WorstUsernameEver
But best title ever!
Ex-Obsidian Jason Fader, who worked as a tech producer on Fallout: New Vegas and its downloadable content, has answered to a ton of questions during a Reddit "AMAA" Q&A, many of them dealing with the Fallout title from Obsidian which makes it newsworthy for us. Reddit's layout is, ehr, peculiar, so hopefully you'll appreciate the quotes:<blockquote>Just got Fallout NV with the steam sale. Crossing my fingers. What's your favorite DLC for New Vegas?
Old World Blues, by far! I loved the weekly reviews we would have of the build and cracking up at the new comedic lines that would go in. The voice acting talent was also great (Mmm... Doc Venture).
Speaking of Old World Blues, what gave you or your team the ideas to make it?
This DLC was the one where we "had fun with it". Any zany idea we wanted to do was fielded by our project director, Chris Avellone. Some ideas were used, others would not quite fit. We all rallied behind the theme of it since the concept itself was pure genius and hilarity. I often joked that OWB was "Wild Wasteland, the DLC".
As for where the idea itself came from, I believe it was from Chris's love of retro scifi and wanting to tell a story that was compelling, yet funny at times for the player.
(..)
Thank you for your work (and Obsidian in general) for FNV and its DLC. FNV is definitely one of my favorite RPGs ever and it gave us Fallout 2 fans great satisfaction. The references were small but all of them put a huge smile on my face.
One of my favorite parts of FNV was its DLC and how varied they are. It was awesome that you guys were able to step away from the traditional gameplay and try new things with DLC. I really liked Dead Money especially; that DLC was a blast to play on Hardcore mode. One of my favorite Fallout characters was from Dead Money, the one who didn't have much to say.
As a lead producer for the FNV DLC, what did you do? Contribute ideas? Made sure things were on schedule? Honest Hearts was a wonderful piece of DLC too, the environments were really cool.
Who was your favorite FNV companion? Where there things you had to cut that you wanted to include in the shipped game?
Thank you so much for the appreciation
As lead producer, I worked closely with the project director, Chris Avellone (and Josh Sawyer for Honest Hearts) to schedule and manage the team. Most of my team management was through my producers, and they in turn would schedule their teams. I also acted as the liaison for the team to Bethesda, communicating their feedback and facilitating any actions needed. On top of this, I was in charge of scheduling/managing the FNV patches. It was a tough balancing act to work on DLC's and patches at the same time, but I'm proud of my team and how hard they worked to make it all happen.
Honest Hearts was a great DLC! Josh went the extra mile (literally) and spent a week up in Zion National Park to ensure we got the area right.
Hmm... I think my favorite companion was ED-E. He didn't say much, but that kid had heart!
I probably can't talk about things that were cut, but there was an idea I had that didn't get very far. I had an idea to do a Wild Wasteland radio station modeled after Coast to Coast AM. Players would need to have the Wild Wasteland perk, and upon getting that perk they would get a quest to find a "tinfoil hat". Once they found the hat, wearing it would "tune" them into the radio station. The station itself was going to be an easter egg for the team where I voiced the show's host, and members of the FNV team would voice the show's callers. All of the calls would be a story the team member would think of, typically dealing with something weird/paranormal.
It was an early early idea that literally did not get past being an email. We didn't do it since we'd need to localize everything, which would break the easter egg of the team's voices being used :-/
(..)
I'm guessing that there aren't any more plans for another New Vegas DLC, is there?
And have you ever heard of the project Nevada mod for the game? It added some pretty sweet additions to the PC version that would've gone so well with the release of the game.
Not to my knowledge, though I haven't been at Obsidian for over 3 months now. Typically with a GOTY (Game of the Year) version of a game, all DLC for it is included and none more are made after. The Ultimate Edition of FNV includes all 6 DLC's.
Project Nevada was a great looking mod! When it came out, our project director, Josh Sawyer, showed it to the team (he follows the modding community very closely) and everyone thought it looked awesome. Frank Kowalkowski (lead programmer) checked it out in Josh's office for a few minutes and said "That looks really good on PC!" with an emphasis on the word 'PC'.
Project Nevada's enhancements would probably be a performance hit on the PS3 :-/
(..)
What location would you like to see the next Fallout game in? In what order were the DLC written? How do you decide what DLC to work on first and which to release first? Why did you make it so I couldn't go back to the town in Dead Money, that was something players hated about Fallout 3 DLC why wasn't it changed for NV? How did you try to top excellent Fallout 3 DLC like Broken Steal and the Pitt? I loved Dead Money, you did excellent work with the backstory and location and it was challenging. I will be purchasing the other DLC once I get a larger hard drive, good work man.
Switching to list mode to cleanly answer these!
• I was asked this question at an E3 once and I loved my answer. I would love to work on a Fallout game taking place in Hawaii so I could have an excuse to do "research" there paid for by the company
• They were pretty much written in order that they were released: Dead Monkey, Honest Hearts, Old World Blues, Lonesome Road
• The order of the DLC was pretty easy since Chris Avellone wanted to tell a continuous story, culminating with Ulysses in Lonesome Road. We just worked on them in that order
• For Dead Money, it was all about keeping the suspense high with limited resources. That would have been broken if the player could go back at any time and refuel their ammo and stimpak supply. For the rest of the DLC's, it came down to a design decision as each DLC is its own experience. In Old World Blues, however, you can go back to The Sink since we wanted to give the player a home that they could go back to after the DLC.
• We never thought to ourselves "How can we make this better than Fallout 3's DLC's?" Instead, the question was more about learning from Fallout 3, listening to the community, and creating the DLC that made the most sense for Fallout: New Vegas. I see Fallout 3's DLCs as brothers/sisters alongside FNV's DLCs all in one amazing family!
Thanks for the questions!</blockquote>There's a lot more at the link, including plenty of non-Fallout-related questions, so head there if you want to read more.
Old World Blues, by far! I loved the weekly reviews we would have of the build and cracking up at the new comedic lines that would go in. The voice acting talent was also great (Mmm... Doc Venture).
Speaking of Old World Blues, what gave you or your team the ideas to make it?
This DLC was the one where we "had fun with it". Any zany idea we wanted to do was fielded by our project director, Chris Avellone. Some ideas were used, others would not quite fit. We all rallied behind the theme of it since the concept itself was pure genius and hilarity. I often joked that OWB was "Wild Wasteland, the DLC".
As for where the idea itself came from, I believe it was from Chris's love of retro scifi and wanting to tell a story that was compelling, yet funny at times for the player.
(..)
Thank you for your work (and Obsidian in general) for FNV and its DLC. FNV is definitely one of my favorite RPGs ever and it gave us Fallout 2 fans great satisfaction. The references were small but all of them put a huge smile on my face.
One of my favorite parts of FNV was its DLC and how varied they are. It was awesome that you guys were able to step away from the traditional gameplay and try new things with DLC. I really liked Dead Money especially; that DLC was a blast to play on Hardcore mode. One of my favorite Fallout characters was from Dead Money, the one who didn't have much to say.
As a lead producer for the FNV DLC, what did you do? Contribute ideas? Made sure things were on schedule? Honest Hearts was a wonderful piece of DLC too, the environments were really cool.
Who was your favorite FNV companion? Where there things you had to cut that you wanted to include in the shipped game?
Thank you so much for the appreciation
As lead producer, I worked closely with the project director, Chris Avellone (and Josh Sawyer for Honest Hearts) to schedule and manage the team. Most of my team management was through my producers, and they in turn would schedule their teams. I also acted as the liaison for the team to Bethesda, communicating their feedback and facilitating any actions needed. On top of this, I was in charge of scheduling/managing the FNV patches. It was a tough balancing act to work on DLC's and patches at the same time, but I'm proud of my team and how hard they worked to make it all happen.
Honest Hearts was a great DLC! Josh went the extra mile (literally) and spent a week up in Zion National Park to ensure we got the area right.
Hmm... I think my favorite companion was ED-E. He didn't say much, but that kid had heart!
I probably can't talk about things that were cut, but there was an idea I had that didn't get very far. I had an idea to do a Wild Wasteland radio station modeled after Coast to Coast AM. Players would need to have the Wild Wasteland perk, and upon getting that perk they would get a quest to find a "tinfoil hat". Once they found the hat, wearing it would "tune" them into the radio station. The station itself was going to be an easter egg for the team where I voiced the show's host, and members of the FNV team would voice the show's callers. All of the calls would be a story the team member would think of, typically dealing with something weird/paranormal.
It was an early early idea that literally did not get past being an email. We didn't do it since we'd need to localize everything, which would break the easter egg of the team's voices being used :-/
(..)
I'm guessing that there aren't any more plans for another New Vegas DLC, is there?
And have you ever heard of the project Nevada mod for the game? It added some pretty sweet additions to the PC version that would've gone so well with the release of the game.
Not to my knowledge, though I haven't been at Obsidian for over 3 months now. Typically with a GOTY (Game of the Year) version of a game, all DLC for it is included and none more are made after. The Ultimate Edition of FNV includes all 6 DLC's.
Project Nevada was a great looking mod! When it came out, our project director, Josh Sawyer, showed it to the team (he follows the modding community very closely) and everyone thought it looked awesome. Frank Kowalkowski (lead programmer) checked it out in Josh's office for a few minutes and said "That looks really good on PC!" with an emphasis on the word 'PC'.
Project Nevada's enhancements would probably be a performance hit on the PS3 :-/
(..)
What location would you like to see the next Fallout game in? In what order were the DLC written? How do you decide what DLC to work on first and which to release first? Why did you make it so I couldn't go back to the town in Dead Money, that was something players hated about Fallout 3 DLC why wasn't it changed for NV? How did you try to top excellent Fallout 3 DLC like Broken Steal and the Pitt? I loved Dead Money, you did excellent work with the backstory and location and it was challenging. I will be purchasing the other DLC once I get a larger hard drive, good work man.
Switching to list mode to cleanly answer these!
• I was asked this question at an E3 once and I loved my answer. I would love to work on a Fallout game taking place in Hawaii so I could have an excuse to do "research" there paid for by the company
• They were pretty much written in order that they were released: Dead Monkey, Honest Hearts, Old World Blues, Lonesome Road
• The order of the DLC was pretty easy since Chris Avellone wanted to tell a continuous story, culminating with Ulysses in Lonesome Road. We just worked on them in that order
• For Dead Money, it was all about keeping the suspense high with limited resources. That would have been broken if the player could go back at any time and refuel their ammo and stimpak supply. For the rest of the DLC's, it came down to a design decision as each DLC is its own experience. In Old World Blues, however, you can go back to The Sink since we wanted to give the player a home that they could go back to after the DLC.
• We never thought to ourselves "How can we make this better than Fallout 3's DLC's?" Instead, the question was more about learning from Fallout 3, listening to the community, and creating the DLC that made the most sense for Fallout: New Vegas. I see Fallout 3's DLCs as brothers/sisters alongside FNV's DLCs all in one amazing family!
Thanks for the questions!</blockquote>There's a lot more at the link, including plenty of non-Fallout-related questions, so head there if you want to read more.
