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Brian Fargo plans to retire after Wasteland 3

inXile boss says when the game ships in 2019, it'll mark the end of a 38-year career

Industry veteran Brian Fargo, who founded the studio Interplay back in 1983, has told our sister site Eurogamer that he intends to retire after Wasteland 3 is completed. Currently, the game is on track to release in 2019.

"Wasteland 2 and Torment both came out great," he said. "The Mage's Tale's got a great buzz. The Bard's Tale 4 looks spectacular. Wasteland 3 is building on Wasteland 2. It seems like a good time to drop the mic.

"I love this industry, but I've been at this since 1981. I've been at it with Ken and Roberta Williams [Sierra co-founders], Trip Hawkins [EA founder], the guys from Brøderbund - I look at my friends, they have a lot more spare time than I do. It's a very intense business. It's all encompassing. It seems like I should relax for a little bit."

Fargo has had a big impact on this industry, as Interplay has produced some incredible IP including the original Fallout series, and the company was publisher for the Baldur's Gate games and Descent series. Interplay also famously teamed up with BioWare and Blizzard (at the time, known as called Silicon & Synapse) on a number of top-selling titles in the '90s.

When Interplay eventually ran into financial trouble after trying to get into the console software business, French company Titus Software gained a majority control of the company in 2001, and Fargo then decided to leave. It was at that time, in 2002, that Fargo started up inXile Entertainment.

Importantly, Fargo is not worried about inXile's future without him. He said it'll be a profitable independent developer with "money in the bank" when he leaves, and the current staff and shareholders should be able to keep the business running smoothly.

"I have some wonderfully competent people who are making it happen here," he said. "One of the things I enjoy the most is finding and fostering talent. Certainly, externally everybody knows we gave Blizzard and BioWare their first shots. Internally I have my own guys who are just great. They're very tuned into these products. I'm good at finding these people and putting the talent together. I've been training these people for years to make me obsolete. That's what you have to do as a leader of a company."

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James Brightman

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James Brightman has been covering the games industry since 2003 and has been an avid gamer since the days of Atari and Intellivision. He was previously EIC and co-founder of IndustryGamers and spent several years leading GameDaily Biz at AOL prior to that.

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