The Outer Worlds Pre-Release Thread [GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Safav Hamon]

Or wait? What if TOW is what Obsidian pitched for Prey 2, but instead of Bethesda it was Take Two that agreed?

Mechanically it was exactly what you would expect from Prey, a first-person shooter, married with what you would expect from Obsidian, a role-playing game. There was to be a big hub where you could interact with all sorts of different people, for example. On the surface it sounds a lot like where Human Head was going with Prey 2 - be a bounty hunter on an open alien planet and improve powers and gadgets along the way - but Obsidian was apparently never told much about that game. "[Bethesda] were very close-lipped about what was going on with Human Head," Feargus Urquhart, studio co-owner and CEO, says. "They had a specific 'what they wanted the game to be' - I don't actually know if that was what Human Head was working on or not."

The pitch Obsidian worked up had a lot to do with dealing with different aliens. "Usually in sci-fi games we humanise - we interpret aliens from how they would react if they were human - so we design a lot of aliens as humans in suits," Urquhart says. "What was important was having the aliens not just be aliens in suits. They have completely different desirous wants and needs, they react to different things they see, and they see things in different ways. How could we have aliens in this world really feel alien?"

There was also going to be Parkour, jetpacks and grappling hooks - mechanics "to try and take the shooter into three dimensions", Parker says. "Since it was sci-fi we really wanted to play with vertical space."

But the Prey 2 pitch didn't go anywhere. "Bethesda talked to us about the opportunity, they never promised anything," Urquhart says. Perhaps two years after buying Arkane, Bethesda had Arkane Austin in mind for the game. Whatever went down, what Arkane eventually made bared no resemblance to what Obsidian had in mind.

 

[Infinitron]

Well Tim Cain was already at Obsidian then, but I really don't think the Boyarsky Dream Game is a recycled pitch from six years ago

 

[Safav Hamon]

No, but it's probably the same gameplay concept except as an original IP.

Nevermind, it turns out she's genuinely a fan of Prey.

 

[SpaceWizardz]

First person action shooters are not Obsidian's forte, so they should stay the fuck away from anything like that.

Prey 2 was an excellent concept and I will never not be mad about what happened.
I can only hope that one day a competent developer comes along and does something similar.

 

[Molina]

The first thing that comes to mind to this guy with the words Bioshock in Space is Prey. WTF.

Well. It's not the worse.
The first thing that came to mind to lot of people when they saw the ads was "Bioshock"...
I see more disdain than anything else. But I could be wrong.

 

[Roguey]

Prey bombed, so he's right in that no sane person would ever want to make another immersive sim.

 

[Nano]

Nobody should be making a Prey-like game because it sucks and is nowhere near comparison to the games it was inspired by.

 

[Quillon]

I'm ok with most things about Bioshock but they better have NOT caricaturized character models in Indiana.

 

[SpaceWizardz]

The first thing that came to mind to lot of people when they saw the ads was "Bioshock"...

I think the Bioshock in space comments are people making a comparison to Infinite's artwork, it also has a "Sears Catalog" vibe going for it

Spoiler

 

[Hines]

A developer's Linkedin revealed Obsidian's Private Division game will be a third-person console RPG, which seems more in their wheelhouse than a first-person immersive sim, so it might be a good idea to adjust the old expectations if you have your heart set on a Prey-style game.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/5q4eb3/a_developers_linkedin_account_says_obsidians/

 

[Terenty]

Nobody should be making a Prey-like game because it sucks and is nowhere near comparison to the games it was inspired by.

But prey is better than system shock 2

 

[Molina]

The first thing that came to mind to lot of people when they saw the ads was "Bioshock"...

I think the Bioshock in space comments are people making a comparison to Infinite's artwork, it also has a "Sears Catalog" vibe going for it

Thanks for the discovery ! I didn't know the "Sears Catalog".
What I find unfortunate is that when we talk about this sort of retrofuturism, we immediately think about "Bioshock". However, I think Bioshock is missing the over the top that was so typical at that time.

 

[Molina]

This JDR was translate in english for exemple :

With some "friends" you've kidnapped, we can have a great time.

 

[LESS T_T]

Codex gazing into Gentleman Cain's crystal ball...

 

[conan_edw]

I'm ok with most things about Bioshock but they better have NOT caricaturized character models in Indiana.

Stylized characters will make it easier to create facial animation like Bloodlines. I kinda hope that they go that way

 

[Flou]

A developer's Linkedin revealed Obsidian's Private Division game will be a third-person console RPG, which seems more in their wheelhouse than a first-person immersive sim, so it might be a good idea to adjust the old expectations if you have your heart set on a Prey-style game.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/5q4eb3/a_developers_linkedin_account_says_obsidians/

That game was Stormlands, not Indiana on Jay Fong's profile. He started at Obsidian around 2011. They weren't working on Pillars or Armored Warfare back then, only on Stormlands out of the 3 projects listed on his LinkedIn.

 

[Haba]

Codex gazing into Gentleman Cain's crystal ball...

"Stare too long at Tim Cain's balls and you're bound to get jism in your eye" --An Ancient Chinese Proverb

 

[Quillon]

I'm ok with most things about Bioshock but they better have NOT caricaturized character models in Indiana.

Stylized characters will make it easier to create facial animation like Bloodlines. I kinda hope that they go that way

Bloodlines' characters weren't caricaturized, there were exaggerations in some of them but they had realistic looks & proportions for the most part, they were nothing like Bioshock or Dishonored characters which is the style I hate.

 

[vortex]

Bloodlines' characters weren't caricaturized, there were exaggerations in some of them but they had realistic looks & proportions for the most part, they were nothing like Bioshock or Dishonored characters which is the style I hate.

Why do you hate that style? I prefer Dishonored and Bioshock style above realistic one. Stylized is always better.

 

[Big Wrangle]

I think the stylized pulpy look would definitely work for this game, based on the in-game products artwork we've seen.

 

[Molina]

Bloodlines' characters weren't caricaturized, there were exaggerations in some of them but they had realistic looks & proportions for the most part, they were nothing like Bioshock or Dishonored characters which is the style I hate.

Why do you hate that style? I prefer Dishonored and Bioshock style above realistic one. Stylized is always better.

Especially since it is a style that ages rather well.

 

[conan_edw]

I'm ok with most things about Bioshock but they better have NOT caricaturized character models in Indiana.

Stylized characters will make it easier to create facial animation like Bloodlines. I kinda hope that they go that way

Bloodlines' characters weren't caricaturized, there were exaggerations in some of them but they had realistic looks & proportions for the most part, they were nothing like Bioshock or Dishonored characters which is the style I hate.

I mean, Didn't Boyarsky say something in the lines of that they pushed for something like Dishonored or Bioshock in Bloodlines but they failed at that

EDIT: lophiaspis

Since the collapse of Troika, have there been any games with an art style that appealed to you as an artist? If so, what are they?

· Bioshock and Bioshock Infinite - felt very akin to the FO/Arcanum aesthetic to me in a lot of ways, and I obviously have a lot of love for both the retro and steampunk genres.

· Dishonored - great job of stylization over photorealism, making their characters and world realistic and painterly at the same time (something we tried and failed to do with our characters in Vampire), plus an interestingly different take on a steampunk type world.

 

[Molina]

Bloodlines' characters weren't caricaturized, there were exaggerations in some of them but they had realistic looks & proportions for the most part, they were nothing like Bioshock or Dishonored characters which is the style I hate.

Why do you hate that style? I prefer Dishonored and Bioshock style above realistic one. Stylized is always better.

Especially since it is a style that ages rather well.

And it will be super important when it will be another 15 years before the next real RPG. :D

 

[vortex]

And it will be super important when it will be another 15 years before the next real RPG. :D

Starfield will dwarf them all.

 

[Quillon]

Bloodlines' characters weren't caricaturized, there were exaggerations in some of them but they had realistic looks & proportions for the most part, they were nothing like Bioshock or Dishonored characters which is the style I hate.

Why do you hate that style? I prefer Dishonored and Bioshock style above realistic one. Stylized is always better.

Good to know, there must be something wrong with me that I don't like child-sized grown woman models and abnormally large male ones and literally triangle shaped bodies. Also it didn't feel good cutting them down in Dishonored with a sword, felt like cutting through paper.

More realistic the better for me. I hate most artificial stuff to give something a "mood", feels like they are cheating. Hey we're making a humorous game and here's our caricaturized characters! Fallout didn't need it, nor did Arcanum nor did Bloodlines, nor should this.