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The Community Blog (An Invitation)
New Community Blog (The Unintentional Gatekeeping of Video Games)

Chris Avellone's Blog

A blog by Chris Avellone in General

  • Entries

    63

  • Comments

    919

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    1180061

About this blog

Musings and uh, Stuff.

Entries in this blog

Project: Eternity and Characterization

Character building for games isn’t easy, and it requires a lot of effort, especially when it comes to companions. I’ve had the good fortune to work on a variety of titles with strong support characters over the years, and I enjoy writing them a great deal. I still can’t believe I get paid to do this (don’t cut me off, Feargus).   There are a few guidelines I try to follow when designing companions (some of these are dependent on the engine and franchise).   - Combat/Challenge

Dead Money, Design Breakdowns.

With Dead Money coming out for the PC and PS3 this week, I got into a discussion about how I feel about its reception and some of the design decisions. In short, my feelings concern the context of the specific design elements. Some folks understand the "why" of the challenge elements even if they don't agree with them, which is fine, as long as they get why we did it the way we did - and that may not be apparent. So: If you play the adventure and want to dig deeper into the reasons behind the co

Why did NCR ask the player/Courier to bring the package to the Divide?

Because Twitter would make this too fragmented:   (Spoiler alert)   NCR sacks Navarro in the West, recovers a bunch of tech they don't understand, as history has proven.   They do, however, recognize the symbols (American flag, silo stencils, etc.) and recognize it might be tied to the same symbols and markings the NCR found at the Divide.   NCR hires a Courier to take the item there. They don't for a second think that anything bad will happen as a result,

Blog o' Romance

So, I generally despise writing companion romances (I think unrequited and/or doomed ones are ultimately more dramatic), but there are some techniques I've accumulated over the years that I try to incorporate into writing and designing romances in RPGs.   A lot of these things came out while writing Gannayev-of-Dreams in Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer, and I suppose it could hold true for other inter-party romances in games. What follows is a summary of some points we kicke

Home is wherever I'm with you

It's been a while - aside from Obsidian work, I've been doing quite a bit of talks here at Dragon*Con and across the sea in Spain at Gamelab on a variety of subjects, from advice to getting into the industry, to Kickstarter, and even our approach to designing characters for video games. Even better, I'll be doing the same coming up here in October at Austin GDC's narrative track concerning Obsidian's narrative approach - and going through our design process at the end of the month overseas conce

Challenge vs Frustration: Bloggin' on Time Limits

So a designer's job is to make jumping through hoops fun, and calibrating the challenge/frustration ratio of jumping through said hoops.   This blog post stems from a question from the AMA Brian Fargo and I did on Reddit (long ago) concerning the issues with this in regards to one infamous piece of game design: time limits, and how two different games dealt with the challenge.   From a gamemaster/game designer perspective, the idea of time limits is appealing. It creates pres

Un-Ravel-ling Torment.

Some fan-based questions I answered recently, posting them to share - it's about Ravel Puzzlewell from Planescape: Torment and some of the thoughts behind her creation.   What was the origin of Ravel?   We had a number of physically powerful enemies in Torment, and I thought a night hag would be a good adversary, especially if she was a cryptic, deadly puzzle maker. As the game went on, the idea that Ravel was a branching creature whose life resembled a great tree (or bramble

Kotor II Questions

Knights of the Old Republic II: Sith Lords questions from Joakim... some spoilers follow.   1. K2 pretty much changed on how the force, the galaxy, the Jedi are portrayed. How did that work in terms that you were making a sequel to a very typical Star Wars game? (KotOR1, we have this evil dude who wants to blow up the galaxy just for the hell of it).   A lot of it came from deep-rooted feelings and opinions about the Star Wars franchise, both positive and negative, and especi

Old World Questions

Some Old World Questions from Rocky Justice (thanks, Rocky):   1. What is your official title? I know in the credits it says you're a writer, but I was wondering if there was a more specific title for your job. Also, how'd you get in to your line of work? Did you study writing in college, or was it something you discovered later on?   I'm Creative Director here at the studio - I'm involved with the design department, giving advice on best practices, design methodology, and he

If you're heading up a Kickstarter, let us know if you want help.

Obsidian gets applicants for internships all the time from schools across the States, and it may be that if you're forming a Kickstarter, you may need a lot of technical, production, and development help for tasks that students and juniors would love to do to contribute to their careers and education.   If you're running a Kickstarter and would like to consider a pool of applicants to help you hit your game's mark, let us know - there may be interns/juniors in your area or could assist

Fallout Fan Question

Alex Nistor:   Concerning Fallout 3 , I really was curious to hear your more in-depth opinion about it.   So you said you had a similiar opinion on it to Sawyer, but what was missing from that, in my opinion, was a breakdown of your pro's and Con's for Fallout 3.   Considering Bethesda made it in a similiar style to Oblivion, I just wanted to know specifically, how was the transition?   And like I said in the above comment, what did you like and not like.

Writing in Computer Games.

Someone wrote me a letter this weekend, asking if I had any suggestions for breaking into computer game writing, and it occured to me I didn't. I had suggestions for breaking into computer game design, but...   Anyway, here's the gist of the response in case anyone else has a similar question about how it all works.   Writing for video games is something of a different beast compared to game design. My experience is that someone will contract a writer (and usually late in the process) onc

Video Game Writing vs. Writing

I get a lot of questions from folks regarding narrative design and getting into the industry (especially after the Trzynasty Schron interview).   When possible, I'll be posting the answers here as well in case anyone else has the same questions (or wants to comment or add to any of these answers).   To start it off, here's the 1st of 3 questions from Joey 😄   Do you feel that video game writing, and video game story creation differ from other forms of creative writin

Aliens and the "Action RPG."

There were some concerns floating around about Aliens being an action RPG, so I thought it would best to clarify. While there will be action elements to it, it is still an RPG in every sense of the word.   An analysis of the elements, along with diagrams as to what constitutes an action RPG in the aliens universe, is presented for your viewing enjoyment here. Hypothetically, the diagrams may resemble cartoons. And it may not be a serious analysis. All other standard caveats apply.   Happy

NWN2: Mask of the Betrayer + Convention Season

Off to Comic-Con within a week, although we won't be showing Mask of the Betrayer there, the plan is to show it at Gen-Con Aug 16-19, and PAX Aug 23-25 as it currently stands. This may fluctuate, so don't quote me on this.   In honor of convention season, I present some things to look forward to at game conventions.   Enjoy and have a good weekend, folks.

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