I've been obsessive about a single dialogue alternative in an underappreciated Obsidian sport for 10 years, so I tracked down the man who wrote it to study every little thing about my favourite joke in RPG historical past
For ten years, I have been obsessive about a single dialogue alternative (actually a group of decisions) initially of Pillars of Eternity’s first enlargement, The White March: Half One.
As soon as you’ve got completed beating again an ogre assault in town of Stalwart, you are free to poke round, meet the residents, settle for aspect quests, all that traditional RPG jazz. On the docks, interacting with a suspicious barrel of fish reveals there is a man inside, and you may dump him out onto the road.
He’s none aside from Zahua, martial artist, ascetic, psychonaut, and a brand new DLC companion. Earlier than revealing that he bought on this barrel in quest of true debasement of the self, a sensory deprivation tank plus train in combatting self-importance, he has a characteristically trippy, befuddled, out-there query for the participant: “Are you actual?”
The potential solutions gave me a primal, hooting stomach snort after I first noticed them in 2015:
- “Sure.”
- “[Lie] No.”
- “[Lie] Sure.”
- “No.”
- “Now that you simply ask, I am not so certain.”
- “There isn’t any method to make sure.”
On the danger of explaining the joke an excessive amount of, I really like that it is concurrently a little bit of a send-up of how Obsidian and old-school RPGs writ massive do dialogue, whereas additionally being an ideal alternative to roleplay your character. After a lot deliberation through the years, my favourite possibility is “[Lie] Sure”—it implies a lot, together with a sure existential angst, in addition to a concern of being discovered about it. “Ah shit, higher make one thing up so individuals suppose I am regular.”
Somewhat than simply preserve gushing about it, although, I made a decision to get in contact with the man who wrote the road, in addition to Zahua’s character as a complete, to get the thin on the way it happened. Enter former Obsidian author, Eric Fenstermaker.
“[Nihilist] I knew it!”
Zahua the monk is an outdated, battered warrior from an extinct tradition, one who combines the gravitas of a non secular ascetic with the buffoonery of a stoner—I will be digging into Fenstermaker’s recollections on the character as a complete in a separate article. A part of Zahua’s warrior observe includes the ingestion of sacred hallucinogens, resulting in his predicament once we first discover him.
“I feel it simply got here naturally out of how I might determined to introduce the character,” Fenstermaker stated. “I used to be trying on the map of the city he is launched in, Stalwart, and making an attempt to determine the place I might place him, and this was a fishing village and there have been market stalls and barrels. And I wished to introduce him in a method that you might see instantly by way of his actions who he was. Type of an icebreaker that will lead the dialog in a route that exposed character.”
“So I assumed, what if he is practising detachment from the fabric world by crouching down inside a barrel of fish for a couple of hours? And he is outdated and perpetually below the affect, so what if he is dozed off and he is simply waking up and he’s so disoriented he has truly misplaced observe of what’s actual?”
As for the number of responses, Fenstermaker expressed that the very last thing he desires to really feel (or make one other participant really feel) in an RPG is a way of being railroaded. “If the NPC is allowed to reject actuality,” stated Fenstermaker, “should not the participant even be allowed?”
He additionally identified how this alternate, nevertheless foolish, manages to tie into one of many core themes of Pillars and now Avowed, an anxious “religious uncertainty” to keep away from spoiling the plots of those video games an excessive amount of. “The query ‘Are you actual?’ although ridiculous in context, has actual weight on this setting,” Fenstermaker stated. “The reply is not essentially as clear lower as it might appear at first blush.
“If I am being sincere although, I in all probability largely did it as a result of I assumed it might be humorous.”
One thing I at all times appreciated concerning the alternate was the way it allow you to accomplish that a lot roleplaying with out demanding loads of written and programmed response from the sport. Zahua has a distinct response for every reply, however in any other case your alternative would not come up once more. Fenstermaker does want he may have invested a little bit extra payoff into it, although, and whereas explaining his reasoning, cited what could also be an even funnier dialogue line from the bottom sport that I might by no means seen earlier than.
“In fact, I might have cherished to seek out methods so as to add extra reactivity, as a result of I feel constructing on that gag may’ve paid off even larger, however the deadlines on that enlargement have been very tight.” He defined. “Within the base sport, one among my favourite bits of reactivity is that you would be able to select a backstory that kind of makes you a nihilist. After which very late within the sport, if you study a stunning bit of stories with existential implications, one of many choices is, ‘[Nihilist] I KNEW IT!'”
Now I desperately wish to play Pillars of Eternity as a nihilist to see this one for myself. Reactivity aspirations apart, Fenstermaker nonetheless sees the worth in providing gamers alternatives for kind of pure self-expression just like the Zahua dialog.
“A lot of the essence of RPG dialogue is permitting gamers to specific their character, however ideally you additionally present them with alternatives to find issues about their character they hadn’t even realized but,” stated Fenstermaker. “It will not matter to everybody—some individuals do not wish to put in that form of psychological work, some individuals love RPGs for the fight and the extra numerical aspect. However I feel understanding that RPG gamers are so numerous of their causes for enjoying, you wish to do your greatest to achieve everybody on their phrases.”