Why Obsidian is going from RPGs to tanks with Armored Warfare

It seems a bit strange that Obsidian Entertainment would go from large-scale RPGs to a free-to-play tank MMO, but chief executive Feargus Urquhart explains why the move to Armored Warfare isn't that unusual.

6

Obsidian Entertainment is widely known for its long line of RPGs, from its early days on Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic to the more recent South Park: The Stick of Truth. So it was unusual to hear the studio announce at GDC that they were moving into the free-to-play tank-busting business with Armored Warfare. But according to Obsidian's chief executive, Feargus Urquhart, the transition isn't all that much of a stretch.

"A ton of making an RPG is of course making the world and story," Urquhart explains to CVG, "but then another huge part of it is the character systems - and the balancing - and the XP tables - and the abilities - and balancing all of these 400 spells and 12 character classes and 9 races. All that together. That's a big part of doing something like a modern armored vehicle MMO. So you kind of tie that together with our abilities and what people like to do and so, hey, why not? We have the opportunity, why not take it? And it's good to try new things."

Obsidian's MMO tank combat game will feature numerous tanks from 1950 all the way through the modern day, each with its own respective stats and abilities. With several customization options also in place, Armored Warfare appears to set itself in Obsidian's comfort zone of complex RPG-style systems. However, there's another reason the studio decided to go in this direction and that's to help create a self-sustaining revenue model that will help when publisher partnerships are not immediately available.

"Slots for an independent developer to work with a publisher are kind of few and far between," Urquhart added. "Sometimes when you're done with a game there just isn't that slot available. So even though you guys like each other a ton and everything went wonderfully, the publisher isn't prepared to sign up for another $30-$40 million game when you're done. I think that's caused a change to what we have to look at and how we do it. We have to look at lots of different opportunities like Kickstarter, like Armored Warfare, and potentially acquiring our own licenses."

Armored Warfare is set to begin its closed beta later this year. Players can sign up on the game's website.

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?

From The Chatty
  • reply
    April 25, 2014 4:00 PM

    Ozzie Mejia posted a new article, Why Obsidian is going from RPGs to tanks with Armored Warfare.

    It seems a bit strange that Obsidian Entertainment would go from large-scale RPGs to a free-to-play tank MMO, but chief executive Feargus Urquhart explains why the move to Armored Warfare isn't that unusual.

    • reply
      April 25, 2014 4:28 PM

      Cus World of Tanks ain't touching anything past 1970 and it's making bank that's why.

      Make it cheap Obs. WOT costs as much as an mmo and it's no mmo.

      • reply
        April 25, 2014 5:45 PM

        lol 1970 is being incredibly generous...but yeah. I wanna use some TOG's and M1's.

    • reply
      April 26, 2014 11:23 AM

      * Knights of the Old Republic 2.

      Lets be clear they were responsible for that giant turd and not the amazing Knights of the Old Republic.

      • reply
        April 27, 2014 3:16 AM

        You mean for the better game despite being bugged to the core.

        • reply
          April 27, 2014 7:35 AM

          No, I mean it was a giant steaming turd from top to bottom, there was nothing better in that game.

          • reply
            April 27, 2014 7:38 AM

            Bwargh, I can but utterly disagree, but seeing how extreme you are about it, I'll leave it at that.

Hello, Meet Lola