Wasteland 2's Brian Fargo: "We all want respect"

InXile CEO Brian Fargo has discussed the problems with working under a publisher, explaining how frustrating it was in comparison to the crowd-funding route of Kickstarter.

Speaking about the release of Wasteland 2 in the latest issue of our print magazine out next Monday, Fargo explained how doing development work for publishers in the past "was a disaster", and ultimately developers "paid for [publisher] sins."

"We all want respect," he stated when we asked about the positive response from gamers he received first-hand when he began the Kickstarter campaign for Wasteland 2, and discussed the time when on release of his 1985 title Bard's Tale, his publisher went bankrupt.

"So we go on, I try and do some development work for some publishers, and as is well noted, it was a disaster. And what you discovered through it - and this is not just with me - but my fellow developers, is that you pay for their sins. That's what is frustrating. For example, this didn't happen to me, but, if they put out a buggy product, you take the hit. Even though they do QA. So I was taking these hits for things which I had zero control over."

Kickstarter, he says, "got me back in control of myself...I completely jettisoned that concept of working with publishers again."

The CEO calls the successful Kickstarter campaign "the high water mark" of his career ("I was practically teary-eyed when we funded, when we made it") and that the funding structure allowed the team to pour all their resources into Wasteland 2 rather than worry about the future.

"In contrast to other ways you may be developing through outside sources, whether from a publisher or from an investor, they want results. They want milestones. You have to prove yourself constantly along the way that you know what you're doing.

We spent 30, 35% of our energy trying to get paid or proving we knew what we're doing. And then you spend 30% of my energy going "what are we going to do next?" If I don't have the next project lined up, everybody doesn't have a job. So you got this much time to spend this much time on the game: that's the reality. With crowd funding, here's the money up front. "We trust you". So I spend 95% of all my energy just thinking about how to make the game better."

Wasteland 2 is now available from Steam. The new issue of Gamereactor magazine will be available at retailers across the country from Monday. You can subscribe to the magazine to get each issue shipped to your door.