Sven_

Useful things to take from here on: - Not everyone is going to like your game (which is fine) - Kickstarter has its pitfalls, and it's not merely one of budget constraints, like why is this game not as epic as epic quest II, not as dungeon crawley as Dungeon Crawler Dale and why are the NPCs not as fleshed out and manyful as in all of those games combined. It's all about the people, as they give you the money in the first place. However, people on occasion ask for what they think they want rather than what they actually want for far too many reasons to discuss Sorry, I can't take you seriously if I read something like this. I'd say that both BG1 and BG2 had a pretty weak story, so saying that BG1 was slightly better due to a better pacing is justified. I'm totally okay with that. But saying that BG1 had better quests... really? I mean; really? Name me just one quest that wasn't just "go there, beat **** up" in BG1? Certainly not clearing the endless levels of Nashkel Mines. Or all the pointless dungeons filled with hordes of copy & paste encounters. I can name you dozens of memorable quests in BG2: The Unseeing Eye, the De'Arnise Keep, the Planar Sphere, Getting the dragon eggs in Ust Natha, the Skinner of the Bridge district, the Umar Hills deaths, etc. Literally every zone of BG2 had at least one memorable, multi-stage optional quest that you will definitely remember in almost every single detail. In comparison, I can't even remember almost any of the sidequests in BG1. Like literally, I played BG1 at least 5 times now and I still struggle remembering the quests. QFT. Anyone who says that BG1 had better quests or better dungeons than BG2 or PoE is clearly not talking about BG1 the actually existing game, but rather about BG1 the sugarcoated memory of how playing a fantasy cRPG for the first time as a teenager made them feel (when it had no prior expectations to measure up to). True about the quests, absolutely. And yet I have replayed BG1 many more times than any other of the IE game (plus the obviously rather oftenly underrated Icewind Dale 1). Whilst it was justified by the plot, the amount of high level content in BG2 on occasion borderlines on the ridiculous (in that extent, it's the opposite of PoE, where there are few if any completely unique OP items that could turn you into God-like), the combat quickly descends into micro-management clickfests even against the most mundane of opponents (it's mostly all routine, by the way - buff, combat, save, buff - and rest and pray for no random encounters whilst doing so in between). The exploration and pseudo open world was ditched in favor of a far more streamlined "fast travel to area of interest/quest immediately" design (and ultimately ditched for something even more linear later on); and the much cherished chapter 2 is basically doing quests and managing castles for as long as you like despite someone close to yours just being captured. On top of that, and I have to admit that this is ultimately it's appeal, it's cramming as much of D&D into a single game as it can, so you're first fighting the legenday Beholders, the even more legendary Killer Bunny Of The Underdark Or Something and finish the job off by finishing The Lord Almighty himself. It's not that it's a lesser game or anything. But it is different enough designed to the original that each will have its fans and detractors -- on top of that, it didn't break any completel new grounds, as the original did two years prior (D&D had been done before, but not on this scale, sorry Gold Box and SSI). That said, in terms of quest content, there is hardly an equal to this day, and that's not nostalgia. There are various retrospective articles to be found on the web, and they are mostly all about how it was a huge advantage to the team to have all the systems in place and just about pumping concent all day long. Though BG2's quests really aren't as open as some are arguing (not that BG's were in any kind of way) -- what some of the fine folks at Interplay/BI were doing in Fallout a year prior was way bolder in many regards. Which is why I personally don't hold any BG that dearly that I uber glorify it to be RPG perfection to this day. In the same ways, I hugely enjoyed playing Pillars personally -- but in terms of reacitivity and world design in Wasteland 2 is actually better than that. It'd be far more important if these games, RPGs that (sadly) only work on PCs and thus don't attract that hugely many ways to fund them, would stick around for a while and get the chance and build their own line-age, which I hope they do. inXile has another promising game in the pipeline anyway, and pretty much announced another sequel to another legendary Tale too.

What do you mean? That player has to forego character effectiveness in combat in a combat oriented game in favor of flavour options in dialogue? Nah. It's just that the game isn't catering to these types of character sets exclusively. In parts, the character system is about avoiding that huge gap you can have between min/max chars and more balanced ones you'd find in a pen&paper, as attributes neglected will affect all types of characters. Plus, none of the companions are of that min/max type either -- if at all possible to do in PoE. The game may be focused on combat for most parts of the playing time, and that is all fairly well, but I still think there was, given the source, a bit of an irony in the assessment and analysis how you'd presumably have to pump certain stats to totally maximize efficiency.

Some valid criticism aside, I find it a bit ironic that the review pretty much outs the guy as a min/max powergamer who puts up tanks and super casters (which doesn't work the same way as in D&D by the way as every stat affects every character class there is -- a high int Barbarian for instance has a much bigger range in his AoE abilities as well as a much longer duration of those -- in a typically combat heavy D&D computer game that'd be a complete waste). I thought the Codex was about putting back the "role" back into "RPGs", though. That said, experiences will differ, and so will opinions (as an opinion piece, this is as valid as any -- how much of it is useful is up to you to decide). One of the strengths of RPGs is also their inherent weakness, to a point. Pillars, like other games, doesn't cater to a specific set of party. In a pen&paper environment, a highly intelligent Brute kind of character is atypical but viable, as there is a human at the whelm of the adventure who adapts, and there is the actually activity we use to call, well "role-playing". In the (mostly very combat intensive) computer games, that is a little different. Pillars goes a step further though. F'r instance, I recently saw somebody claiming that some of the skills, such as lore, would be basically useless. Yet without it, I would have struggled more to finish the game, or at least would have to adapt my strategy greatly. My party didn't include one of the classic "casters", only a priest who buffed the damage dealers. Thus many AoE spells and similar were only available to me if my party had that knowledge. In a sense, the pains of making the game viable for any party build (and every character build suffering/benefitting of all attributes), can fire back. In particular as all the levels of difficulty adjust are the number and strenghts of enemy types. That said, the Codex isn't as "elitist" as you think. You don't need to look further than their adventure gaming sections, where there are threads of appreciaation for just about any mediocre adventure game ever released during the adventure flood of the 1990s -- and as there is no type of game that relies as much on somewhat compelling writing as this one, and it was easy even for the best of designers to apply moon logics to their puzzle solutions (GK3's cat hair conundrum being the most prominent standout, naturally), there were a ton of those, inevitably. That is the forum side of things -- on the editors' they could improve on their editorial standards, as the quality of content varies hugely. And in fairness, there's a lof of interesting stuff being covered that isn't covered anywhere.

Baldur's Gate wasn't exactly my first role-playing game, having grown up on a diet of 8bit systems. But I can relate completely, in particular as in terms of D&D games, there hadn't been anything of its complexity before. The more open-ended exploration, the decent narrative pulls, the party members who would on occasion outright get into fights amongst themselves, the dialogue trees as complex as in a Lucas Arts adventure game -- D&D had been done on computers before, but not on such a grand scale. I know that the wraith of the Goldbox fans will crush upon me any minute now. But at that point, the contract between TSR and SSI had been bust for half a decade already, and advances in technology and complexity in design were not mutually exclusive entities. Alongside the big releases, I'm playing other games that aren't powered by the latest in tech, but PoE is another one of those reminders that the desperate arm's race for technology hasn't made games any real better. In particular the big productions from the last 15 or so years were all about upgrading visual stimuli, which can be important depending on the overall experience targeted (no point in going for the most realistic combat simulation on the market aka Armed Assault and then going for the pixel looks of early Doom id tech) -- and equally if not more about making games more accessible. However, very few have thought about a player's input, and how (deeply) he is engaged or not. That is why Pillars, even after these fifteen years in between, "retro" aesthetics aside, totally plays like a cutting edge role-playing game from start to finish. It may flirt with the past and aims to do so, but some path finding and camera issues aside, at its core lays as engaging an experience as ever. That is also why games such as the original Fallout still look massively bold to this day -- heck, depending on your character's build and decisions, you'll have a completely different experience and ending. Most games made by Looking Glass equally look as futuristic and advanced as they did back then in a lot of ways -- if you can look past the pixles, that is. In some ways gaming has come full circle ever since the hype surrounding Interactive Movies in the 1990s. But whereas it used to be actors and grainy video sequences being put onto CDs, it is now huge amounts of money put into polygons pretending to be actors. Talking Baldur's Gate, you can't blame Bioware for what they've become in a sense, they've outgrown their specialized niche to keep up with the big guys on the block -- however you might be interested in this interview I found today all the same. Even the developers basically acknowledge such on occasion. http://www.pcgamesn.com/sword-coast-legends/inside-sword-coast-legends-back-to-baldurs-gate-with-the-director-of-dragon-age-origins

I wouldn't class the opening dungeon of Baldur's Gate II a tutorial though. Actually, it's pretty hardcore and fairly long with some tough encounters, especially if you're not familiar with the mechanics. TES has opened with a dungeon ever since Arena (Morrowind is the only exception in the entire series, if you don't count the spin-offs) -- going back to my first one, Daggerfall, I think this is intentionally done. I think it took me hours to find the exit on my first run, and then you get out and get some breath of air after being locked into endless caves for days and nights depending on which, and the world really opens up. It is that key moment when you get to realize you're free to explore and go wherever you wish. Probably BG II was aiming for the same thing, considering that you'll immediately get to a big city in bright day-light. But yeah, the flipside of design like this is that you have to repeat this each and every time you start a new game and character (and the TES design has become a lot more tutorial-ish in recent titles... which naturally goes along to streamlining the mechanics and making them ever more accessible for just about anyone. I think Pillars did pretty good in avoiding that kind of feel overall).

Had the time to let the ending sink in (and already bought and installed Wasteland 2 to get some additional fix). Really enjoyed this game, and will be a Kickstarter if there will ever be another thing like this. To me this wasn't merely nostalgia, this is state of the art role-playing more than ever. Speaking about nostalgia though... Any way to get this signed? Not sure whether there had been an equal in American/English promotional material back then, but that's a very fitting tag line for the game: "The first role-playing game in which you don't know which role you're going to play." Good times back then with Torment. Good times now with Pillars. Thank you.

I like Skyrim, though in terms of narrative it's not nearly as compelling as New Vegas, Obsidian's take on the "open world" thing for various reasons. I've been playing most of the TES games ever since Daggerfall, and that was a completely different thing from all the Interplay/BIS games back then already. They run out of steam for me once I've explored what there is to explore, and exploration is the main attractions of these games by far. The problem in more recent years was that it was all there is -- even Bioware, whilst hardly the same company of the same people as yesteryore, are being influenced by it, and until the Kickstarters no prominent names considered scaling back to significantly smaller projects really. Those games -- they are like the Summer blockbusters in the movies. Hugely entertaining when done well, but I think there'd be riots if everything that was available was an endless string of Adam Sandler comedies and Michael Bay studies in PG13 approved mass destruction. Luckily gaming has found ways to fund smaller projects too and make them viable on top of that. Speaking of which, all the new channels of distribution and funding -- by which means of purchase does the most money trickle through to where it matters, that is the developerse themselves? Steam takes a fair chunk, GOG does too, then there's often boxed copies too at regular retail vendors -- and just being a popular presence on a platform as big as Steam certainly has the side effect of exposure.

Yeah, that too. Simplifying it, it's the same as a publisher providing the money the fans did. Nobody did though. There's no extra money, those 4 million minus X for Kickstarter plus the backers was the budget they had, end of. There is nothing extra. Either it is semantics or you seem to be confusing this with some studios that start a Kickstarter to "better" a game that is already funded, i.e. The Book Of Unwritten Tales 2, which is enormously big and long for an adventure game (in parts due to very long voice overs and tons of dialogue), and would have been about as long without a Kickstarter as it had been picked up by a traditional publisher at the time of the Kickstarter. The additional money they collected via Kickstarter was utilized to improve the 3d technology the game utilized, some optional side quests as well as the score being recorded by a real orchestra rather than synthesizers. With a pitching video as charming as theirs, they succeeded and tripled their target, which meant 170,000 Dollars truly "extra", which is a big amount for an adventure game being produced in Europe (according to some developers, the average budget of an adventure game made in Germany is about 300,000 Euros). https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/kingartgames/the-book-of-unwritten-tales-2/description Has a point about the "profits" though. The marketing/distribution deal with Paradox aside (a very good fit, in my opinion, for games like this -- and I'm almost convinced they'd fund a game such as this too), there is no share that goes to a traditional publisher. Which is why Obsidian initially voiced hopes they'd be able to fund whatever comes next on their OWN. That they go to Kickstarter next appears not a given deal according to more recent interviews, unless I'm mistaken. However, for making profits, they need to sell additional copies of the game, naturally. The Kickstarters funded the game, allowed it to be made at ALL, not earned them a profit. Here are some early graphics on how the money was planned to be spread, by the way. http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/62207-update-30-how-stuff-is-made/

Seen lots of talk about how Thaos' / The Leaden Key's intentions regarding bad-mouthing animancy in the Dyrwood is supposed to be primarily an act of harming potential finders of secrets they are not supposed to find. However, why is it that this is only happening in Dyrwood during the time we witness the Key / Thaos in action? It's been made clear in the meating at the Duc that the only region suffering from Hollowborns is the Dyrwood, which is naturally where the machines are located currently used by the Key -- and more importantly some of the lore books and some conversations appear to hint at that animancy is pretty much accepted and practiced in some other parts of Eora (most notably the Vailian Republic, as it wasn't a former colony of the Aedyr Empire who's opposed to it). "If this was a punishment by the gods, why are we the only ones to suffer from it?" When I first met Thaos in "person" or rather soul, at the Sanitarium, which was actually the first Leaden Key quest I did, I thought the key was about ensuring the powers and knowledge they obviously had (Thaos anyway, as aptly demonstrated in the flashbacks as well as the fight that follows), would remain their very own. Naturally it turned out to be something bigger than that. By the end I saw this in two ways: 1) The Key's attempts of lessening the impact of anymancy in the Dyrwood were at least in parts a local (?) attempt of a cover-up (the Engwith sites containing the soul machines are told to be regularly studied by animancers in particular, who might one day find out or at least sense what is going on in the region). Belittling animancy is also an easy target and distraction from what's actually going on. There is more to it to me though, and it was argued against on page one. Science vs. religion is a theme running throughout the entirety of the game anyhow. Folks arguing Waidwen's Legacy to be a punishment of the Gods, them arguing that man wasn't supposed to play Gods themselves. 2) Animancy, going as far as man mastering and harnessing his very nature, the power of his soul itself, is probably the most advanced science in all of Eora. It is, in parts, man becoming God. As the Delemgans in Twin Elms tell you, Thaos and Woedica are of an old order they'd cling onto. In the old days when questions were many and answers not delivered by science, man would seek the answer for everything in the Gods. That increasingly is becoming a thing of the past, this is pretty much a direct quote: "Now man turns to animancy instead." Interestingly, as also pointed out, in the conversations you can have with the Gods, some of them are actually fine with animancy. If you trigger the Galawain shrine, you'll get into a conversation with him, Magran and Abydon, who at least appear to not be against it, arguing that "kith is supposed to better hisself". Woedica, however, isn't like the other Gods. She'd kill everyone that would oppose her and lessen her power, as implied by various dialogues (Iovara) and I think some lore books. There's a reason why she's being refered to as the Queen That Was even by her followers, though, and why the other Gods are in support of you stopping Thaos and thus from granting her the power she used to have. It's likely not one connected to her open nature. Engwithian knowledge may have created her, but advanced science is bad for her, an act of heresy, as it would weaken her powers even if she would again rule supreme.

Even so, that is a pretty big niche, especially considering that unlike City Skylines PoE has some serious competition -- and multiple studios still doing successfull projects of that scale as well as multiple competition from bigger projects. As outlined above, there are various publishers, some of them spending hundreds of thousands on games each that sell a fraction of these numbers and keep business afloat (the aforementioned publishers specializing on PC adventure games). I think one of the main reasons Obsidian did the Kickstarter was IP ownership. If they had serious trouble getting at least some funding through a traditional model (the original object was 1.1 million dollars), then that was likely because very few, if anyone, had done such games in years before. It's problematic researching a market that at least on initial looks might have disappeared. Or as that Lucas Arts classic had it in 2004, when they hadn't released an adventure game in four years and suddenly axed their Sam & Max sequel reportedly but a couple months from release and in the midst of major gaming outlets doing major press coverage and preview articles: "After careful evaluation of current market place realities and underlying economic considerations, we've decided that this was not the appropriate time to launch a graphic adventure on the PC". The rest was history, or rather Telltale Games. Besides, those are numbers that aren't way off the classic PC RPGs numbers. You're not going to do a Skyrim via this route, obviously. And Electronic Arts won't even consider about opening a Bioware subdivision focusing on doing endless amounts of Baldur's Gate (alongside even more DLC). That is not a criticism, their structuring isn't geared towards that kind of thing. But depending on the project, there are others that would do. Depending on the scale, you don't have to be Skyrim. Or, as Avellone so eloquently put it: "It’s a much reduced amount because you’re not doing all the extraneous features (total voice acting across all languages, the latest super graphic video card enhancements with tint control and crotch rumble™ technology, multiple skews across consoles, etc." There have been various interviews since in which Faergus talked about getting approached by traditional publishers that would like to back that sort of thing and for which it would fit their roster. Naturally a studio of the size of Obsidian, somewhere in between the small houses and the huge dogs on the block, can't live entirelly off of these things. At least they'd do multiple projects like this, and all of them being as successful, likely. If anybody knows London based Sports Interactive, they do specialize on a very PC specific hardcore sports management game that sells a million copies each year (equally not sporting any crotch rumble technology but more numbers juggling than any PC hardcore RPG, which is why they were initially neglected by Electronic Arts though running one of the most succesfull long-term PC franchises by now). But they also have teams who do more streamlined handheld versions of the same thing, and close to 100 full-time employes. Somewhere in between it's similar to something like Total War: doing fine, obviously, but not doing a Skyrim or New Vegas either. Paradox' roster is all about very specialized PC games, and the gaming world would be a much less diverse place without them. By the way, if Steamspy is anywhere near accurate, I find it interesting that more than a third of current Pillars players are from the US. Obviously that is still a large player base in total, but many of the PC exclusive titles traditionally have gone strong in Europe in more recent years, where the PC market is still very strong depending on the region. That is reflected in this statistics, as 50% are said to be from Europe in total, but this doesn't look as clear-cut as I thought it would.

There's different kind of publishers. Maybe things look a lot worse in the US, in particular regarding PC games, but there are a lot of publishers specializing on niches. Posted this somewhere else, but heck, there are some that do barely anything but point&click adventure games. naturally, they all run on very small budgets, which in some areas is easier to do than in others. The difference between say Europe and Canda/US appears quite large on average, but then the US arguably also has a far bigger pool of studios as well as top talent in games development. A Pillars 2 is pretty much seriously considered anyway. http://www.pcworld.com/article/2880098/obsidian-apparently-greenlit-a-sequel-to-pillars-of-eternity-and-the-game-isnt-even-out.html It's also worth reminding, apart form a design / target audience point of view*, in parts it was getting burnt on a multi-million project that made Obsidian seriously consider doing that Kickstarter in 2012 in the first place. I can happily enjoy both New Vegas as well as Pillars. However, naturally, it was the latter approach that had gone missing. * (http://kotaku.com/5942307/the-people-behind-fallout-and-planescape-are-making-my-dream-rpg)

As a comparison, this is from an interview with Brian Fargo regarding Wasteland 2 from 2013. I don't think the scope and budget of both games was hugely different. In the end, it will also come down to if the guys want to pursue this further, i.e. work on smaller scaled projects when they have the opportunity to also do bigger ones (which having some of the industry's best talent, they still do). I don't know if he was being a bit tongue-in-cheek at that point, but I read an interview with Chris Avellone that he'd love the studio to work on multiple projects like this simultaneously. Exactly like in Black Isle's heydays. http://www.pcgamer.com/brian-fargo-interview-torment-micromarkets-and-the-ongoing-war-with-the-clowns/

Looked it up on Mobygames, where it's compared to Jagged Alliance (which is not a bad thing, obviously). Never had heard about it myself, actually. On a related note to the topic at hand, there is a recent PoE review that is linked to the 2d/3d debate. http://www.incgamers.com/2015/04/pillars-of-eternity-review Have there been any words from Obsidian ever since the release? I looked for a couple older articles from a few days ago, in some of them Chris Avellone was quoted as saying that he'd hugely enjoyed it if there were working on multiple projects like this at once -- like BIS of yore -- but I haven't found anything recent concerning future plans and the state of things except for the confirmed add-on for PoE. Just seen that inXile's Torment: Tides Of Numenera is still open to be pledged. )

That is an excellent point about how it all had to fit the "make your own adventure" toolsets (which where the game's best asset). I think my point about art direction was more about that NWN wasn't exactly the most thrilling looking game released. A year down the road for instance there was Beyond Good And Evil for instance, a game sporting a fantastic art style, which still holds up reaonsablish enoug considering that it's been more than a decade. ) I mean it's understandable given where they're coming from both in terms of players and developers -- but the the weird thing about RPGs it's that if somebody would annouce a WWII RPG tomorrow it would cause heads being turned. :D I think Aliens could have been amazing, though I don't know the direction they were going for. The (Colonial Marines) squad stuff was all in the original X-Com already, sort of, and seeing your squad being killed off one by one worked really well in there -- being able to give them names even made it feel a little personal when they were KIA. Maybe it would have been more akin to System Shock though, which would also suit the license really well, speaking of which, Alien:Isolation for the most part absolutely nailed the original movie. As for Obsidian's next moves, I expect them to release at least another game in their newly created universe surrounding Eora, as it's their very own thing, and very important and personal to them such. I think it was announced to become a franchise thing in case of Kickstarter success anyhow. There are of course many overlaps with the typical D&D stuff, but I find it pretty enjoyable and intriguing so far. I'm just very glad these kinds of games are sort of back, and that this is hopefully the start of some diversity -- what is it that is keeping companies from working on franchises such as South Park as well as something smaller in scale, typically? Unfortunately for studios such as Double Fine or Obsidian, they are located in an area where making games is pretty expensive, admittedly. Pillars isn't an entirelly retro affair either way, and I'm personally glad that most of the press and players pick up on that as well. ) There is a lot of influence from Troika and Black Isle games of yore, bold ideas and design that has never been picked up from ever since -- and there is something about text that a fully cinematic cutscene will never be able to convey. I love this game. And I hope it is the game, or part of a wave of games that will change the nature of an industry.

Hey there. I'm the new guy. I haven't been sucked into a new RPG as much as this one at least as far back as New Vegas, probably more like the original Baldur's Gate, when it was breaking all new grounds in 1998. I'm ashamed to not have backed this also (I have yet to back a game). Yet I'm hoping that this will mark the beginning of something new, not just a one-off. For me it's never been a case of 2d or 3d. They're both technologies, tools. It is the artist and what he's doing with it that matters. Speaking of which, Neverwinter Nights look didn't suffer of the basic 3d technology of its time as much as of the art direction -- in my opinion anyways. 3D has some inherent advantages that 2D can't cope with, and vice versa. It depends on the game and experience though. I enjoyed New Vegas immensely, Bloodlines even by 2015 standards is almost absurdly packed with vision and scope, and I would have loved to see the canceled Aliens RPG to see the light of day. Speaking of which, as some of you have pointed out, indeed there was a push for 3D at the turn of the millenium. It's not merely 2d that has been slowly fading though, it is more specialized games in general. Back in 1997, something (as crude looking for today's eyes) as Fallout could still happily sit on the same shelf as the likes of Jedi Knight. Budgets for the most expensive games hadn't yet exploded (Wing Commander and Interactive Movies featuring Hollywood's B cast aside), titles didn't need to break the million units sold point to barely break even. In more recent years that changed a little though. New models of distribution opened up, as did new ways of funding a game. What is exciting to me about the latest Kickstarter ressurgance isn't so much that it is happening. It is who has actually been involved. It's not like these games had died out in the first place, it's just that they didn't have an audience that would warrant triple A budgets or attract triple A publishers. Thus it was small indie outlets filling the gaps. From small garage teams like in the 1980s to smaller publishers who specialize on niches. Here in Germany you have actually publishers who very much focus on PC adventure games -- and doing reasonably well enough even though they sell significantly less than your average PC RPG (a game selling 50,000 units is considered a major hit pretty much -- and though not as complex in development as a fully-fledged RPG, they all feature fully professional voice overs throughout, and production values up to this: http://www.kingart-games.de/bout2/). They all have competition now. As now you're getting the most creative heads in the industry taking note -- and scaling back a little. If your game doesn't cost 20 millions+ to make and market, you don't have to ship a million plus units in the first place to turn a profit. Thus Tim Schafer's first new adventure game ever since the utterly brilliant Grim Fandango will be released soon (though it reportedly went hugely overbudget). Brian Fargo appears to have embarked on a quest to do sequels or spiritual follow-ups to just about anyone's favourite cult RPGs. And Obsidian have just released the fantastic Pillars Of Eternity. Thank you to the backers, thank you to Josh, Faergus, Josh, Adam, Eric and the entire team for making this a reality. There is a little uncertainty about Kickstarter, probably, and that is because of the people. It very much relies on them: If they don't trust you anymore, the backing might fade. That is why I'm hoping for traditional publishers to take note too, Obsidian's connections to Paradox sound like a great fit. In the Road To Eternity video, it became apparent that Obsidian had trouble finding such a publisher for games like this. Yet there are publishers out there who very much focus on PC games, interestingly even Sega, who canned the Aliens RPG for reasons the public will likely never know. Take a look at their portfolio: their biggest franchises are Total War (totally PC) and Football Manager, a series selling a million copies each year despite not sporting much of any kind of graphics to begin with (correspondingly, it is always to be found amongst Steam's most played titles at any time of the day). Here's hoping and off to the Endless Paths now. )