Owlcat's next game is an AAA title that will need full voice acting to compete with BG3

[lycanwarrior]

Owlcat founder breaks down RPG budgets and Larian’s impact on genre: “We can’t invest $200 million to make BG3”​

https://gameworldobserver.com/2024/03/18/rpg-budgets-owlcat-cannot-invest-200-million-to-make-bg3

“We made all our games with partial voiceover, because 1) it’s expensive and 2) it makes the development process extremely difficult. Especially when you have one million words,” Shpilchevskiy said. “Looking at BG3, you understand: it is becoming a must-have feature, which doesn’t guarantee you success, but if you don’t meet that bar, your game is considered one that no longer fits into the right category. So it looks like we will have to do a full voiceover for our next games.”

 

[Yosharian]

Owlcat, we don't give a shit about voiceover. We care about writing, combat, exploration, that kind of thing. And bugs, specifically, we don't want them. And we don't really give a shit about your tacked-on minigames. Get it through your thick skulls.

 

[ropetight]

Owlcat founder breaks down RPG budgets and Larian’s impact on genre: “We can’t invest $200 million to make BG3”​

https://gameworldobserver.com/2024/03/18/rpg-budgets-owlcat-cannot-invest-200-million-to-make-bg3

“We made all our games with partial voiceover, because 1) it’s expensive and 2) it makes the development process extremely difficult. Especially when you have one million words,” Shpilchevskiy said. “Looking at BG3, you understand: it is becoming a must-have feature, which doesn’t guarantee you success, but if you don’t meet that bar, your game is considered one that no longer fits into the right category. So it looks like we will have to do a full voiceover for our next games.”

Yes, motion capture, cutscenes with Hollywood grifters and 200 hours of content are also a must have for any cRPG that is to be made after BG3.
What a stupid cunt.

Was this kind of narrowminded thinking present and responsible for the Great Decline of the 2000s, after BG2 was shipped on a bunch CD's with cutscene animations (along with premature 3D mania and consoles, of course)?

 

[Saark]

Owlcat, we don't give a shit about voiceover.

Unfortunately, a great many people who aren't currently playing Owlcat games do. And if you're looking to spend a much higher sum of money on developing a new game, something needs to be done to make the game more accessible and approachable. Neither Kingmaker, nor WotR, nor RT struggled in the content department, and for the vast majority of their gametime, their writing and character development was better, as well as the gameplay. But the TikTok and Snapchat generation doesn't care much for reading vast amounts of dialogue or ingame rule-sets by themselves, which is a problem in a 50+, potentially 100+ hour game.

Most people in here will obviously disagree, and that's understandable, since I don't like that gaming has development in that direction either. But I think it's asinine to think that a company like Owlcat, or any company for that matter, can comfortably keep producing games like this without regularly worrying about whether the next game might not bring in the same numbers and the company go bankrupt. So some concessions have to be made to be able to reach a wider audience, and frankly, I'd prefer a game that simply has more VA than one that dumbs down its mechanics just to be playable by Fortnite enjoyers.

Personally I think having the games fully voiced is overdoing it, but I did feel that RT was definitely lacking some voicing in very important game moments, and that does undercut the gravity and importance of certain scenes throughout the game. Imo they need to cut the game-within-the-game approach, although I think the ship combat in RT was actually pretty damn good. Spend some of that on more VA, a few better cinematics (especially early into the game, because that's what game journos will cover and get more people to buy your game), and for the love of god, spend it on some proper QA. Nobody cares if the game isn't as cinematic or visually appealing 20 hours in, by then the game systems and writing have people hooked anyway. It's the first 5-10 hours you need to knock out of the park, and BG3 has done a great job at that (largely due to having years of EA of the first act which made it nigh bug-free and well developed, compared to the rest of the game which was a hot mess).

 

[Swen]

Owlcat founder breaks down RPG budgets and Larian’s impact on genre: “We can’t invest $200 million to make BG3”​

https://gameworldobserver.com/2024/03/18/rpg-budgets-owlcat-cannot-invest-200-million-to-make-bg3

“We made all our games with partial voiceover, because 1) it’s expensive and 2) it makes the development process extremely difficult. Especially when you have one million words,” Shpilchevskiy said. “Looking at BG3, you understand: it is becoming a must-have feature, which doesn’t guarantee you success, but if you don’t meet that bar, your game is considered one that no longer fits into the right category. So it looks like we will have to do a full voiceover for our next games.”

Based, BG3 is the new standard for CRPG's. Owlcuck and the rest need to follow or won't get good sales

 

[Old Hans]

Owlcat founder breaks down RPG budgets and Larian’s impact on genre: “We can’t invest $200 million to make BG3”​

https://gameworldobserver.com/2024/03/18/rpg-budgets-owlcat-cannot-invest-200-million-to-make-bg3

“We made all our games with partial voiceover, because 1) it’s expensive and 2) it makes the development process extremely difficult. Especially when you have one million words,” Shpilchevskiy said. “Looking at BG3, you understand: it is becoming a must-have feature, which doesn’t guarantee you success, but if you don’t meet that bar, your game is considered one that no longer fits into the right category. So it looks like we will have to do a full voiceover for our next games.”

this guy really comes off like a whiny sore loser. Acting like BG3 is the first game to implement voice acting and he's all "THIS IS GOING TO COST ZILLIONS OF DOLLARS!"

 

[Rhobar121]

Owlcat founder breaks down RPG budgets and Larian’s impact on genre: “We can’t invest $200 million to make BG3”​

https://gameworldobserver.com/2024/03/18/rpg-budgets-owlcat-cannot-invest-200-million-to-make-bg3

“We made all our games with partial voiceover, because 1) it’s expensive and 2) it makes the development process extremely difficult. Especially when you have one million words,” Shpilchevskiy said. “Looking at BG3, you understand: it is becoming a must-have feature, which doesn’t guarantee you success, but if you don’t meet that bar, your game is considered one that no longer fits into the right category. So it looks like we will have to do a full voiceover for our next games.”

this guy really comes off like a whiny sore loser. Acting like BG3 is the first game to implement voice acting and he's all "THIS IS GOING TO COST ZILLIONS OF DOLLARS!"

Didn't DOS2 do the same and also make a fortune (compared to other CRPGs that came out at that time)? At this point, Owlcat is probably a bigger studio than Larian was at the time of DoS2's release.

 

[Old Hans]

Didn't DOS2 do the same and also make a fortune (compared to other CRPGs that came out at that time). At this point, Owlcat is probably a bigger studio than Larian was at the time of DoS2's release.

sometimes I wonder if any of these other developers even know who Larian is. they make it sound like Larian is a company that came out of nowhere with unlimited money with access to cutting edge technology like voice acting, cutscenes, and 3d graphics

 

[Swen]

The acting and mocap footage of every character and npc was the biggest cost, not the voiceovers.

 

[MerchantKing]

The acting and mocap footage of every character and npc was the biggest cost, not the voiceovers.

It's almost like it's more cost efficient to spend more money on making gameplay good instead of wasting time on garbage cutscenes. No cutscenes also means fewer voice-overs needed which means even more money for gameplay.

 

[Swen]

The acting and mocap footage of every character and npc was the biggest cost, not the voiceovers.

It's almost like it's more cost efficient to spend more money on making gameplay good instead of wasting time on garbage cutscenes. No cutscenes also means fewer voice-overs needed which means even more money for gameplay.

The mocap scenese really made BG3 more immersive than any other CRPG before it.

It's because of BG3 that Bugthesda was laughed at:



Small belgian indie studio beating the big american rpg behemoth.

 

[MerchantKing]

The acting and mocap footage of every character and npc was the biggest cost, not the voiceovers.

It's almost like it's more cost efficient to spend more money on making gameplay good instead of wasting time on garbage cutscenes. No cutscenes also means fewer voice-overs needed which means even more money for gameplay.

The mocap scenese really made BG3 more immersive than any other CRPG before it.

It's because of BG3 that Bugthesda was laughed at:



Small belgian indie studio beating the big american rpg behemoth.

I don't care about Starfield. Cutscenes are gay and a waste of money.

 

[Old Hans]

The acting and mocap footage of every character and npc was the biggest cost, not the voiceovers.

It's almost like it's more cost efficient to spend more money on making gameplay good instead of wasting time on garbage cutscenes. No cutscenes also means fewer voice-overs needed which means even more money for gameplay.

The mocap scenese really made BG3 more immersive than any other CRPG before it.

It's because of BG3 that Bugthesda was laughed at:



Small belgian indie studio beating the big american rpg behemoth.

heck even Witcher 2 still shits all over starfield when It comes to NPCs

 

[Jeskis]

Well to be fair he has a point. It’s hard to imagine anything widely successful in the RPG genre nowadays without voiceover and mocap and shit. People can’t be arsed into reading walls of text anymore. Unless we will see a new RPG Messiah that will prove the oldscool ways are still valid (highly unlikely).

Again it’s the least of Owlcat’s problems.

their writing and character development was better, as well as the gameplay

 

[Velut]

Owlcat founder breaks down RPG budgets and Larian’s impact on genre: “We can’t invest $200 million to make BG3”​

https://gameworldobserver.com/2024/03/18/rpg-budgets-owlcat-cannot-invest-200-million-to-make-bg3

“Looking at BG3, you understand: it is becoming a must-have feature, which doesn’t guarantee you success, but if you don’t meet that bar, your game is considered one that no longer fits into the right category. So it looks like we will have to do a full voiceover for our next games.”

Didn't Sawyer said the same thing when Original Sin 2 came out? But it didn't stop pathfinder games from commercial success.

 

[Infinitron]

Why'd you hide this in the BG3 thread? This is important news:

Shpilchevskiy shared his thoughts earlier this month on the Pilim, Trem podcast (in Russian). He touched on a variety of topics, from working with licensed IPs to growing Owlcat Games from roughly 30 people to over 500. But for this article, let’s focus on budgets and the RPG market. Below are some takeaways.

According to Shpilchevskiy, each game is classified at a certain tier (e.g. B, AA, AAA, etc.) depending on its production value. He added that there is usually a correlation between costs and projected revenue, roughly highlighting the following tiers:

• AAA game — budget in the range of $50-70 million, expected revenue of $300 million (for the game to be considered successful);
• AA game — budget in the range of $5-15 million, expected revenue of $50 million;
• A game — budget in the range of $1-2 million (Shpilchevskiy didn’t mention any revenue expectations).

It is worth noting that budgets depend on many factors, including the country your studio is based in and employee costs. So keep in mind that the figures Shpilchevskiy mentioned are mostly driven by his experience and the CRPG genre, because games made by major US-based companies like EA, Microsoft, or Sony’s first-party teams have much higher costs. For example, The Last of Us Part II cost $220 million to produce, while Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 had a total budget of $315 million.

Owlcat’s previous titles — the Pathfinder series and Warhammer 40k: Rogue Trader — were all AA, so their budgets were in line with the second tier mentioned above. And while many think that it is better to aim higher with each game, pouring more money into production usually makes things more difficult.

The studio is now working on a larger project, and the process is radically different from its previous titles in terms of workflow, planning, and communication, posing new challenges and risks. Shpilchevskiy noted that while Kingmaker was made by a team of 30, the new unannounced game already involves 150 people, adding that you need to have a strong will and desire to even step into this field.

Roguey

 

[Roguey]

People just make up shit based on "vibes" and "feels" don't they.

Full voice acting does not move the needle. It didn't move the needle for Deadfire. And there are plenty of new games without full voice acting that have done very well.

Nintendo does not give a damn about full voice acting and it didn't stop them from being #1 of this console generation.

 

[Infinitron]

Full voice acting does not move the needle. It didn't move the needle for Deadfire.

What he's saying here is that once a game hits a certain tier of budget and production quality, it also needs full voice acting. So it's not as simple as "add full voice acting to your niche isometric game to get moar money!"

 

[notpl]

Owlcat, we don't give a shit about voiceover. We care about writing, combat, exploration, that kind of thing. And bugs, specifically, we don't want them. And we don't really give a shit about your tacked-on minigames. Get it through your thick skulls.

They really are the champions at ignoring if not outright gaslighting their player base. It doesn't really matter to me, though, as there is not a single god damn thing anyone could say that would incite me to buy their next game after Rogue Trader.

 

[Roguey]

What he's saying here is that once a game hits a certain tier of budget and production quality, it also needs full voice acting. So it's not as simple as "add full voice acting to your niche isometric game to get moar money!"

Yeah, that's also not true. Nier Automata didn't have full voice acting. And like I said, Nintendo games don't have full voice acting either.

 

[luj1]

Of course that VO is not needed, nor is it desirable, even. But you can't explain that to these narrow-minded developers.

 

[Fedora Master]

I told you they would take the wrong lessons from BG3.

 

[user]

Bloody bollocks! Bet he is the same dumbfuck who rushed RT. Let's see in what category it will fit if they compromise on writing, which they definitely will, for this "must-have" feature.

Of course that VO is not needed, nor is it desirable, even. But you can't explain that to these narrow-minded developers.

He's not a developer - even if he was at some point, this is clearly disgusting entrepreneurship drivel.

 

[Fedora Master]

The acting and mocap footage of every character and npc was the biggest cost, not the voiceovers.

Very expensive to mocap appropriate halfing sex animations, sure

 

[I eat frozen vegetables]

The acting and mocap footage of every character and npc was the biggest cost, not the voiceovers.

It's almost like it's more cost efficient to spend more money on making gameplay good instead of wasting time on garbage cutscenes. No cutscenes also means fewer voice-overs needed which means even more money for gameplay.

The mocap scenese really made BG3 more immersive than any other CRPG before it.

It's because of BG3 that Bugthesda was laughed at:



Small belgian indie studio beating the big american rpg behemoth.

heck even Witcher 2 still shits all over starfield when It comes to NPCs

It would be easier to list games that are below Starfield when it comes to NPCs.