Episode 59: F*** Your Yankee Blue Jeans (51:19)
Featuring the definitive EGM/1UP expose, the debut of Sooch’s KORG DS-10 phat beatz, Prince of Persia, Lord of the Rings: Conquest, and gobs of listener mail.
Podcast: Download (47.1MB)
Podcast: Download (47.1MB)
I found a copy of the Oblivion interview that I mentioned on the show:
Click here
The entire article is hilarious, but these two questions in particular are fantastic (50 books!):
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3. Will creatures interact with each other? E.G. Will bears attack deer when they are hungry? Would this emulate an ecosystem? Also will there be more underwater creatures than there were in Morrowind, approximately how many?
We have a few situations in the game where animals will attack each other. But yes, it does happen. It depends largely on their AI settings. For water creatures we have slaughterfish again. There is far less water in Cyrodiil than in Morrowind. A few of the land creatures are capable of swimming, though.
29. How many of the 400+ books are new titles, what is the general ratio of fiction to non-fiction, and are any written by new authors, or is everything still written by the old hands (Ted Peterson, Michael Kirkbride, etc.)? What updates can we expect for the ‘Pocket Guide to the Empire’, especially considering recent history? Are there any specific subject areas that have gotten some more love, such as this ‘Argonian Compendium’ we have heard about? In what other ways will the the lore be communicated apart from through books?
We commissioned around 50 books from Ted and Michael this time around. In addition, our designers here have cranked out all manner of texts, including notes, letters, books, newspapers, and more. With full voice for all characters, we’re trying to rely on NPCs for exposition, and keep books for more background and world atmosphere. The Pocket Guide is part of the Collector’s Edition.
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And here’s the one I was talking about, with photographic evidence:
I was at EB looking for Electroplankton and got on the subject of Oblivion with the guy. This guy is pretty knowledgeable about games so I don’t think it’s BS.
Anyway he was telling me the reason for the delay, or one of them anyway, is because they had to dumb down the AI because it was too smart, freakily so. There is a Minotaur in the game that carries one of the ultimate weapons in the game. Due to the AI and their ability to roam about the land without boundaries he is extremely difficult to find. There is a Unicorn in the game that once a specific quest is complete will give you a magical item that will help you locate the Minotaur. During the Beta they kept finding the unicorn dead and couldn’t figure out why. As it turns out the Minotaur had discovered the existence of this item and in order to protect himself kept killing the Unicorn. That is just amazing to me.
Another thing they discovered was one of the main quest givers kept commiting suicide. As it turns out this particular NPC had fallen for another NPC but upon getting rejected decided he couldn’t go on and offed himself. I’m not so sure about that one.
This sounds pretty amaing and it’s a shame they have to dumb down the AI to keep the occurences from happening. It’s almost frighteningly realistic.
When I originally read that, I think I laughed until I pissed myself.
“Fuck, I missed the loop”!!
SSOOCH! I wanna hear more about this fucking beat jobber? SHOW ME!