Thread 3867696

What made Troika fail and what made Obsidian succeed?

>>3867696 (OP)
>what made Obsidian succeed
obsidian was constantly on knife's edge between bankruptcy and making next pay. they were just a tiny bit business savvier.

>>3867696 (OP)
money, mostly

>>3867696 (OP)
Idk, but I think Obsidian's games actually being functional had something to do with it.

>>3867696 (OP)
>What made Troika fail and what made Obsidian succeed?
Troika tried making their own games, while Obsidian made standalone expansions for Bioware and Bethesda

Troika spent too much time and money on Bloodlines.

>>3867696 (OP)
What happened with Troika was no publisher answered their calls after Bloodlines. They simply couldn't get anymore work. I love how their ending was "we're shutting down, but everyone gets fair severance and medical".

>>3867696 (OP)
Kickstarter existing.

>>3867727
more true than people realize. according to urquheart obsidian had bankruptcy date LITERALLY marked on their calendar in case poe1 kickstarter failed.

>>3867701
>>3867704
>>3867727
These three

>>3867727
I would have gladly donated all my savings and my soul to Troika for VTMB2

Troika decided to open up with a crpg when crpg's were simply not selling.
TOOE was just bland and would barely find success even in the 90's let alone 2000's.
Bloodlines was a clusterfuck and was never gonna save Troika.
Them attempting to bid for a license(fallout) that lost all meaning was the final nail in the coffin.

Obsidian on the other hand got cheapskate higher ups who only made sequels/expansions to popular franchises.

>>3867696 (OP)
I think it's because consoles were really taking off around that time, video games were starting to take over in popular culture in general, and PC gaming started to lose a lot of people because it was always harder to get into PC gaming with how expensive it was and the technical knowledge it required to get it working. consoles were just hammering that nail in the coffin. Troika was using outdated tech, too, at the ass-end of a dying genre of games, and isometric rpgs really didn't start making a comeback until 5-10 years ago. Then, of course, World of Warcraft came out in 2004 and damn near killed everyone.

>>3867779
Doesn't help that vtmb released the same day as half life 2

>>3867780
I think all those games released in November, including WoW, so it was the beginning of the end. It makes sense no one really paid attention to VTMB. I don't even really remember any marketing for it. A lot of people would end up signing up to Steam in 2004, as well, since yeah, Half-Life 2 released and I think it came with a deal for Steam or whatever. At least that's when I signed up, November 16 2004.

>>3867780
The way I remember it back in the day was that it came out a few days before hl2, and so was technically the first source engine game released, which I always thought was amusing. But apparently I misremembered

>>3867785
nta, but I seem to remember that being the case, too. Maybe HL2 was delayed a few days and VTM released before it, but everyone just remembers the official release date or whatever... I dunno.

DEI cash.

>>3867786
didn't helped that the game was broken beyond belief. I remember not being able to play the game because some ladder in the sewer would throw you under the map.

>>3867696 (OP)
Troika was owned by artists. Obsidian was owned by business people.

>>3867822
An Italian artist, contemporary to da Vinci, was one asked why his art was so beautiful, yet his children were so ugly.
>Ah, but my art was made in the light of day, while my children were made in the darkness of night.

I always felt that, for all of his *shared insight and wisdom*, Tim Cain was and is a reasonably big talentless fraud. He's made fallout 1 and has managed to coast on that for the rest of his career, releasing blunder after blunder, now in an industry which, he admits, has nothing to do with the one that he thrived in 30-some years ago

>>3867841
He's a good programmer and has come up with good ideas, but there are many people who made those games and Cain would have been replaceable.

>>3867844
>has come up with good ideas
Over the last 25 years, though?
I'm sure he's fine as far as programmers go, but there's no actual way to measure that that I can think of. His games have been plenty buggy

>>3867841
You can say that for any game developer. See: Peter Molyneux.

>>3867855
After troika died and he started getting buttfucked he hasn't had a single good idea. Inceldom is what made him powerful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcIchbZ4eK8

>>3867869
>You can say that for any game developer
And I'm eager to. Fuck Boyarsky too and while we're at it, fuck Avellone for good measure

>>3867841
>managed to coast on that for the rest of his career, releasing blunder after blunder
The only other games he had authority over after that were Arcanum, ToEE, and Outer Worlds, and two of those are great games despite their reception. Supposedly, he didn't want a creative role after dealing with the office politics of Fallout 2 and Wildstar, which he left partway through development. He's not a John Carmack who can shoulder the work of an entire development team, but no one is. Cain's career was actually a pretty normal one by the standards of any field. It sounds like you're not only overestimating his importance, but also the visibility and general influence of programmers.

>>3867731
Wild, because PoE2 was so much better but didn't get nearly as much attention from players / marketing hype. Didn't Obsidian make Fallout New Vegas???!

>>3867731
Yes, it's the actual answer, that's why I gave it.
>>3867925
>Why didn't more people play PoE2?
They played PoE1.

>>3867965
>They played PoE1.
Rekt

>>3867925
Well by the time PoE2 dropped the novelty of bringing back isometric CRPG had worn off

>>3867925
Because PoE1 was just a very mid game that was ridiculously overwritten.

>>3867844
Seems to me that Tim's strengths are how well he works with other people, and him developing tools to make work easier for the others.
Good fit for a lead position in a small studio of like-minded fellows.

>>3867696 (OP)
As much shit as people give him Feargus Urquhart managed to keep Obsidian afloat. Those were rough days for RPGs in general.

>>3868004
>Those were rough days for RPGs in general.
There were a lot of shitty RPGs. Developers like Bioware, Bethesda and Blizzard thrived.

>>3868004
>>3868011
it's astonishing obsidian survived kotor2 and nwn2 as the initial games

Isnt current obsidian mostly back to where they were. Lots of the previous great devs who worked on obsidians classics like nv and kotor 2 are currently employed at Obsidian ?

>>3868027
>Isnt current obsidian mostly back to where they were. Lots of the previous great devs who worked on obsidians classics like nv and kotor 2 are currently employed at Obsidian ?
I find that extremely unlikely. Indians, more like it.

>>3867776
>Troika decided to open up with a crpg when crpg's were simply not selling.
Wrong
The main issue with Troika stuff was that it was outdated and buggy
Temple of Elemental Evil was released a full year after Neverwinter Nights.

>>3868163
There was a problem with retailers and it would be a few years until Steam would make them irrelevant.

>>3868165
Sawyer is talking completely out of his ass here
The reality was that unstable buggy games were poison for retailers.
Diablo 2 and its clones were going strong even in 2002 and all of them were 2d Isometric. This is one of the bigger problems with "CRPG" developers. They lack self awareness and introspection and will keep making excuses on why their failures were due to some other nebulous factors.

>>3868165
>>3868167
Want to know something even funnier?
A little studio from Belgium released a 2D isometric game the same year as Neverwinter Night and went on to be extremely successful

At least in the case of VtMB, they got utterly fucked by the publisher like right after release.

>>3868171
Divine Divinity? Tbf, the rules were different in Europe.

>>3868167
Diablo 2 isn't a single player crpg, it's a multiplayer hack and slash.
Retailers would have no idea how buggy or not-buggy a game was when they were ordering it.
>>3868171
Divinity did okay but it wasn't a massive success. Just look at the state of Beyond Divinity.

>>3868175
>Diablo 2 isn't a single player crpg
Sawyer wasn't talking about CRPGs
>Retailers would have no idea how buggy or not-buggy a game was when they were ordering it.
Are you retarded
Retailers would read reviews before ordering stock. TOEE wasn't even Troika's first game so they had a track record they could rely on and the publisher knew better than anyone else on how buggy the game is so they would refrain from spending too much on marketing and just cut their losses.
Again zero knowledge and no introspection.

>>3868177
Yes he was.
>Retailers would read reviews before ordering stock.
Retailers have to order their stock months in advance. There are no reviews, review copies, or gold masters printed. The state of one game doesn't reflect the state of a future one.

>>3868180
>Retailers have to order their stock months in advance
They only do that for games with a marketing budget, presence and preorders.
No retailer is buying stock for annual D&D shovelware #12 in advance.
>The state of one game doesn't reflect the state of a future one.
This has to be sawyer himself here to defend his retardation lmao

>>3868182
>They only do that for games with a marketing budget, presence and preorders.
Do you not know how the retail and shipping industry works?

>>3868183
Enlighten us all then with your supreme knowledge

>>3868184
The retailers need to put in their orders months in advance so the company can know how many units to manufacture and then have those units shipped out all over so they can all be put out on the same designated day. It's not something that can be done on a dime.

>>3868185
Publishers don't manufacture units based on retailer demands in the first place so I don't know where you learned this horse shit from

The devs were all too happy to chase the console market. Just look at Obsidian today, digital distribution is right there but all they want to do is chase trends and produce marketable console experiences. These guys always have someone else to blame and are probably repeating bullshit their boss fed them to justify themselves.

>>3868188
You really think they pay the money to print millions of copies and hope the demand will eventually be there?

>>3868197
You can just stop humiliating yourself at this point.
Atari knew better than anyone the absolute state of TOEE, they spent just enough money on pressing and marketing it to not break contract.

>>3868198
ToEE sold better than Arcanum because it was a Dungeons and Dragons product, but that was the last break the retailers were willing to give. Original IP, forget it.

>>3867917
>It sounds like you're not only overestimating his importance, but also the visibility and general influence of programmers
I can concede that, but I also wouldn't go as far to call Arcanum and ToEE anything other than decent. Outer Worlds is a joke and let us not even talk about OW2

Their games were really missing a good user interface. At least Arcanum. It was just so difficult and bizarre to know what the hell was going on. They really needed someone on the team to be like "Ok, you can nerd out on stats and quests and different builds, but we REALLY gotta smooth out gameplay. We really gotta narrow our focus so the user can get grounded." Diablo II was GREAT at that. A child could figure out 80% of the game in like 5 minutes. Then it adds layers and layers of depth as you go. There was a good UI dude who helped fix some of fallout's screens, but he quit before it launched. If he had stuck around maybe that would have been the magic sauce to balance out Tim and the main artist guy.

>>3867696 (OP)
Feargus always had his eye on the prize of surviving long enough as a startup to get a corporate buyout. Troika was actually trying to make the games they wanted to play

>>3867925
PoE was the peak social media FOMO of Kickstarter. So many people that clearly don't give a shit about CRPGs in any other context were all in on that game.

>>3868249
I don't know if it's that so much as a bunch of aging BG fanboys realized they don't like BG clones anymore, especially in some tryhard homebrew setting. They just quietly walked away.

>>3868252
I find it easier to replay and finish BG1 than I do to replay and finish PoE1, for what it's worth.

>>3868165
I know the kind of slavs that play CRPGs hate Steam and don't want to hear it, but retail was a terrible burden on all medium-sized PC genres. All the industry culling and the rush to consolize anything that could possibly be consolized was entirely because in the 2000s Babbages died and Walmart stocked a half shelf of PC shit that could only accommodate the fastest selling AAA and everyone else could get fucked to death.

Steam gives the same store page access to Gary Grigsby's World at War as it does Call of Duty. That's all you have to give it, you can hate everything else about it, but it changed how PC works and the 2000s were a terrible low point for the old way.

>>3867696 (OP)
valve jews.

>>3868355
it's a Tzimisce AMAE (assigned male at embrace) female-identifying kindred-kin. Essentially a tacit endorsement of the LGBTQ+ community and its plight at a time where neo-nazi fascist G.W. Bush types were breathing down the necks of RPG writers.

>>3868389
>neo-nazi fascist G.W. Bush types
Tell me that you’re a delusional leftist without telling me that you’re delusional leftist.

>>3868391
meant to post that in the vtm thread, mybad
way to take a joke though

>>3868392
Forgive me. Your sarcasm is indistinguishable from the real thing, nowadays.

>>3867696 (OP)
Falling standards.

>>3868202
Makes sense. Keep in mind this was when D&D's name carried weight.

I wouldn't call what Obsidian is doing right now succeeding. They are making games that are the video game equivalent of a direct to DVD movie.

>>3868691
>when D&D's name carried weight
so, any time in the last few decades?

>>3868691
D&D's name will still automatically make your game a hot topic. Just because 30% of grognards and 60% of chuds on 4chan (the other 70% and 40% are in denial still) have come to terms with the fact D&D sucks doesn't mean that it doesn't have millions of normie fans. D&D is in fact bigger than ever.

>>3868916
>30% of grognards and 60% of chuds on 4chan (the other 70% and 40% are in denial still) have come to terms with the fact D&D sucks
just say 100% of hipsters

>>3867734
Your donations would have been useful during the development of VTMB. Pretty much everyone involved came out with PTSD over the whole thing and never wanted to touch the IP again. Except for b mitsoda, who actually came back to it and now *definitely* has PTSD.

>>3868165
The problem is 2d CRPGs are stuck reinventing the wheel and not improving anything, Fallout 1/2 had the clay faces, great animations and gore, meanwhile newer CRPGs are very basic, Deadfire at least graphically and modelwise looks good but it doesn't have any detail and it doesn't make you feel immersive.

>>3869007
>everyone involved came out with PTSD over the whole thing
almost like they are a bunch of weak little nerds and mentally ill faggots
>b mitsoda
glove man was never stable

Since Obsidian's claim to fame was always taking other studio's games and making clunky, messy, but better in key ways sequels to them, we need the following to happen
>EA sells Dragon Age and Mass Effect to Obsidian
>Activision sells Arcanum to Obsidian
>Larian hands off Baldur's Gate 4 to Obsidian

Looks like Shitsidian will go bankrupt soon.

>>3868916
No, what people know as far as vidya goes is BG3.

>>3869471
I’m not sure which would be worse, Larian doing another Baldurs Gate, or Obsidian. Truly cursed

>>3869751
we almost got a obsidian bg3

>>3869755 (checked)
It would have been so good bros...

>>3869107
I dunno, having to shit out an unfinished game with the publisher breathing down your neck while going bankrupt might do that to you too.
>glove man was never stable
Perhaps, but they done did him dirty. Pretty sure he and his co-writer got the sack well before the entire studio got canned, which musta sucked extra hard.

>>3867696 (OP)
>Obsidian succeed
In what? Being the producers of AAA-priced barebones garbage that's only good at being made to look discount TES on trailers?

>>3868167
>Diablo 2 and its clones were going strong even in 2002 and all of them were 2d Isometric.
He said "zero supporting data"
2000s Blizzard had completely unrivaled brand strength in the PC games industry. No one else even came close. No retailer was going to deny Blizzard anything at that point in time.
>But Blizzard did...
>Will your game have that blue Blizzard logo on it?
>Well no
>Then fuck off

>>3869751
Old Obsidian it would have been a janky rushed mess but with some really interesting hook that gave it SOVL. New Obsidian it would be a janky rushed mess with the plot themes having the subtlety of a brick through your window.

>>3867696 (OP)
>what made Troika fail
Going by Tim Cain it was their "everyone is equal even though we three have our own entire savings & mortgages on the line and all the responsibility towards the publishers" nonsense that created most of their issues, along with some publisher fuckery and basically having hold down triple jobs except with the promise of not actually being bosses who could tell someone we're doing things X way and no ifs or buts about it so none of them want to do it again.

>>3869750
Even before BG3 there were millions of people playing 5E. 5E got hip years ago.

>>3867696 (OP)
>and what made Obsidian succeed?
If Obsidian is a success, then I hope I fail at everything for the rest of my life.

>>3869755
>Black Isles is le Obsidian
Kill yourself.

>>3867696 (OP)
Obsidian still exists but I wouldn't call it succeeding.