Krantos said:
Mr. Grey said:
Krantos said:
I know the complaint is always that they weren't given enough time, but Alpha Protocol was shamelessly delayed repeatedly and it was still unbalanced and buggy as hell.
I think Obsidian wanted to cancel it, but Sega wouldn't let them. So what became an exciting game, eventually became mowing the lawn with a broken down lawn mower. Responsibilities be damned! They can't mow the lawn with a broken lawn mower. Sega hands them a hedge clippers, for some reason, and tells them to continue anyways, it's hard to cut the lawn even with hedge clippers. Really hard... and it takes a long time.
Or that's the story I've heard. Don't know how much of it is true, but considering how Alpha Protocol ended up, it sounds like something Obsidian would want to cancel.
That's possible, but there's definitely a pattern here. Every Obsidian title to come out so far has had great potential but poor execution, and, every time, someone comes along behind and tries to pin the blame on the producer. If it was just one game I'd be willing to give them the benefit of the doubt, but that's been the story for every game they've made.
Like I said, I really want to like Obsidian because they do tend to be very innovative, but I can't have much respect for a company with that kind of track record.
They definitely need to be paired up with a company that knows how to program. Let Obsidian do all of the story and the crazy ideas, then have a competent development team handle the programming and execution. Then we just need them to relay information with each other smoothly as the Publisher oversees the project. Hopefully they'd work together and make a game instead of develop a harsh rivalry, it could happen.
And I agree, Obsidian always ends up like this. However Lucas Arts did create a fiasco when they released the
Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords for a Christmas release much to the chagrin of Obsidian. I don't know much about what went on with
Neverwinter Nights 2, but I enjoyed the game... so I don't think I'm the guy to be scrounging around for information regarding whether or not it "failed".
Alpha Protocol I haven't played, but it seems that anyone that wasn't a "professional" reviewer seemed to enjoy it despite its flaws. Although, it's all whether or not you have the threshold to ignore the problems and have fun or the luck to never run into the problems. I don't know though, I've heard Obsidian worked on
Fallout: New Vegas during the near end of
Alpha Protocol, so it may be that they never wanted to cancel
Alpha Protocol, but postpone it till they can give it the full attention it needed. Which Sega denied and apparently due to all of the delays that I never payed attention to, they do have a right do so, but the game suffers for it.
Why would they need to postpone it? Well there was that whole Interplay/Bethesda Legal Battle... I wouldn't be surprised if Bethesda put something similar in their contract.
I don't know though, just trying to make a rational explanation for what went on and why. Because Obsidian does have the potential to make a full game... but bugs were never Black Isle's strong suit, so why would it be for Obsidian which is just a fragment of the old team? Maybe that's the explanation there, simple and to the point. Even Black Isle bugged out an entire ending for the Followers of the Apocalypse in
Fallout which they never fixed.
I may very well just leave it that Black Isle hasn't changed all that much when it comes to bugs and cut content. And since there's only a fraction of them left... well, that would explain why they're having such terrible luck. What they need are better contracts, but being an independent company doesn't really give them the freedom or exercise to do so.