AHAHAHAHAHAAH! (that's a "hell no") No, but I did play it, just to try Yes, it's Fallout, after all Yes, and it's a great game Yes, and I've been haunted by hellspawn ever since None of your business! Didn't buy, didn't play, but would if I had the chance Yes, but from the bargain bin
The Bethesda blog has a special-format inside the vault with lead designer Emil Pagliarulo.
The NPD data for March reported that the video game industry in North America sold $1.7 billion in hardware and software, that’s a 51% increase from a year ago. Do you think it would be fair to say the industry is “recession” proof? Or is it more that we’re heading into an upswing and it’s just part of the cycles our industry goes through?
Because of the growing popularity of video games, I do indeed think the industry as a whole is recession proof, but that’s more of a high level financial statement. It doesn’t mean a hell of a lot for the people who work for companies that suddenly go under. That seems to have been happening a lot lately, and my heart really goes out to those guys.
I think we sometimes forget how young this industry really is. We’re experiencing the kind of exponential growth the film industry experienced in its early days, and with that comes a lot of growing pains — cancelled projects, studio closures, what have you.
So for the end user, it’s great. All video games, all the time. Steady releases at Christmas, sequels to your favorite games pretty regularly, even revivals of old licenses like what we’re doing with Fallout 3. I don’t see that ever ending. But I think for the people working in the industry, there will continue to be trials and tribulations for quite some time.
Seriously? Honestly, you don't think it could be kind of exactly the same thing as this, maybe? This "recession proof" thing is wearing me the hell out, since this is all old-hat news for entertainment industries. Anyway...
Lately, you’ve been a bit more active on our forums, relatively speaking. How do you filter through the signal to noise?
Right now, everyone is hungry for information. Whether it’s an Oblivion fan, or a fan of the old Fallout games, or just someone who’s new to the forums and wants to know what Fallout 3 is all about — everyone has a million questions, and wants a lot of detail.
Unfortunately, there’s not a lot of detail I’m at liberty to give right now. So what I generally look for are discussions about issues we have addressed publicly in some capacity. I like to make sure that information - the information we’ve already released - is getting disseminated accurately. Because, you know, with all the previews and forum posts, and can be like a big game of “telephone” — information gets modified in its retelling, until you occasionally (and unfortunately) arrive at a bit of complete misinformation.
That’s the kind of stuff I look for, and like to clear up. But I also like to generally check out all the cool conversations taking place, all the debates people are having. So even when I don’t respond, I’m always lurking. Always waaatttccchhiinngggg…
StarWarKnights.com published a three part interview (links at the end of the newspost) with Vince D. Weller, who you all probably know as Age of Decadence's Lead Designer and developer. There are a few insightful questions about the process of making the game, but there's also lots of stuff a hardcore role-player will probably find exciting. Here's a snip:
What are your thoughts on "Jack Bauer in space" syndrome (i.e. the growing trend to remove the choice between good and evil from RPGs)?
I haven't played Mass Effect, so I can't comment on the qualities of the game or the "Bauer in space" syndrome, but here is what I think about good and evil choices:
Good and evil are subjective concepts and I think that developers should never present the player with clearly marked "good" and "evil" options. Since [this is] a Star Wars site, let's use the Anakin's fall in Ep. 3. From his perspective the mistrustful and arrogant Jedi Council plotted against and tried to assassinate the chancellor chosen by everyone, the chancellor who supported and trusted him. Was siding with the chancellor and turning against the Jedi an evil act? Not at all. Anakin was given reasons to act the way he did, and that's how RPGs should be designed.
Sides in conflicts and choices should never be black and white, good and evil. There should be reasons for acting this way or that way, for supporting the Jedi or sticking with the Sith, for saving a village or letting them die. Then and only then someone will judge your actions and slap labels like "good" or "evil" on them. People who are with us are "good", people who are against us are "evil". Isn't how it usually works?
In AoD there are no default enemies and no good and evil choices. You make decisions that make sense to your character, you side with people and factions that you agree with the most, and then some factions will see you as a great guy and some factions will see you as an evil bastard who should be killed with extreme prejudice.
Sounds like the Vince we know. There's a lot more of it too.
Pete Hines interviewed Inon Zur, Fallout 3's composer, and published the result at the BethBlog.
One other question. How did the experience of writing and creating the music for Fallout 3 change from before you had a chance to see the game and after you had a chance to see the game?
You know, in fact I had lots of reservations and actually I visited Bethesda and it was very close to what I thought. The document that I got was very well written by Todd and Mark Lampert and Gavin. They did a great job of tapping me into the realm of Fallout and what they were doing. Fallout, yes it’s a lot about the visuals, but the story itself is so powerful. So just basically getting inspired by the actual story created a lot of emotional triggers that helped me to compose the music, rather that actually seeing the game and playing the game. The actual story of this twisted reality, there is like a [whole other] reality that happened and it’s really, really powerful. It helped me a lot.
This is only a little bit. Don't miss the whole piece.
Bethesda Softworks®, a ZeniMax Media company, announced today that Inon Zur has created the original musical score for Bethesda Softworks’ highly anticipated post-apocalyptic video game, Fallout® 3. Zur, an award-winning composer, has created numerous scores for films, television, and new media.
“We’ve wanted to work with Inon for a long time,” said Todd Howard executive producer of Fallout 3. “He brings so much to the table, in terms of his talent, background, and the music that’s influenced him. He’s created a score that has epic sweep; from the lonely ambience of the wasteland to dramatic fights for survival.”
As such, Bethesda has also put up three of the tracks that will be featured in Fallout 3 on their official website, they can be heard here on Bethesda's website.
I would like to point out specifically that Inon Zur considering music in games is responsible for tracks from titles such as Baldur's Gate 2, Everquest 2, most recently Crysis and perhaps most importantly for us, Fallout Tactics. You can visit his website and even hear some of his music there.
I give thanks to the anonymous informant who alerted us to this, and thanks to Autoduel76 for pointing out the music tracks.
Next Generation has put up an interview with Emil Pagliarulo, Fallout 3's Lead Designer, and that's what he asks himself:
”I look at Fallout when I play it every day, and I sometimes think that there's a lot of old-school hardcore PC stuff in there too, and part of me thinks, 'God, is this too inaccessible for console players?'”
Although this is a bit of a certificate of incompetence for console players, I don't think that was his intention:
People like myself and some people that work here actually grew up as hardcore PC guys, and now we're older, we have kids, we don't have that much time, so we've transitioned. We're console players now.
So his certificate of incompetence would actually apply... to himself... Thankfully, that's not the case:
(...) we still have those PC game sensibilities. Those are the games we like. So I think BioShock has a little bit of that too. You can definitely feel the old System Shock roots in that game. So hopefully there's a trend there.
Right.
The interview is a partial transcription of a podcast. To fully transcribe a bit the Next Gen only covered partially (this bit is going to be hard to swallow):
It's funny too...I kind of feel the same way because I'm not in the circle of the people that might be close to No Mutants Allowed or very hardcore-into-the-Elder-Scrolls franchise. I played Morrowind, but Oblivion is the one I played most extensively. As a guy that didn't play these PC RPGs, I agree, for the average person it actually was a little overwhelming and good for you guys for selling that many copies of what I would almost consider a hardcore PC RPG on the console.
I think we're starting to find now that there is a market for that on console. People like myself and people who work [here] kind of grew up as hardcore PC guys and now we're older, we have kids, we don't have that much time so we're in transition, we're console players now. But we still have those PC game sensibilities. Y'know, those are the games that we liked, so I think BioShock has a little bit of that too. You can definitely feel the old System Shock roots in that game. So hopefully there's a trend there.
With all the Fallout 3 previews and the hype surrounding its release, Game On decided to do something about their knowledge about Fallout. For the first time, chillzilla plays Fallout, and lives to tell the tale:
On Sunday I watched the ending credits. I had beaten the game, but I had played it wrong. Maybe "wrong" is the wrong word. I didn't play it through the way I imagine it was intended on somebody's first play-through. Nope, "wrong" was the correct word.
To explain in detail my actions would be to spoil the game for others. I will do my best to leave details vague. The game is good, so I don't want to ruin the experience for would-be players, even if the game is 11 years old.
While the game is non-linear, there still is an order to things. It is possible to skip over missions, items & even whole towns (never did visit the Boneyard), but the game does nudge you to finish the main quest. I apparently decided to skip half the game.
There is a point where a leader of one group asks you to take out a gang of mutants that have been bothering them. As I approached my assigned targets, one of the mutants started to talk to me. My choices in dialog got me captured and taken to the mutants base. I started to notice that the game had gotten a lot harder then it had been, but yet my escape didn't seem unattainable. Through many save files and reloading I was able to make my escape and in the process I unknowingly finished a major story plot.
Ah... To be young and in love. I mean, playing Fallout for the first time? Good memories, good memories.
According to 4players.de, Ubisoft sent out a press release announcing they are publishing Fallout 3 in several European countries. This is a bit odd in light of ZeniMax opening a London office, so hopefully we'll hear more about this later. A translation of the 4players newspost:
Ubisoft has gone into agreement with Bethesda Softworks and has become the seller of the post-apocalyptic role-playing game in large parts of Europe, including Germany, Switzerland and Austria. This comes from a press release of the publisher. In this it stays with the indicated release date of Autumn this year. Alain Corre, Executive Directorf with Ubisoft knows that expectations are enormous for the popularly anticipated sequel and is sure, "that Fallout 3 will have the success of the earlier blockbuster, like for example TES IV: Oblivion".
EDIT: Note that the post isn't 100% clear if this is "publish" or "distribute". It's possible ZeniMax Europe will be publishing, while Ubisoft distributes.
Interplay sneaked in another filing, denoting how much FPD paid for the controlling stock of 58 million.
Further to the change in control described in the registrant's 8-K filed on March 27, 2008 relating to the acquisition of control of the registrant by Financial Planning and Development S.A. ("FPD"), the registrant has been informed by FPD that FPD paid $159,000 on April 30, 2007 in a private sale by the bankruptcy trustee of Titus Interactive S.A. (at a time when a petition for involuntary bankruptcy had been filed against the registrant, which had not been dismissed). FPD purchased at that time 58,426,293 shares of common stock of the registrant and warrants to purchase 400,000 shares of common stock of the registrant at an exercise price of $3.79 per share. The registrant believes that FPD paid such consideration from FPD's own working capital.
That's 0,0027 USD per share. On April 2007, the shares in Interplay were going for 0.10 USD. Not a bad price, I suppose.
GameSpot UK offers a video interview with Bethesda in their Start/Select feature, starting around 8:30, with Pete Hines. They discuss the start, plot, Dogmeat, good characters can't recruit evil NPCs, that kind of stuff. Including mentioning perception influences how well you see other people, but bulky armor/helmet lowers that perception.
CanardPC's write-up on Fallout 3 is pretty good, so I figured why not provide some translated quotes from the article, thanks to Sebosson the Codex:
Fade to black and you're now at your tenth birthday, ready to get your Pipboy3000, "the indispensable companion of the modern man". This scene introduces your first social interactions.
You'll go then from a little flirt with a girl your age through the confrontation with a little bully desiring to strip you from your birthday cake, to a surrealist discussion with a schizophrenic Mr Handy.
And there, I feel reassured. The dialogs and the argument with the dumbfuck in the making come right into the series spirit. During your conversation with the little scum, the game offers you ten different dialog options: immediate cowardly capitulation, insult leading to a brawl, lies, [...] spitting on the cake before offering it to him. The list is more than satisfying.
(...)
While I was expecting an outright treason of the Fallout setting, more because of ineptitude than vice, I have the feeling the game is spot on. The ambiance, scenery and lighting of the Vault seem perfectly faithful to the series, with just the right dose of rust to enhance claustrophobia.
(...)
Now here's the point where things get messy. We're going to get onto the thorny problem of the combat. [...] We'll note that the developers repeated ad nauseam that the efficiency of your shots depend on your statistics and that the FPS skills of the player don't have any importance, and that all shots fired in real-time mode will be automatically aimed to the torso. [Here goes a lengthy description of the VATS system]
The idea seems to stand theoretically, but in facts I'm far from convinced. Firstly, during the presentation, either he was wearing a Power Armor and holding a Gatling gun and fighting hordes of super mutants armed with heavy machine guns, bakookas and supersledges or fighting ghouls with a 9mm and wearing just a leather armor, the demonstrator was just standing there, shooting long bursts without using any kind of tactics.
Besides, aimed shots, possible even with a minigun, looked far less effective to me than just "run right next to the baddy and empty my magazine in one burst".
(...)
Regarding monster design, I'm afraid they are completely off the mark. Forget about quirky, clumsy supermutants or weird ghouls with tree branches sticking out their skulls. All you'll get is overmuscular, overarmed orcs and undeads Oblivion style. But that was expected.
The Bethesda Blog put up word that yes, Fallout 3 will be at E3, to beat any possibly rumours that they won't be caused by the ESA attendants list.
Yes, Bethesda Softworks will be at this year’s E3 in LA.
Yes, we will have Fallout 3 there.
No, I don’t know why the ESA sent out a list that did not include us, just like they did last year. Maybe it’s because the had to go to print at a certain point and we hadn’t picked our space yet. No idea.
But we’ll be there and so will Fallout 3.
Meanwhile, E3 is creaking heavily at the joints now that giant publisher/developer Activision-Vivendi (also called Activision-Blizzard/Sierra, representing about 15% of the worldwide gaming industry) has declared they're not coming, as well as Atlus, Majesco, NCsoft and WBIE and others (story here).
It's been a year since what has probably been the most successful...uh...thing in NMA history, ever, the release of the Van Buren tech demo, which brought in over 118 thousand visitors to NMA that week.
So how's it done since then?
The Black Isle's Van Buren trailer we put together to tease you guys with days before the release of the demo has had nearly 200 thousand views on Youtube, though someone else also put it up under the moniker Fallout 3, which might not be fully honest but does get in those search views, and it was viewed 175 thousand times there.
While that's just ok-ish, the file has done exceedingly well, having been downloaded 35 thousand times from our fileserver AtomicGamer, as well as 10 thousand times from FilePlanet, 13 thousand times from Gamer's Hell, 18 thousand times from GameSpot, five thousands times from FileFront and two thousand times from FileShack. So not counting quite a few other mirrors available, the tech demo hit well over 83 thousand downloads. Not bad for a 250 MB large elephant that only offered a half-broken technical demo.
360Zine issue 18 is up for download and features a Fallout 3 preview, as well as a Q&A with Pete Hines. It's an enormous and - at least for me - hella annoying to view PDF file, so here's some bits.
Opening with the series’ most iconic catchphrase, it’s clear that Bethesda have gone to some lengths to ensure that Fallout 3, while very different from its predecessors, is still very recognisably Fallout. The two PC games from the late Nineties attracted a substantial, fanatical cult following, and it’s this bunch that have been watching the game’s development as closely as they possibly can. Suffice to say that Bethesda are under pressure to appeal both to franchise veterans and create an inclusive experience for everyone.
(...)
Fallout 3's combat is potentially more problematic than Oblivion's - while the first-person shooting seems very solid, it's got a lot of competition from other games in that department. Fortunately, players can take a more strategic approach, with the Vault Assisted Targeting System.
They note the game is 80% finished, and rate their first impressions (?) 90%.
The interview talks about nods to the originals, VATS, the "500 endings" misunderstanding and - of course - the fans. I get a major feeling of deja vu when reading it, but that might be because Pete is giving his standard answers.
Another few tidbits from a magazine preview, from FalloutDude14.
Choice quotes:
"Bethesda's last title, Oblivion, was a huge slice of freeform joy."
"[The prospect of Bethesda making Fallout 3 is] as close to a dream game as anyone has managed so far."
"[...]and there's a vociferous (and presumably faintly insane) minority that's convinced this game is a slight on the previous two and will simply be 'Oblivion with guns'."
"It seems that rather than be discouraged by the negativity, the team is spurred on by it."
New info (or at least info that I haven't seen before):
The Behemoth is based on some concept art that Adam Adamowicz drew. Originally it was to use a car battery on a chain as a weapon, instead of the hydrant.
Certain perks can only be taken by certain karma levels.
In reply to "and will simply be 'Oblivion with guns'."...
So rather than Oblivion with Guns, what we have here is a conglomerate of influences from a whole bunch of games. Oblivion in a lot of mechanics and perhaps in some deeper gameplay mechanics I have yet to see. Fallout in superficial style and look, occasionally. Some BioWare mechanics on combat. Add a sprinkling of Deus Ex for elements of combat, dialogue and choices. This is a big mess that can only be shortened to "Oblivion with Guns" unfairly.
The game it's closest to is Oblivion. So now when someone asks, 'Is it Oblivion with guns?' my main answer is, 'in all the best ways.'"
Neither of us are saying it's "just" Oblivion with Guns, but NMA is saying it's Oblivion with Guns is an unfair term, Todd Howard is saying he uses the term. Good job attributing a statement from the executive producer to the fans, PC Format.
French magazine CanardPC number 170 has an eight pages Fallout 3 preview and contains a a few new tidbits of information:
Teen age gives you access to a few quests which will have an impact on how you are perceived within the Vault
While travelling across the Wasteland, you can come across a few caravans, each heading to precise locations.
There are three difficulty levels, as well as an "autolevelling difficulty" mode.
A few new weapons : Cryolator allows you to freeze ennemies while you can hypnotize them with your Mesmetron. [these weapons were also mentioned in the NMA preview, though their functions unknown]
Also a new perk, Daddy's Little Girl, which gives a Science bonus to female characters.
Additionally, the writer of the preview, O. Boulon, made some comments here. Amongst the comments is, by MrBumble's reading:
It basically means that he's sorry he has forgotten to put it in the article but he really HATED the soundtrack because it is entirely orchestral, Call of duty style, very far from Mark Morgan's ambiant works. He advises players to replace it with Fallout 1 and Fallout 2's soundtrack as soon as they can.
GamesIndustry.biz: How far are you going with the 'go anywhere' sense in this game?
Pete Hines: Very. If you want to see how many of the hours you can play without seeing an hour of the main quest, give it a shot - it will be lots. You could spend 50 hours, 70 hours, just doing stuff in the world and never once make an effort to figure out what happened to your dad. We want it to be a self-directed world, for players to just see what happens.
And the idea is that the main quest is not the only cool stuff going on - there are tonnes of miscellaneous free-form things out there for you to do that will be a lot of fun, that maybe you've got five or six quests at any time where you can figure out what to do next.
How do you deal with the hardcore fanbase - that is, in development, how do you balance the need to be true to the series to the point where you are satisfying those people, but not to the exclusion of those who don't live and breathe Fallout?
PH: I think, ultimately, it comes from us having been in this space for a while, and kind of - you know, I mean, we hear this a lot with The Elder Scrolls. You know, with the folks that were around in 1994, when Arena came out, versus the folks that showed up in 2005 because they were interested in Oblivion. And it gets back to listening to what people have to say, and understanding not only what it is they want, but also sort of the root of what their concerns are.
I think that we do have a pretty good understanding what all of the different sections of our fan base are interested in, but it comes back to the thing of, you know, gotta make the game that we think is the best. Certainly, try and take those things into consideration, but there are people in the office who spend 14, 16, 18 hours a day making this game, and sometimes, if you're going to break a tie, you go with our instincts.
The people who know everything about it are the folks who know - you know, you can't make a game with a committee of three thousand, or three hundred thousand. Just, nothing would ever get done. Somebody has got to break the tie and say, "This is what's best for the game."
I think we've tried to make that our approach, and we've tried to do the best that we can to listen to all the segments of our fan base, and give them what they want, and I hope that all of them will give the game a shot, and it will be something that they'll enjoy.
What’s your job at Bethesda?
I am one of the AI Programmers and I am responsible for Pathfinding, that is, figuring out how NPCs navigate around the world. Considering how organic our environments are and the huge variance in scales of our NPCs, pathfinding has turned out to be quite a challenge. Add to that huge explosions that move/destroy everything around, and you get the idea of how complicated it becomes. As a consequence, my work involves a lot of 2d/3d math, writing search algorithms and dealing with multithreaded optimizations.
Last year, once all the dust cleared from our initial unveiling of Fallout 3, we provided you guys with a chance to ask some burning questions about the game. Given we’ve just had another blitz of previews come out, we figured now was as good of a time as any to give you another opportunity.
Starting today in the Fallout 3 Discussion thread of the BGS forums, you can start suggesting questions you’d like to see answered. You can also share your questions in the comments section of this blog post, or simply by emailing us. To help make sure we’re answering the questions you guys want to know, I’ve entrusted three of our community members to help out with the process — Alexander, Briosafreak, Gizmo. If you’ve got suggestions, or think you might be able to help them out, drop them a line.
If you want your question considered, you have between now and Sunday, May 18th to post your questions through the channels listed above. Once we’ve got the final questions, we’ll work on getting answers back to you guys.
That's it. If you still have questions about this game, it might be a good chance to ask.
As he promised after the Eurogamer preview, KG's interview with Pete Hines is up now.
Eurogamer: What I've never quite understood about Fallout 3 is why would Bethesda buy the licence? Arguably "Bethesda does post-apocalyptic game" is a bigger story than "Bethesda makes Fallout 3". Fallout is a relic to modern gamers. If you'd made your own world, you'd have sidestepped all the stress of dealing with over-protective fans.
Pete Hines: It's like, if George Lucas died tomorrow - God willing, he doesn't - and you're a film director. And you've grown up making big epic films - maybe you're Peter Jackson. And he finishes whatever his big next film is. And someone asks him, "what do you want to do next?" And he says, "I always wanted to make a big space movie. A big epic movie full of action." And they ask, "do you want to do generic space movie that you make up yourself, or do you want to do Star Wars." And he says, "I could do whatever, but I grew up as a kid and Star Wars made me want to get into making movies. It had such a profound impact on me, I would love to pick up this thing I loved and cared so much about and make the next one. And I'm not the guy who did the originals, but it means so much to me, and would mean much more to me to work in this world. It would be easier, perhaps less controversial and less pressure to do my own, but I'd rather do this thing that someone else did so much more."
That's the best analogy I can use. We could have made anything and people would have been interested in it, probably, but Fallout meant a ton to us, and we love the tone and flavour of that world, and how meaningful it was for its time, how different it was from other stuff that was out there. We said, "we could do anything, but what we'd really love to do is Fallout". Use that character system and that world that's so unique from anything else that we might come up with. We'd rather do that than come up with our own thing. Bring that to life - and bring it not to just people who played the it before, but people who've never got to play or experience it. There's this great game and world which somebody came up that we really think you'll want to play.
I love a party with a radioactive, toxic atmosphere.
Eurogamer: You're driven by love. Do you think that's something the very hardcore Fallout fans miss?
Pete Hines: I don't know whether they miss it or not - it may be that they don't care and think, "that's all well and good, but you're not the ones we wanted to make this". I don't pretend to know exactly what their motivations and thought processes are. Those guys are very enthusiastic - we're talking about the very hardest of the hardcore Fallout fan. They're very passionate about this thing and protective about it. And that's okay. It's something they've clearly got a lot of attachment too. At the same time, we are making the very best game that we can. It's not for any one group of folk - we're making the best game we know how for a lot of people who'll come to play and enjoy it.
Eurogamer: So do you blank out the criticism then?
Pete Hines: You never blank it out. You take all the feedback from Oblivion, and all the feedback from what people want from a Fallout game. And what you find is there's never agreement on anything from anyone. We get feedback from people who say you've got to have this. As long as you've got the SPECIALs [the game's statistics - Ed] and perks, that's Fallout. And some people say if it's not isometric and not turn-based, it's not Fallout. So you basically go and look at what made the game meaningful for them, and try as much as you can to match it with what you're doing, so you're doing what people remember and is important to them. But it's more of getting a vibe of what they want, rather than sitting in an art meeting and going, "What do we want this creature to look like... let's go and ask the fans". At some point we have seventy-five people making the game, devoting 3-4 years of their life and they're ultimately the tie-breakers. And it's not as if all seventy-five people think the same thing. We have big rows over should something work like X and Y or Z. And eventually a decision gets made, and we move forward with it. It's the same with feedback from outside the company - we take it all into account, but at some point you have to pick and direction and move on.
"...The fact that [Oblivion] was well received critically, and had the sales numbers to back it up, is a very positive sign for us as we look to expand our presence there," Hines added.
He didn't disclose exactly how much business ZeniMax expects to generate from its new Asian arm, as the firm is privately held.
Bethesda's next high-profile title is Fallout 3, slated to arrive later this year in the US. ZeniMax Asia will be bringing the title to Asian territories.
Regarding the rampant piracy in Asia, Hines said it's an issue in every region of the world, not just in the East.
"It's a concern in any case, whether we were expanding there or not, so I don't know how much us expanding there changes that one way or the other.
"[Expanding] is more about our continuing desire to establish more direct relationships in a number of different territories. Obviously, the announcement about the establishment of a UK office to cover the UK/European markets was a big part of that, and this office just builds on that."
