Chris Avellone leaves Obsidian

[Earth]

That's probably New Vegas 2 down the drain then. It was nice knowin' ya Fallout series.

Why? As far as I know, he wasn't involved in brokering the deal, nor did he have an instrumental role in the development of the game. He did lead the DLCs, sure, and I'm sure some people would miss his authorial style, but it doesn't mean anything concerning a NV2. Hell, to play the devil's advocate, considering that MCA was the one that broke out the news about New Vegas' contract, Bethesda might even be more willing to work with Obsidian again now that he's gone.

Fair enough. My mistake. For some reason Chris Avellone=Obsidian in my brain. Not entirely sure why.

 

[Gnarles Bronson]

I would be completely happy with any old school RPG,

If you're a bauldurs gate fan i hear good things about pillars of eternity, I never was though. I think I just like the old fallouts, turn based and solo adventurer.

WL 2 was a noble effort but I find the turn based squad games like WL2 and the new xcom too tedious (the old one was better for some reason, maybe because it had more base management); I would have been happier if it were real time / pause like FO tactics -- which I thought actually had a pretty fun combat system if not much else.

 

[lisac2k]

Personally, I wish him all the luck in his future endeavors, whatever and wherever that may be.

Hopefully again in the game industry - it'd be damn shame to see those talents lost to an insurance company or a jail catering service or such. It may be worth to check 'Dex for latest rumors, I guess.

 

[ramessesjones]

If I had a guess he left to be more creative and less management, it's been a long time he's been a real lead on a game that has gotten released and he's often seemed to be busy with other stuff. New Vegas was Sawyer and John Gonzalez who left Obsidian quite a while ago and worked on Shadow of Mordor after that. Eric Fenstermaker seems to be on the rise Obsidian was well, he on worked several of the more popular parts of New Vegas and was the lead narrative designer for Pillars.

Either that or Avellone got some sort of dream project like Star Wars to work on.

 

[Atomic Postman]

That's a real shame. Chris Avellone is borderline legendary. Obsidian is going to be a whole lot weaker now.

As others have said, this kind of soils the idea of another Obsidian Fallout run by the old ex-Black Isle team.

I wish him good luck in whatever plans for the future he has.

 

[Knight Captain Kerr]

I'm wondering if he'll just go full on freelance, human stretch goal that he is.

 

[Lexx]

I can't wait for more writing like this. Shoutouts to our very own oihrebwe here at NMA, his post with this image was one of the first I got when I googled "Bad fallout 3 dialogue" for reference.

This is the corrected screenshot:

Truth told, it doesn't surprise me that much. He did so much other shit on the side in the past months / years. Writing for Wasteland 2, writing for FTL, doing that comic stuff, giving a helping hand in that Nuka Break web series, also doing the same for the Legend of Grimrock web series, oh and that Wasteland 2 novella that still isn't released yet, because apparently it became something bigger. Almost makes me feel like he is looking for something new already for a while.

Did you ... did you, just called Wasteland 2 shit!

I write "stuff" all the time, sometimes I need to get away from "stuff" and write "shit" instead. Actually, I have a shit quota to fullfill as well as a stuff quota.

 

[Eumesmopo]

If he is going to join Inxile. Why wouldn't he say it straight away?

 

[Crni Vuk]

Because he is shy?

 

[Marionettetc]

This is the corrected screenshot:

Truth told, it doesn't surprise me that much. He did so much other shit on the side in the past months / years. Writing for Wasteland 2, writing for FTL, doing that comic stuff, giving a helping hand in that Nuka Break web series, also doing the same for the Legend of Grimrock web series, oh and that Wasteland 2 novella that still isn't released yet, because apparently it became something bigger. Almost makes me feel like he is looking for something new already for a while.

Did you ... did you, just called Wasteland 2 shit!

I write "stuff" all the time, sometimes I need to get away from "stuff" and write "shit" instead. Actually, I have a shit quota to fullfill as well as a stuff quota.

I was able to run the corrected version through a few "special", high tech filters and got this enhanced version :

 

[SuAside]

Yeah, I think he'll probably join inExile.

Wouldn't it be a demotion ?

InXile stirred up a lot of passion in the old timers of the gaming industry. And with the shitty hours, the insane workloads and so on, it is passion that really keeps people going in this industry.
If he's indeed joining inXile it would be on his own terms and i'm sure he wouldn't view it as a demotion.

 

[Atomkilla]

To be fair, most of his recent work was as a contractor for InXile and small indie developers than as a developer at Obsidian.

 

[WittyUsername]

I do know that, but that doesn't mean future games need to follow the same formula -- the transition from FO2 to 3 as example.

And that worked out so well.

It did, actually. Fallout 3 is extremely popular despite older fan opinion. A shift in gameplay style can make a huge difference

Fallout 3 has a lot of problems but none of them are its choice of being in third person and real time. Most are writing issues and bugs.

 

[Crni Vuk]

Yeah, but you can't really call it the same game either.

Look at it this way. Take someone who has NO clue what Fallout is about. Remove ALL Fallout related stuff (like vault signs and such).

Now show them F1 and then show them F2 and F3 and ask them which game is the Sequel to Fallout 1.

 

[fred2]

What if we apply the same test to FO2 and FO:Tactics.. Actually, I don't care, you can call that shift whatever you want, all that maters to me is that FO:NV provided me with a squeal to the events I partake in a long ago and I enjoyed it.

Also the topic of shifts originated with the possibility of voiced protagonists. On that topic, I agree that fully voiced protagonist are commonly used in AAA Action-RPGs, titles which usually make a very limited used of dialogue.

 

[Crni Vuk]

The change from Tactics to F2 was definitely not as huge like the change from F2 to F3. We are not just talking about the visuals here.

 

[Gnarles Bronson]

To be fair, most of his recent work was as a contractor for InXile and small indie developers than as a developer at Obsidian.

Which makes his departure all the more odd. He seems to be able to do whatever he wants, so why publicly quit when he could work as he pleased?

 

[WittyUsername]

Yeah, but you can't really call it the same game either.

Gameplay, no. Lore, yes and no. New Vegas is better for that there than 3.

Still, I wasn't arguing if they're "true sequels" or not, I'm talking popularity. From a business standpoint, the more sales, the more money the company makes, and the more money it makes, the more "it works out well."

Fact is some types of gameplay have a larger appeal than others. For me, 3 and New Vegas is a lot more fun to play with if only for the real time (though 3 has problems), I was never a huge fan of turn based games. I find myself opening Fonline Reloaded a lot more than Fallout 1 or 2. And, honestly, I was never a huge isometric or 2D fan either, unless the games are really old. Personally, I'd prefer 3 and NV to have been third person, because I feel no sense in making a character to just go in first person the whole time. There IS a third person button for those but... eh, third person is clunky in those titles.

I'm not saying 1 and 2 aren't good titles, they certainly are, but other types of gameplay are a lot more popular depending on certain ages.

 

[Walpknut]

Use the dynamic Camera and the Enhanced Camera mods, you will be able to see the rest of your body in first person, and makes third person mode a lot less clunky.

 

[ChildServices]

I don't really like the enhanced camera mod very much. I'm somebody who likes to play these kinds of games with his crosshairs turned off (STALKER mode let's go). It doesn't play well with iron sights and turning on first-person view models with it looks like a really ugly workaround.

Edit: There's an idea for Fallout 4. Make the game support this kind of first-person view style natively, like Arma.