Feargus Urquhart on Licensed Games

While we already posted about Feargus’ IGDA presentation as a whole, GameSpot is offering some of Obsidian’s CEO thoughts on licensed games expounded there in more detail. The bottom line is that, as nice as they are, original IPs can be a problem too:

“I really like making licensed products,” Urquhart said. “I really enjoy playing in other people’s worlds. And that doesn’t mean I don’t ever want to make another original IP. I just think that in some cases, a lot of people in the industry think that original IP is the pinnacle achievement of your life, and that you can only be creative if you’re working in original IP. I can say that I’ve had the most fun in my career working on licensed products.”

Urquhart later amended that statement to suggest his work on the original 1997 Fallout for Black Isle Studios was as enjoyable as his previous licensed work.

“The creativity on original IP is awesome,” Urquhart continued. “You get to invent something. But there is no box. And because there is no box, all you get for a long period of time is a lot of people arguing about what the box is. We’ve learned that you have to have that person who gets the box, and through sheer force of will, force that box on everybody else. There has to be someone who comes in and says, ‘No, this is the box. All of you need to shut up.’ In my opinion.”

Here’s still hoping that we’ll see at least some new “boxes” from Obsidian and other RPG developers in the future.