "world" is a pretty blank slate as compared to AD&D FR or SW, so I suppose that it could be molded into a decent SF RPG...

 

[denizsi]

I'm not well learned on the subject, but I believe the whole concept of AvP was born out of just a gimmicky scene in Predator 2, where Danny Glover finds the creature's hiding place in the city and there you see a trophy spot, a collection of skulls from various alien races one of which is Giger's Alien.

A good thing about the Aliens setting is that theres almost no setting so it's mostly a blank setting to fill with details. There's practically no information on the Aliens or the human civilization at the time, except for the ways the Aliens reproduce and some clues about the technological advancement of the human civilization. It's about time someone decides to create a sci-fi rpg setting. Mass Effect doesn't count, obviously.

Well, there is this mysterious race whose a long dead representative you see in Space Jockey scene in Alien. In the point&click adventure game "Aliens: A Comic Book Adventure" (1995), the game kept track of passing time to some degree between certain key points. If you tended to play too longwinded during those intervals, you would witness video sequences of living members of this humanoid race operating their spaceships (which looked like a scene from the bridge of Enterprise with these creatures instead of Kirk&Co), to warn the player. If you failed to achieve any progress in a certain time for the 3rd or 4th time, these fuckers finally arrive to blow up the entire planet.

 

[serch]

While I'm disappointed about how some people felt about the game when it came out, we have been working very hard out of our own pocket to enhance things in the game after it came out

So what does he mean by that? Is he saying that Atari doesn't pay the for the process of mending the errors of the original software through patches? Or only that they don't pay the additional features? (for instance, the multiselection by dragging a box).

 

[elander_]

Well, there is this mysterious race whose a long dead representative you see in Space Jockey scene in Alien. In the point&click adventure game "Aliens: A Comic Book Adventure" (1995), the game kept track of passing time to some degree between certain key points. If you tended to play too longwinded during those intervals, you would witness video sequences of living members of this humanoid race operating their spaceships (which looked like a scene from the bridge of Enterprise with these creatures instead of Kirk&Co), to warn the player. If you failed to achieve any progress in a certain time for the 3rd or 4th time, these fuckers finally arrive to blow up the entire planet.

Interesting detail but not very believable. I think that entire race was driven to extinction by the Aliens. It's a warning to the humans fo how dangerous the Aliens are.

 

[kingcomrade]

It's portentious and such.

 

[JarlFrank]

He had me at "definitely a RPG".

Exactly. Isn't Chris Avellone a designer on that project? Go Feargus! I really do think that those guys have their hearts in the right place. Still, with a game like that the temptation to just release a slightly more immersive shooter like Irrational's System Shock 2 can be strong. It would be cheaper to make and have a wider audience. It would also do better on the consoles which tend to be a cash cow these days. Isn't the type of game they actually release dependent on those with the purse strings, aka Sega. Has Sega ever published a PC cRPG before? I would think they would be more interested in console games.

Sega are pubishing the Total War games since the Rome expansion, and their user support is quite good, and the games haven't been dumbed down. Medieval 2 was one of the better games of 2006, and even had some improvements over the previous title, Rome [which is quite seldom nowadays.]

So I guess they are quite safe with their publisher choice.