Interview Brian Fargo Interview Roundup: On hustling around and rising development costs

[Kem0sabe]

Fargo will go back to making mobile games soon enough, and of course he will blame everyone but himself...

 

[CryptRat]

If they are planning on having voice acting then they should probably cut that up since I heard voice acting is expensive and its unneeded for an isometric game.

I still hope Wasteland 3 will be more of a Fallout game more than a Wasteland even tho some people probably want a Wasteland game.

Yes, I'd like something exactly like Wasteland (1) myself, but actually it seems it will be very far from it this time, I think they've been talking about base building or something, which as far as I'm concerned goes at the opposite from exploration and sense of adventure which are some of the best points of both Fallout and Wasteland.
I liked Wasteland 2 despite the modern quest structure, the switch to keyword-but-not-keyboard and the least weird setting and tone compared to the original which are 3 bad points in my opinion and I think Wasteland 1 is very superior, but when you add base builiding, no party creation from the start which means we may get a chosen one story and dialog choices the game won't have anything to do with the original Wasteland left. Now does that make the game close to Fallout? I don't know, base building seems actually even more weird in a Fallout game than in a Wasteland one.

 

[MurkyShadow]

Yeah, but do you really think the dungeon design will be good

Bard's Tale IV has only hold up to my expectations of how my memories feel about the dozen times playing through the original trilogy. (mostly on my C-64)
Really not that much. They should be able to manage that.

 

[Infinitron]

Yes, I'd like something exactly like Wasteland (1) myself, but actually it seems it will be very far from it this time, I think they've been talking about base building or something, which as far as I'm concerned goes at the opposite from exploration and sense of adventure which are some of the best points of both Fallout and Wasteland.
I liked Wasteland 2 despite the modern quest structure, the switch to keyword-but-not-keyboard and the least weird setting and tone compared to the original which are 3 bad points in my opinion and I think Wasteland 1 is very superior, but when you add base builiding, no party creation from the start which means we may get a chosen one story and dialog choices the game won't have anything to do with the original Wasteland left. Now does that make the game close to Fallout? I don't know, base building seems actually even more weird in a Fallout game than in a Wasteland one.

Not a lot of people remember this, but when Brian first outlined Wasteland 2's plot during the Kickstarter campaign back in 2012, he said you would travel to California and "build a base" there. Which is sort of what happens, but not really. Like the Gippers faction, this may be another thing they originally wanted to do in Wasteland 2 but didn't have time to.

 

[Infinitron]

Here's the video from April 2012:



A lot was already fleshed out at that early stage. At the time I wondered how many plot elements in Wasteland 2 were borrowed from its earlier pre-Kickstarter iterations that Jason Anderson and Leonard Boyarsky worked on.

 

[Scruffy]

fuck brian fargo

 

[Nazrim Eldrak]

I think he has a strong personality and can gain trust pretty fast.
I also believe he is just a guy who loves to be in charge and shifting money, and isn`t solution-focused but more prestigious greedy.....What a fucking disappointment!

 

[Daedalos]

They need to go for broke on WL3 and make it a smash hit to stabalize.

 

[Father Foreskin]

Wasteland 2 and torment both were like eunuchs trying to fuck. The will is there but the tools are insufficient. I think Fargo will achieve one good game with Inxile eventually. My money is on bards tale 4. And thats theoretical money, not actually backing that shit.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

I just want to play Bard's Tale 4.

The Bard's Tale IV will join Grimrock and Grimoire in reestablishing the superiority of first-person blobbers over isometric drek.

 

[Grauken]

Wait, what now

Fargo sold the Wizardry franchise to Japan ???

There was some Japanese MMO based on Wizardry a while ago.

Don't be dense, everybody knows that Japan is doing Wizardry games, this was about the fact that Brian was involved in the original license sale

 

[Urthor]

THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH YOUR BUSINESS MODEL FARGO YOU JUST CAN'T MAKE FLOPS LIKE TORMENT AND EXPECT TO STAY IN BUSINESS


I say this after paying good money for Torment and rather enjoying it as a CYOA

 

[toro]

Low energy PR exercise.

I'm more interested in the stupid vehicle combat from W3.

 

[Ismaul]

I think Fargo will achieve one good game with Inxile eventually. My money is on bards tale 4.

With the "smashing success" of their previous games, you can be sure they'll play it safe with BT4.

They can't afford to just come out even from this, it would kill them back to Choplifter levels. Which is why they went straight for the guaranteed VR money, because on its own BT4 is already too much of a gamble. In other words, expect to be disappointed, expect the game to be streamlined bullshit, and for it to show it's made for VR. I have no idea yet how VR impacts mechanics, UI and level design, but we will find out soon enough, because you can be sure there are constraints, and inXile doesn't have the resources to do two different versions.

 

[Davaris]

If much smaller teams made better games decades ago, they are doing it wrong.

 

[l3loodAngel]

If much smaller teams made better games decades ago, they are doing it wrong.

Meh. The whole culture has changed and so did the people involved. They were more like passionate and talented geeks back then. Today they are misfits, posers and hipsters. Who try to solve their head problems by being hip and "with the times". Their work shouts - the world does not understand me or even worse "I hate the world". They are just useless. You can sweep them like coal with a shovel or even better just hit them to the head with it.

The only studio I now see that has talented real geeks is Creative assembly. Fuck. I am just playing Warhammer total war 1; 2 and having such a blast I have not had in fucking ages. They know what they are doing, what they want to do and etc. And you can see by the way they know lore and look, that their problems aren't mental and passion is real (Not PR guys). 520 hours and still loving it...

 

[Van-d-all]

So once again Fargo blames everyone and their dog that his merry rag tag troupe of developers is incapable of delivering a product, that adheres to his stellar concept.

 

[Xeon]

I kinda like the bald guy from InXile since he helped making MotB or something iirc. Sea and Brother were good guys when they were here as well.

Edit:
Oh yeah, George Ziets also joined InXile, I heard he made the evil path in MotB and it was pretty good.

 

[l3loodAngel]

I kinda like the bald guy from InXile since he helped making MotB or something iirc. Sea and Brother were good guys when they were here as well.

Edit:
Oh yeah, George Ziets also joined InXile, I heard he made the evil path in MotB and it was pretty good.

It's not the top names, man. It's the grunts who do the heavy lifting what matters.

 

[Xeon]

Yeah, I kinda understand that but aren't the lead developers who dictate what gets in to the game? For example, a grunt can't make a side quest on his own unless he gets approval from the lead writer or designer or something.

Infinitron or Tulus explained developer titles to me once or something but kinda forgot I think.

 

[Roguey]

My money is on bards tale 4.

BT4's likely having budget troubles on account of its weak kickstarter and none of the money they were expecting from ToN flowing in. It's also not going to bring in much, if any, money either.

 

[Lithium Flower]

So Fargo is already trying to justify the future flop of Wasteland 3. Interesting.

 

[l3loodAngel]

Yeah, I kinda understand that but aren't the lead developers who dictate what gets in to the game? For example, a grunt can't make a side quest on his own unless he gets approval from the lead writer or designer or something.

Infinitron or Tulus explained developer titles to me once or something but kinda forgot I think.

Yes, but the quality of the quest depends on the grunt, not on the lead. If there is no passion nothing can ignite the flame.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Brian Fargo Interview Roundup: On hustling

This should've been the real title for the interview.

 

[Sacibengala]

Bard's tale 4 was my last stroke of confidence on him. best late than never, I guess. Torment was not a horrible game, wasteland 2 neither, but these was not good enough rpgs. And I gave more money to torment than I gave to any other kickstarter, I feel ashamed and paid for it in trust blindly in his merchandising, despite the warnings I saw in here. Some lessons was learned from this, and that alone worth the time spent. Thank you all!