Cain on Games - Tim Cain's new YouTube channel

[Ashen_Shugar]

I talk about the contributing factors to the rising costs of making video games.

Games companies have become too big - behemoths where the left hand doesn't know what the right is doing. 90% of staff are doing it simply to make a buck. No passion or pride in producing something outstanding. Far too much of the budget devoted to shiny 3D graphics, with graphics seemingly always taking 1st priority (Witcher 3 is guilty here too).
Also emphasis on producing robust core code which should be priority 1 superseded by need for shiny visuals with RT, AA and pals.

A question I'd like to see him answer that I wouldn't expect him to just yet is how Troika was able to make Bloodlines for around 5 million but Hardsuit struggled and The Chinese Room continues to struggle to make Bloodlines sequels of lesser scope with tens of millions.

No pride no passion, clock on at 9 clock off at 5. Too much beaurecracy, too many moving targets and confused priorities. Troika was what 50-100 man operation max at its biggest? Plus the leads were wholly invested in producing something they could be proud of, something they wanted to play. By gamers for gamers type shit. In the absence of this type of dedication the end result can only be mediocrity.

 

[Infinitron]

I tell a story with the phrase "she used her foot to shoot me in the face with a laser" while talking about Fallout. Enjoy.

 

[NecroLord]

I tell a story with the phrase "she used her foot to shoot me in the face with a laser" while talking about Fallout. Enjoy.

JarlFrank check this one out mate!

 

[Roguey]

Tim approves of Twin Peaks and The Return.

Not only is he color-blind, he had a tear in his retina that could have made him lose his sight entirely, geez.

He also mentions that his teeth are always breaking/falling out, has to get a lot of work done to make them look good. Perhaps too much sugar in his younger days.

 

[NecroLord]

He also mentions that his teeth are always breaking/falling out, has to get a lot of work done to make them look good. Perhaps too much sugar in his younger days.

He might have a sweet tooth.
He's also quite a good cook, I think, or he likes cooking a lot (remember the banana bread recipe from the Arcanum manual).

 

[Roguey]

He might have a sweet tooth.
He's also quite a good cook, I think, or he likes cooking a lot.

In the intro to the Pillars cookbook he mentions that in graduate school he was baking a new dessert every night for himself and his pals and they had to beg him to slow down because they had all gained 15 lbs.

 

[Late Bloomer]

Looks like he is doing members 1st videos now. Anyone a member?

I talk about what I expect to see in a designer portfolio when they apply for a job.

 

[Late Bloomer]

Channel Memberships information for anyone who might have missed it.

Mutant 2.99
Super Mutant 5.99
Master 9.99

The "Loyalty" Badges

 

[Late Bloomer]

Members Only again. Will free up when the set time is expired.

I talk about how some of my existing IPs could be made into non-RPG games.

 

[NecroLord]

Channel Memberships information for anyone who might have missed it.

Mutant 2.99
Super Mutant 5.99
Master 9.99

The "Loyalty" Badges

C'mon, man.
Tim trying to beat the New Reno whores in cheapness.

 

[Yoomazir]

He should open a OnlyFags account, I'm sure he'll get more subs there

 

[Infinitron]

I talk about how using an Intellectual Property in a new medium can mess up...in many different ways.

 

[NecroLord]

I talk about how using an Intellectual Property in a new medium can mess up...in many different ways.

Shame we never got Van Buren.

 

[Infinitron]

Hmmm:

I talk about how some of my existing IPs could be made into non-RPG games.

 

[Roguey]

Tim reveals his love of Borderlands started because it felt a lot like how he would have done a Fallout FPS.

 

[Infinitron]

I talk about how hard it can be to define the simplest of terms and why that means you need a Game Director.

 

[NecroLord]

Tim reveals his love of Borderlands started because it felt a lot like how he would have done a Fallout FPS.

Already have a Fallout FPS in the form of Bethesda's "Fallout"...
New Vegas tried to steer it into the direction of the original Interplay games, but still failed.

 

[Elttharion]

Do we know if Tim is working on a game right now?

 

[Roguey]

Tim reveals his love of Borderlands started because it felt a lot like how he would have done a Fallout FPS.

Already have a Fallout FPS in the form of Bethesda's "Fallout"...
New Vegas tried to steer it into the direction of the original Interplay games, but still failed.

There's definitely a difference in scope between Fallout 3/4 and Borderlands. Tim's talking about a pure fps.

Do we know if Tim is working on a game right now?

He's remotely working on The Outer Worlds 2 and is doing a bit of contract work here and there.

 

[NecroLord]

He's remotely working on The Outer Worlds 2

No fucking way.
Just what the industry needed.
Another The Outer Worlds game...

 

[Infinitron]

I talk about my dog Madame Abigail aka Abby.

 

[Infinitron]

Hmmm:

I talk about feeling insecurity...and how I caused that in others.

 

[Infinitron]

I talk about why Fallout is set 84 years after the war.

 

[NecroLord]

I talk about why Fallout is set 84 years after the war.

I do wish Tim and co. would've spent more time on explaining what were the full and exact reasons for why the US and China duked it out (it was the Resource Wars) and how did the Great War manage to lead to worldwide societal collapse.
Did they blanket the whole world with nukes that hit all major population centers?

Ah well, still, we have the iconic "War. War never changes" as a reasonable explanation.
And of course Tim himself commenting on the fact that Fallout was never a critique on Capitalism (this was Bethesda's doing) but rather a commentary on the inevitability of war and humanity's innate impulses toward conflict.


Something to go with the current subject matter and the soundscape that I imagine during and after nuclear annihilation:

 

[Roguey]

Tim answered a question of mine in the comments.

I have a related question - is there a particular reason why Aradesh speaks with an accent but Tandi doesn't? Wondering what the thought process was here, even if the explanation is just as simple as inconsistent voice direction.

I think it's just an oversight, just like the "date" of Shady Sands foundation.
The way I explained that date issue to myself was that it wasn't Shady Sands initially. So it can be both true that Aradesh's ancestor founded it according to the game and that Shady Sands was founded only 20 years before the events of the game according to the "bible".

I have no notes about Aradesh and I didn't write him, but @zhulikkulik's explanation makes sense. One of the starting characters for Fallout was a woman with a Russian name who was the daughter of a Russian consulate who made it into a Vault when the war broke out. Would she speak with a Russian accent like her parents? Maybe.

I have never known a second-generation immigrant to have an accent like their parents. My siblings and I are second-gen ourselves (you only need one parent to qualify ), we speak like the people around us (and this changed over time; it started out thick and southern like my grandparents and then became more neutral like the people on tv). It seems unlikely to me that Aradesh would have the accent he does unless everyone around him spoke like that, and Tandi speaking the way she does and all the future NCR people speaking the way they do shows that they do not. This is further supporting evidence that Fallout is a middlebrow game made by people with good tastes, not the work of intellectuals. Barring a more in-depth explanation from the fellow who wrote Aradesh, I conclude that he has an accent simply because he thought it would be cool for him to have one. That's all right, but there's a fine line between Black Isle/Troika middlebrow cool and Bethesda lowbrow cool.

Josh Sawyer would have gotten it more-nearly-accurate, this is within his field of expertise.