Wasteland 2

Chris Keenan (Producer) John Alvarado ( Technical Director )

Wasteland 2 is an upcoming post-apocalyptic computer role-playing game from inXile Entertainment Brian Fargo. It is the sequel to the 1988 released Wasteland. The graphic representation is shown an isometric perspective and turn-based battles run. The game has been funded via the Internet platform Kickstarter.com by crowdfunding. Within 42 hours, it reached the on the platform then the highest targeted funding target of U.S. $ 900,000 and was ultimately supported by over three million dollars. According to Tim Schafer's publicity funding success for the Double Fine adventure it was the second major attempt by a long-standing game developer to revitalize a formerly popular computer game genre with the help of a Fanfinanzierung on Kickstarter. The game should appear in 2014. It is since the end of 2013 in an open beta test and is available on Steam's Early Access.

• 2.1 Vision Document
• 2.2 Character System
• 2.3 game world

• 3.1 Background
• 3.2 Financing
• 3.3 Production

• 5.1 Prior to the publication

Action

Prehistory

Wasteland is set in an alternate timeline. In 1998, it came in the wake of meteorite impacts on Earth to a nuclear world war between the U.S. and the Soviet Union, which destroyed much of the world's population. The few survivors of the Apocalypse fought henceforth against the hostile environment and their fellow human beings. A group of survivors were U.S. Army engineers who just were staying at the time of the disaster to the bridge in a desert in the southwestern United States. They occupied out a nearby newly built prison and seeking assistance granted from the neighborhood shelter. From prison, the Ranger Center was created and how the Texas and Arizona Rangers draw from the former military engineers the Desert Rangers, the Wild West, through the desert. The first part takes place in the year 2087, and the second part 15 years later.

Style

As in the first part, the style and pop culture allusions refers mainly to the 1980s. The embossed steel, concrete and glass architecture of the 70s, 80s and 90s can be found not only in the nuclear winter dominated, bleak and barren environments, but also in the nature reconquered, green, overgrown cities. From the leftover remnants of civilization, the inhabitants of the Wastelands produce their means of living. The world should turn out colorful than in many other post-apocalyptic game settings. On a dark, humorous note should be placed well worth in the first part. In addition, there is a sometimes bizarre world, which manifests itself in the ways how people depart from this.

Gameplay

Vision Document

Brian Fargo published on June 11, 2012 in a Kickstarter update a Vision Document, in which the fundamental vision was formulated for the game. In addition to the history and style of the game, the gameplay is shown therein.

The RPG genre has, according to Fargo neglected central role-playing elements in recent years. Role-playing games, which are characterized just by playing a certain role itself, would not have evolved through frequent focus on the newest technology, artistic limitations, complete musical settings and platform independence, this central aspect of the role play, but stunted. A central feature of Wasteland 2 is therefore the adaptation ( customization) of the game to the player. This not only affects the game world, the game characters and the style of play, but also the game interface and game options.

" True RPGs allow options, allow you to make fundamental choices in customization and character creation, and most importantly, allow you to role-play and make your impact in a living world and see The Consequences around you. "

Due to the large decision-making and freedom of movement that should allow the player to Wasteland 2 is an open world game. Conversations to have an influence on the course of history, the game atmosphere and the game. Struggles also provide a key element of the game is, turn-based run and tactically, but are not out of hand.

In addition, playing with a group is central, which can be composed of player controlled characters and NPCs ( non-player character ). For tasks and struggles of the different abilities of the group are to be used, the possibility of group division is designed to provide additional game depth.

The game world reacts to the player's actions ( cause and effect) creating a complex and variable gameplay should be possible. The reactivity of the game world to the player's actions should be both short-term and long- term nature. Different solutions for tasks and behaviors have consequences for the game. The story is developed by using the game mechanics and the player's actions and not driven primarily through cutscenes.

Character System

The character system of the player characters working without a fixed classes, but instead define the characters similar to the predecessor about their attributes. Is the basis for Wasteland 2 designed CLASSIC attribute system. The acronym is derived from the seven passive attributes, each player character: Charisma, Luck ( luck), awareness ( perception), strength ( strength ), speed (velocity), intelligence ( intelligence) and Coordination (Coordination).

From the attributes themselves, inter alia, the underlying assets of the different skills ( abilities), which possess the characters and apply them in the game world calculate. The skill in performing one of the 30 skills can be increased at a Level, by application of skill and by special items. Also, the skill system has been developed on the basis of the system in Wasteland.

Through various actions, such as the successful completing of missions, battles, etc may experience points are obtained, which lead from a certain height to level rise and thus improve the player characters.

Game world

The Ranger team moves in different venues such as settlements or industrial complexes that are interconnected via a world map. The scenes are represented by a moving camera angle from above ( " isometric " perspective). The team explored the localities in carrying out tasks in discussions, shops and struggles.

In turn-based combat mode unlike in the first part not the entire group also leads an attack from, but the characters (players and non- player characters ) perform on the field according to their action points individually acts. Tactical elements include fields of view for opponents, the use of coverage and combat environment in general, different hit probability modifiers, the influence of character attributes and skills, different ammo, simultaneous attack, and other elements. The combat system is more oriented towards the Fallout series ( Fallout Tactics ) than Wasteland.

Wasteland 2 uses a modernized keyword dialogue system. The player can be obtained by exploring the game world and in particular conversations keywords that open up new dialogue options. The response of non-player characters depends on a number of factors that result from the actions of the player and his player characters.

The player explores and travels by means of a world map ( 2D & 3D Overview sensing) free the different geographical regions. In addition to the main venues, there are also smaller sideshows as well as resources in the Wastelands. When traveling on the world map the water supply of the team and opponents must be paid to nuclear radiation. Different skills and attributes as well as objects can travel, explore and survive easier.

Development

Background

Wasteland is often regarded as the first post-apocalyptic computer role-playing game. Already recognized for publication, it was later sometimes even acted as a classic. Although there was a desire for a sequel to Wasteland to Interplay times on the part of developers, this did not materialize due to trademark issues. Instead, it was developed with Fallout (1997) applied a similar game, which soon reached cult status and attracted many sequels. Also for this game series possessed Fargo no more rights with the decline of Interplay's and his departure early 2000s. In June 2003, he earned about his new development company inXile the naming rights to Wasteland by Electronic Arts. As a result Fargo tried several times unsuccessfully to convince publishers of the financing of a successor. As part of the crowdfunding success of Double Fine Adventures Fargo finally tried 12 March 2012 within 35 days an official successor using the crowdfunding platform to fund online Kickstarter. Chris Keenan, producer of the game, this is described in a Forbes interview follows:

" After a year of meeting after meeting, we started to feel like this was not going to happen. Brian had literally shelved the pitch document a week before Tim Schaefer did his Double Fine Adventure campaign. The next day after Schaefer funded, Brian immediately said that we needed to start looking into this and prepare for a Wasteland Kickstarter. We spent the next few weeks with our heads down creating our video, rewards, polling the community and getting our idea together. This way, We Could see if the fans really wanted this game or if the publishers were right and there which no market. We figured it was a win / win. Either we'd get support or know to stop wasting our time. Well, I think you know which way did went ... "

Financing

According to the project created for the Kickstarter campaign to Wasteland 2 should be closely aligned to the first part, so faithfully implement the retro concept gameplay and game mechanics in "old school " style. Old school in this context meant the deliberate departure from the current, with critics perceived as superficial game development trends such as casual gaming or focus on visual presentation. Developer inXile presented the concept of an RPG with turn-based battles and heroic group, in which the freedom of the player to have consequences for the game. InXile promised to all interested fans to involve them throughout the production process into the development process and to respond to requests and suggestions.

Donors were able to acquire the right to a DRM-free download version of the game from an amount of $ 15. At higher amounts of money in addition to other compensation was the right to shape a part of the game world to a limited extent. These included the right to nominate descriptions and background objects, characters or places, or the name will appear in the game as a statue or in the form of a shrine. The required minimum sum of U.S. $ 900,000 has already been achieved in less than 48 hours. Funding was successfully completed on April 17. The developer could ultimately occupy 2,933,147 U.S. dollars on Kickstarter. There were $ 107,522, which were provided by an alternative donation options using the payment provider Paypal via the corporate website available. Overall, more than 63,000 people paid money. About 30,000 of them paid $ 15 to get a digital copy of the game. Twelve people secured the highest compensation offer to $ 10,000. This includes, inter alia, Min- Liang Tan, CEO of computer accessory manufacturer Razer, the winking thus established his donation that he played in his youth, the first part in a pirated version, and would like to settle with his payment now. The significantly higher revenue enabled inXile during the financing process called stretch goals to be defined, ie pledge more product modifications above a certain income level. See also the opinion of the community was obtained. This led to a significant expansion of the scope of the game and a port on the operating systems Linux and Mac OS X. Furthermore, it was by Chris Avellone of Obsidian Entertainment are gained as a designer. Fargo met with Obsidian also an agreement on the exchange of development tools, mainly in the dialog builder and the design area. From the success of the project, Fargo was impressed:

"Of course I was hoping that we reach our stated goal, but the reaction from the fans was really overwhelming. I have received hundreds of emails, where fans write that they have not so happy in the last ten years on a computer game. This is something I did not expect. "

Fargo expressed later convinced that crowdfunding will occupy a place in the future in the financing of certain games. In fact, developed with Schaefers Adventure 2012, a new form of financing for games with relatively small or medium budget. During 2010, Kickstarter only about half a million was invested in games, flowed in 2012 more than 80 million dollars, seven games reached a financing of over one million dollars. Fargo also emphasized the entirely new relationship between game developers and players in the financing, which will affect the production of games and the games themselves.

" Through online distribution platforms like Steam, you can minimize the influence of the interests of retail. And through crowdfunding to the Publisher. Now, players and game developers can move at eye level. That was not possible before. "

Production

The present even before the Kickstarter funding basic concept, which had been previously submitted to various publishers for evaluation, was drafted by Fallout developers and Troika Founder Jason D. Anderson, who, however, had left the studio December, 2010. According InXiles commitment to a transparent development process with Fanbeteiligung Brian Fargo published on June 11, 2012, a document with the current production concept that the main objectives of the development work formulated (Vision Document ).

For the game's development studio manager Fargo recruited numerous designers and artists from the former Interplay environment. From the team of the original Wasteland core developer Michael A. Stackpole works, which mainly was in the meantime as science fiction and fantasy author works, the design and the story. Alan and Liz Danforth Pavlushina, who also cooperated in Wasteland, designing parts of the game world and are consulting services. Further support came from the original designer Ken St. Andre. Another former Black Isle designers involved: in addition to Chris Avellone has been with Colin McComb ( Torment Fallout 2, Planescape ). For the music composer Mark Morgan ( Fallout, Fallout 2, Planescape: Torment ) was committed. Chris Keenan has worked as a producer and designer, Andree Wallin was hired for the concept art. For scientific questions a team of consultants was used.

The first six months of development are devoted according to plan Fargo's pre-production. During this time, the whole design of the game is to be done as far as developed so that it can be played by pen and paper. At the same time, the technical principles and tools should also be sufficiently developed so that production can begin the game in a row with a reinforced team, which is estimated at twelve months.

"The best production process is pretty fluid ... so I hate to commit to exactly how things roll out but I can tell you did 90 % of the writing / design will happen by October [note 2012]. Scripting will start in about a month from now [note End of August 2012] on the levels did are done. I plan to have all levels in and scripted by April [note 2013 ] Malthus leaving another 6 months for iteration and play test. "

With the start of pre-production to put inXile for the Unity engine fixed as the backbone of production. The reasons were technical director John Alvarado to the existing support for common engine development software such as 3ds Max and Adobe Photoshop, the integrated version control for assets and programming code as well as a comprehensive support of the provider and a large supply of already finished assets.

In order to integrate those interested in the production process of the plant, different methods were used. About the service Google Moderator nearly 200,000 votes were cast to nearly 2,000 ideas to the game. The private forum also different questions were put to the vote, or collected ideas for missions and other aspects in the game. A oftmaliger wish the community was, for example, to include the first part of the series in the publication of Wasteland 2. The company EA, rights holders of the first part, inXile authorized the publication. Another important aspect of the Fanbeteiligung the game is to allow easier modification of subsequent games to modify for example, the original game or create entirely new game content.

To make the game world with the available human and financial resources in the planned production period varied than would otherwise be possible, the Unity and Wasteland community was called in early December 2012 specific graphics models of the game environment, such as Wrecked cars, houses, robots, etc. to design for the game world in the wake of a crowdsourcing. Selected assets are bought by inXile to conventional Unity store prices for Wasteland 2, the further exploitation rights for the work shall remain with the designers of the models. The Umgebungsdesiger Koy Vanoteghem said in an interview on crowdsourcing as follows:

"Wasteland 2 was a crowdsourcing experiment from the very beginning ... So, did Extending concept to the production side of things what an idea did evolved pretty quickly. [ ... ] Failure or success aside, this experiment Has been great for us in our effort to get more involvement from the community. [ ...] [ N] o one shoulderstand confuse this effort with to opportunity to find cheap labor. This Has as much to do with connecting with our fans as it does acquiring much needed assets. Truthfully, the time it takes to collect, review, fix and modify assets synthesis is not insignificant. "

On February 9, 2013, the game was first presented by means of an environment contained in the final game in a 15 -minute gameplay video. In related Kickstarter update was given regarding the level of development that one is at about the middle of production. Mid- March 2013 was Fargo is known about the short message service Twitter that you make great progress, the second phase of the production process - complete end of April - creating the level and scripting. In mid-July 2013, said in an update that Wasteland 2 probably is the largest role-playing game in which he had been involved. Because of the larger budgets and scope of the game, the production time would be extended, one would be located about six weeks behind the original production plan, however, should in about a month a version of the game exist, which includes all the key performance functions and all levels.

After the game a little circle was presented to testers, it should start in October 2013 in the beta phase to complete the game using reactions of the players. The beta was finally released in early December.

Distribution

Digital distribution is made possible by inXile via different online distribution platforms, including Origin, Steam and GOG.com. The physical copy of the game and other material offers as part of the Kickstarter campaign logistically distributed by Deep Silver. The sale price of the game is higher for regular buyers for those who purchased the game during the Kickstarter funding. December 2013 Wasteland 2 was released on Steam in an Early Access version, which among other things Granted access to the beta version of the game and also includes the predecessor Wasteland.

Reception

Prior to the publication

Since Wasteland 2 was one of the first major, funded by crowdfunding computer games, it was not only in trade magazines mention but also in the general media coverage of the new phenomenon. Not only because of its new funding, but also because the game is the sequel to one of the most important early role-playing games and is a game genre to be revived with the project, the game has been discussed in the professional world. On Chip.de example, was commented:

"After more than 20 years, returns one of the best games of all time. By fans, for fans, true to the old Interplay slogan 'By Gamers, For Gamers. " The fact that Brian Fargo, the old ' band ' around flocking lets hope in a playful feat. And the fact that guarantees must not talk in between Publisher lets hope a milestone away from the thousand durchgenudelten mainstream sequels of the last total rather sad games years. "

It has sometimes been referred to the connection with the first two parts of the Fallout series.

" [ A] true Fallout sequel would be a top-down, Strategically based tactical combat game with extremely non-linear game play, infinite replayability, sharp writing and absolutely merciless mechanics. And that's what this is. "

The success of projects like Wasteland 2 or the Double Fine Adventure led some commentators on the one hand on the reputation of the developer back, on the other hand, the potential affluent target group that wants to revitalize nostalgic reasons the games of their childhood and youth. Often it was generally critically pointed out that so far there is no experience on whether this new funding model was working at all, and what would happen if projects can not deliver their product.

End of August 2013 were presented at the Gamescom the game in a runnable version to journalists and read worldwide. The video gaming site Gameinformer.com ruled: " We only got a taste for the open world did awaits us in Wasteland 2, but we're excited to see how its world will react to our actions When the game comes out. " For pcgames.de the game Heise.de summed up " the potential to actually satisfactorily implement the ambitious plans of its developers. "

" Total Waste Land makes 2 already a very good impression and promises a classic RPG with lots of dialog and a turn based combat system to be. "

Fiction Game

As part of the Kickstarter campaign two short stories ( " Novellas " ) have been announced, which will be written by Chris Avellone and Michael A. Stackpole.

Trivia

• At Christmas 2012 turned inXile all persons the Wasteland 2 Supported in advance of publication, free The Bard's Tale on Steam. In addition to the published by inXile 2005 under this title hack and slash role-playing game, which satirizes the usual clichés of the RPG genre, and an emulation of the original trilogy of 1985-88 is included. This was one of the first role-playing games by Interplay and Brian Fargo.
• Project Eternity Obsidian Entertainment offered as part of its Kickstarter campaign a packet to which, inter alia, also a digital version of Wasteland 2 contained.
• This also by inXile early 2013 on Kickstarter funded RPG Torment: Tides of Numenera contained at different crowdfunding offers for supporters a digital version of Wasteland 2 as a bonus. The pre-production of spiritiuellen successor to Planescape: Torment began even during the production phase of Wasteland 2 In part, engaged writers and artists who had already finished their work on Wasteland 2, in the Vorproduktionsteam for the new game, the programming work but only after the completion were recognized by two Wasteland.
• In the course of production of Wasteland 2 the predecessor Wasteland was released back in November 2013. Buyer of the second part given free play. It has been optimized for new operating systems (Windows, Mac OS X, Linux) and supports, in contrast to the original 1988 store several times. In addition, texts from the included in the original "Paragraph Book" have been integrated directly into the game, and can optionally be played with voiceover. Furthermore, also music as well as revised portrait pictures, and graphics filters can be selected.