Lorne Lanning Interview

[Sloane]

Source (http://www.working-title.de/artikel.php?artikel_id=47&page=1)

Creatively speaking, I’m interested in creating content that has a more mass market entertainment appeal and that has more innovation and relavent storytelling taking place. For the most part, I don’t feel even the best selling games have much of this quality. It’s still largely a core gamer driven market, and designing for what this market specifically wants... is not something that seriously interests me creatively. There’s plenty of that on the shelf already.
He also talks about another Oddworld game:

It’s possible. Personally, I don’t want to see any new console based Oddworld games until after there is an Oddworld film.

[BleedTheFreak]

Might want to make a note on who this person is? I mean, I did gather it from the material, but maybe put something at the beginning explaining the news post?

[bean19]

This is a really good interview. I wish you had done a better write-up Sloane, as I don't think it will be as widely read as it would be if you had prefaced it a bit.

I particularly like how he mentions that he feels that console makers are not doing enough to support developers because they are creating new hardware structures instead of simply enhancing old ones that could take advantage of developer's previous development tools, and then in the next answer says that the Revolution may be too underpowered to compete (when the Revolution appears to be doing exactly this. . . focusing on innovation and not reinventing the wheel).

His stance is that the X360 should have simply stayed with a single thread processor and enhanced the other capabilities exponentially. Although how they would do this beyond holding more RAM and having a better GPU - things the X360 is already doing, I am uncertain.

His point about game development having a larger tech focus than a content development focus is a good point though. To what degree does the advancement of hardware contribute to developers shipping out "more of the same" with shinier wrappers instead of innovative, compelling new content?

I think the best developers are the ones that seem to realize that game development is both a craft and an art (actually many crafts and many arts). They have a broad focus that includes both technical and artistic excellence.

Which is also true of film. . . Mr. Lanning's new focus.

[MaiXu]

Something about Lanning always came off, to me at least, as used-car-dealer smarmy, especially that shit-eating grin of his.

But I can't disagree with what he's saying here. Having just played the OXM demo of Painkiller, I almost threw up on my controller. It's just one in the seemingly endless wave of shitty me-too shitware with no ambition higher than breaking even. It's just re-hash of re-hashes, knock-offs of knock-offs, with original games like Call of Cthulhu, and Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath being marginalized for Another Burnout, Another James Bond Game, Another Tony Hawk, Another Movie Tie-In.

I'm not against licenses or movie titles. If done well, they can be just as amazing, well-told pieces of interactive art as Metal Gear Solid or Knights of the Old Republic. But the gaming industry does seem to be in a spiral of feeding off the current pool of gamers, with very few games aimed at bringing in new gamers or expanding a platform's userbase beyond the hardcore. So maybe Lanning has something.

[Nimos]

I will admit it, i really liked the Oddworld games... especially the first two which reminded me of Delphine's Flashback.
IMO Oddworld games, always had a fantastic story. It was funny, twisted and sad at the same time.

[EternalGamer]

This is a really good interview. I wish you had done a better write-up Sloane, as I don't think it will be as widely read as it would be if you had prefaced it a bit.

I particularly like how he mentions that he feels that console makers are not doing enough to support developers because they are creating new hardware structures instead of simply enhancing old ones that could take advantage of developer's previous development tools, and then in the next answer says that the Revolution may be too underpowered to compete (when the Revolution appears to be doing exactly this. . . focusing on innovation and not reinventing the wheel).


I think what he means is that it does not to any good for one company to go this route, because it will just be enough for innovative developers to sink so much risk into a console that probably will not hit as large as the other two systems. For the console market to become more developer friendly, in the way he is talking, there has to be a paradigm shift away from the technological focus. Personally, I think we are going to see that soon rather than latter, as the tech is getting less and less impressive on an immediate visual level. The average consumer can still see the improvements, but they are getting harder to notice. The selling "wow" factor is going to shift to gameplay rather than graphics. At least, I hope it will. Lanning prediction is already coming true for me, I know. I get bored with games pretty easily now, and it's only if I take a week or so off and play only on weekends that I can still really enjoy them.

Anyway, it is an excellent interview. I've always liked Lorne Lanning a lot. I think his games show personality in a way that only a very few of the best game developers games do. I also understand his disappointment. If I through years of my life into making a game as kick ass and as widely gamer friendly as Stranger's Wraith was and it didn't sell, I'd be pretty dissappointed. Its failure certainly didn't have anything to do with lack of quality. I think he's going to be very sucessful in film and I wish him all the luck and look forward to whatever they release next.

Dan

[EternalGamer]

IMO Oddworld games, always had a fantastic story. It was funny, twisted and sad at the same time.

I think that's a dead on description of the emotional response they solicited. I was always very impressed with Lanning's ability to nail both the comedy and the sympathy of the characters at the same time. Everyone who hasn't played it really should check out Stranger's Wraith, it has a great cast of characters and is everybit as good as the other Oddworld games, and is actually more accessible in terms of gameplay (it plays alot like Halo with some very cool innovations).

Dan

[Chimpbot]

I love the Oddworld games to death, but there was a Penny Arcade strip that sums it up best; I'm glad Lorne Lanning is not making games anymore.
His true calling is film...play any one of his games and that is all made too evident, especially in Stranger's Wrath(fantastic game, by the way. I love how everything changes up midway through...you wouldn't even think it was the same game, really).

Unfortunately, he sounds like he wants to have his cake and eat it too; he wants to see more powerful consoles, but have them essentially remain the same structurally. Unfortunately, you just can't do that.



I'm curious...
Has there been any news on when he'll actually be making a movie? I really want to see an Oddworld film...but there hasn't been any talk of one since he announced he was quitting the game industry.

[Abash Alarmist]

Might want to make a note on who this person is? I mean, I did gather it from the material, but maybe put something at the beginning explaining the news post?

The only people who would be interested in this would already know who it was.

[joruussuun]

Something about Lanning always came off, to me at least, as used-car-dealer smarmy, especially that shit-eating grin of his.
I hear he is a big fan of Money Hats (http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2000/10/23) too!

[EternalGamer]

Yeah, we all know about the MS debacle. I honestly believe that what Lanning was looking for was creative security, though. Unfortunately Microsoft kicked him to the curb just like they did with Psychonaughts. Really stupid mistakes on both. Had they been properly marketed, they could have been the beginning of a solid and beneficial publisher/developer relationships for them.

Dan

[fahrvergnugen]

I can't blame Lanning for taking his toys and going home. Stranger's Wrath, as shipped, is a fantastic game, but EA shoved it out with no marketing in the middle of February to die a quiet death, and it did. Also, they over-emphasized the FPS elements of the game, when really about half or more of the game is played in a third-person perspective.

I would have skipped it entirely if it hadn't arrived as a Christmas present last December, and I'd finished all of the other Oddworld games & was a big fan of the series. This one never had a chance.

[MaiXu]

Yeah, we all know about the MS debacle. I honestly believe that what Lanning was looking for was creative security, though. Unfortunately Microsoft kicked him to the curb just like they did with Psychonaughts. Really stupid mistakes on both. Had they been properly marketed, they could have been the beginning of a solid and beneficial publisher/developer relationships for them.

Dan

I agree. While SW was pretty flawless, execution-wise, Psychonauts would have really benefited from being Xbox only. Doublefine would have had a great chance to tweak everything nice and purdy, instead of wasting time porting it to the PS2. Having Oddworld and Psychonauts Xbox-exclusive would have been 2 more great reasons to own an Xbox. Their fate at the hands of third-party publishers is a fucking travesty. MS will greenlight dogshit like Voodoo Vince and Blinx (and it's sequel!?), but won't give two games like this the money and support they deserve?

[bean19]

Yeah, we all know about the MS debacle. I honestly believe that what Lanning was looking for was creative security, though. Unfortunately Microsoft kicked him to the curb just like they did with Psychonaughts. Really stupid mistakes on both. Had they been properly marketed, they could have been the beginning of a solid and beneficial publisher/developer relationships for them.

Dan

I can't agree more about Psychonauts.

That game completely flew under my radar until I got the demo, as a lark, from Gamespot. I immediately wanted to buy the game and it was set for release a week later.

For someone as tuned in to gaming news to not have heard about an upcoming Tim Schafer game until a week before it's release is some astronomically shitty PR work.

They should have had him pimping Psychonauts a year before it's release like he was Peter Molyneux. We should have been eagerly anticipating the title. It should have gotten multiple page previews in all the gaming mags and video developer interviews on all the gaming sites.

The game delivered, but the publisher and the developer's marketing failed utterly.

People say that Psychonauts is an industry guideline against great innovation. I say that it is indicative of an industry story against poor publishing/marketing.

If they were smart, they would re-release a Psychonauts Gold this Christmas with enough new stuff to give all the critics who love it the incredible amount of press it deserved on it's first time around.

[Magnanimous Gnome]

Malice, Oddworld, and Psychonauts - all sad tales of the past generation. :(

[EternalGamer]

I'm with you on the second two. Having spent a brief bit of timewith Malice, though, I'm not so certain the devs behind it every had what it took. The final product was not just rough around the edges, it was down right uninspiring.

Dan

[motor]

I can't blame Lanning for taking his toys and going home. Stranger's Wrath, as shipped, is a fantastic game, but EA shoved it out with no marketing in the middle of February to die a quiet death, and it did. Also, they over-emphasized the FPS elements of the game, when really about half or more of the game is played in a third-person perspective.

I would have skipped it entirely if it hadn't arrived as a Christmas present last December, and I'd finished all of the other Oddworld games & was a big fan of the series. This one never had a chance.

Although I hate defending EA, they did have a good reason. Their publishing is built around xbox / ps2 multi-platform games. Strangers Wrath was xbox only (and could not be converted over without huge amounts of work), which means at best it could only sell 17% of other potential EA titles. The fact that EA even agreed to publish it should probably be a mark for EA. The real villian is Microsoft in this case. Sure Lanning blew milestone after milestone, but when you spend $350 million dollars on Rare for Grabbed by the Ghoulies, you've got to give someone else a break. Especially when they are such a good developer who puts so much personality ino their games.

[bean19]

motor - Well, that 17% figure represents 24 million potential customers at the time that Stranger's Wrath was released.

The X-Box had an ample install base and good games could sell incredibly well for the system (i.e. - Halo and Halo 2, Fable, KOTOR). Cross platform could have sold more, but the Xbox could easily generate a hit if the game was properly marketed.

However, I don't know that EA really deserves much blame for not marketing Stranger's Wrath because I recall reading ads for it and seeing previews, etc. This game didn't sell well because Oddworld has core gamer brand identity, but it doesn't have a great deal of mass market appeal.

While the characters are emotive and fun, the gameplay in the entire series has been a bit difficult and doesn't cater to the big guns and big explosion crowd.

They were trying to go more mass market with Stranger's Wrath, but the result was a really fun and puzzle-y third-person shooter that still appealled to the original market (core gamers), but was too cerebral and difficult for the zoomtards that make games like Star Wars Episode III a best seller.

Also, I don't know how many core gamers picked it up and kept it. . . because it didn't have much, if any, replay value. I played the game with a friend at his house and after I saw the ending, I never had any desire to play the game again. The payoff for beating the puzzles is great, but after you learn the tricks. . . well, you are done (except for the annoying, finnicky, try and die ones that require finger agility and luck to beat. . . and those aren't fun).

However, Psychonauts and Beyond Good & Evil failed not because of the game, but because of terrible PR/marketing.

[danhoo]

Psychonauts would have really benefited from being Xbox only. Doublefine would have had a great chance to tweak everything nice and purdy, instead of wasting time porting it to the PS2.

If I'm not mistaken, Budcat did the port to PS2, and doublefine just verified it.

While I agree that had MS stuck with Psychonauts, they would have had a nice license on their hands, if you read the postmortem of the game in one of the more recent Game Developer Magazines, I can understand, at least from a business viewpoint, why they dropped it.

According to the post mortem written by someone at double-fine, the sum total development cost was somewhere near $12 million, which is pretty huge for a platformer. This was DF's first game as a studio, so they ran into the usual staffing and delay issues. At some point, someone at MS decided the costs going in, including calculated future costs, weren't going to be worth it. In hindsight, they were right -- Psychonauts did not re-coup that $12 million, even if you take into account that MS paid for a portion of that via milestone costs.

I feel for people like Lanning and Schafer. Right now publishers aren't interested in marketing "original" games, and some would argue gamers aren't interested in buying them either. Lanning's making a wise move moving to a more 'mature' market like film, where the odds of success with original work are much higher (still a role of the dice, but you get two).

[Wedge]

However, Psychonauts and Beyond Good & Evil failed not because of the game, but because of terrible PR/marketing.

Don't write off Psychonauts as a failure saleswise just yet, as it has not been released in Europe yet (Being released this friday, actually). Don't have much hope though, as advertising is absent.

Back to Lanning: I have never had much love for the guy. Talking about innovation and how he was gonna make a oddworld-quintology where each game was different from the other, and yet you had barely time to put down the controller after completing Abe's Oddysse before standard run-of-the-mill-sequel Abe's Exodus hit the store shelves.

Then the mediocre Munch's Oddysee. Never played it though, just going by the impression formed by fellow gamers and reviews.

Then Stranger's Wrath, which was a perfectly ok rental for the weekend (if you go to the movies saturday night and spend the sundays doing something else than playing games, that is) and it might even have had a decent story, but I wouldn't know because I had a hard time deciphering the low bitrate garble that came out of my speakers.

Well, I guess I just don't understand why we are supposed to miss this guy, and I definetly don't understand why we put him in the same boat as Schafer & Ancel. I concider the gaming community failing to pick up Beyond Good and Evil a crime against gaming. Stranger's Wrath not doing well? meh.