This week we interviewed Lexx creator of Shattered Destiny and one of FOnline 2228 Developers.
<blockquote>1. Who are you?
I am a Kraut from some place close to Berlin with a rather generic office job. Had a small internet music magazine about industrial (and similar) music many years ago, but it transformed into far too much work beside the normal job and studies, so we closed it after around two years. I was one of the head honchos of the former biggest german Resident Evil fan site even more years ago (later closed as well) and now I am one of the folks behind the german Fallout fan site “FalloutNow!” which is not yet closed and hopefully never will be.
2. What do you do outside of modding?
Currently? Eating, sleeping, working, while working occupies most of my time now. But there also have been days where I could go out with my bike or do some reading. Reading now only occurs during the time I drive to and from my workplace by bus. Biking has been postponed until I buy myself a new bike, because my old one got stolen a few years ago…
3. How did you get into Fallout modding?
I think it was when I've discovered the BIS mapper and the manual in early 2005. I've actually printed the 28 page manual and was reading it in bed. The next day I started to create some maps, which sucked. But I've made more maps, which also sucked. Then there came the idea to create a big new Fallout game, which (surprisingly) sucked, and was far too much work anyway, so it died. I moved everything into the trash bin and then “Shattered Destiny” was born, which - for the first time - didn't suck that much. And here I am now... with three new screens of my current work (sorry, only in German, no translation is done yet). :>
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<blockquote>4. What work are you most proud of?
This is a very hard question, because most of the time if I release something, I find a million things on it right after that I don't like anymore and wish to change... but I lack the mood to do so. But I guess that kicking out “Shattered Destiny” for release was a good thing, despite everything that was going wrong with it while I've worked on it.
Ah, another one comes into my mind now: kicking out FOnline: 2238 in around 7 months of work was great. Sure, the game had lots of huge flaws and still has, but in the few months we worked on it pre-beta-release, with only five to six active people (in crunch-mode most of the time), we actually managed to pull off more stuff than many other mod-teams in years! So actually this doesn't seem to be such a hard question anymore, its pretty much what I am most proud of so far.
5. The characters most people roleplay in FOnline: 2238 are mostly PKers or organised gangsters, looking to kill the weak. You don't find many utopian visionaries in the wastes. Do you think this validates the concept of social-Darwinism, or are they just a bunch of FO fans blowing off steam?
Not everyone in the game is a bloodthirsty player killer who regenerates from tears of fallen victims. Most players only do what the game allows them, which is whatever they want, wherever they want, unlike in other MMOs, with real safe-zones and no-PvP zones, where everyone can and will hide all the time in fear of losing everything etc. Additionally, it’s always harder to try to build up something “good” in an open MMO, because there are always people who love to ruin it for everyone… So yeah, call it “blowing off steam,” as I think it’s as close as you can get. If at all, I’d say it proves that anarchism is very instable and will never work. :>
6. You are one of a few well known "one man modding teams." Why did you decide to work on FOnline: 2238, with all the complications that go with dealing with other people egos, while having to placate the famously fussy FO fans at the same time?
In all honesty, I didn't really care about anyone. There was this idea of an online Fallout game and it was fancy and cool and other people’s opinions didn’t matter to me at that time. The only thought I had was too create a living Fallout online world. Really, the idea existed already long before FOnline was in a playable condition, but has never been possible until its first beta release.
I’ve been sliding into the development more by accident, though. I had done one small thing for the game, followed by another small thing, followed by some bigger thing and over the following days, there I was in the team.
But I am still working on Fallout singleplayer stuff every once in a while too. After all, I still have to finish my current Fallout 2 mod, which I don’t want to talk too much about yet, and so on and so on. There are so many dreams and only so little time…
7. You're making Shattered Destiny 2 on your own. Considering your experience in the field, do you have any useful advice for other solo modders out there?
Yes. If you want to create a new mod / a total conversion, create design documents *before* starting anything. If you want to make a new game, start writing down *everything* you can think about. If you feel that there are parts that you have no ideas about, try to fill these holes *before* starting to work on the actual game. Because if you don't work with good design documents, you will soon forget what you wanted to do here and there and hey—wait! What happens if story chapter X and Z is finished, but you have no idea about Y yet? Ah well, let's fill up that hole with something random..!
Sooner or later, working on the game will become a mess (if you continue to work on it anyway- most mods without concept are dead born) and the chances are actually pretty high that you have plot holes and elements that don't make any sense at all. Additionally, creating design documents first will speed up the development later, because you know exactly what you want to do. That’s really important, because working alone means you have to motivate yourself alone as well.
This actually is also a good advice for non-solo modders, if not even more so, because working in a team requires that everyone knows what’s going on.
8. Shattered Destiny was a small mod with a lot of replay value. How do you find the balance between game length and re-playability? Given the feedback, do you feel that replay value is a concept worth championing or that bigger more linear games should be the goal of modders?
This question is killing me. I’ve rewritten my answer already like a million times and I’ll guess I will do it again soon.
I really think that re-playability is worth the time to take care of, but most people do not replay a game or a mod anyway, especially if it feels very long. In the case of Shattered Destiny, despite the mods flaws and its short playtime, the overall feedback was quite positive, but I don’t think that many people replayed it (I never got much feedback regarding this nor do I have any statistics, so I can only guess). But then again, I also can’t say that it’s a masterpiece of re-playability. It’s true that you can’t see everything in only one playthrough, but at least three should pretty much cover it (male, female and low intelligence).
In my opinion, modders that create content for RPGs should always try to cover as much possible quest solutions as they can, not because of re-playability, but to offer the player ways between he can chose, which then adds more possible and deeper roleplaying to the RPG. I’ve never really understand RPGs where the only thing that is "RPG" are character stats and dialogues with the rest of the game being a linear pathway. To me, this really is something that everyone should try to avoid, even if not for re-playability, but at least for role-playings-sake.
9. Where do Fallout 1,2,3,NV rank in your all-time favorite titles?
Fallout 1 is and will always be the first in my favorite titles-list, followed by 2. Though, I have to say there was a time, where I really hated Fallout 2, because *everyone* always just yelled how great that game is, while totally forgetting about the first one, which - in my opinion - is in quite a lot areas simply the better game. As example, while it is not very big in terms of content, it is actually much more detailed when it comes to the game world, encounter design and story… New Vegas follows right after Fo2, because for me it's a pretty good game. Fallout 3 died in 2003, so I don't think it would be fair to rank it by the content of the released design documents. :p
Regarding other games on my fav-list, Monkey Island 1 and 2 are pretty high as well, followed by Jagged Alliance and Incubation. I just love that stuff and try to keep replaying them at least once a year.
10. How do you find the creativity to do this?
I don’t, it’s finding me! No, seriously. I play a game and either I see something I would love to add or I don’t. Other than that, I try to brainstorm every once in a while or ideas come up while watching movies or reading a book. That being said, I don’t think I am a very creative human. I just try to think about something and then I see how I could modify and change and improve on it. Luckily, I like reactive roleplaying games, so for me it’s more about creative solutions for various situations in the game than totally new and groundbreaking gameplay ‘n stuff.
11. Who is your most influential modder?
Oh, easy question! I'd say my most influential modder is actually Neil Manke. Years ago, he has been a really great mapper and modder. By now, I think his name is quite forgotten, but some folks might remember the They Hunger trilogy, USS Darkstar or that Underworld Bloodlines mod for Half-Life, which came from him and his small team. I really loved the mapping and all that fuzz around it, also I've been big into Zombies back then, so They Hunger has been *the* thing anyway. It actually brought me into modding games for real and I've played around with doing Half-Life mods for years. Sadly, the last thing I've heard about Neil Manke (already a few years ago) was that he is ill. I don't really know what’s going on. Hope, all is getting alright, though.
12. Who is your favorite fallout character and why?
I am always happy to see Cabbot, with his silly face and way of talking. But I think my most favorite character is Katja from Fallout 1. She is such an underused companion and so worthless if you pick her up too late in the game (which most likely happens, as you normally don’t go early to her place), but she gives a lot background information about the Boneyard and seems to be a nice person, beside her thievery. Additionally, she has cool hair and can wield a 14mm Pistol… BAAM!
13. What would you prioritise if you survived a nuclear war? (water, procreation, Saviour of knowledge or finding shelter)
Clean water would be pretty important, maybe even more than secure shelter. But then again, what worth is clean water if you die of radiation a bit later. I don’t really know, so I’ll guess I would be one of the first dead in any case.
14. Whats your take on modern RPGs?
If you like action-adventures with some roleplaying game elements included and maybe minor choice & consequence as salt in the soup, the future will be great! If not, well, shit happens. When I was younger, I’ve always thought that future RPGs will have lots of things to do in whatever way you want to do it everywhere and every time with everything in the game: The ultimate reactivity. But that’s a pipedream and modern AAA RPGs will never deliver this, because they are more about cinematic experiences than real roleplaying and I doubt it will ever change again. So stick to modern mantra #123: Indie-RPGs are the way to go; because they can deliver what the niche market wants to have (damn, 10 years ago we have been the AAA market and now we are the niche market? The times they a-changin..). </blockquote>
<blockquote>1. Who are you?
I am a Kraut from some place close to Berlin with a rather generic office job. Had a small internet music magazine about industrial (and similar) music many years ago, but it transformed into far too much work beside the normal job and studies, so we closed it after around two years. I was one of the head honchos of the former biggest german Resident Evil fan site even more years ago (later closed as well) and now I am one of the folks behind the german Fallout fan site “FalloutNow!” which is not yet closed and hopefully never will be.
2. What do you do outside of modding?
Currently? Eating, sleeping, working, while working occupies most of my time now. But there also have been days where I could go out with my bike or do some reading. Reading now only occurs during the time I drive to and from my workplace by bus. Biking has been postponed until I buy myself a new bike, because my old one got stolen a few years ago…
3. How did you get into Fallout modding?
I think it was when I've discovered the BIS mapper and the manual in early 2005. I've actually printed the 28 page manual and was reading it in bed. The next day I started to create some maps, which sucked. But I've made more maps, which also sucked. Then there came the idea to create a big new Fallout game, which (surprisingly) sucked, and was far too much work anyway, so it died. I moved everything into the trash bin and then “Shattered Destiny” was born, which - for the first time - didn't suck that much. And here I am now... with three new screens of my current work (sorry, only in German, no translation is done yet). :>
</blockquote>
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<blockquote>4. What work are you most proud of?
This is a very hard question, because most of the time if I release something, I find a million things on it right after that I don't like anymore and wish to change... but I lack the mood to do so. But I guess that kicking out “Shattered Destiny” for release was a good thing, despite everything that was going wrong with it while I've worked on it.
Ah, another one comes into my mind now: kicking out FOnline: 2238 in around 7 months of work was great. Sure, the game had lots of huge flaws and still has, but in the few months we worked on it pre-beta-release, with only five to six active people (in crunch-mode most of the time), we actually managed to pull off more stuff than many other mod-teams in years! So actually this doesn't seem to be such a hard question anymore, its pretty much what I am most proud of so far.
5. The characters most people roleplay in FOnline: 2238 are mostly PKers or organised gangsters, looking to kill the weak. You don't find many utopian visionaries in the wastes. Do you think this validates the concept of social-Darwinism, or are they just a bunch of FO fans blowing off steam?
Not everyone in the game is a bloodthirsty player killer who regenerates from tears of fallen victims. Most players only do what the game allows them, which is whatever they want, wherever they want, unlike in other MMOs, with real safe-zones and no-PvP zones, where everyone can and will hide all the time in fear of losing everything etc. Additionally, it’s always harder to try to build up something “good” in an open MMO, because there are always people who love to ruin it for everyone… So yeah, call it “blowing off steam,” as I think it’s as close as you can get. If at all, I’d say it proves that anarchism is very instable and will never work. :>
6. You are one of a few well known "one man modding teams." Why did you decide to work on FOnline: 2238, with all the complications that go with dealing with other people egos, while having to placate the famously fussy FO fans at the same time?
In all honesty, I didn't really care about anyone. There was this idea of an online Fallout game and it was fancy and cool and other people’s opinions didn’t matter to me at that time. The only thought I had was too create a living Fallout online world. Really, the idea existed already long before FOnline was in a playable condition, but has never been possible until its first beta release.
I’ve been sliding into the development more by accident, though. I had done one small thing for the game, followed by another small thing, followed by some bigger thing and over the following days, there I was in the team.
But I am still working on Fallout singleplayer stuff every once in a while too. After all, I still have to finish my current Fallout 2 mod, which I don’t want to talk too much about yet, and so on and so on. There are so many dreams and only so little time…
7. You're making Shattered Destiny 2 on your own. Considering your experience in the field, do you have any useful advice for other solo modders out there?
Yes. If you want to create a new mod / a total conversion, create design documents *before* starting anything. If you want to make a new game, start writing down *everything* you can think about. If you feel that there are parts that you have no ideas about, try to fill these holes *before* starting to work on the actual game. Because if you don't work with good design documents, you will soon forget what you wanted to do here and there and hey—wait! What happens if story chapter X and Z is finished, but you have no idea about Y yet? Ah well, let's fill up that hole with something random..!
Sooner or later, working on the game will become a mess (if you continue to work on it anyway- most mods without concept are dead born) and the chances are actually pretty high that you have plot holes and elements that don't make any sense at all. Additionally, creating design documents first will speed up the development later, because you know exactly what you want to do. That’s really important, because working alone means you have to motivate yourself alone as well.
This actually is also a good advice for non-solo modders, if not even more so, because working in a team requires that everyone knows what’s going on.
8. Shattered Destiny was a small mod with a lot of replay value. How do you find the balance between game length and re-playability? Given the feedback, do you feel that replay value is a concept worth championing or that bigger more linear games should be the goal of modders?
This question is killing me. I’ve rewritten my answer already like a million times and I’ll guess I will do it again soon.
I really think that re-playability is worth the time to take care of, but most people do not replay a game or a mod anyway, especially if it feels very long. In the case of Shattered Destiny, despite the mods flaws and its short playtime, the overall feedback was quite positive, but I don’t think that many people replayed it (I never got much feedback regarding this nor do I have any statistics, so I can only guess). But then again, I also can’t say that it’s a masterpiece of re-playability. It’s true that you can’t see everything in only one playthrough, but at least three should pretty much cover it (male, female and low intelligence).
In my opinion, modders that create content for RPGs should always try to cover as much possible quest solutions as they can, not because of re-playability, but to offer the player ways between he can chose, which then adds more possible and deeper roleplaying to the RPG. I’ve never really understand RPGs where the only thing that is "RPG" are character stats and dialogues with the rest of the game being a linear pathway. To me, this really is something that everyone should try to avoid, even if not for re-playability, but at least for role-playings-sake.
9. Where do Fallout 1,2,3,NV rank in your all-time favorite titles?
Fallout 1 is and will always be the first in my favorite titles-list, followed by 2. Though, I have to say there was a time, where I really hated Fallout 2, because *everyone* always just yelled how great that game is, while totally forgetting about the first one, which - in my opinion - is in quite a lot areas simply the better game. As example, while it is not very big in terms of content, it is actually much more detailed when it comes to the game world, encounter design and story… New Vegas follows right after Fo2, because for me it's a pretty good game. Fallout 3 died in 2003, so I don't think it would be fair to rank it by the content of the released design documents. :p
Regarding other games on my fav-list, Monkey Island 1 and 2 are pretty high as well, followed by Jagged Alliance and Incubation. I just love that stuff and try to keep replaying them at least once a year.
10. How do you find the creativity to do this?
I don’t, it’s finding me! No, seriously. I play a game and either I see something I would love to add or I don’t. Other than that, I try to brainstorm every once in a while or ideas come up while watching movies or reading a book. That being said, I don’t think I am a very creative human. I just try to think about something and then I see how I could modify and change and improve on it. Luckily, I like reactive roleplaying games, so for me it’s more about creative solutions for various situations in the game than totally new and groundbreaking gameplay ‘n stuff.
11. Who is your most influential modder?
Oh, easy question! I'd say my most influential modder is actually Neil Manke. Years ago, he has been a really great mapper and modder. By now, I think his name is quite forgotten, but some folks might remember the They Hunger trilogy, USS Darkstar or that Underworld Bloodlines mod for Half-Life, which came from him and his small team. I really loved the mapping and all that fuzz around it, also I've been big into Zombies back then, so They Hunger has been *the* thing anyway. It actually brought me into modding games for real and I've played around with doing Half-Life mods for years. Sadly, the last thing I've heard about Neil Manke (already a few years ago) was that he is ill. I don't really know what’s going on. Hope, all is getting alright, though.
12. Who is your favorite fallout character and why?
I am always happy to see Cabbot, with his silly face and way of talking. But I think my most favorite character is Katja from Fallout 1. She is such an underused companion and so worthless if you pick her up too late in the game (which most likely happens, as you normally don’t go early to her place), but she gives a lot background information about the Boneyard and seems to be a nice person, beside her thievery. Additionally, she has cool hair and can wield a 14mm Pistol… BAAM!
13. What would you prioritise if you survived a nuclear war? (water, procreation, Saviour of knowledge or finding shelter)
Clean water would be pretty important, maybe even more than secure shelter. But then again, what worth is clean water if you die of radiation a bit later. I don’t really know, so I’ll guess I would be one of the first dead in any case.
14. Whats your take on modern RPGs?
If you like action-adventures with some roleplaying game elements included and maybe minor choice & consequence as salt in the soup, the future will be great! If not, well, shit happens. When I was younger, I’ve always thought that future RPGs will have lots of things to do in whatever way you want to do it everywhere and every time with everything in the game: The ultimate reactivity. But that’s a pipedream and modern AAA RPGs will never deliver this, because they are more about cinematic experiences than real roleplaying and I doubt it will ever change again. So stick to modern mantra #123: Indie-RPGs are the way to go; because they can deliver what the niche market wants to have (damn, 10 years ago we have been the AAA market and now we are the niche market? The times they a-changin..). </blockquote>
Nah I can't add much as I "know" him through the german site relatively good and share some views on games etc. with him. The thing that you're doing (almost) everything on your own still baffles me and inspires me that even just a small workgroup can create big things. Without Shattered Destiny, I would never have thought about starting modding. 
I needed a weaker energy weapon for the beginning of the game and this came pretty handy. So I've modificated the look and thought it was fitting.
Or Projectile Weapons