Polygon has a lengthy piece on Brian Fargo's history in the gaming industry, his connection to Fallout and the production of Wasteland 2. It's a pretty interesting read, so be sure to check it out, but there's one particular bit that should interest Fallout fans: the reason Interplay was forced to sell the rights to Fallout was that Brian Fargo started hounding them to pay their debts.
Later, he learned that many of Interplay's creditors were not being paid, some of whom were people he had done business with. He pulled them together and filed a winding-up order against Interplay.
In order to pay its bills, and get Fargo off its back, Titus was forced to sell prime assets. One of them was a property called Fallout, which was picked up by developer Bethesda.
"The whole reason why Bethesda has the rights to Fallout is because of me," he recalls. "Bethesda had already licensed Fallout from Interplay, but it was for a license deal, a percentage. [Interplay] sold Fallout to Bethesda for $3.8 million. Everybody got paid what they were owed, including some of my old employees.
"Do you know how much Bethesda would have had to pay on Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas? It would have been tens of millions of dollars I saved Bethesda, because they got to terminate that royalty deal."
Well, thanks for that, I guess? Bethesda hasn't exactly been a great caretaker of Fallout, but I can't imagine Interplay under Titus would have done any better.
Another interesting bit is marketing executives pushing to change Fallout 2's art style, and Fargo shutting them down.
"[Fargo] was very in tune with the games that we were making," Urquhart says. "Particularly I remember a project review meeting on Fallout 2. We get into the meeting and I'm presenting." The presentation was not playing well to the gathered marketing execs. They made some suggestions about changing the game's art style. "We'd have to redo all the art," Urquhart says. "I wasn't as good at dealing with executives. I didn't want to just say, 'That's stupid.' Brian, he's like, 'No, it doesn't make any sense to change the art. People love the art in Fallout.' That ended it. I don't know a lot of other CEOs that would have been as understanding of the situation and the product and able to head off something like that. It could have really hurt us."
Plus, there's a hilarious picture of Brian Fargo with a mullet in there.
Link: One of Fallout's fathers returns to the Wasteland - Polygon
Later, he learned that many of Interplay's creditors were not being paid, some of whom were people he had done business with. He pulled them together and filed a winding-up order against Interplay.
In order to pay its bills, and get Fargo off its back, Titus was forced to sell prime assets. One of them was a property called Fallout, which was picked up by developer Bethesda.
"The whole reason why Bethesda has the rights to Fallout is because of me," he recalls. "Bethesda had already licensed Fallout from Interplay, but it was for a license deal, a percentage. [Interplay] sold Fallout to Bethesda for $3.8 million. Everybody got paid what they were owed, including some of my old employees.
"Do you know how much Bethesda would have had to pay on Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas? It would have been tens of millions of dollars I saved Bethesda, because they got to terminate that royalty deal."
Well, thanks for that, I guess? Bethesda hasn't exactly been a great caretaker of Fallout, but I can't imagine Interplay under Titus would have done any better.
Another interesting bit is marketing executives pushing to change Fallout 2's art style, and Fargo shutting them down.
"[Fargo] was very in tune with the games that we were making," Urquhart says. "Particularly I remember a project review meeting on Fallout 2. We get into the meeting and I'm presenting." The presentation was not playing well to the gathered marketing execs. They made some suggestions about changing the game's art style. "We'd have to redo all the art," Urquhart says. "I wasn't as good at dealing with executives. I didn't want to just say, 'That's stupid.' Brian, he's like, 'No, it doesn't make any sense to change the art. People love the art in Fallout.' That ended it. I don't know a lot of other CEOs that would have been as understanding of the situation and the product and able to head off something like that. It could have really hurt us."
Plus, there's a hilarious picture of Brian Fargo with a mullet in there.
Link: One of Fallout's fathers returns to the Wasteland - Polygon
