New Mass Effect 2 character

[Purkake]

But Serious Cat is no ordinary cat he is a legend among the intertubes.

 

Bored man sleeping is just a picture waiting for a witty capture to be accepted on the internets.

 

Also cats are generally funnier than bald middle-aged fat dudes.

Edited September 12, 2009 by Purkake

[HoonDing]

But Serious Cat is no ordinary cat he is a legend among the intertubes.

 

Bored man sleeping is just a picture waiting for a witty capture to be accepted on the internets.

 

Also cats are generally funnier than bald middle-aged fat dudes.

Thought it would fit since that man is the legendary David Gaider.

[Purkake]

Still needs a witty caption, preferably with bad grammar.

[Maria Caliban]

Awesome, they added something that should have been in the first game.

 

'Should have been in the first game?' Because a custom AI for each teammate is now standard in Western RPGs?

 

 

Also cats are generally funnier than bald middle-aged fat dudes.

Thought it would fit since that man is the legendary David Gaider.

 

Have you guys not seen the interviews? David lost about 100 pounds and gained hair; I suspect he's been bathing in the blood of interns.

Edited September 12, 2009 by Maria Caliban

[Guest Slinky]

Awesome, they added something that should have been in the first game.

 

'Should have been in the first game?' Because a custom AI for each teammate is now standard in Western RPGs?

No, because it should be standard in western RPG's.

Edited September 12, 2009 by Slinky

[Purkake]

Awesome, they added something that should have been in the first game.

 

'Should have been in the first game?' Because a custom AI for each teammate is now standard in Western RPGs?

 

I don't think that expecting decent AI from an AAA game is too much to ask. 90% of the time it was me against the enemies with my companions dead after a few seconds.

 

If you change the combat system, change the AI enough to be at least useful.

 

 

Also cats are generally funnier than bald middle-aged fat dudes.

Thought it would fit since that man is the legendary David Gaider.

 

Have you guys not seen the interviews? David lost about 100 pounds and gained hair; I suspect he's been bathing in the blood of interns.

 

I can count the amount of game developers I know by face on my fingers. David Gaider is not among them.

[Volourn]

"90% of the time it was me against the enemies with my companions dead after a few seconds."

 

Wow. You had bad luck. My companions rarely died.

[Krookie]

"90% of the time it was me against the enemies with my companions dead after a few seconds."

 

Wow. You had bad luck. My companions rarely died.

 

Agreed, even on Insanity (I think that was the hardest difficulty...) my squadmates were pretty reliable. I did most of the work, but that's expected.

[J.E. Sawyer]

That's why I find Blizzard and Valve so cool. They completely rely on the PC, and that's good so.

A company with online verification/monthly subscriptions and a company with its own online distribution system.

[Purkake]

That's why I find Blizzard and Valve so cool. They completely rely on the PC, and that's good so.

A company with online verification/monthly subscriptions and a company with its own online distribution system.

 

...which both companies made from scratch and which have become the market leaders in their respective fields.

 

EDIT: Apparently I suck at Mass Effect, but I have heard other people make the same complaints on podcasts etc.

Edited September 12, 2009 by Purkake

[Morgoth]

That's why I find Blizzard and Valve so cool. They completely rely on the PC, and that's good so.

A company with online verification/monthly subscriptions and a company with its own online distribution system.

The point remains valid.

 

Or do I sense a tiny bit of jealousness here?

 

Oh btw... Is the "PC only self-funded hardcore RPG" still a topic for Obsidian?

[J.E. Sawyer]

...which both companies made from scratch and which have become the market leaders in their respective fields.

Both companies had previous successes that allowed them to develop their technology over long periods of time, and they were developed during a period of relatively low-cost development. Battle.net was pretty meager when it launched, and Steam took years to develop and become stable. That is, both companies were big before their technologies were big. Few game companies have the resources to develop and maintain systems like Battle.net and Steam concurrently with the games they are developing. Of course, Steam offers PC-based developers a nice online distribution method, but a portion of that income is going straight back to Valve.

 

My point is that Blizzard and Valve focus on PC development because they have long-standing and/or well-established technologies in place that a) prevent or discourage piracy and/or b) directly generate profit for them. And in the case of Blizzard, their development cycles typically eclipse console cycles, so it doesn't make much sense to develop for consoles.

 

In the past six years, I have not interacted with a publisher (other than Atari for NWN2 -- since that tech wasn't going on a console in that time frame) who wanted anything less than three SKUs for a title: PS2/Xbox/PC or PS3/Xbox360/PC. They all want the PS3/Xbox360 and they all want a PC SKU.

[J.E. Sawyer]

The point remains valid.

 

Or do I sense a tiny bit of jealousness here?

I will always be jealous of any company that has enough money to work on a project for six years. But it's more of a "no duh" statement: Blizzard and Valve made great games in the 90s that sold well, invested that money in smart technology, and continue to dominate because of it. It has little to do with "being cool" and a lot more to do with being successful and using that success to stay dominant.

 

Oh btw... Is the "PC only self-funded hardcore RPG" still a topic for Obsidian?

That's a question for the owners. I just work here.

[Morgoth]

Which makes perfectly sense from a business standpoint.

 

But how high are the chances of an Obsidian published niche RPG, say in the vein of Jefferson? Go Steam exclusive and you get a 60% margin I think, that should still generate enough money to warrant a smaller development team.

 

Unless Obsidian has zero interest in making old-school RPGs anymore.

[Morgoth]

The point remains valid.

 

Or do I sense a tiny bit of jealousness here?

It has little to do with "being cool" and a lot more to do with being successful and using that success to stay dominant.

I know I know. It's pretty impossible these days to repeat such a success that was a lot easier in the 90s to get started with. Though I still hope that Obsidian once generates enough money to allow them to make their "dream" project with the necessary time frame.

Edited September 12, 2009 by Morgoth

[J.E. Sawyer]

I can't speak for anyone else at Obsidian, but I'd like to work on a smaller game with less of a focus on being cutting edge and more of a focus on really good mechanics. Personally, I've always thought it would be a lot of fun to work on a turn-based, top-down/"iso" Delta Green game. I think there are still good platforms for such games on XBLA or through Steam.

[Purkake]

Blizzard and Valve used their capital wisely and built something that will guarantee them income for years to come.

 

They were by no means in an unique position, however. I agree that times have changed, but there is still a place for innovation in the market, no one is forced to make $60 games for at least three SKUs. Other options do exist.

Edited September 12, 2009 by Purkake

[Morgoth]

Half Life sold like 6 million units for Valve, that's a lot of profit if you take the relatively "low" dev costs in mind. These days, dev costs are so high that you hardly make enough profit that allows you to develop something like Steam for 4-5 years. So the chances are a lot more slim to have the same success as Blizzard or Valve.

[Purkake]

Half Life sold like 6 million units for Valve, that's a lot of profit if you take the relatively "low" dev costs in mind. These days, dev costs are so high that you hardly make enough profit that allows you to develop something like Steam for 4-5 years. So the chances are a lot more slim to have the same success as Blizzard or Valve.

 

As I said, times have changed, the old business model of $60 retail games only works for AAA-titles.

 

You can still make money on a lower budget DD-only game. It would be pretty fun to see a real developer make something IE-like with today's technology, but focusing on the story/writing/characters instead of combat/graphics.

[Morgoth]

Yeah, I wish there was more of that. I mean most DD only games we see right now are some sort of platformers, puzzle games or some other game-y stuff that I'm not particularly interested in.

 

Alien Breed from Team 17 actually sounds interesting, I'm gonna get this. I heard though that MS makes it very difficult for you to get your game up and running on XBLA. I think MS once said they only want to concentrate on a hand full of premium XBLA games.... that's quite restrictive.

Edited September 12, 2009 by Morgoth

[Purkake]

It also makes for some good games. That's what you get with a closed platform.

 

From what I've seen you really need to do things differently to stand out in the ever-growing crowd. People are/were excited for games like Scribblenauts, Borderlands and Mirror's Edge even more so than for Halo and other big franchises because they did something new of different. Just releasing a good game isn't enough sometimes(especially when all the damn games come out in ~2 months).

 

If someone were to create a horror/RPG that didn't look too horrible, give it a distinct style, some interesting gameplay mechanics, decent writing and released it DD-only in one of the emptier months like June, it would get as much attention as any AAA title in the Fall. If it doesn't have any glaring flaws it would probably sell pretty well.

Edited September 12, 2009 by Purkake

[RPGmasterBoo]

I can't speak for anyone else at Obsidian, but I'd like to work on a smaller game with less of a focus on being cutting edge and more of a focus on really good mechanics. Personally, I've always thought it would be a lot of fun to work on a turn-based, top-down/"iso" Delta Green game. I think there are still good platforms for such games on XBLA or through Steam.

 

Jagged Alliance is dying for a remake, after the planned one was cancelled. I'd love to see Obsidian copy the mechanics, streamline it, pimp it up with nice graphics (as in pleasant- not Crysis "nice"), throw the usual Obsidian^TM storyline in it, etc...

The demands of high tech graphics too often lead to too many compromises with actual gameplay...

[Niten_Ryu]

Jagged Alliance seem to be poison for development teams and since Mr. Sawyer has seen more then his fair share of cancelled projects, it's cruel to suggest something like that

 

On topic - My ME squad mates spend good amount of time hugging the floor, especially on insanity difficulty level. At some point I just ordered 'em to guard some bottleneck and did most of the killing alone. Something very basic like "shields are down, seek safe cover (meaning away from enemies), wait untill shield are back up" script would have been nice. Or smarter use of powers (usually they just waste powers on low threat mobs).

[Maria Caliban]

Awesome, they added something that should have been in the first game.

 

'Should have been in the first game?' Because a custom AI for each teammate is now standard in Western RPGs?

 

I don't think that expecting decent AI from an AAA game is too much to ask.

 

 

No, it's not. But that's not what you said. You said that giving each companion a unique AI should have been in the first game. That implies you consider it a standard feature that was missing from ME, but I can't think of any RPG were that's the case. Usually the most diversity is 'aggressive/protective' and the player toggles that.

[Purkake]

Awesome, they added something that should have been in the first game.

 

'Should have been in the first game?' Because a custom AI for each teammate is now standard in Western RPGs?

 

I don't think that expecting decent AI from an AAA game is too much to ask.

 

 

No, it's not. But that's not what you said. You said that giving each companion a unique AI should have been in the first game. That implies you consider it a standard feature that was missing from ME, but I can't think of any RPG were that's the case. Usually the most diversity is 'aggressive/protective' and the player toggles that.

 

You could alter the AI way more in NWN2. Also ME was way bigger than any other RPG at release which made me expect more in terms of actually functional gameplay.