It all started with a suspected prank call. (development narrative of SP:SOT)

[Leferd]

Interesting read. Talks of the censorship issue, collaboration with Trey and Matt, and publishers.

 

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-03-12-south-park-it-all-started-with-a-suspected-prank-call

[C2B]

Today I got a lot more negative about Ubi's involvement and Feargus not talking about it doesn't make me feel better.

 

Eh, at least it released. Doesn't help getting worked up over what coud have been.

 

Still awaiting that re-balancing patch

Edited March 12, 2014 by C2B

[Leferd]

I'd be hesitant to lay blame or make accusations on "evil" publishers based on speculation or second hand hearsay without compelling evidence or reasonable deductive reasoning.

 

Even Bethesda shouldn't be blamed for not paying off the bonus. Contract was signed and agreed to by both parties. Obsidian didn't get screwed by either the publishers or the critics (who for the most part, reviewed the game fairly. It was just unfortunate that they came so close from achieving their bonus. It was just a bad time at Obsidian - they weren't dealt the right cards and probably didn't play their hands correctly either.

[C2B]

I'd be hesitant to lay blame or make accusations on "evil" publishers based on speculation or second hand hearsay without compelling evidence or reasonable deductive reasoning.

 

Even Bethesda shouldn't be blamed for not paying off the bonus. Contract was signed and agreed to by both parties. Obsidian didn't get screwed by either the publishers or the critics (who for the most part, reviewed the game fairly. It was just unfortunate that they came so close from achieving their bonus. It was just a bad time at Obsidian - they weren't dealt the right cards and probably didn't play their hands correctly either.

 

 

I've got the deductive reasoning. And I've got the game. In fact all the little things are just strengthening my suspicions.

 

In the end though, bad (as well as good) publisher based decision changes happen through the entirty of game development. And since its THEIR money the publisher certainly has the right to influence design, regardless of the outcome.

 

Thankfully now that we have alternate venues like Kickstarter I can be excited for pillars of eternity showing off Obsidian's chops and just be glad South Park and other games still release and the quality, despite shortcomings, still shines through.

 

[Leferd]

Just for the sake of putting it out there, what are your suspicions?

 

I actually haven't played the game yet, still waiting on the first few patches to resolve most of the critical issues that may or may not be game-breaking or annoying. I've only seen alanschu's first let's play video (which is hilarious btw).

[C2B]

Just for the sake of putting it out there, what are your suspicions?

 

I actually haven't played the game yet, still waiting on the first few patches to resolve most of the critical issues that may or may not be game-breaking or annoying. I've only seen alanschu's first let's play video (which is hilarious btw).

 

Mainly regarding the difficulty/combat systems. I've already vented about it though on another forum and got over it, so I'd rather not repeat.

 

Easy difficulty is an often critizized issue with the game, but if you look at it deeper there's lots of things that don't make much sense about the combat/rpg systems. At least not with a change towards the end.

Edited March 12, 2014 by C2B

[Flouride]

I'd be hesitant to lay blame or make accusations on "evil" publishers based on speculation or second hand hearsay without compelling evidence or reasonable deductive reasoning.

 

Even Bethesda shouldn't be blamed for not paying off the bonus. Contract was signed and agreed to by both parties. Obsidian didn't get screwed by either the publishers or the critics (who for the most part, reviewed the game fairly. It was just unfortunate that they came so close from achieving their bonus. It was just a bad time at Obsidian - they weren't dealt the right cards and probably didn't play their hands correctly either.

 

As far as I know that signed contract got changed midway of creating the game. One former dev said it was like the scene from Empire Strikes Back with Vader and Lando.

If I recall correctly, Bethesda pushed the release date months ahead that could have been used to fixing all the minor bugs that some people apparently had while playing the game that showed in the reviews and eventually lead to them "only" getting Metacritic of 84. If you look at the few 65-75 reviews up there, they are complaining about how buggy the game was (for them). Don't remember if there was a immediate patch for the game when it got released, but I never had any broken quest chains etc.

 

The whole concept of Metacritic is just frelling ridicilous. Who even decides which reviews are shown on the page that actually matter on the Metacritic rating? Publisher? One guy at Metacritic who might be pretty damn desperate for ad money from publishers? It's not even statistically viable if you look at how few sites actually get their reviews put up there. You have 39 reviews out of hundreds on that site, some from small sites that no one even reads but they miss big *** magazines from Europe. Not to mention if you take away 1-2 of the bad reviews and change it up with a good review, and boom it's 85.

 

And if you are waiting for compelling evidence, you might need to wait a bit longer. Don't think anyone from Obsidian is going on a record and say how much Bethesda screwed them over, if they screwed them over, since they might want to work with them again. Not to mention it sends a bad signal to all the other publishers out there. It's good that there's people like Brian Fargo out there who are done with the publisher model and will tell us just how bad it is working with some of them.

[C2B]

Bethesda already worked again with them twice. One project they declined/cancelled and one project they took away (Prey 2)

[Shirobon]

Very informative article; I enjoyed reading it. I'm very curious now as to how much the game changed after Ubisoft took over. I guess we'll never know, but what I do hope is that cut content some how makes it way back in the form of DLC. Perhaps not "here's what we cut out"-DLC, but more of "here's this DLC with some of the cut out stuff added on top".

[TheChris92]

I honestly wanna see Obsidian do a Futurama RPG after this - I loved this game a lot. Heck, I'll be onboard for any new ideas after Project Eternity :D