Obsidian are notorious for release bug-filled products...

[C2B]

Obsidian may make buggy games here and there, but the worst Obsidian games are at least as good as a normal Double Fine release, don't go over budget, and are normally on schedule.

 

Eh, Alpha Protocol was kind of a big mess actually when it comes to development under the own admittance of Obsidianitie's. So was NWN2 (albeit less).

 

The truly sad part about Double Fine's current situation is, that they had trouble with that in the past and now are in this situation. Under their own rules no less, provided with money from fans.

[anubite]

Kotor2 was rushed development. I'm amazed they did as much as they did in under a year and produced some great work there in spite of it all.

AP was a combination of untapped potential and poor balancing; glitches though? I dunno, I can't think of having experienced any while playing the game twice-through (just the ocassional crash I think, which is annoying, but probably engine-related). They should have found someone to help with their shooting mechanics though, it's tough to compete with the gun game crowd. It's still a great RPG, but it's a shame somebody over there didn't rope in some ex-Deus Ex designers or something.

New Vegas? Gamebryo. Seriously, Bethesda making clunky engines is no surprise. Also, if you make an open-world game you pretty much triple the amount of glitches to hunt down. It's not like QA'ing a CoD-inspired hallway game.

NWN2? I think this might be the only legitimate complaint against Obsidian. The quality of NWN2 is spotty in places. MOTB is decidedly great, however.

I haven't played DS3, but from what I understand, DS2 and DS1 barely stand today as being 'playable' so it was a rather large mistake for Obsidian to take the reigns for what is at best a mediocre ARPG.

Stick of Truth? I have absolutely no faith in it, especially since THQ died. This is another thing where Obsidian is out of their comfort zone. "Feast or famine" basically translates to, "We'll do any job anyone is willing to deign us with." Which is a shame - Obsidian is talented, but you don't ask them to make a game they can't make. AP didn't work for the market Sega wanted it to, Stick of Truth has no market, as far as I can tell.

 

I'd say that Obsidian makes great work when they are in their 'realm'. DS3 and AP are outside their realm. Fallout, KOTOR? They know their **** and they get it done right. Publishers just don't have the diversity to offer Obsidian. This is why Kickstarter has the potential to let them shine. Show us that isoRPGs can work again and we'll be back to the golden era of games.

Edited July 16, 2013 by anubite

[C2B]

@anubite

 

Sorry, but that reasoning at the end is a load of bollocks. AP was the only one *out of their comfort zone* (and its development problems are a lot more than just what you describe). Both DS III (Not as a Dungeon Siege, but what it actually ended up being. A Dark Alliance/Champions like game) and South Park: TSOT are very much in it.

 

And sometimes you have to do things out of *your comfort zone*. That's usually the way you get to know things and maybe can improve them.

Edited July 16, 2013 by C2B

[jethro]

StickofTruth has no market? What parallel dimension did you come from?

 

I expect it to be fairly successfull if they get the tone and the quality right (and that seems to be the case according to german games magazines who could play a beta-version already, AFAIK).

 

Sadly the game was bought by Ubisoft and that probably means they will bind it to uplay which means I won't play it.

Edited July 16, 2013 by jethro

[Karkarov]

Alpha Protocol had plenty of development issues, but again, it wasn't just Obsidian, SEGA was equally involved there.  That said the reason the game flopped is because people played it like a shooter, it isn't a damn shooter, it is just like ME1, an RPG that happens to have guns for weapons.  Trust me, you skill up your pistols you won't have any issues killing anything.  The games only real flaw is the skill balance, some skills literally were broken either because they were so good (pistols) or just sucked (smg's).

[C2B]

Alpha Protocol had plenty of development issues, but again, it wasn't just Obsidian, SEGA was equally involved there.  That said the reason the game flopped is because people played it like a shooter, it isn't a damn shooter, it is just like ME1, an RPG that happens to have guns for weapons.  Trust me, you skill up your pistols you won't have any issues killing anything.  The games only real flaw is the skill balance, some skills literally were broken either because they were so good (pistols) or just sucked (smg's).

 

I disagree. Gunplay was broken in its core. Obsidian themselves have acknowledged that including Avellone and Sawyer. It's not even how they wanted it. One of the major problems here was how long they took to define the general question on how they should balance the rpg and shootery aspects ending up having to have it enforced (And leading to a major change in how Obsidian does project management today) with a sub-par system.

 

The gunplay system we got was neither a good rpg system nor a good shooter.

Edited July 16, 2013 by C2B

[Amentep]

To be honest, I've never found Obsidian's games to be more (or less) buggy than other game company's output. And pretty much every Gamebryo game I've played have had game ending bugs. But Bio's games have had some bugs (usually graphical glitches, but some others as well).

[HoonDing]

It's always somebody else's fault.

[Amentep]

I think there is some logical stretching by fans to "justify" bugs by pointing out publisher issues.

 

But again I say this as someone who hasn't experienced Obs games being worse than others with bugs.

[Dream]

I had no problem with the PC controls. Maybe you're just whiny?

 

The only place I've ever seen anyone say that game had good controls was here; pretty much any other forum not loaded with Obsidian fanboys agrees the controls are a **** show unless you use a gamepad (which is idiotic for a Diablo clone).

 

Alpha Protocol had plenty of development issues, but again, it wasn't just Obsidian, SEGA was equally involved there.  That said the reason the game flopped is because people played it like a shooter, it isn't a damn shooter, it is just like ME1, an RPG that happens to have guns for weapons.  Trust me, you skill up your pistols you won't have any issues killing anything.  The games only real flaw is the skill balance, some skills literally were broken either because they were so good (pistols) or just sucked (smg's).

ME1 had **** combat as well.

[Infinitron]

KOTOR2 wasn't particularly buggy, just incomplete.

 

NWN2 was a bit buggy, but mostly just had a crappy engine.

 

Alpha Protocol was maybe a bit glitchy, but its main problem was that it was just a bad game.

 

Somehow all of these things have come together in the mind of the public as "Obsidian makes buggy games".

Edited July 16, 2013 by Infinitron

[Infinitron]

Stick of Truth has no market, as far as I can tell.

 

lol

[Malekith]

inb4  Stick of Truth sells better than New Vegas

[Lephys]

Wasn't NWN2 (at least the original campaign/game) the one that was spearheaded by a completely different project lead for like 75% of its development, and between publisher-induced decisions and various people in-charge, was not handled very well at all, to the point of pretty much not even being releasable (not due to lack of quantity, but, rather, lack of quality)? Then Josh Sawyer took over for about the last 4 or 5 months, and somehow got it out the door in passable shape?

 

I might have the exact details wrong, but someone posted a quote from someone in the actual development community (possibly even with Obsidian, themselves) in response to people talking about how wonky NWN2 OC was. It was kind of an "all things considered, it was miraculously well-polished."

 

I mean, I'll just say that when you give a creative person (or creative team) free reign to design what they want, with only their own expertise and a budget as their limitiations, as opposed to having a bunch of non-creative people telling them what to do, and a bunch of completely-unrelated-to-creative-design businessy goings-on and job-role shifts, etc., it's a whole different animal.

 

If someone commissions me to draw them a portrait, and I draw what they want me to draw, and they're like "No, no, I want you to use crayons, and I want it to look like a 3-year-old drew it, like something you'd magnet onto a refrigerator," then it's pretty silly for other people who see it to say "Man, you really should've drawn something better than that! You're obviously not a very skilled person at producing quality artwork!"

 

It's a much broader scale with publishers, but they often push decisions based on demographical statistics, without much concern for what actually works best with the overall game's coherent design and what doesn't. Not to mention the fact that they basically pull "I want you to clean this entire car, by hand, with this sponge and some soap, but I want it done in like 3 minutes. Once 3 minutes is up, we're driving this car away, no matter what you want to do, and people will judge how well you cleaned it" stunts with timeframes. Then, people make threads like this one: "Man, Obsidian sure doesn't care about bugs and glitches." When, you don't even really know that Obsidian hasn't been all "Umm... we kinda need to hold off on release until we fix all these bugs" and/or "If you had let us code these things differently/not changed the entire design of the combat system halfway through production just because you decided 5% more 13-17-year-olds would appreciate the new system, we wouldn't HAVE all these bugs!" on pretty much every project they've ever worked on.

 

I'm not saying development studios never make mistakes. It's just silly to consolidate all even completeley circumstantial factors into the fault of the developer.

[bonarbill]

 

Alpha Protocol had plenty of development issues, but again, it wasn't just Obsidian, SEGA was equally involved there.  That said the reason the game flopped is because people played it like a shooter, it isn't a damn shooter, it is just like ME1, an RPG that happens to have guns for weapons.  Trust me, you skill up your pistols you won't have any issues killing anything.  The games only real flaw is the skill balance, some skills literally were broken either because they were so good (pistols) or just sucked (smg's).

 

I disagree. Gunplay was broken in its core. Obsidian themselves have acknowledged that including Avellone and Sawyer. It's not even how they wanted it. One of the major problems here was how long they took to define the general question on how they should balance the rpg and shootery aspects ending up having to have it enforced (And leading to a major change in how Obsidian does project management today) with a sub-par system.

 

The gunplay system we got was neither a good rpg system nor a good shooter.

 

Yet I enjoy the gunplay and everything else in that game.  Go figure.  *shrugs*

Edited July 16, 2013 by bonarbill

[lolaldanee]

I would prefer feature-rich game with massive world with a lot of various things to do and many memorable characters and moments before bug-free release any day, thankyouverymuch. I trust Obsidian will try to sort out any post-release bugs as soon as they can, but I'm patient.

i very much agree with this

i'd rather have a crash now and then, if obsidian are being a bit to ambitious and they implement one awesome feature more as a tradeoff

of course, that's not an excuse to release overly buggy stuff, the game should work

what i can NOT forgive that easily is camera controls like in NWN2 or Alpha Protocol *shudder*

thank god this game is 2D and they can't mess that one up so easily

[teknoman2]

KOTOR2 wasn't particularly buggy, just incomplete.

 

NWN2 was a bit buggy, but mostly just had a crappy engine.

 

Alpha Protocol was maybe a bit glitchy, but its main problem was that it was just a bad game.

 

Somehow all of these things have come together in the mind of the public as "Obsidian makes buggy games".

Alpha Protocol what? making an analogy, AP was a ferrari with busted engine. 

and since im at it, kotor 2 was a lamborghini without wheels and NWN2 was a used BMW. DS3 was a brand new hyundai and FNV was an old mercedes that they forgot to fully repair before driving. 

[Dream]

DS3 was a brand new hyundai

A brand new hyundai with a gamepad instead of a steering wheel*

[Rostere]

 

I had no problem with the PC controls. Maybe you're just whiny?

 

The only place I've ever seen anyone say that game had good controls was here; pretty much any other forum not loaded with Obsidian fanboys agrees the controls are a **** show unless you use a gamepad (which is idiotic for a Diablo clone).

 

I didn't say the controls were "good", just that they were not awful. And yes, in fact I happen to own the game for both the PC and the 360 so I've also been able to compare.

 

But then again, I also played Psychonauts, RE4 and Silent Hill 2 with keyboard controls. I think there are just a lot of whiny people who complain about the wrong stuff. Maybe the controls weren't 100%, but who cares? There's more important things than that to a game.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

To be honest, I've never found Obsidian's games to be more (or less) buggy than other game company's output. And pretty much every Gamebryo game I've played have had game ending bugs. But Bio's games have had some bugs (usually graphical glitches, but some others as well).

With the exception of SoZ, I haven't either. Pretty much any game is going to be buggy as **** on release.

[GhostofAnakin]

Tight deadlines and release dates seem to be the cause of bug-related issues for Obsidian.  Given that this game, while having an unofficial release date, is basically a "it's done when it's done" type deal, I don't think you'll see the same issues crop up.

 

Not to mention, since this game is "self-funded" so to speak, and no publisher that has the ultimate say, Obsidian can probably provide prompt fixes for any issues that do crop up.  They won't have to wait for their publisher to give them permission to patch and what not, like they normally would have to.

[Dream]

 

 

I had no problem with the PC controls. Maybe you're just whiny?

 

The only place I've ever seen anyone say that game had good controls was here; pretty much any other forum not loaded with Obsidian fanboys agrees the controls are a **** show unless you use a gamepad (which is idiotic for a Diablo clone).

 

I didn't say the controls were "good", just that they were not awful. And yes, in fact I happen to own the game for both the PC and the 360 so I've also been able to compare.

 

But then again, I also played Psychonauts, RE4 and Silent Hill 2 with keyboard controls. I think there are just a lot of whiny people who complain about the wrong stuff. Maybe the controls weren't 100%, but who cares? There's more important things than that to a game.

 

No, there aren't. A car can be the greatest car in the world, but if the steering wheel is ****ed up it doesn't matter.

 

Also it's not like we're talking about some complex game here, but a Diablo clone (and a rather simple one at that).

[Lephys]

Yeah, I remember reading an interview with one of the people working on both Eternity AND Torment, and they said that one of the main negatives with a publisher is the sheer amount of wasted time and resources, spent in the name of appeasing the milestone updates to make sure they got their next 6 weeks-or-so of funding. So, you're working on stuff, and they want to see progress, but simply showing them what you're working with isn't good enough. They want like... a gorgeous, cinematic trailer of some class that isn't even finalized battling some villain who's already been conceptually replaced, because it looks really cool and makes THEM feel like "Yes, this looks very good and means the game is going to do well!", because they can't tell that from looking at alpha footage of incomplete systems, even though it's only been like 3 months of pre-production.

 

So, they spend all that time making sure that cinematic looks really nice in that meeting, but all that work on that not only does them no good toward actual game production progress, but it actually does them a NEGATIVE amount of good, since they COULD'VE spent that time actually progressing with the game's actual production.

 

They said they still have milestone meetings, but they only have to appease themselves, so they're happy with actual progress and not "this looks, to you, more like progress than actual progress does" impostor progress.

[Bill Gates' Son]

Alpha Protocol had plenty of development issues, but again, it wasn't just Obsidian, SEGA was equally involved there.  That said the reason the game flopped is because people played it like a shooter, it isn't a damn shooter, it is just like ME1, an RPG that happens to have guns for weapons.  Trust me, you skill up your pistols you won't have any issues killing anything.  The games only real flaw is the skill balance, some skills literally were broken either because they were so good (pistols) or just sucked (smg's).

 

Weirdly enough, Deus Ex had nearly the same shooting system, yet that game is somehow "one of the best games ever."  Mass Effect 1 had a similar system as well; you wasn't effective with guns until you used skillpoints.,

Edited July 17, 2013 by Bill Gates' Son

[pseudonymous]

 

lol - QA by Valve:  

 

 

 

If you launched Half-Life 2 earlier today, you may have been surprised to hear every NPC delivering their lines in Korean instead of your language of choice.

 

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/125401-Half-Life-3-Is-Not-Coming-Today-Says-Valve