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The One & Only - Blooper Girl [Katrina Garsten] : Our Lovely - PR Manager [Mikey Dowling] :

Hi all, Just wanted to announce that I'll have Josh Sawyer, Project Director for Pillars of Eternity, on my channel tomorrow night at 8 p.m. EST. I've done a number of these chats, most recently with Paul Neurath from Otherside Entertainment's Underworld Ascendant, and having played the beta version of POE I'm extremely excited for its release and to speak to Josh about it. Please stop by tomorrow night with questions and comments--looking forward to it! Arvan Eleron http://twitch.tv/arvaneleron

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2014/07/24/freedom-and-fantasy-pillars-of-eternity-interview/#more-222703 Some new information, a little clarification on the Saints War. It's also confirmed that there will be conflict between companions. Good interview, lots of good questions and answers.

Link to Page 3 of PCWorld Interview (where this quote comes from): I am curious about something that PCWorld didn't ask and that neither Adam or Josh answered, I also underlined and bolded something important that Adam said in the quote regarding modding. Will models (Characters, Monsters) be something that could be moddable? And what about textures? Furthermore, is there a simpler way that could allow for more maps to be added? Josh mentions that environments are tough and complicated and time-consuming for Obsidian, but is there a simpler way to make them? I mean, obviously hobbyists or fans do not need to be able to make state of the art top-notch areas like Obsidian are making. A child loves to play LEGO, but that doesn't mean that the child has any idea what they are doing with it or makes something super advanced with it. So when Josh says "because even for us they're complicated" I'm surprised that he even compares. It's like if an adult LEGO master who can make tons of stuff and has the imagination and skills to make super cool LEGO stuff tells a child "Sorry little child, but this LEGO business is just too difficult for you". Again, is there a simpler way for environments to be created and added into the game from a fan- or hobbyist perspective? For instance, let's look at WarCraft II (which has a great map-maker tool), it is pretty advanced too and that's not what I am asking for but there is a feature in the Map Editor which is great. Triggers that you can lay out, make an area impassable "Character can not pass through this area because this Trigger says so" kind of thing. Invisible wall stuff. I'll explain below. The "simplistic" idea I'm thinking about which could make it easier for hobbyists to add more content: A) Background picture, a simple picture you could draw in Photoshop perhaps. B) Triggers and borders or whatnot, make that mountain you painted be layed out with an area with triggers which says "Can't pass through this area" or something. C) Props. I know Obsidian is using them so why not be able to use them as a hobbyist. Are there simpler ways to make maps that might not be necessarily up to par with the quality of Obsidians maps but at least allowing more maps to be generated and added..? Imported or whatnot. For instance, could it be simpler for fans and hobbyists to be able to export an existing map and modify it, then import it again? Kind of like... say this is a fully developed map (for this hypothesis to work, this is from Update #39): But I decide to, you know, modify it a little bit so I... uuh... put a different texture on it and use some of Eternity's props (still an example). And then voila I could transform an in-doors dungeon into an out-doors forest area-thing: It's not meant to be pretty, it's just concepts on concepts. Thoughts? Question of the thread: How would a map making method be handled in the most simplistic way?

Interesting read. http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/04/04/obsidians-avellone-on-torment-kotor-2-alpha-protocol/

http://www.sorcerers...ead.php?t=58248 Lovely little nuggest of information here about a character (possibly a companion?). Pretty cool!

Apologies if this has been already posted (couldn't find it) : http://www.gamebanshee.com/interviews/109792-project-eternity-interview.html Some interesting information on the open-ended nature of the game, healing magic (resurrection included), Ciphers, Barbarians, the UI and more. Enjoy!

Josh was kind enough to take some time out and grant me an interview. You can find it here. I particularly loved his answer about where he derives some of his inpiration (outside of games) for Project Eternity. I also found a Chris Avellone interview conducted by "Obsolete Gamer". Not all of it is specific to PE but I'm guessing people here will appreciate it just the same. It does give some remarkable insight into how Chris goes about blowing our minds.

I'm doing an email interview with Josh (I think, although others may answer my questions if they're more appropriate) for the Australian website Cybergamer (which has a European sister site). My interview will try to avoid any of the questions that interviews/articles have asked already and things that the devs have answered on the Kickstarter Q&A, the forums or their personal sites (Sawyer's Formspring etc). The planned interview will be split into three sections (Personal, Design, Mechanics). I will ask very specific design and mechanics questions to try and generate better / more informative answers. I think I have a bit of room for an extra design or mechanical question or two, so if there's anything you want to know that fits the bill of the interview then feel free to post your question here and if I like it I'll try and fit it in. I expect that I should get a reply tomorrow, if so the article should go up in 36 hours or so. General topics I've already got covered

Hey everyone- I had the great pleasure to talk to Feargus Urquhart about Project Eternity, Obsidian in general and the gaming industry. An amazing experience, not one you'd want to miss! Here's a tease You’ve had great success in the past, now you’re jumping into Kickstarter with your new game, “Project Eternity” What exactly is Project Eternity? Feargus: A lot of us before we worked for Obsidian, we worked for another company called Internet Interplay, which had an RPG division “Black Isle Studios” which I was the founder back then we worked with a developer called Bioware on games like Baldur’s gate and the sequel and internally, Icewind Dale 2. A lot of people called these games the resurgence of sort of PC role playing games. They were fun games that people loved to play, but they sort of stopped being made and we were having a real challenge getting publishers funding and people interested so when Kickstarter came out we realized this was the perfect way to recreate the games people remember fondly again. You mentioned Bioware, with the recent news that the Docs in charge are retiring- What’s your opinion on that? Feargus: Well Ray and Greg are great guys and still very much my friends, I talk to them frequently and I wish them all the best. They put an immense amount of time trying to build the RPG brand at EA up and I think that sometimes you need to take a break…If you work so many years so intensely you tend to burn out and sometimes you just need to take a brake. But you’re not at the “Taking a Break Stage” just yet? Feargus: No maybe I’m just more of masochistic then they are (Laughs) I still love making role playing games. It’s kind of hard for an independent developer- for those who don’t know what that means. We kind of work for people who are going to pay us, which is a challenge but also means we have more options. If we don’t want to make a certain style game- we don’t have to pitch that. Which puts us in a very different position. Of course the challenge is then getting that funding- which is why Project Eternity was a hard sell.