Wombat

Well, still most of anime/manga are intended for teenagers and you cannot avoid some more-than obvious and stinking teen exploitation, which scares me miles away. Interestingly, given the current condition of Japan, the manga version of Nausica

What?

This is actually a sad news.

That's actually one of the possible reasons why old PnP RPG settings are based on real world, historical or not. The settings such as Sherlock Holmes and Lovecraft were quite popular, too. In any case, considering how cool the PS:T design document was, I'd rather like yous to go for original IP/any flexible setting which can be expanded with interesting ideas. So, guess I'm with Humanoid, here. Content-wise, I can be optimistic. I prefer original IP but it's just that original IP would let the designers free from some legal restrictions. Rather, I guess I have a peculiar taste considering the game-play sector - I cannot get myself into point'n click adventure games even when it comes to some my favourite settings. I cannot put my finger on what's exactly wrong with me but I hate it when I'm stopped simply because I overlooked a dot in the given picture. Been busy enough to miss Double Fine project but managed to put some money on Wasteland 2, although I found it is not quite fun to deal with radiation in daily basis, especially while forced to hear stupid "politically correct" info. Hope this Kickstarter thingy will work well for both of us. Well, should be cautious. Kickstater may have its potential but, when a game development doesn't go well, it won't go anywhere - we should know the risk, too, after all, it's just a kind of investment. Personally, I think it worth a try, though.

So, its confirmed and being developed for PC, too. Avellones dream came true, to some extent, except the setting is not high school. PS Shame that they lost Travis Stout since his style should go well with this kind of work. I even suspected that the South Park rumor was wrong when he left Obsidian.

There are still chances for sales during the upcoming vacation. Lets see what people would say when they buy it at lower price. I found some reviews on the DLC are quite favorable except that I needed to search for them. Yeah, that thought kept me from buying some games on sale although they are on my list. I "secured" NV DLCs just in case, though. IIRC, the lowest price for AP on Steam sale was 2 USD, BTW.

Thought so, too, and we are right. I bought all the DLCs now. Wonder when I can play them any time soon, though PS L.A. Noire is half price but I would wait for better deal this time...I don't have time for gaming atm, anyway.

I've gotten an impression that a close-up over the shoulder camera mode might have helped than the misleading top-down one since the view is quite common in successful PC ports - I think it's a sweet spot for PC/console control scheme (Haven't played Dragon Age 2 but it appears like it took this view, too). In fact, with the top-down view mode, I felt like playing an old school shooter, in which I, personally, don't find any fun. Also, I noticed some Japanese reviewers regard non-boss fights as a routine grinding process rather than fun hack&slash. Furthermore, I haven't come across to a single Japanese review which complains about the story (Then don't even talk about the story - so there are no complaints or praises). That said, the majority of the complaint is about that there are not many things to do after the rather short campaign is completed and, of course, the lack of variety in the multi-player mode area, which are common in player reviews in their western counterparts. No. We don't know the view of SE on the sales figures but the release of DLC seems to have been accepted rather...silently for a successful game. If I hadn't been tracking Obsidian games, I wouldn't have noticed the release at all.

Er...you know, we are not living on making games and don't need to face the reality but, for the designers, the story is probably different. It seems, at least, the most of people don't seem to want story for a game like DSIII, which is what I gathered from browsing. I thought Japanese gamers, who are more accustomed to story-focused CRPGs may be interested in the game but, as it seems, core action gamers are much more picky than I thought. I haven't played Souls series but if DSIII and Dark Souls are at the same price range, it's not tough to imagine what Japanese action gamers would say about DSIII. Although waned by net gaming, it doesn't necessarily mean that Japanese console market is easy to penetrate into. In AAA game market, Obsidian need to fight toe to toe against games supported by enormous funding. While Obsidian have to match the expectation to the product value of AAA games, at the same time, they must keep their originality in order not to be buried in the sea of similar products. They are quite successful with FONV but the same scheme don't seem to have turned out well with DSIII. Probably, they shouldn't have made a Dungeon Siege sequel, but I don't think they have a plenty of choices in offered contracts.

That said, I cannot but notice how unpopular DSIII is in Steam's stats even after the release of the DLC. Sadly, business-wise, it seem to be much better to make a solid online experience rather than offering story-focused DLCs with a certain intervals - at least, for a game like DSIII. In fact, Boarderlands, Dungeon Defenders, and Dead Islands appear to be quite popular. Let's see how Diablo III turns out. Well, at least, the latter scheme worked fine with FONV. The trend of information industry tends to go for money-milking schemes have been quite strong. In fact, I have stumbled upon an interesting blog article, which probably sheds light on the trend to some extent. While I'm not totally happy with the world filled with money-milking schemes from online trades to MMORPGs but the points of the author is more than understandable.

Yea, Indeed, holiday season sale flickered in my mind but I found it quite cheap already, personally.

Wondering why since even some people who didn't appreciate DSIII admitted the graphics is quite good and that Obsidian doesn't seems to have completely given up such segment. Anyway, enough for speculation. You have been one of the designers who frequent the boards and definitely missed.

Got it already. ...but wondering when I would be able to play it...Dead Spaces and some Holmes ADVs from the Halloween sale should wait, too.

Mixed feeling here. His style may not be my cup of tea but it was well-established and, yea, hilarious, I admit. Anyway, good luck on his future.

Well, considering story-telling in games in general, I find the quality of Obsidian writing quite decent, at least.

And poor conjecture on my part.

I could come up with something like Pychonauts (It has a mac version now, which is a good news, by the way) except that it's not based on any pop IP, which often means some restrictions. At the end of the day, though, it depends on how they develop around possible themes...I think KotoRII did a relatively decent job. Also, after watching spoiler alert! (As the top comment says, my silver-tongued non-lethal Thornton couldn't see this scene.), I convinced me that they did a decent job, again, considering Star Wars/pop spy action movie settings are not my cup of tea at all. Thinking about that, D&D-ish fantasy settings are not my cup of tea...simply, I'm accustomed to CRPGs based on them. Another possible point is that humor can hit and miss depending on the players. Even a scene like that won't change it from a spy action move which doesn't take it too seriously since characters tend to be comic...some are outrageously so. I know it's a design decision and, indeed, some people seem to be very happy with them. Also, I couldn't but notice that not all people are happy with humor in some FONV DLCs. Personally, I like subtle humor and occasional comic relieves but taste differs.

During my routine Steam sales check, which is only "gaming" activity at the moment for me, I found DSIII is half-price on Steam till 10 am 10/03/2011 PST. I'm not buying it (sorry, the team) simply because it is out of the range of my game-play preference, despite of the fact that I, indeed, managed to play Alpha Protocol despite of its "flawed" game-play (...guess I played too many good stealth games). Just in case someone might be interested in.

I wonder if they would be happy about this but you can stalk follow Sawyer and Avellone on twitter and Formspring (Sawyer only). Luckily to them, I'm not a heavy twitter user, though.

Thanks, funcroc as usual. As for the interview, it's mostly just updated info. That said, you may not believe this, Sawyer, but I respect you about living as a professional designer while answering to hobbyist gamers like us, at times. Glancing at the list, I feel myself a mere casual gamer, after all. I played only the two games in the stealth genre. I wonder if I should play Katamari Damacy and Ninjya Gaiden. Currently, I'm keeping a distance to playing games, though...probably till every single DLC comes out for New Vegas and that post DLC bugs are settled, at least. PS BTW, how did he make friend with the Booker prize writer in her seventies?

No problem. I just cannot stop putting my nose into game design discussions. I wish my English would be as clear as his, though. From the interview

Actually, Chapman covered that part already in one of his blog entries. However, I don't think his intention is dragging the players from the core-game play but gradually giving additional dimensions to it. Throwing some additional factors to the core game-play, or, what the player has learnt so far, gradually to form a steady learning curve seems to be his policy. Personally, I think this should be all the designers policy since, as it is often said, it's a bad design if a game force the players to follow how the designers think. Either through tutorials or natural flow of game-plays, the players should be able to figure out, using given utilities. The reason why I brought up Assassin's Creed series is: in Assassin's Creed's case, the basic tricks players need to learn to deal with challenges can be trained through tutorials independently till the players' content, which was nice for someone who are not confident with action games like myself. However, of course, they are just utilities, not the final answers to the obstacles in the game. For example, the players need to learn tricks such as multiple counters (quite absurd but it reminds me of old hack and slash movies)/double jump to deal with puzzles and combats in the game but still they need to figure out how to apply them to "win" the game. Gradually increasing additional moves needed and giving the players opportunities to learn additional moves to the core game-plays were quite nice touch, I think. That said, I'm far from a hardcore action game fan and I wonder how hardcore players like Chapman see that. PS Oh, and just to avoid misunderstanding, I don't think AC and Thief series are similar...simply, no way.

I think there is no point in praising games simply because they are from indie companies. That said, currently, Dead State keeps an eye of mine, simply because Brian Mitsoda worked on considerable part of dialogues in Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines and his idea on DS seems to be interesting. "Let's see how it turns out." mood, here. In any case, I'd keep a certain distance to gaming in general.

I don't know, I think it allows you to use your imagination. Sure, rescuing the hostages, or not killing the one guy in the first mission may not have a huge impact on the end of the game, but it does affect how you view yourself in the end. For example, it made a great difference to how I felt about the story when I was able to save my brother in the original and the helicopter pilot in the new one. Yeah...that's the way I thought when I referred to "the silent guy with the sunglasses" type and the atmosphere was done well, IMO. That said, I still think there is not much in the theme/story/character development...when they are able to come up with the choice about Radford, who gave quite a hard choice to the protagonist, I think they could do better with the main plot. Personally, I like the game-play of DXHR than that of the Witcher 2, but, as a whole work, TW2 felt more completed. Of course, TW2 doesn't have much deep theme to be dug, though.