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Fallout 2's Chris Avellone describes his game design philosophy
- tikotus 11mo agoI didn't know the same person was behind both Planescape: Tormentand Fallout 2, some of my favorite games of all time. Torment I actually played only recently (had only played Baldur's Gate 1&2 before) and absolutely loved it. So it's not even just nostalgia.
- D13Fd 11mo agoYeah I re-played Torment recently on the iPad. It holds up really well. It’s just a very well done game all around.
- Thaxll 11mo agoThe golden age of RPGs with Bioware.
- Yokolos 11mo agoHe's worked on an impressive number of great games. Prey, SW Kotor 2, Fallout New Vegas, Neverwinter Nights 2, Icewind Dale 1+2 and Alpha Protocol (ok, arguably great) jump out at me https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Avellone#Works https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Avellone#Works
- psyclobe 11mo agoNeverwinter nights 2 was awesome I recall having lan parties with that game
- phlakaton 11mo agoAlso (to my mind) two of the most successful Kickstarted video game projects so far: Pillars of Eternity (a personal favorite) and Torment: Tides of Numenéra. (He just needs to jump on a title like Numenéra: Into the Planescape to complete the cycle.)
- phantasmish 11mo agoAnyone who overlooked Prey (as I did for years) but loves the Looking Glass Studios games and successors (Thief series, Deus Ex series, System Shock series, Dishonored Series): just get it an play it. Read nothing. Just play it. You won’t regret it.
- VTimofeenko 11mo agoWorth qualifying as Prey (2017). Somewhat related[1] to Prey(2006) which is also a great game. Chris did not work on the 2006 one. [1]: it's complicated.
- phantasmish 11mo agoYes, the 2017 one is what I mean. I think the overlapping names might even be why I overlooked it. Didn’t realize it was a new game.
- VTimofeenko 11mo agoIIRC it was supposed to be a sequel for 2006 one at some point, but some development and name rights shenanigans happened. When it was developed as a sequel, the story was completely different.
- byPawel 11mo agoyep, i remember playing Fallout 2 and Planenscape as well, one of the best summers ever (1998 and 1999). I discovered some glitch in Fallout to get more skill points ;) and Planescape, had one of the best plots ever in video games (IMO BG3 doesnt even compare ;))
- bigstrat2003 11mo agoIn all honesty, the plot in BG3 isn't anything special imo. It's not bad, but neither is it something which stands out from the crowd of fantasy RPGs. Where BG3 shines is the freedom the game gives you to approach things how you like, not so much the writing.
- jasonthorsness 11mo agoIf you like this sort of content, I recently found Sandy Petersen (Call of Cthulu, Doom, Age of Empire, Halo) is extremely active on X. Lots of interesting tidbits about game design https://x.com/SandyofCthulhu https://x.com/SandyofCthulhu
- embedding-shape 11mo agoSome people are a different level of productive, and game development sure was different back in the day: > During his (Sandy Petersen) interview, John Romero (of id Software) introduced him to DoomEd and simply asked him to build a level. Romero was ultimately happy with the results, so Petersen was brought on to production for Doom. The level from Petersen's interview eventually became "E2M6". He was a fast level designer and produced all maps for the third episode of Doom, Inferno. Petersen designed 17 levels for Doom II, a little over half of the 32 total.
- mrec 11mo agoSweet cheese and crackers, you weren't kidding about "extremely active". He's posting like once a minute.
- recursivecaveat 11mo agoMark Darrah worked on a bunch of classic RPGs and has an interesting retrospectives series as well: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLN8wmKeck6fe0jtibONfIWzpYLXiGbVK2 https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLN8wmKeck6fe0jtibONfIWzpY... The Anthem one is very long, but is a really fascinating portrait of cultural misfunction. The biggest factor to me was the entire design was dictated by the 'ghost' of Casey Hudson. His initial high-level vision was sacrosanct, but he also was not around to actually clarify anything or take feedback from development since he had already left the studio.
- aresant 11mo agoGreat find and also worth a watch is the Classic Game Postmortem: Fallout video from Fallout creator Tim Cain https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2OxO-4YLRk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2OxO-4YLRk
- hakunin 11mo agoObligatory link to Tim Cain's[1] YouTube channel[2] where he talks almost daily about every aspect of game dev. [1]: Tim is the original Fallout creator/designer, who also made Arcanum, and worked on Outer Worlds. [2]: https://www.youtube.com/@CainOnGames https://www.youtube.com/@CainOnGames
- VTimofeenko 11mo agoArcanum is an awesome game. Shame the OST was never released on vinyl.
- deleted 11mo ago[deleted]
- cadamsdotcom 11mo ago> “Players are selfish,” Avellone said, reflecting on his time designing the seminal computer roleplaying game Planescape: Torment. “The more you can make the experience all about them, the better. Put more charitably: the user is paying for this experience with their money AND their time. Let’s pack a wallop into the experience. More software should be this way!