Chris Avellone interview @ RPGDot

[kirottu]

The publishers are really the largest villains in the computer game industry. Theyre just suits who view games as no dfferent than toilet paper or shampoo, theyre looking to sell the games cheapest to produce(lowest possible quality) at the highest possible prices and thats all there is to it. They actively oppose creativity, originality and quality in favor of "branding" or "accessability".

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It

[Atreides]

It's not out of the realms of reality to have games getting backing by special interest/political groups if they have some kind of message that they're pushing. Don't know how much I'd like that I suppose. As long as they're realistic and fairly balanced, I don't mind.

 

One issue worth exploring is the ability (responsibility?) to make a difference and whether or not to shirk it, even if it's unpopular.

[Shadowstrider]

The only traitor I didn't see coming was Melissan.  That did actually surprise me a bit.

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I probably wouldn't have seen it coming IF ONLY BIO HADN'T PUT A HUGE PICTURE OF HER ON THE DAMN ToB WEBSITE!

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Her in-game avatar was a normal human female avatar until the end of the game. Your signature holds true, at least.

 

Not to mention I'm not exactly sure what this brings to the discussion of writing.

[Judge Hades]

So, basically you want the game to not only account for your character's knowledge and biases, but also your own.  Thats not asking too much.  Not at all...

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If I am playing a reasonably intelligent character, lets say Intelligence 14 with a WIsdom 12 or higher, and is given all the clues in character I don't see why my reasonably intelligent character cannot figure these things out on his or her own.

 

Now if I had a character with an 8 Intelligence and a 6 Wisdom, then now. The character would be a little of the dull side to figure them out.

 

It is a role playing game after all and I don't see it as being too much to ask for.

Edited December 23, 2005 by Judge Hades

[Pope]

The only traitor I didn't see coming was Melissan.  That did actually surprise me a bit.

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I probably wouldn't have seen it coming IF ONLY BIO HADN'T PUT A HUGE PICTURE OF HER ON THE DAMN ToB WEBSITE!

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Her in-game avatar was a normal human female avatar until the end of the game. Your signature holds true, at least.

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Yes, but the url of the picture had Melissan in it.

[Hell Kitty]

The only traitor I didn't see coming was Melissan.  That did actually surprise me a bit.

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I probably wouldn't have seen it coming IF ONLY BIO HADN'T PUT A HUGE PICTURE OF HER ON THE DAMN ToB WEBSITE!

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Her in-game avatar was a normal human female avatar until the end of the game. Your signature holds true, at least.

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Yes, but the url of the picture had Melissan in it.

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I knew Melissan was the big baddie before I got the game, and I think this may have been the reason. Something like the picture being called Melissan.jpg or something.

 

It's like when I saw The Sixth Sense, I went in knowing there was a twist, so I figured it out right in the beginning.

Edited December 23, 2005 by Hell Kitty

[Gromnir]

yes, the labeling of url gave some things away to board folks, but even if url had been disguised, it were still pretty obvious that melissan were the baddie once the tradition of picturing the UBG (ultimate bad guy) in adverts were continued by bis/interplay. the rules of character development must needs apply after all.

 

melissan were female. melissan gots sizebale character development. never could interact with melissan save for in controled dialogues (no opportunity to cast detect evil or holy smite or some other spell to test her pathetic d&d good v. evil meter.)

 

*shrug*

 

after seeing the picture of a babe with clawed gloves we knew that some female character would be the UBG in tob. were only a couple of other female characters that gots more than a few moments of game time in tob, and one of 'em were drow.

 

besides which, we knew that Gromnir must needs be correct... even if it were half-orc Gromnir.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Kaftan Barlast]

It

[Gromnir]

"They turn a blind eye to the fact that games like PsT are STILL selling well enough to make the top #20 more than 5 years after it was released. Or that Vampire:Bloodlines is #1 on the RPG sales charts this christmas"

 

they not turn a blind eye. am sure that they do notice where ps:t ranks... they just don't care.

 

first 2 quarters. the realities of the business has resulted in providing games and game publishers with a relatively small window for sucess. that window is 2 quarters. a game can continue to sell for years, and such a thing not really help the publisher in a cost effective way unless the game were succesful in the first 2 quarters.

 

publishers know.

 

developers know.

 

little old ladies know.

 

am always confused as to why a handful of game fans don't know.

 

and we is getting WAY off the trail of chrisA and his interview.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Kaftan Barlast]

Im just sayig that being able to show hat your game has a high chance of continuing to sell for years ater its release opens many financial opportunities if only the publishers were interested.

 

 

I id go to a bank in Sweden and say that "its 60% certain that I will sell 100.000 units or more of game X in the next two years, can I get a loan so I can produce game Y?" theyd say "With interest, but yes, defiently"

 

whereas a publisher is only interested in the first two weeks of sales. beyond that, it doesnt matter to them.

[Gromnir]

is the first 2 quarters... six months. divide a year into 4 equal parts, etc... not two weeks. six months is a considerable period of time.

 

"Im just sayig that being able to show hat your game has a high chance of continuing to sell for years ater its release opens many financial opportunities if only the publishers were interested."

 

nope. again, like it or not, the game publishers is slaves to the process almost as much as is the developers. they got a relatively short period of time to be showing success.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[kirottu]

So any profit after first two quarters doesn

[@\NightandtheShape/@]

Im just a young, naive Gamedev student but it seems quite apparent that we need to reverse the rut of backwards-striving that the game industry is stuck in. Someday, consumers are going to get fed-up with being spoonfed the same games over and over again in a slightly different package. It also needs to change to reach out beyond todays consumers(although most people are already reached today).

 

 

There are some things that a game story must have in order to satisfy the player, like how there must always be something to give a sense of accomplishment.

 

But if you changed the entire concept of what a game is supposed to be and made it somekind of 'interactive exerience' then there would be no limit to what you could do, and then it gets really exciting.

 

 

 

mmm... this turned into a rant

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One gamedev student to another, Kudos to that. Games need to change, drastically so.

 

One of the things which I have always disliked about RPG's is the lack of decent AI, over use of scripting etc...

 

If you ask me for the story to change the implementation needs to change... The entire approch to development of role playing games on computers needs to change, I have always felt that RPG's should be at the frontrunner of AI development in games, sadly that isn't so because people are mentally stuck in trying to recreate PnP on a computer, as in literally trying to recreate PnP, if folks think about the problem differently you get a different result.

 

It's about time people started asking different questions on how to control story's in games.

 

Mold the story to the player and not to the player to the story, natural language processing is perhaps a little too far fetched in it's current state, but in terms of future developments this is perhaps one tool that may indeed be useful.

 

NPC's need to start communicating and reacting to player actions in a realistic way, a player should have a standing with all comunicatable NPC's, and NPC's with each other.

 

Dialogue trees can then be implemented based upon a players standing with the said NPC, the NPC's faction and so on.

 

(Edit: For clarity)

Edited December 23, 2005 by @\NightandtheShape/@

[Pope]

So any profit after first two quarters doesn

Edited December 23, 2005 by Pope

[kirottu]

So money gotten from sales after two first quarters goes where?

 

I just don

[Surreptishus]

They still get the money but i would imagine peak sales occur within the first six months and that is what is important.

[J.E. Sawyer]

Sawyer's style, judging from those areas I recall him designing, is a bit on the anti-septic side of sterile, but at least it gets from point A to point B without embarrassing side-routes through points C, D, and Z.  His writing is by and large grammatically correct and it conveys the idea in a way that most players will understand.  Kind of like most of his posts.  So, as a consumer, I'm happy with Sawyer

[Pope]

hehe, Spinter Cell > MGS indeed

[Judge Hades]

BG1 > Splinter Cell > MGS.

 

[alanschu]

So, basically you want the game to not only account for your character's knowledge and biases, but also your own.  Thats not asking too much.  Not at all...

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If I am playing a reasonably intelligent character, lets say Intelligence 14 with a WIsdom 12 or higher, and is given all the clues in character I don't see why my reasonably intelligent character cannot figure these things out on his or her own.

 

Now if I had a character with an 8 Intelligence and a 6 Wisdom, then now. The character would be a little of the dull side to figure them out.

 

It is a role playing game after all and I don't see it as being too much to ask for.

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Hello ginormous branching factor.

[Pope]

BG1 > Splinter Cell > MGS.

 

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I was comparing two stealth games, but what the heck

[Nartwak]

You are all ****ing insane.

[Judge Hades]

BG1 is a stealth game. Last time I played it I played a solo halfling fighter/theif who snuck through out the Nashkel mines and killed the Half Orc before he could rally his troops His troops came of course but I made short work of them.

[alanschu]

Then Deus Ex is definitely an RPG

[Judge Hades]

Its a Shooter/RPG hybrid.