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Josh Sawyer Pillars of Eternity 2 Tease Thread

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Quillon

Quillon

Posted
Posted

According to Larian's CEO, Divinity: Original Sin 2 may be the most high budget isometric RPG ever made that doesn't have the word "Diablo" in its title. They've got like a hundred people working on it now. Those guys are operating on an entirely different level.

Then its safe to assume the production quality will be comparable DAO?

 

Fortune favours the bold and Obs were never bold in their approach to making games, they even went to KS as a last resort. The other independent companies who are thriving atm made their own engines as early as possible and usually own the IPs of the games they are making. Maybe Avellone is right about Obs' been looking to get bought out, maybe this was always in their minds as they've worked/are still working for publishers without trying anything on their own for so long & ditching their onyx engine easily for a cheaper rented one for "PoE"; they've made DS3(3D) and SP:TSoT(2D) with Onyx, and PoE is 2D+3D... : p

guguma

guguma

Posted
Posted

 

Regarding the 4 Million issue,  if you think that a company puts 4 million dollars in a safe and keeps paying everything from that until a project is finished, than it is not much. That is not, and should not be, how companies work though. One can squeeze a lot from million dollar sums by proper handling of that money. Also I have to mention Larian's Divinity Original Sin 2 here. 1 Million Budget, using their own engine (by the way the only reason I am bringing the engine Issue up here is not because I want the developers to come up with their engine, definitely not, unity is fine, and certainly saves a lot of resources (funds, work etc). Using unity would allow them to allocate those resources where it is needed). Let us not get into comparing Original Sin to PoE, though. Original Sin is not a great RPG in terms of story writing etc. and had way too many cheap jokes for my liking. 

 

Divinity Original Sin's budget was over 4 million euros (which was at that time over 5 million dollars). Majority of their budget didn't come from KS as they only collected 1 million dollars to finish the game. Before they started their kickstarter Larian was already build their engine and engine tools in most parts and most of the game itself. Larian also did in their KS for D:OS mistake to promise too much and they had to take back some of those promises during developing the game.

 

Divinity Original Sin 2 also had KS for it, that produced over 2 million dollars and Larian puts in their own money also in that game so it budget is about same as the budget of the first game.

 

There are benefits and draw back in both making own engine and using general purpose engine like unity. And those benefits and draw back vary from project to project and there which is why companies make assessments of their needs and select tool according to them. One thing is certain that Obsidian didn't have their own engine ready when they started their KS and making one from the scratch would have meant additional developing time, as it takes time to build engine. 

 

And there is also one thing that needs to be taking in consideration when you compare D:OS to PoE, which is difference in typical salaries in Belgium and California.

 

 

Come on now, and Obsidian had no spare funds at all.

 

According PCGamer, Larian loaned money from banks, got outside investors and also got the Kickstarter funds. Shows enormous dedication, if nothing else. Larian's "dream RPG" concept does not really overlap with mine, but I enjoyed playing it.

 

Maybe a better comparison to PoE will be Torment: Tides of Numenera (definitely a friendly comparison though, not as rivals), that one took much longer to be sure and still not out.     

Elerond

Elerond

Posted
Posted (edited)

 

 

Regarding the 4 Million issue,  if you think that a company puts 4 million dollars in a safe and keeps paying everything from that until a project is finished, than it is not much. That is not, and should not be, how companies work though. One can squeeze a lot from million dollar sums by proper handling of that money. Also I have to mention Larian's Divinity Original Sin 2 here. 1 Million Budget, using their own engine (by the way the only reason I am bringing the engine Issue up here is not because I want the developers to come up with their engine, definitely not, unity is fine, and certainly saves a lot of resources (funds, work etc). Using unity would allow them to allocate those resources where it is needed). Let us not get into comparing Original Sin to PoE, though. Original Sin is not a great RPG in terms of story writing etc. and had way too many cheap jokes for my liking. 

 

Divinity Original Sin's budget was over 4 million euros (which was at that time over 5 million dollars). Majority of their budget didn't come from KS as they only collected 1 million dollars to finish the game. Before they started their kickstarter Larian was already build their engine and engine tools in most parts and most of the game itself. Larian also did in their KS for D:OS mistake to promise too much and they had to take back some of those promises during developing the game.

 

Divinity Original Sin 2 also had KS for it, that produced over 2 million dollars and Larian puts in their own money also in that game so it budget is about same as the budget of the first game.

 

There are benefits and draw back in both making own engine and using general purpose engine like unity. And those benefits and draw back vary from project to project and there which is why companies make assessments of their needs and select tool according to them. One thing is certain that Obsidian didn't have their own engine ready when they started their KS and making one from the scratch would have meant additional developing time, as it takes time to build engine. 

 

And there is also one thing that needs to be taking in consideration when you compare D:OS to PoE, which is difference in typical salaries in Belgium and California.

 

 

Come on now, and Obsidian had no spare funds at all.

 

According PCGamer, Larian loaned money from banks, got outside investors and also got the Kickstarter funds. Shows enormous dedication, if nothing else. Larian's "dream RPG" concept does not really overlap with mine, but I enjoyed playing it.

 

Maybe a better comparison to PoE will be Torment: Tides of Numenera (definitely a friendly comparison though, not as rivals), that one took much longer to be sure and still not out.     

 

 

Obisidian put their own money to PoE, they run out KS funds half year or so before release. Also Paradox put their funds in the game. I don't have knowledge how much they put their own funds, but quite lot.

 

As I said Larian developed D:OS years before they brought it to KS where they seek funds to add some features they wanted and create buzz for the game. Larian started D:OS after relative success of Divinity 2 and they were also developing Divinity: Dragon Commander, but they had to release it bit too early to bring money in, so that they could focus in developing D:OS. Obsidian wasn't in best financial situation when they decided to do KS for PoE, it was bit Hail Mary move after cancellation of one of their projects. 

 

As side note: Torment: Tides of Numenera was delayed because Wasteland 2 was delayed. It was bit chain effect situation. Said delay gave TToN's design team more time to design things which they think will make game better. And they also build on work that Obsidian did with PoE as they licensed add ons that Obsidian made for Unity in order to use 2d backgrounds etc.. 

Edited by Elerond
Sedrefilos

Sedrefilos

Posted
Posted

You all know that all this about the money, the budget, were did they get it from, how they spent it... it is all speculation, right? We cannot know for sure how they work and we'll probably never know anyway. Why not focus on what info/tease we have about Pillars 2 and what we want to see/be removed from the sequel? You know, like the OP is made for (I assume, from the title...)?

  • Like 4
Sedrefilos

Sedrefilos

Posted
Posted (edited)

Also there is this interesting thing here; a recorded livestream Obs did a couple of days ago. Josh answers questions about Pillars and commenting on the game, while Eric, the community manager, plays through it. He doesen't talk directly about the sequel but he highlights things in the original that will/can be improved.
 

Edited by Sedrefilos
  • Like 6
anameforobsidian

anameforobsidian

Posted
Posted

I like how honest and generally polite Josh is.

 

- I think he missed a huge chunk of modding in the modding question. He talked about wanting stats to be in xml, so it's easier to change the balance. That's great. But many, many, many mods add characters or dialogue. I'd like to hear something about that.

  • Like 1
Sedrefilos

Sedrefilos

Posted
Posted (edited)

Obsidian is the most sadistic teaser ever. Other companies usually give you an officially announced, well directed, high budget (for a teaser) teaser video that you know its gonna be meh because it doesen't say much about the game, so you're like "meh, nothing here I'll just wait for a lengthy gameplay video sometime". No hype whatsoever.

 

These guys put out here and there small stuff that "slip", being teasers but also giving (partly) actual information about the game. And they never talk abou anything!

 

This or it's just that I care more about Pillars 2 than other games :p

Edited by Sedrefilos
  • Like 2
JerekKruger

JerekKruger

Posted
Posted

 

I like how honest and generally polite Josh is.

 

One of the very few devs that don't try to oversell their work.

 

 

Yeah, I wish more devs would recognise the kind of good will this engenders.

  • Like 1
AndreaColombo

AndreaColombo

Posted
Posted

Is it just me or PoE 2 is already very promising before having even been announced?

  • Like 8

"Time is not your enemy. Forever is."

— Fall-From-Grace, Planescape: Torment

"It's the questions we can't answer that teach us the most. They teach us how to think. If you give a man an answer, all he gains is a little fact. But give him a question, and he'll look for his own answers."

— Kvothe, The Wise Man's Fears

My Deadfire mods: Brilliant Mod | Faster Deadfire | Deadfire Unnerfed | Helwalker Rekke | Permanent Per-Rest Bonuses | PoE Items for Deadfire | No Recyled Icons | Soul Charged Nautilus

 

Sedrefilos

Sedrefilos

Posted
Posted

Is it just me or PoE 2 is already very promising before having even been announced?

It's just us I suppose :p

We don't have that deep info to tell how promising it looks. Bu t we just *know* it will be better that the original :p

  • Like 2
WorstUsernameEver

WorstUsernameEver

Posted
Posted

Yeah. Don't be afraid of modernization :)

To be honest, dynamic weather was already a thing in the original Baldur's Gate. In some ways, it's a return to the past, though I obviously expect it to be much more impressive in a modern game than it was in a 1998 game.

Sedrefilos

Sedrefilos

Posted
Posted

 

Yeah. Don't be afraid of modernization :)

To be honest, dynamic weather was already a thing in the original Baldur's Gate. In some ways, it's a return to the past, though I obviously expect it to be much more impressive in a modern game than it was in a 1998 game.

 

In any case it's a move forward :)

Even better if the weather affects gameplay!

  • Like 1

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