Tim Cain interview at The Greyhawk Chronicles

Michael_Wolf · Jan 9, 2003

Hi!

I interviewed Tim Cain about Arcanum, Fallout and his upcoming game Greyhawk. The questions and answers can be read here:
http://www.sturmwolf.de/greyhawk/timcaininterview.html

:D

To TimCain: Thank you!!!!!

triCritical · Jan 9, 2003

Great interview.

The only thing that kind of made me nervous was when he said he was exploring non-rpg adventures in the arcanum setting.

Anyhow, is the Greyhawk Inn that crappy IGN board?

HanoverF · Jan 9, 2003

Arcanum FPS:
Of Nailguns and Rockit Jumping

Saint_Proverbius · Jan 9, 2003

triCritical said:
Anyhow, is the Greyhawk Inn that crappy IGN board?

Probably, they love the "<game name> Inn" theme for their forums.

Though, it's rather funny everyone's calling it "Greyhawk" instead of ToEE, when Greyhawk is just the setting for the game.

Mistress · Jan 9, 2003

Saint_Proverbius said:
Probably, they love the "<game name> Inn" theme for their forums.

Though, it's rather funny everyone's calling it "Greyhawk" instead of ToEE, when Greyhawk is just the setting for the game.

Yes...it doesn't make sense to me. The game is called Temple of Elemental Evil. It uses the Greyhawk setting - hence "Greyhawk:...", much like "Planescape: Torment", you wouldn't just refer to it as "Planescape".

DrattedTin · Jan 9, 2003

It's a matter of convenience.

"Greyhawk Inn" sounds much cooler than "ToEE Inn" which sounds like a hangout for the local gang of chiropodists.

SexExitium · Jan 10, 2003

DrattedTin · Jan 11, 2003

Ahh!

You understand implicitly.

Saint_Proverbius · Jan 11, 2003

I don't know, I'd think they'd want the forum to reflect the name of the game, not the setting of the game. I'm sure their KotOR forum isn't called, "Star Wars Inn".

triCritical · Jan 12, 2003

Any news on a new forum, that isn't filled with idiots, that the dev's might visit?

Saint_Proverbius · Jan 12, 2003

triCritical said:
Any news on a new forum, that isn't filled with idiots, that the dev's might visit?

If there were more conversations on the subject here, I'd consider making a ToEE forum here.

triCritical · Jan 13, 2003

Saint_Proverbius said:
If there were more conversations on the subject here, I'd consider making a ToEE forum here.

How possible would it be to get in touch with Troika and have the official forum here, or at least officially unofficial. I think it you would have more traffic, if there were some official sites like Troika, that would possible link to a forum. And I have seen Tim Cain post of DAC, so I do not see why they would not post here. Who knows? I just know that I find the IGN forums unbearable.

Walks with the Snails · Jan 14, 2003

If you could get Tim Cain or other developers here it might be nice. As it is, there really isn't all that much to talk about yet. Reading thousands of posts of speculation about a game before it comes out never makes it any more fun, anyway. Why not just talk about existing games instead.

Ausir · Jan 14, 2003

Tim has already posted at RPGC. Look here:
http://www.rpgcodex.com/phpBB/viewtopic ... 2&start=50

Akilae · Jan 14, 2003

Though, I don't understand why they use the 3rd AD&D engine. I mean It's far from being the best engine around, it's expensive and it's design for dungeon crawl & monster bashing anyway. I know they can't use GURPS because steve jackson is such a jackass (Remember the genesis of Fallout) or reuse SPECIAL 'cause it belongs to Interplay now but it's better to develope a real role playing rules set than just relie on an obsolete set of rules to sell a game.

AD&D is not middleware, it's P&P engine, why do they think it's good for CRPGs anyway... (middleware is software designed to be reused by other softwares like quake III engine and Masa AI) It's not a way to take a shortcut in a game developement, People buy Quake or unreal engines because it takes to long to make one from scratch but creating a new set of rules is cheap and doesn't divert programmers from their main tasks.

I understand AD&D is a reliable way to ensure that the game will be sold enought but it's not the best wayto do it and if Tim Cain starts to make commercial games we're kinda... screwed...

MF · Jan 14, 2003

Well. It's the setting. With that setting comes a statistical system. People will recognize it.
That's not the problem. The problem is implementing it. I think Tim will do fine.

Akilae · Jan 14, 2003

I hope you're right but even then, the AD&D package is... well, the whole package that doesn't suit the CRPG environement. I believe that troika has the experience needed to write a set of rules and build a whole gaming world from scratch. I know Arcanum was a commercial failure and the should be in need of money soon, so when Infogrames contacted them the couldn't throw the contracts through the winow, but I regret they don't seem to be on the way to make the greatest RPG ever.

But, hey, I must be wrong... I hope I am...

Araanor · Jan 15, 2003

Two things:

1. Arcanum was not a commercial failure.
2. Tim wanted to make a game in a more classical fantasy setting.

Saint_Proverbius · Jan 15, 2003

Arcanum didn't sell as well as it should have, then again, Sierra held off releasing the game while the warez version had a little over two months of availability. Not too many games would sell well after that.

Akilae · Jan 15, 2003

... and the warez sucked without the manual. If Arcanum had sold as it should have, Troika would be able to hold any publisher by the balls and say stuff like:"We'll release it when it's done, quit bothering us." But developing games is a tricky buisness, because a game concept doesn't worth a buck. Until you have a "playable" you dont earn anything and even if you have one, you still gotta find a publisher willing to give you the money to complet it, hire extras like sound people, additional artists, buy middleware licenses or just keep the payroll on.

Releasing a "playable" isn't easy, it's not cheap either.you keep paying your employes, you still need expensive software and hardware and you have to come up with an idea very soon while basically working for free.

As far as I understand; that was the situation for troika when Infogrames arrived. It appears that some clever guy at Infogrames spotted the talent of Troika's people and their technology and convinced the marketing bastards that the game would sell 'coz-it-has-AD&D-inside-like-Baldur's-gate-which-sold-well-and-made-a-lotta-shiny-money. The maketing crooks don't give a shit about the game being made by Tim Cain or Leon Boyarsky but they think they are very smart 'coz they will sell a game like Baldur's Gate or Neverwinter Nights. It's a good opportunity for Troika too because the game will most likely sell, it will ge deep and everything like they want it to be but I think they would like to put in an original setting and use an original game engine as they always did. I find unfortunate that they have to work with a rules set and a setting that aren't designed for their purposes.

MW: Arcanum has a lot of NPC interaction, but as far as I know, the original ToEE was very combat-intensive. Are you planning to change ToEE a little bit to have more roleplaying possibilities in "Greyhawk - ToEE"?

TC: Yes. I believe we have changed it a lot. First, third edition D&D has a lot of support for role-playing besides combat, such as its dialog skills like Diplomacy, Bluff, Intimidate and Sense Motive. And second, Troika is known for its multiple paths to follow through quests and through the story. Together, these provide a lot of roleplaying opportunity beyond the mere hack and slash that people associate with dungeon adventures

See ? My point is that the have to rework the whole stuff that wasn't absolutly necessary in the first place. I already know i wont be able to play a bard wondering through the Flanaess, telling tales and singing songs to anybody willing to spare a coin or two. Once more I'll have to be the hero and save the widow and the orphan from some ancient evil from... whatever...

chrisbeddoes · Jan 15, 2003

Saint_Proverbius said:
, Sierra held off releasing the game while the warez version had a little over two months of availability..

It was more like 3 months in certain countries in europe.

chrisbeddoes · Jan 15, 2003

Person A
Hey we just sent out the press copies. Lets release the game.
Person B No no localization . We need 3 months then we will release it.
Person A But its gonna be copied like hell.
Person B No no don't worry . All the persons that we sent the press copies are good guys !!!
Person A
Ahh and what about the Devaince gaming site .
Person B
what ?
Person A
Are they trustworth ? I am not able to find their site on the web ?
Person C
Do not worry . They were reccomended by the Care and Pissa Moth and Intansion gaming sites !!!!
Person A
I cannot seem to find these gaming review sites either.

Person B to Person A

Look i know that you are new here but here we do as the boss says .
They said localisation first no matter . You want to have problems with the boss ?

Person A Ehh of course not . Localisation as the boss says . The boss is god .
Person B
Good person A . There still hope for you in this buziness.

Akilae · Jan 15, 2003

Yeah, why do the publisher dudes have to act like jerks? It's weird, isnt it? They always try to remplace cool features with features that sound cool or features that were cool in the last best seller... I know they never played a game in their entire life but thats no excuse for moronic behavior, being a moron is the only excuse for such behavior.

Shipping unfinished games is so damn stupid, leaking it 2 month before is really stupid and doing it in a that gives bad publicity to the game is Definitly-so-so-very-with-a-cherry-on-the-top-frikin'-stupid that i wonder if they did it un purpose. They must be there to punish developers that were naughty kids or something...

SexExitium · Jan 16, 2003

Sol Invictus · Jan 16, 2003

That's because publishers generally do a pretty shitty job at marketing good games. They devote most of their time to marketing sweaty sheets of cum rags like the Aribeth poster in the NWN collector's edition box.

Tim Cain interview at The Greyhawk Chronicles

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