The Outer Worlds: Spacer's Choice Edition - Obsidian's first-person sci-fi RPG set in a corporate space colony

[cvv]

How so? Boyarsky was lead narrative designer and co-director here. Shouldn't the blame for this be placed on him?

Can you also see Boyarsky being all "oh wow, that's so funny Megan, great job!", all grimacing and pretending to wipe his tears, desperately trying to steer clear from the meetoo waters, quietly thinking "I'm too old for this shit, just trying to survive till my first social security check"?

Or, as you say yourself:

My take is that Leonard is still burned out and doesn't have the energy to wrangle 5.5 incompetent writers into creating something decent.

Also this

TOW ended up being half-women/half-soymen in terms of writing staff anyway.

 

[Darkzone]

Ah I see we've arrived at the inevitable "bitch about millennial female writers" part of this game's lifecycle. Might as well get it over with.
But look, this isn't a thing that's going to go away. In fact it's going to get worse. And it's not really about California. Look at the demographics. Which of the two sexes reads more books today? Which one earns more college degrees, especially in literature and the humanities?
We're not going to return to the era where most of an Obsidian RPG's writers were overeducated dudes who were born in the 1970s and played Planescape: Torment in college. That generation has moved on. You should actually expect majority-female or even all-female RPG writing teams to be the norm in the future.

We need more sober russian-, romanticist german-, existentialist polish-, katholic french- and critical rebelious british male writers in RPGs.... instead of annoying white middle class goals.

 

[Daidre]

Blame the characters being vapid on the individual writers but enforcing the overall direction has to be the lead's responsibility, no? One could of course argue that this was an impossible mission given his staff but he could at least have nipped Parvatis companion quest in the bud.

I have a really vague ideas about how USA game development works, but is it even possible to enforce a vision on female writer's work or "nip quest in the bud"? Wont he get blamed for discrimination and completely fucked up if she decides to escalate it to management instead of listening to his critique?

Maybe I am just horribly prejudiced.

 

[BlackAdderBG]

Boyarsky and Cain are hacks, time to search who are the people that actually made Troika's games good.

 

[Infinitron]

If you want to get competent dudes to write, you can get them. It is not like there are a billion gaming companies that focus on writing. Look at Kingmaker (or Disco Elysium fans will probably bring up DE- I haven't played it yet), where have these guys been? Apparently, noone was looking for them.

That's why in my later post in this thread I narrowed that down to professional (non-indie/non-startup) game development in the West.

Not to mention that Obsidian had the most talented game writer ever and they lost him. As a matter of fact, they had quite a few very good writers and they lost them. I do not think they can be excused.

Mistakes were made, but I think in the long run these guys from the MOTB era like George Ziets, Eric Fenstermaker, etc were never going to be content to remain a dream team of "Avellone understudies" forever. It seems that if you're a really smart professional male video game writer, your natural career path is to eventually either become a bigshot Creative Lead (which means you have to find a studio where that position is open - see Fallout: New Vegas's John Gonzales) or go freelance.

 

[Lacrymas]

Going freelance bars you from overseeing a whole project, though. When was the last time Avellone was a lead on anything? His talents are criminally underused, Larian didn't even use his work for Fane in the end (afaik).

 

[Riddler]

If you want to get competent dudes to write, you can get them. It is not like there are a billion gaming companies that focus on writing. Look at Kingmaker (or Disco Elysium fans will probably bring up DE- I haven't played it yet), where have these guys been? Apparently, noone was looking for them.

That's why in my later post in this thread I narrowed that down to professional (non-indie/non-startup) game development in the West.

Not to mention that Obsidian had the most talented game writer ever and they lost him. As a matter of fact, they had quite a few very good writers and they lost them. I do not think they can be excused.

Mistakes were made, but I think in the long run these guys from the MOTB era like George Ziets, Eric Fenstermaker, etc were never going to be content to remain a dream team of "Avellone understudies" forever. It seems that if you're a really smart professional male video game writer, your natural career path is to eventually either become a bigshot Creative Lead (which means you have to find a studio where that position is open - see Fallout: New Vegas's John Gonzales) or go freelance.

If it is genuinely impossible to find adequate staff then I would honestly prefer that they just used less writing and adjusted their games thereafter.

 

[Deadass]

Boyarsky and Cain are hacks, time to search who are the people that actually made Troika's games good.

Anderson

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Oh, two more pages, I wonder what this is abou...

California, valley girls and colorful hair.

Bro you've written an elaborate wall-o-text review and not a peep about the writing quality and the relevant bigger picture. Good job?

It's like you're doing a detailed review of the new iPhone, meticulously describing all the features, functions and faculties, while being completely oblivious to the fact you're standing waist deep in a trash compactor and the walls are slowly closing in.

You seem to have lost your reading glasses. Maybe this will help.

Well I finished it. Short review is this: Outer Worlds is a burger made of high quality ingredients, but chef forgot to add seasoning. It also makes zero excuses for being a burger, which is why I ended up liking it more than both Pillars, they aimed for the Michelin star only to end up undercooked.

One thing I gotta praise is that the game stays remarkably loyal to its advertised formula. I ended up clocking 26 hours, completionist run wouldn't take more than 30. Small amount of content in a $60 RPG was always going to be controversial, but throughout the game Obsidian avoids the temptation to add some cheap filler content. They stick to making well-crafted levels with multiple approaches and reactivity in the quests. There's something to commend about the game that is 30 hours long but stays consistent, focused and comes out polished and finished on launch. Josh could learn a thing or two about scope control from Tim and Leon.

Overall most of the game is done well, but two biggest offenders dragging it down are loot and writing. Loot is simply horrendous and made worse by the game constantly throwing trucks of items at you. Just sorting through that shit makes you want to find a different hobby. Writing has some high points, but most of the time it lacks flavor, fails to establish the factions, fails to flesh out the setting and memorable characters and quests are rare.

The biggest strength is the core gameplay - level design, exploration and C&C are excellent, and combat while not great, is enjoyable enough at the start and becomes more enjoyable throughout the game when some of the more funky items and abilities start opening up. It's certainly a Troika game in terms of gameplay - quest and world structures are similar to Fallout 1, there are Tim Cain's trademark hilariously broken abilities and weapons, and there's a traditional sneaker/talker/fighter gameplay triad.

After Pillars 1, 2 and now TOW, I think we can conclude that this is entirely new Obsidian we're dealing with. They became famous for games where everything was shit except for the writing, but with these last 3 games they've done a complete 180 turn. They've became a developer that is technically competent and makes games that look good, run well, launch without a million bugs, area and interior designers make some gorgeous looking locations, but the writing just isn't there anymore.

I wouldn't go as far as to call it a drastic decline. They've improved as a company in many ways and every once in a while it's fun to take off my top hat and eat a burger. But the old Obsidian is gone and the real innovation in the genre is coming out of indies these days. And perhaps that's how it should be.

 

[cvv]

You seem to have lost your reading glasses. Maybe this will help.

You just added that in.




Fine, I take it back.

 

[DeepOcean]

Well Feargus just tought "How can I hire writers on almost minimum wage levels here on California? Nobody gives a shit about writing anyway." Well, I can't blame him, most normies are loving this game, his plan worked flawlessly.
I agree with Infinitron, this will only get worse, but you guise relic nostalgia for Obsidian is an old man obcession at this point, the company is dead, at least the things that were good about it. Dunno why people still care, at this point there is no difference from Obsidian and other AAA garbage factories, I dunno why you guys keep holding the flame of hope. Maybe now on Microsoft, they get money to hire real writers but I doubt anything appealing to our niche will come out of it. Maybe Obsidian will make another looter shooter to compete with Borderlands 3 and Destiny 2, Feargus will love it, maybe we will get a looter shooter that is 10% slightly better written, guess that is incline amiright?

 

[Shadenuat]

Boyarsky and Cain are hacks, time to search who are the people that actually made Troika's games good.

https://www.mobygames.com/developer/sheet/view/developerId,46366/

I can't even find the photo of the guy; he wrote all these fantasy magazines.

 

[Dishonoredbr]

Dunno why people still care, at this point there is no difference from Obsidian and other AAA garbage factories, I dunno why you guys keep holding the flame of hope

Because J.Sawyer is a cool dude and Megan starks is cute

 

[Riddler]

Dunno why people still care, at this point there is no difference from Obsidian and other AAA garbage factories, I dunno why you guys keep holding the flame of hope

Because J.Sawyer is a cool dude and Megan starks is cute

Sawyer should leave and start biking for Digimancy.

 

[Lacrymas]

Sawyer is a good developer but he needs someone to hold his leash. He understands where the problems are and has vision and ambition, but he needs help.

 

[Shadenuat]

Sawyer at least understands the importance of difficulty

Even though it is not important for sales, as we can observe. sadness.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Sawyer at least understands the importance of difficulty

Even though it is not important for sales

I take it you didn't play Deadfire on launch.

 

[Shadenuat]

it was a bug dude.

 

[Daedalos]

Failure of the main and side quests to grab the player is the biggest flaw of the game. I complete the game atm because I want to end it, simply almost feels like a chore, but i'm too OCD'd not to finish it.

But I don't have that feeling like, omg, i need to get back into the game and see whats up with the story, that feeling died very shortly after early parts of the game.

Exploration is dogshit because the environments and the open world spaces are filled with trash loot, trash mobs and generally just hard to tell apart because of the artstyle

Choices dont feel meaningful because you pretty much can pass all skillchecks, because of how much xp u get, and how easy it is to acquire gear and shit.

The factions dont feel engaging either, and the C&C the follows is mostly meh

 

[Riddler]

Sawyer at least understands the importance of difficulty

Even though it is not important for sales

I take it you didn't play Deadfire on launch.

I thought that was mandated by Feargus and Sawyer argued against it.

 

[Shadenuat]

Deadfire development was probably hell; especially when owners came in with grand idea of fully VOing game when it was already in development

Well, not probably; Sawyer stated as much and now has lots of grey hair.

I thought that was mandated by Feargus and Sawyer argued against it.

I can see this being possible; i.e. the bashing of Kingmaker highest difficulty proving it might be a good move to release game too easy; releasing it too hard even if it's optional is worse.

 

[Van-d-all]

Going freelance bars you from overseeing a whole project, though. When was the last time Avellone was a lead on anything? His talents are criminally underused, Larian didn't even use his work for Fane in the end (afaik).

But thanks to that, look in how many projects he's taken part in just the last few years, bless him. Plus while it might's not be a stable "job", I bet it's more profitable, and it's not like he's going to get more famous in the industry anyways.

 

[DeepOcean]

You need someone capable of human emotions to compensate for Sawyer advanced production AI, if it is let on its own devices, it will go rogue and create a machine controlled regime to exterminate all fun for the sake of humanity and achieve perfect balance.

 

[Hot Coldman]

How so? Boyarsky was lead narrative designer and co-director here. Shouldn't the blame for this be placed on him?

Can you also see Boyarsky being all "oh wow, that's so funny Megan, great job!", all grimacing and pretending to wipe his tears, desperately trying to steer clear from the meetoo waters, quietly thinking "I'm too old for this shit, just trying to survive till my first social security check"?

Or, as you say yourself:

My take is that Leonard is still burned out and doesn't have the energy to wrangle 5.5 incompetent writers into creating something decent.

Also this

TOW ended up being half-women/half-soymen in terms of writing staff anyway.

Well Feargus just tought "How can I hire writers on almost minimum wage levels here on California? Nobody gives a shit about writing anyway." Well, I can't blame him, most normies are loving this game, his plan worked flawlessly.
I agree with Infinitron, this will only get worse, but you guise relic nostalgia for Obsidian is an old man obcession at this point, the company is dead, at least the things that were good about it. Dunno why people still care, at this point there is no difference from Obsidian and other AAA garbage factories, I dunno why you guys keep holding the flame of hope. Maybe now on Microsoft, they get money to hire real writers but I doubt anything appealing to our niche will come out of it. Maybe Obsidian will make another looter shooter to compete with Borderlands 3 and Destiny 2, Feargus will love it, maybe we will get a looter shooter that is 10% slightly better written, guess that is incline amiright?

Trying out this game gave me a new hunger for an open world RPG. I ended up installing and boot up Morrowind
for the first time in a very long time. Sweet, believable world in computer-format bliss.. It feels lived-in, the same
way New Vegas does. Certainly a greater open world RPG than TOW, which reminds me of a romp (albeit with a few more skill checks) a la FO4.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

But even if I go full liberal and pretend that women can successfully write for a male audience (which is not impossible, I just consider it very rare), can they at least try to hire competent ones that can appeal to said audience?

The first burning question is "what does it mean to appeal to a male audience?". Your answer would be "pretty ladies and buff dudes saving those pretty ladies", but that's extremely shallow and most well-read adult men wouldn't find that very exciting or stimulating. There's a whole novel about that, it's called Don Quixote. What is left then?

Appealing to male audience means this:

You like men eh. Lots of men in the video games. A masculine narrative. Traditional virile values. The phallus is omnipotent, but gentle at the same time. It must come from within, but also express itself outwards. And so, women want to take over the world, and the video game. A fatal mistake. God is absolute. The Phallus eternally erect. It must come from within, but also express itself outwards. As I walk through the valley of death, the masculine virtues eject sperm all over the maternal stratosphere. There can be only one. Power is Unity. Unity is the Phallus. These fools think to emasculate us, but I write on an rpg internet forum. I am beyond contemporary feminist culture. Nothing stops men from taking what they want. And what they want is the phallus. You know you want this fucking dick bonzo. It's coming out for you. It must come from within, but also express itself outwards.