Gamasutra - Brian Fargo on RPG Legacy

An RPG also needs deep cause and effect, which helps with immersion. In The Bard's Tale, for example, early on you can be nice to a dog, or be mean to it. If you're nice to the dog, it follows you, and there are scenes that happen 10 or 20 hours in that have to do with the dog. If you were mean to it, you'll never see that content. On a more micro level, you need to make players feel the effect of a new weapon, every time they get one.

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Pre-production is especially important. "Once you're writing and designing a product, the best creativity tends to come in waves," he says. "Anybody could create something generic in about five seconds. True creativity tends to come in waves, and you can't do it in a crunch." So to Fargo, pre-production is when you need to come up with most of your story elements. When you're just focusing on implementation and you're operating under time pressure, you can't focus on story or creativity.

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