Bethesda talks Fallout: New Vegas

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Vault Dweller
Shacknews managed to nab Pete Hines to ask a set of questions about their cooperation with Obsidian on Fallout: New Vegas.<blockquote>Shack: What has Bethesda's attitude been in terms of allowing Obsidian freedom to create their own Fallout game?

Pete Hines: I think we tried very hard not to put much in the way of parameters on them. To let them kind of come up with the idea. So we didn't go to them and say, we want a game that is set here, and--we didn't do that. We said, "What would you do with it? If we were going to do this, what would you guys like to do?"

Shack: So you asked them for a pitch, as opposed to pitching them a project.

Pete Hines: Correct, correct. And honestly, generally speaking, that's how it works best, which is: you've gotta have people who are really vested in the idea that it's their creation. "This is what makes us excited. If we could do this, this is what we would want to do."

You may help them mold or frame that, but if that's what they're excited about, then that's what you should do. As opposed to, I come up with something that would be cool, and you go to them and they go, "Oh, okay. Well, sure." You're just not necessarily going to get the same passion or excitement from the team. And those are the guys who need to be the most excited about it, because that's what they're going to go into the office and be creative on and make for the foreseeable future. </blockquote>
 
Can't really translate "we tried very hard not to put much in the way of parameters on them" into normal English, it's too much PR-ese for me. It sounds good, but it doesn't mean anything.

Still, good to hear Obsidian got to pitch rather than vice versa, that's pretty important.
 
since Obsidian has their own people who once upon a time worked at Interplay, lets hope they go to them for advice and not to Bethesda. ;)
 
Considering that this is Pete who's talking, this doesn't really mean anything.
 
I do appreciate the gesture of letting some of the people connected with Interplay and Black Isle have a shot at working on a new episode in the franchise. I attack Bethesda when they deserve it, but from what I've seen so far, this is one of the good things they've done lately. Time will tell how it all pans out.

Call me extremely cynical. I'd LOVE for Obsidian to make a Fallout game with a great story line and deep RPG elements, but I'll believe it when I see it.
 
Beelzebud said:
Call me extremely cynical. I'd LOVE for Obsidian to make a Fallout game with a great story line and deep RPG elements, but I'll believe it when I see it.
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In the end that is the best attitude to have. Who knows what they will do, but I hope it is good. And while it is smart for Bethesda to contract Obsidian to do the spin off, you just never know how the people who originally designed Fallout have changed over the years. I do know that I would have loved to see Troika do a take on it, what they did with VTM: Bloodlines was really excellent. The game would have been even buggier than fallout 3 probably, but a lot deeper.
 
I guess BS wants to go back to TES and is attempting to outsource to Obsidian, just as Bioware did with NWN.

Or, maybe it is a joke. These guys are all insane, who knows what's going on in their reptilian brains.
 
So this is going to be something like the Planescape mod for NWN2 (or any large quest mod for Oblivion), except with professional game developers.

In a sense it is kinda good, because Obsidian doesn't have to develop everything, only the storyline (quests, NPCs, etc), landscapes and town, and some assets for that special setting.
This way they will actually be able to finish it by next year.
 
The benefit Obsidian I suppose is that they can focus heavily on the writing. Often certain developers, particularly of RPG's, have big ideas but the technical aspects; engine, combat etc slow them down and take away from the writing and story development. Often the technical aspects are never really nailed down properly because they're trying to split their time between the two areas (see the problem with Troika). Obsidian have a working engine, they have tonnes of assets they can use, a combat system in place (albeit a bit of a naff one imo) , A.I. etc.
 
I always appreciate people who can talk a lot without saying anything. Good job, Pete!

syllogz said:
So this is going to be something like the Planescape mod for NWN2 (or any large quest mod for Oblivion), except with professional game developers.

In a sense it is kinda good, because Obsidian doesn't have to develop everything, only the storyline (quests, NPCs, etc), landscapes and town, and some assets for that special setting.
This way they will actually be able to finish it by next year.
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Just like they managed to finish a mod for KotOR?
 
I know other people than betheseda are working on it, but the best solution is not to have any hopes for a decent game. Atleast you wont be disappointed when you play it ;)

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lugaru said:
I do know that I would have loved to see Troika do a take on it, what they did with VTM: Bloodlines was really excellent. The game would have been even buggier than fallout 3 probably, but a lot deeper.
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I think the guy who worked on a lot of the dialogue and characters for Bloodlines (Brian Mitsoda) is working for Obsidian now.
A lot of people got laid off recently though, and I'm not sure if he was one of them.
Would be cool if he's working on it too.
 
Mikael Grizzly said:
If it's like KOTOR2, we've won.
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yah, I agree, if it is similar to Kotor, it will be better then Fallout 3. But this time I hope Obsidian does bother to finish the endings isntead of cutting it down. Kotor 2 has quite a lot of unfinished parts in its story which had to be removed cause of time or other issues. I am not sure anymore.
 
Crni Vuk said:
Mikael Grizzly said:
If it's like KOTOR2, we've won.
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yah, I agree, if it is similar to Kotor, it will be better then Fallout 3. But this time I hope Obsidian does bother to finish the endings isntead of cutting it down. Kotor 2 has quite a lot of unfinished parts in its story which had to be removed cause of time or other issues. I am not sure anymore.
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The endings were finished mostly. Thank Lucas Farts for forcing an early release.
 
Mikael Grizzly said:
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The endings were finished mostly. Thank Lucas Farts for forcing an early release.
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have you ever read on the Star Wars fansite the informations about Kotor2 ? The game has quite a lot of loose endings (like the story around the clones of HK-47).
 
And they completely fudged the last planet so some of it makes very shaky sense.

Well at least Obsidian have decent writers so we can expect less "Intewigence: I are the smart" dialogue.
 
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