Obsidian Celebrates 20 years

[MadPreacher]

Part 1 of a 4 part documentary series about Obsidian's 20 years of being in the business.

[wndrbr]

Oh I cannot wait to see what Avellone is going to say in this documentary! They invited him, right?

...right?

[MadPreacher]

Oh I cannot wait to see what Avellone is going to say in this documentary! They invited him, right?

...right?

I dunno since I didn't watch it. It popped up in my recommended feed. Being the good guy that I am I figured y'all would enjoy it.

[SDG]

Garbage developer. Their greatest achievement was making a spinoff of Fallout 3. Their proudest defining moment was being Bethesda's unofficial B-team XD

And now they are a modern day Bioware but even worse. Oh the humiliation.

[Roguey]

Oh I cannot wait to see what Avellone is going to say in this documentary! They invited him, right?

...right?

They could invite him and then leave all his material on the cutting room floor because he's only interested in talking about how the other owners screwed up and this is supposed to be a self-congratulatory puff piece.

[Tweed]

20 years of accidentally making games that weren't complete trash. When you read about all the ******** going on at Obsidian it's like they threw themselves at the ground and missed.

[Humbaba]

Only New Vegas separates Obsidian from Troika in terms of quality products released.

[rusty_shackleford]

How many people at Obsidian were actually working there when FNV released?

[J1M]

Peak Obsidian was Alpha Protocol.

Good RPG. Good reactivity. Bad contract decision on some licensed music fucks them out of residuals later.

[Klerik]

How many people at Obsidian were actually working there when FNV released?

Or Kotor 2, or any of the games they madewhich were good.

That fat **** there just assumes he's ******* brilliant for being the fat ****

[General Reign]

It's well known that Obsidian is now populated by pink and purple haired ******'s. Before it was just ******* but now the rainbow parade made it worse.

[The_Mask]

I'm going to assume this is the Official Obsidian thread. As such:

Nine years ago, Tyranny invited players to rule a world conquered by evil. Today we celebrate its 9th anniversary and every Fatebinder who brought justice (or ruin) to the Tiers.

Fatebinder, when was the last time you visited the world of Terratus?

[rusty_shackleford]

I'm going to assume this is the Official Obsidian thread. As such:

Nine years ago, Tyranny invited players to rule a world conquered by evil. Today we celebrate its 9th anniversary and every Fatebinder who brought justice (or ruin) to the Tiers.

Fatebinder, when was the last time you visited the world of Terratus?

Can't wait for them to finish this early access game!

[Vaako]

hmmm could play tyranny again has been a while... and I wasnt such a noticer back then

[Tweed]

7-8 years worth of good games, 12 years of slop and counting.

[rusty_shackleford]

7-8 years worth of good games, 12 years of slop and counting.

list of good games:

[Cassidy]

I will never understand why Obsidian was so overrated in the past considering they only did 2 above average games, on retrospect I wouldn't really consider any of their games good, and both of their above average games were either sequels or an expansion pack. Troika was the best part of Black Isle Studios remnants by far, and mostly because Troika didn't live long enough to become sellouts and start shoveling dumbed down woke slop, thus they will always be fondly remembered for going bankrupt before they became a **** games peddler.

Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer and KOTOR 2 were the only arguably decent games Obsidian ever did, after them they just did spinoffs for Oblivion with guns or Mass Effect pop-a-mole clones like Alpha Protocol or other forgettable or so bad it's bad crap, and MOTB already had the obvious hints of their going full woke future in the design of some of the NPC party followers.

If Obsidian goes bankrupt, good riddance. Fallout New Vegas doesn't deserve to be counted between above average because it's below mediocre without mods and the core gameplay is not even a real RPG, wasn't designed by Obsidian at all, they only tweaked Bethesda's slop but that didn't make its essence change at all, and they only made it slightly better than modded Oblivion with Guns, somewhat less ******** in writing and got hugely overrated for being released in a time where the CRPG genre looked completely dead outside of rare and obscure independent developers releases.

[AmericanMonarchist]

I will never understand why Obsidian was so overrated in the past considering they only did 2 above average games, on retrospect I wouldn't really consider any of their games good, and both of their above average games were either sequels or an expansion pack. Troika was the best part of Black Isle Studios remnants by far, and mostly because Troika didn't live long enough to become sellouts and start shoveling dumbed down woke slop, thus they will always be fondly remembered for going bankrupt before they became a **** games peddler.

Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer and KOTOR 2 were the only arguably decent games Obsidian ever did, after them they just did spinoffs for Oblivion with guns or Mass Effect pop-a-mole clones like Alpha Protocol or other forgettable or so bad it's bad crap, and MOTB already had the obvious hints of their going full woke future in the design of some of the NPC party followers.

If Obsidian goes bankrupt, good riddance. Fallout New Vegas doesn't deserve to be counted between above average because it's below mediocre without mods and the core gameplay is not even a real RPG, wasn't designed by Obsidian at all, they only tweaked Bethesda's slop but that didn't make its essence change at all, and they only made it slightly better than modded Oblivion with Guns, somewhat less ******** in writing and got hugely overrated for being released in a time where the CRPG genre looked completely dead outside of rare and obscure independent developers releases.

Obsidian is beloved for their writing. The stories for KOTOR 2 and Fallout New Vegas are some of the best in the franchise and I will die on the hill arguing that Kreia is the best Star Wars character. Their new stuff is garbage, but Obsidian could write once-upon-a-time and that is why they had fans.

[wndrbr]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... g-new-path

https://archive.is/20260203120242/https ... g-new-path

Every week, Feargus Urquhart, the head of Obsidian Entertainment, meets for breakfast with his management team at a diner near their office to scarf down cinnamon rolls and make decisions about the video game studio’s future. They’ve had a lot to discuss in recent gatherings. Last year the developer released three games—a rare and impressive achievement for a studio of its size—but two of them failed to meet sales forecasts set by Obsidian’s parent company, Microsoft Corp.
...
Since it was acquired in 2018, Obsidian has been prolific, releasing a half-dozen titles, including last year’s trio: the trippy fantasy role-playing game Avowed, the survival game Grounded 2 and the dystopian sci-fi RPG The Outer Worlds 2. (Some other studios within Microsoft haven’t released a single game in that period.) While Grounded 2 was a big hit, the disappointing results from the other two have led Obsidian to “think a lot about how much we put into the games, how much we spend on them, how long they take,” Urquhart says. Both Avowed and The Outer Worlds 2 were in development for more than six years, inflating their production costs and the company’s financial expectations. One of Urquhart’s missions is to cut down development timelines to three or four years per title.
...
Obsidian appears to be on relatively firm ground. For divisions of Xbox, sales are just one part of the equation, and RPGs tend to gain sales momentum over time. Obsidian’s games get respectable reviews from critics and sometimes win awards, helping to sell Xbox hardware, and they’re offered on Xbox Game Pass, the company’s Netflix-like subscription service.
...
In recent years, Urquhart has been grooming two lieutenants, Justin Britch and Marcus Morgan, to take over the business when he retires. Last year, Britch, 33, and Morgan, 36, gave a talk at the D.I.C.E. Summit in Las Vegas called “Obsidian’s 100-Year Plan” that detailed their philosophy: retaining as many staff members as possible, avoiding unchecked head-count growth, pursuing moderate successes and not chasing trends. Rather than focusing the entire studio on a single game, they like to juggle multiple projects at once, a skill that’s eluded many other developers but that Obsidian has mastered.
...
Obsidian’s plan for the next few years is to work on projects big and small—completely new games and added content for The Outer Worlds 2 and Grounded 2—and space out their releases. It isn’t working on a third Outer Worlds game but does plan to keep making games in the Avowed universe. Although the studio remains proud of what it accomplished in 2025, it’s safe to say Urquhart and his team hope to never repeat the Year of Obsidian.

[Valter]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... g-new-path

https://archive.is/20260203120242/https ... g-new-path

In recent years, Urquhart has been grooming two lieutenants, Justin Britch and Marcus Morgan, to take over the business when he retires. Last year, Britch, 33, and Morgan, 36, gave a talk at the D.I.C.E. Summit in Las Vegas called “Obsidian’s 100-Year Plan” that detailed their philosophy: retaining as many staff members as possible, avoiding unchecked head-count growth, pursuing moderate successes and not chasing trends. Rather than focusing the entire studio on a single game, they like to juggle multiple projects at once, a skill that’s eluded many other developers but that Obsidian has mastered.

Who the **** focuses on pursuing "moderate successes"??? "hey now let's try not to be too successful mkay guys?"

[KnightoftheWind]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... g-new-path

https://archive.is/20260203120242/https ... g-new-path

In recent years, Urquhart has been grooming two lieutenants, Justin Britch and Marcus Morgan, to take over the business when he retires. Last year, Britch, 33, and Morgan, 36, gave a talk at the D.I.C.E. Summit in Las Vegas called “Obsidian’s 100-Year Plan” that detailed their philosophy: retaining as many staff members as possible, avoiding unchecked head-count growth, pursuing moderate successes and not chasing trends. Rather than focusing the entire studio on a single game, they like to juggle multiple projects at once, a skill that’s eluded many other developers but that Obsidian has mastered.

Who the **** focuses on pursuing "moderate successes"??? "hey now let's try not to be too successful mkay guys?"

I think they mean to pursue development of games without the expectation that they will sell 12 million copies or more.

[Roguey]

Feargus Urquhart doesn't bet the farm like Swen Vincke does, pouring everything into one game. The company would have been shut down already if they did that.

[rusty_shackleford]

Feargus Urquhart doesn't bet the farm like Swen Vincke does, pouring everything into one game. The company would have been shut down already if they did that.

Yea because it requires you to have faith in your team to make a good game