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When Larian Studios’ CEO Swen Vincke took the stage at The Game Awards to present Game of the Year he also relayed a bit of advice to other studios: Make a game that you want to play yourself, and your game will do well. Something that Daniel Knight, CEO of Kinetic Games and lead developer, did years ago with Phasmophobia.

“I don’t think there’s any main inspiration [for Phasmophobia],” Knight says in an interview with Andrea Shearon at Summer Game Fest. “The whole reason why I made [Phasmophobia] was because it didn’t exist and I wanted to play it.

“I got impatient waiting for a game to come out. I was constantly looking at the Steam store and waiting for something to come out; there was never anything. So I was like, I’ll just make it myself.”

Knight also theorises that Phasmophobia’s uniqueness was one of the reasons why it performed so well. I had certainly never played anything like it before, and I’ve played a lot of co-op horror games.

The other reason why I think Phasmo did so well, other than that fact it came out at the end of 2020 when people were still locked inside their homes trying to find new ways to entertain themselves and hang out with friends, was thanks to its odd take on horror games.

(Image credit: Kinetic Games)

Knight also told Andrea during this interview that he doesn’t even really like horror games, nor does he play a lot of them. Phasmophobia was actually made with the intention of creating a VR puzzle game which you could try and solve together with a bunch of your friends. The ghosts and scares all came second to that.

But just having the vision of something you want to create isn’t always enough. “[Phasmophobia] originally was a VR-only game, and I’d worked at a VR company so we did VR things before,” Knight says. “I took that knowledge to make a VR puzzle horror game. At the time there weren’t very many co-op horror VR games, and I was a huge fan of VR, so I just wanted to make something like that.

“But it’s very hard to make a co-op VR game on your own. So I ended up forcing it to be able to play without VR, and then I could get friends who didn’t have VR to help play test it.”

Phasmo does offer a VR mode now, but as someone who doesn’t own an Oculus or any VR kit, I’m very happy that this switch was made. It has meant that I had the chance to experience all the hilarity and horror which comes with hunting ghosts with friends.

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If there’s one thing us folks who love a good RPG can never have enough of, it’s quests. Oblivion Remastered has plenty in its base form – The Elder Scrolls 4 not being short on stuff to do – but of course modders were always going to add to that.

We’re still at a pretty early stage in terms of folks digging underneath the Unreal Engine second skin Virtuos has cocooned the classic game in and seeing what they can accomplish by pushing the boundaries. However, there’ve been plenty of mods that have already come out and had everyone going full Uriel Septim ‘I’ve seen you in my dreams’ mode.

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The latest of these, in my case, had been modder ColdTyrant’s “Infinitum” series, a bunch of mods released in rapid succession that overhaul Oblivion’s already pretty stellar faction questlines by adding in new infinitely accessible radiant quests and systems. They offer nice rewards in return for your character doing more of the job they signed up for – be it assassin, warrior, thief, gladiator, or mage – in a way that’s perfect for roleplaying.

So, having also been intrigued by his earliest works that made it possible to join the Mythic Dawn and become a necromancer in Oblivion Remastered, I decided earlier this week to reach out to ColdTyrant. We chatted about how the quest mods he’s created so far came together, what the next steps in Oblivion Remastered modding might require, and what his future modding plans are. Here’s that conversation:

VG247: What drew you to modding Oblivion Remastered, and has your previous modding experience come in handy when getting up to speed with it?

ColdTyrant: I’ve been playing Oblivion since I was a kid, in 2007 on the PS3. At that age I was absolutely astounded that I could do whatever I wanted, go wherever I wanted, fight, kill, or help whoever I wanted – the game absolutely blew me away and had a fundamental effect on myself and my creativity. I’ve been modding Bethesda games ever since my dad first let me play on his PC, and I was able to download the Construction Set for Oblivion and start poking around to see how things work and what I could make.

I had been following the rumors of an ‘Oblivion Remake’ since January of this year leading up to its eventual shadow drop, and was absolutely floored by the incredible visuals and gameplay overhauls made by the extremely talented team at Virtuos. They breathed new life into one of my all-time favorite video games, and it’s been so exciting to see everyone playing and talking about Oblivion again just like when I was a kid.

Naturally, after I’d already sunken about 100 or so hours into Remaster, I started feeling that itch to get back into the Construction Set. People were (and still are) pumping out mods, tweaks, and tools for Oblivion Remastered like crazy, and I really wanted to sort of get on that wave and see if I could contribute my own content to help enrich players’ experiences further.

Being back in Cyrodiil can do that to a guy. | Image credit: Bethesda/VG247

VG247: How did you go about creating your first couple of quest/faction expansion mods, Mythic Dawn Rising and Dark Path of The Necromancer? Was it a case of wanting more evil options and finding out what was possible, or did you go in with a set vision?

ColdTyrant: When I decided it was time to start modding Remastered, I really wasn’t sure where to start. I’ve always been fascinated with the villains Bethesda has created, and I know many players (including myself) have a desire to explore the idea – what if *I* was the bad guy?

I started re-learning Oblivion’s scripting and quest system, and ultimately decided I wanted to create an alternate path to the Main Quest, where the player could decide to explore what it would be like to actually be a member of Mehrunes Dagon’s Mythic Dawn cult. This mod was sort of a test of what I could get away with mechanically – a proof of concept to myself, and it’s a bit light on content and needs a big update (I’m working on this!).

After I released Mythic Dawn Rising, I just kept playing around with scripts and variables and seeing what could be done. When I discovered the different types of systems I’d be able to create with what I’d discovered, my ideas really began to run wild.

Dark Path of the Necromancer started as just a mod that would add an alternative way for players to create Black Soul Gems, but as I’d finish one feature I’d think of another, then get to work on it – then another, then another. It quickly sort of snowballed into this big project with multiple necromantic-centered systems, and I really love how it turned out. Sort of accidentally, I’d wound up creating another mod that allowed the player to explore membership with another previously forbidden faction.

Who wouldn’t want to join a group of folks who can cast armour illusions this cool? | Image credit: Bethesda/VG247

VG247: I’ve noticed that in both of those mods’ descriptions you note that you’re hoping to add more to them once more advanced Oblivion Remastered modding tools are out there. What kinds of tools are you most keen to see emerge going forwards and can you paint me a picture of what the ‘ideal versions’ of those mods might look like?

ColdTyrant: So, with modding the original Oblivion, it’s a lot simpler – anything you put into the game world will just be there when you load up the mod. No requirements, no difficult installation instructions, just plug and play. If I dropped a new NPC named Bob the Mage into Anvil, he’d just be there!

Oblivion Remastered is a bit more complicated. Virtuos has created an incredibly remarkable hybrid engine that combines both Gamebryo (an earlier version of Creation Engine) and Unreal Engine 5. Gamebryo handles the scripts, quests, and gameplay mechanics, while Unreal Engine 5 handles all rendering – meshes, textures, menus, lighting, shadows, effects, lines of text, pretty much anything and everything the player sees on their screen.

What this means in layman’s terms is that if I dropped Bob the Mage into Anvil in Remastered using the Gamebryo Oblivion Construction Set, well… that’s not enough to make him show up. At best, a visit to Anvil will result in him being completely invisible, and at worst, a game crash. This is because Gamebryo no longer handles rendering.

Unreal Engine needs to be told by Gamebryo via strings what actually exists and what to render into the game. Everything needs a table string entry that connects back to Unreal, or you’ll have problems.

Fortunately, some incredibly talented modders (I like referring to them as engineers) have created tools like TesSyncMapInjector or the Fix & Port Script for xEdit that do this job for us – so Bob the Mage can exist in Oblivion Remastered.

Ok, so this particular mage isn’t called Bob, but you get the picture. | Image credit: Bethesda/VG247

However, this means players will be required to install these tools on their end to experience mods that add new items and systems to Oblivion Remastered, and it can be frustrating for new people that want to get into modding their games, but feel intimidated by all these requirements and specific installation instructions.

So ideally, we’ll get to a point where either Bethesda/Virtuos release official modding tools for the remaster or talented mod engineers are able to create tool(s) that make mods fully compatible with Unreal, without the end user needing to install extra requirements. For the ‘Oldblivion’ versions of my mods, they are all plug and play – no requirements. But for Remastered – for now – you’ll always need UE4SS and TesSyncMapInjector.

VG247: What inspired you to take on your Infinitum series, how was it putting together each of the radiant quest systems and deciding on the unique twists you were going to give each faction’s system? One of the things I found most interesting about the Dark Brotherhood one was the gacha-style Dark Token reward system, so how did the idea for that specifically come about?

ColdTyrant: The ‘radiant quest system’ I’ve designed was actually initially a side feature in another currently unnamed mod project regarding the Blackwood Company, as my original intention was to continue the ‘join and play evil factions’ genre of mods I’d released so far.

When I discovered during testing how much fun I was having just doing infinite quests, I thought to myself – I need to adapt this to the main factions. From there, once again, my ideas started to kind of run wild.

I ‘extracted’ the radiant quest system from my Blackwood project, ported it into a new project, and reworked it for the Dark Brotherhood. I think a lot of people feel this way, but Oblivion’s Dark Brotherhood is by far my favorite questline in the game, and I say that while really loving all of the major factions. I wanted to be able to take contracts to assassinate people forever, and I hoped others would too. In the end, Dark Brotherhood – Infinitum was born, and the series kicked off.

Creeper, gacha master of the Dark Brotherhood. | Image credit: Bethesda/ColdTyrant

As far as the ‘gacha reward system’, I wanted to create a unique way for the player to get random rewards, but also be able to choose what type of reward they’re interested in. Creating a gacha that may or may not give the player something good for their Dark Tokens I thought would be a fantastic way to motivate the player to keep doing infinite contracts besides just the fun of sneak killing and gold.

If the popularity of certain gacha games is any indicator, people really love being able to take their chances and roll for rewards, even if the odds are stacked against them. Fortunately, however, Creeper does NOT charge the player any real-world money!

Some players complained that Creeper being in the Cheydinhal Sanctuary is not immersive (hence my ‘No Creeper’ optional version), and I totally get it – but I love Morrowind just as much as Oblivion and Skyrim, and I’m sure any Morrowind player is aware of the “meme” of selling Creeper hundreds of sets of Dark Brotherhood armor. Why wouldn’t he show up? He wants more of that stuff! It was just a fun reference in the end, and I was hoping people would get a kick out of it!

VG247: What are your personal plans and general hopes for Oblivion Remastered modding going forwards, especially when it comes to quest mods – are there any complex ideas you’ve not tried yet that you’re keen to give a go once the tech’s there and do you think there’s a high ceiling in terms of what people might eventually pull off?

ColdTyrant: Similar to what I mentioned earlier, the ideal situation for Oblivion Remastered modding will be the release of official modding tools to ‘grease the wheels’ on the mod development process – but given the complexity of the hybrid engine, I’m not sure if this will happen. It would be really nice, though, so our friends playing on console can hop on the hype wave of Remastered modding too.

As far as my plans – the next (and final, for the major factions) mod in the Infinitum series will be Mages Guild – Infinitum. This mod will feature an endless Creature Research system, a brand new Elixir-crafting system separate from regular Alchemy, and radiant quests to deliver those Elixirs to the various Mages Guild Halls. Additionally there will be an endlessly-available staff-crafting system.

Since we had our chat, ColdTyrant’s released his Mages Guild mod, so you can try it right after you’re done reading. | Image credit: Bethesda/ColdTyrant

Since the Mages Guild is a bit different, and focused more on scholarly endeavors and magical power, I’m hoping people really enjoy it!

Once the main Infinitum Series is complete, I’ll likely shift my focus to a big Mythic Dawn Rising update, and a secret project I’ve been writing up, that I think people will really love!

As far as whether or not I’ve tried certain ideas due to current limitations (I consider Remastered modding to currently be in its infancy), there are certainly a few. I try not to lean *too* heavily into NPC dialogue, for example, since we can’t use custom voice files yet, or have an elegant solution like ‘Elys Universal Silent Voice’ which exists for Oldblivion.

I think there is a high ceiling for learning and getting into more complex scripting if you’ve never done it before, but really, the sky is the limit when it comes to Bethesda modding – there are hundreds and hundreds of mod authors far more talented than myself that have created incredible content for all of Bethesda’s single-player masterpieces.

As time marches on, I’m really excited to see the things people continue to pump out for Oblivion Remastered. It’s really exciting to see what people can come up with!

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‘It didn’t exist and I wanted to play it’: Phasmophobia’s lead dev got tired of trawling around Steam for a co-op horror puzzle game so decided to just make it himself

Downhill is a fourth wall breaking action RPG whose protagonist knows you exist, and might not agree with your actions

“What if I was the bad guy?” Oblivion Remastered’s best new faction quests so far exist because a modder was doing evil stuff, and they’re now teasing “a secret project”