Chris Avellone

[mattbarton.exe]

Hi, guys. I've got a firm commitment from Chris Avellone! I have plenty of ideas for things to talk to him about, but wanted to put this out in case you had some ideas or questions you want me to ask. If he's up for it, I might try for another multi-part series, or at least put the entire thing up later on Armchair Arcade.

P.S. I don't know how many of you guys keep up with that, but I did finally post the entire John Romero interview (audio only). Here's the link:

http://armchairarcade.com/neo/node/3236

[gilgamesh]

Just great!

Read somewhere that that PS:Torment was designed to be even weirder then it actually happened to be. I wonder what it would have looked like if the designers would have had a free hand.

And there were plans for three sequels, some quite advanced...

[Falcon Flight]

mattbarton.exe:

-ask him how much his work on Fallout 2 when he was a noob influenced his dialogue heavy Planescape: Torment.
-what did he think of Bethesda's casual noob Fallout 3. Did he lawl?
-what did he/does he think of Troika's Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura. Does he wish he worked on it?
-who else should get lots of credit for Planescape's design as he's normally the only one mentioned by fans when that game comes up in conversation.
-what is with his infatuation with old hags like Ravel (Ravel is probably his most interesting char - I'm sure he'd agree). Is his interest in old women seers personal or acquired from reading novels?
-the women in HoW and Icewind Dale 2 who are like or who maybe _were_ Ravel. Was that Avellone or Sawyer's work?
-what books did he read that enabled him to express intricacies of death so well (PST's mortuary, MOTB's Myrkul furnace etc.)
-ask him if some inspiration for Akachi's avatar battle (The Faceless Man) was got from Ocarina's Dark Link.
-does Obsidian own any IP from Planescape/Icewind Dale 2? If so, what?
-does he miss the days of Interplay/Black Isle/Troika? Surely these were the greatest three rpg devs of all time?
-why does Obsidian always wear the cast off clothes of a long-gone guest?

ty.

[gilgamesh]

Just read the Torment outline. Did the game eventually meet his expectations? Why was the name changed from "Last Rites"?

Which one does he like better, Torment or Fallout franchise? What do they mean to him after 12 years after?

Why are people still obsessed with them? Which aspects of design make a game a classic?

Which is the most satisfying, making RPGs in P&P, 2D or in 3D?

My fanboy rant is over for this time.

EDIT: Does he still espouse "world simulation" in CRPGs?

[mattbarton.exe]

Thanks, Falcon Flight and Gilgamesh. Thanks to you, I'll sound like a true insider asking Chris these questions! Hopefully, he'll have lots of time and we can do another huge interview. Looking at FF's questions, a few might be just quick email type questions I could share here. Each one is brilliant, though. Even reading the questions makes me see things in the game I didn't see before. I don't think I could ask him that question about the hag without laughing out loud, though!!!

Gilgamesh's questions are great. Those are open-ended enough to keep him busy for a long time. I have to admit, from talking to him over email he seems like a very, very cool dude. Assuming I'm up to the task, we'll have an EPIC interview.