Dungeon Siege III Community Q&A, Part Three

The folks at Obsidian published the third part of their community Q&A with Dungeon Siege III’s lead designer Nathaniel Chapman on their official blog, and it seems this is the last installment that will deal with Obsidian’s hack’n’slash as the Q&A veers towards broader (but still RPG-related) territories. Here’s a sampling:

greenpeas asked: I play the game on PC, and really like it there (the keybinding helped me, though I only made very minor changes from default). Did you talk about simply not doing the game for PC? This forum suggests to me that PC gamers were always going to be angsty about a game on PC and console, particularly if the game was going to go for such a streamlined skills tree (no complaints from me there). PC folks were always going to yell (consolitis) because it offends their deep and complicated dignities about their mode of entertainment. I almost hate to ask, but is PC still worth it?

Sure, PC (generally speaking) is worth it. The questions are really the type of game, the budget, the control scheme, and the opinions of the PC market PC gamers are very passionate about the platform and what they do and don’t want from PC games. Ultimately those are really the same considerations, when you’re developing for any other platforms, but in some cases they are magnified on PC.

One note: I do disagree that we have a more streamlined level-up system when compared to the earlier Dungeon Siege games. The level up and skill system from DS was actually quite simple simpler than ours, for sure. I often think we’re really compared to games like WoW and Diablo 2 when people say (This isn’t as complex as Dungeon Siege.). Now, that’s okay, people can compare us to whoever they want but the issue isn’t that our mechanics are not as complex as Dungeon Siege 1 or 2, but instead that we’re not as complex as [insert Hardcore PC RPG here].

.and now on to a few questions about general industry and game design topics:

Purkake asked: What kind(genre + setting) of a game would you like to make if you could freely choose your next project?

I really want to make a turn-based tactical RPG for the iPad/iPhone that hails back to the original Fallouts in terms of (oldschool RPG-ness). That’s probably my dream genre at this point. I think that platform has an awesome interface for those kinds of games, and the market is there, too.
Or maybe a Space Sim (like the old X-Wing and Wing Commander games) for the consoles. I think you could do map those games controls over to consoles really well now. Heck, if they could make a decent port of Wing Commander on the SNES, we could easily do it on a 360 🙂

I wouldn’t necessarily want to do something post-apocalyptic, though. There are a ton of settings I’ve been kicking around in my head for a long time but I don’t know that they’d exactly be mass market successes. Historical+Fantasy settings always appeal to me. Western Fantasy something like Deadlands could be pretty darn cool. Same with Eastern Fantasy something like Legend of the Five Rings. I’ve always wanted to make a straight historical game set in the Taifa period of Spanish History (11th-13th centuries roughly). I think the complex political, religious and ethnic tensions would make a great opportunity for an RPG like Darklands or even a strategy game with RPG elements something like Castles. Or a sci-fi setting that deals with themes like humanity’s exploration into genetic and environmental modification, cybernetics, or digital life. they’re all potentially very interesting.