Obsidian's Josh Sawyer on RPG cities: 'Compared to a dungeon, generally speaking, a town is 4x the expense per square foot'

Nov 02, 2026 - 05:13

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Obsidian's Josh Sawyer on RPG cities: 'Compared to a dungeon, generally speaking, a town is 4x the expense per square foot'

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In a new Q&A vlog on his YouTube channel, Obsidian studio design director Josh Sawyer took a question about why there are so few RPGs in contemporary urban settings. Part of the problem, according to Sawyer: They're more difficult and costly to make than other RPG environments.

"One of the issues as an RPG developer that we've found⁠—at least at Obsidian and Black Isle⁠—is that, compared to a dungeon, generally speaking, a town is four times the expense per square foot, basically. Not really "square foot" but, if you have a map of a given size. If you have a dungeon that's this big, it costs X. If you have a town that's populated with people that feels realistic, that's four times as expensive.

"Obviously, that's a generalization, but that's something that is reflected in our [past] work. As we work on areas over time, when we get towards the end, we realize: 'Holy crap, we spent forever trying to do these maps.'

"For example, at the end of [Pillars of Eternity], we had to do Twin Elms. And that was, one: A big pacing landmine that a lot of people did not appreciate⁠—so, sorry about that. But also, we're back to doing very expensive content. You might ask: 'Well, what's the expense?'

"There's a high density of NPCs, a lot of characters have dialogue. They have their own⁠—maybe not super-unique appearances⁠—but there's just a lot more custom stuff that goes into setting up towns, usually. They're more expensive. Obviously you can do it, though."

Elsewhere in this section, Sawyer cited Baldur's Gate 2's Athkatla, Disco Elysium, and the recent Zero Parades as RPGs that land the plane on believable, dense urban environments⁠—though Sawyer notes that the latter two have the advantage of not needing to work in as many believable combat encounters as other RPGs.

A few others spring to mind for me: Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, Cyberpunk 2077, and Baldur's Gate 3's version of the titular city. But all of those really highlight Sawyer's point about expense and challenge. Vampire and Cyberpunk were notoriously difficult development cycles for their respective studios. I'll always be a BG3 Act 3 defender, but it's definitely the part of the game with the most noticeable seams.

But even if they're hard to make, I love urban adventures in RPGs, whether as part or the whole of a game. Novigrad and Oxenfurt are two of my favorite parts of The Witcher 3, for example. For a real niche example of an urban RPG you should have on your radar, I highly recommend the early access Moves of the Diamond Hand.

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Ted has been thinking about PC games and bothering anyone who would listen with his thoughts on them ever since he booted up his sister's copy of Neverwinter Nights on the family computer. He is obsessed with all things CRPG and CRPG-adjacent, but has also covered esports, modding, and rare game collecting. When he's not playing or writing about games, you can find Ted lifting weights on his back porch. You can follow Ted on Bluesky.