Best way to support Obsidian, FO:NV

[spacekungfuman]

I know this might sound ridiculous, but I really like Obsidian's games and can't stand Bethesda's, and I want to know if any method of buying the game would be more beneficial to Obsidian than another. Does Obsidian get more money from each sale on steam for example, or does the profit breakdown work the same no matter where I buy it from?

[WorstUsernameEver]

I don't think that there will be any difference in the division of profit between buying the game retail or on Steam.

Assuming there even is a division of profits in the first place.

 

I'm going to quote J.E. Sawyer from his Formspring thingy:

 

Publishers take the majority of profits. Developers are paid on a milestone basis with some bonuses or royalties (usually) negotiated into the contract, but said bonuses/royalties are usually contingent on some strict criteria (shipped on time, 85%+ rated, X million units sold, etc.).

 

In the 11 years I've been in the industry, I've received one royalty check for one game: Icewind Dale. Some very successful companies have a lot of bonuses and royalties flying around, but they are the exception.

[Slowtrain]

In this case there is really no way to support the developer without supporting the publisher.

 

But, in all fairness, Bethesda seems to have done a nice job giving Obs some freedom to make changes.

 

Which I wasn't really expecting a year ago.

 

Anyway, as long as you buy the game in some way, you're supporting Obs.

 

 

Buy it twice.

[spacekungfuman]

I would pirate the game and send Obsidian a check, but the sale is probably more valuable than the cash. I wish that there was an "I think Fallout 3 was a travesty and that Bethesda should not have purchased the license" edition. . .

[WorstUsernameEver]

I would pirate the game and send Obsidian a check, but the sale is probably more valuable than the cash. I wish that there was an "I think Fallout 3 was a travesty and that Bethesda should not have purchased the license" edition. . .

 

Only thing you can do is buy New Vegas but not Fallout 3 and the next Fallout (4?) by Bethesda.

I don't think there's really any other way to support Obsidian without supporting Bethesda's Fallout(s).

 

To be fair, I could argue that the core gameplay of Fallout 3 and New Vegas is the same, and that actually New Vegas is in a lot of way a refinement/correction rather than a revolution, but I don't really want to start a debate on how you feel on Fallout 3.

[spacekungfuman]

I would pirate the game and send Obsidian a check, but the sale is probably more valuable than the cash. I wish that there was an "I think Fallout 3 was a travesty and that Bethesda should not have purchased the license" edition. . .

 

Only thing you can do is buy New Vegas but not Fallout 3 and the next Fallout (4?) by Bethesda.

I don't think there's really any other way to support Obsidian without supporting Bethesda's Fallout(s).

 

To be fair, I could argue that the core gameplay of Fallout 3 and New Vegas is the same, and that actually New Vegas is in a lot of way a refinement/correction rather than a revolution, but I don't really want to start a debate on how you feel on Fallout 3.

 

The core gameplay is not what I'm buying this game for. I thought the mechanics, engine, and overall feel of FO3 were pretty terrible. But the worst part of that game was the writing, which I found less tolerable than the broken english you see in some translations of Eastern European games. I believe that the gameplay of this game will be terrible, because FO3's gameplay was so bad, but I am counting on quality writing.

 

I literally could not bring myself to play past the first conversation with the Sheriff in megaton in FO3. I could not say to the sheriff "I'm looking for my father. Middle-aged guy. Maybe you've seen him?" because my character concept was not a mental deficient. If I had an intelligence score of 1, then I could have chosen that, but my character was supposed to be smart (int 9) so I stopped playing, and replayed FO1 instead with a low int character, to relive the alternate script to a 10 year old game which was better than the main script of Bethesda's so called AAA blockbuster game.

[Wombat]

Sticking to the OP, I think CD Projekt Red did something similar to such scheme. If you like the game, you are offered to have opportunities to pay your money quite a few times in different editions. This may sound ridiculous but if you really like their game and don't see anything worth your money in other games in the market...reading some posts on the net, I believe some enthusiastic fans bought virtually the same game more than twice. IIRC, Sawyer sounded contemptuous but the point is that nobody forced you to buy them. Personally, I bought the first one in full price, which seems to be enough support since I have eventually gotten fully patched game with some additional content.

 

As for Fallout:New Vegas, you may be interested in buying a boxed collector edition and a digital one at the same time, which would allow you to play the game immediately while you can satisfy your geeky pleasure with the former. However, since these things can be done through your free will, please don't complain it even if something wrong happened since by doing this, you are doubling risks for something unexpected. For example, if you end up with finding there is a rare but fatal bug in your environment.

 

However, all in all, Obsidian need to be recognized as a competent company by publishers. For that, they probably need to polish their product value, or, assure the most players to get what they expected. For, as you can see in Alpha Protocol's case, there are almost nothing can be done once a considerable number of people find themselves unhappy with their products. Different from CD Projekt's case, I don't think it would have made a difference even if I had bought the game at full price immediately after the release.

 

That said, if Obsidian find their share in opportunities in web-based and/or portable gaming, it may make their lives easier. Relatively low budget games with distinct art direction such as DeathSpank and Valkyria Chronicles showed that there are still rooms for the definition of polished products, too.

[Slowtrain]

Sticking to the OP, I think CD Projekt Red did something similar to such scheme. If you like the game, you are offered to have opportunities to pay your money quite a few times in different editions. This may sound ridiculous but if you really like their game and don't see anything worth your money in other games in the market...

 

 

I bought the Witcher twice. Regular and EE.

[Purkake]

Obsidian should look into merchandising, t-shirts, mugs, etc.

 

That's how Double Fine did it.

[Humodour]

Do what I'm doing: don't buy Fallout 3, buy Fallout: New Vegas.

[Gorth]

Obsidian should look into merchandising, t-shirts, mugs, etc.

 

That's how Double Fine did it.

Been there, tried that, They didn't listen

 

Will we see g-strings with Obsidian logos, t-shirts with your resident artists concept art on them, coffee cup with your portrait on it etc.

 

I for one would buy at least 5 cups, one with each company founder on it, if it would support one of those less profitable isometric party based crpgs being self published and developed...

[Jackalmonkey]

The first question that popped into my mind when I saw the collector's edition was whether Avellone will see any royalties for All Roads, the included graphic novel. But given that it's published "in conjunction" with Dark Horse rather than by Dark Horse (it's likely out of their custom shop), I'd guess he got a flat fee out of Bethesda's marketing budget instead.

 

At any rate, I've pre-ordered the collector's edition, figuring that the best scenario is that FO:NV eclipses FO3's sales figures early. The rest is really up to critical reception. I'm excited to see what Obsidian will do with the franchise, but I really hope that a success will see them getting another shot at an original IP.

[Wombat]

I have nothing against Bethesda especially when they gave an opportunity to make FO:NV to Obsidian. However, I hope Obsidian would have more control on making their games by piling up commercial successes especially there are now opportunities opened for low budgets games, too.

[WorstUsernameEver]

To be honest I don't have anything against Bethesda too, though who knows what would have happened if Obsidian had more time to work on the game (but again, maybe the fact that they didn't have much time and that they tried to keep the game safe it's for the best, both from the reception pov, and from the management pov, so they don't screw it up by being too ambitious). Then, again, Bethesda probably has given them the project in the first place because they don't want to keep too much time between installments of the series.

[Humodour]

I would buy an Obsidian g-string and wear it proudly.

[Wombat]

To be honest I don't have anything against Bethesda too, though who knows what would have happened if Obsidian had more time to work on the game (but again, maybe the fact that they didn't have much time and that they tried to keep the game safe it's for the best, both from the reception pov, and from the management pov, so they don't screw it up by being too ambitious). Then, again, Bethesda probably has given them the project in the first place because they don't want to keep too much time between installments of the series.

Well, about that, I allow myself to indulge with a certain level of romanticism where I believe that the designers of Bethesda, or, at least some of them, too, are fans of FO at their heart.

[Morgoth]

F:NV will be the first Obsidian game I won't buy at release.

 

Probably.

[Luso]

I don't know, I somehow have a good feeling about NV like this is the game that will be the turning point for Obsidian when it comes to polish.

[Karl the Unfettered]

I may be wrong, but it seems as if Obsidian never gets enough time to really work things out. KotOR 2 was on shelves about thirteen months after they got the project, or some such ridiculous timeline; as far as I can tell you'd need twice that much time to get a decently polished and debugged title out there. Alpha Protocol had all sorts of delays and setbacks, and almost none of them were for the good of the game itself; the very last delay, I heard, was Sega angling for the best sales. Why didn't they let the developers polish and tweak the game in that time? Obviously there would have been a much better game put out; I adore AP and I adored KotOR 2, but will be the first to admit they both had a great many flaws and bugs. No doubt others can speak for the rest of Obsidian's games and any deadline issues they faced.

 

In any event, I have NV on preorder, and cannot wait for it to come out.

[WorstUsernameEver]

I may be wrong, but it seems as if Obsidian never gets enough time to really work things out.

 

Well, to give credit to the publishers, it's not like Obsidian doesn't agree to the deadlines in their contracts.

[Sannom]

I may be wrong, but it seems as if Obsidian never gets enough time to really work things out.

 

True only for KOTOR 2, where the publisher really could have given them a few more months to polish things out, and the deadline was already kind of ridiculous. But as far as the other games are concerned, I don't buy it. NWN 2 was as much Obsidian's fault as it was Atari's fault, comments from both Feargus and Josh support it. And after that, Atari let them patch and expand the game. As for Alpha Protocol, we know how "hellish" the development process was, and that big mistakes were made on both sides.

[Wombat]

Rather, I cannot but feel some odd decision-making either by Obsidian and/or Sega about which projects should have priority. If the so-called leaked doc of Sega is genuine, it's laughably surprising how they can be wrong in choosing promising projects. I feel some things are terribly wrong in the hierarchy but fans will stay blinded, helplessly guessing what is actually happening behind the closed door.

 

So, instead, I'd go back to the OP. IMO, probably, the fruit for these years of canceled project is Onyx engine, which seems to be capable of dealing with both more-than-decent graphics and mulch-platforms. According to what is revealed so far, it may also be compatible with various game-plays especially with the said smooth camera shifts. If it is capable of realizing natural game-plays for both console game-pads and PC keyboards and mouse, then, I think there would be quite a good opportunity for Obsidian. I guess I was not alone thinking like this since even Bioware seems to be going for similar tactics with Dragon Age 2, by providing different game-plays for console and PC platforms.

 

Yea...I'm poking around in this respect at Dungeon Siege III boards. Onyx engine seems to be promising but I'm wondering how flexible it is in terms of game-plays and how much forethought is implemented to it. If the engine can satisfy both action and tactical gamers while letting the both game-plays feel native, it can reduce the risk of multi-platforms, means, leaving either group unsatisfied like in the case of Alpha Protocol.

 

As long as the presentation such as game-plays and graphics are good, I think, at least, some people would appreciate Obsidian's originality in the area of content since people finally began to notice that big RPG makers hadn't been offering "meaningful" choices.