Road to Eternity, PoE behind the scenes.
 

An interesting behind the scenes on the financial dire straits that Obsidian was experiencing, leading up to their Kickstarter project.

https://vimeo.com/121305519

Hey, neat, video automatically embedded :)

It's a sneak peak at the behind the scene documentary promised in the Kickstarter. Looks like it's going to a quite awesome too, well as awesome as documentary can be.

I wonder, is this the making-of documentary? Did they promise one as a reward. I can't seem to remember.

EDIT: yeah, it seems it is. And it looks great. The beginning was really heart-breaking. The fact that these guys have it this hard, and the corporate machine keep spewing garbage and rakes in the big bucks.

Yes, it's a sneak peak at the making-of documentary.

What will be interesting to find out, is how many new buyers are out there that haven't already pre-purchased a copy. The money the game made on kickstarter has most likely run out. I'm sure Obsidian was able to get a line of credit established after it came in, but they need a lot of new sales to stay afloat. Eternity needs to knock it out of the park or that documentary may end up with a sad ending.

Thanks for the link, Drithius.

Well, Eternity hasn't been their only project since. They released the Stick of Truth to some pretty solid acclaim and I believe they have other projects they are working on now too. Eternity may have saved them, and may be able to take their studio to another level of it's successful (since the profit will be all theirs) but I doubt they are relying on it entirely at this point.

Hopefully the game and the reviews will be strong. I believe D:OS did very nicely on normal sales channels after release, so hopefully the same crowd will lap this up too.

Helping on Starforge and making Armored Warfare for Mail.ru (probably their biggest employer right now) and making a mobile (and PC) adventure card game based on Pathfinder for Paizo. That's the confirmed projects.

All these came after the Kickstarter though. They already had the money for the Stick of Truth and THQ went chapter 11 a few months after the KS ended. So they were effectively running dry.

Don't forget they also have a few expansions planned for the Pillars of Eterinity after its release, and they have been talking about a new Kickstarter for next year.

A CRPG Pathfiner game is also in the planning stages according to an interview last month. I'm sure they have other projects they haven't talked about yet either.

Link - http://www.rpgwatch.com/forums/showthread.php?t=27652
Link - http://www.rpgwatch.com/forums/showthread.php?t=27574

New Kickstarter: Arcanum spiritual successor.

I'd totally forgotten about the Stick of Truth. Did it sell well? Hopefully, they have some good fundage right now, but I think Pillars will sell pretty well. There are more crpg players than the 80,000 backers. Some 20 million folks bought Skyrim, so if 1/10th of those buy Eternity, that'd go a long ways to making them healthy.

No, just…no. Obsidian does not have the talent to even remotely touch Troika.

I would have to agree they're not in the same league, but I guess it's the best we can hope for when it comes to Troika remakes.

Any Pillars Of Eternity follow-up needs the game to sale well first (they blew the expac money on the main game). The Pathfinder cRPG is still in "discussion", Paizo's approval might also be pending PoE's success or failure (it haven't released yet, I won't be premature).

I'm sure there are plenty that haven't bought Pillars yet and are a "sure thing". I'm one of them.

Could you please buy 2 million copies, Todd? I want my made up number to be accurate :)

I think the stats show that only 10-15% of KS game sales are due to prefunded pledges. So… Theoretically they still have 80+% sales out there— granted, at a discount and minus the cut from Steam and GOG, but thats still several million potentially.

Anyway, I'm really looking forward to the finished documentary, and of course the game.

I think you are right Dart, but I would rather see Troika's work rest in peace rather than have a different company necro their games and risk turning them into shambling husks of their former glory.

Now, a "Troika 2" similar to OtherSide studios (Looking Glass), revived with the leading members of Troika? (Tim Cain, Leonard Boyarsky, etc.) Now that would be incredible.

I would back that game in an instant, but as I said in the other thread from last month all three are working for different game developers now. A man can dream though.:sleep:

Blizzard can keep Leonard Boyarsky though as he worked on Diablo III.:biggrin:

Yeah, I know that unfortunately Couch. Just one of those thoughts for "while we're talking about impossible pipe dreams…;)" Plus, Tim Cain has said multiple times that he no longer has the desire to be "in charge" again. I can't say I blame him in the slightest, but it's a great loss to gaming that the stress of running Troika burned him out on ever being in a prominent position again.