Cain on Games - Tim Cain's new YouTube channel

[std::namespace]

I talk about my work on making Arcanum a native Windows 10 executable...and why I cannot release it.

KING

I don't buy it. He can make mods like any other people. The only difference is that he'd be doing it using the source code that he owns. He's not bound contractually to any special treatment, he'd be just like any other modder. As a modder, he can release the diff patch for the current .exe.
He's just being a drama queen. He also clearly wants Microsoft to pay him for essentially a mod. Good luck with that. I'd throw a few dollars his way if he simply opened a Patreon and started modding. But he wants to be the drama queen.

DROG!? where is drog when you need him...

 

[0sacred]

Anyway, Tim likes to tell the story of how Troika (as the developer) was barred from releasing patches for TOEE. Probably got hit with a bunch of legal mumbo jumbo back then and got the shit scared out of him, and has never looked at it again. He's the type to go "well ackshually" when you tell him that you patched or modded this game you have no rights to.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

He mentioned he might take a look at Vampire. Really looking forward to that one too.

Yes, but I'm even more looking forward to him taking a "look" at TOEE... like, a really hard look. Something that makes it playable. I'd rather watch a Cain video of an improved TOEE than play it in its current state.

Co8 and Temple+ mods have got you covered!
Install those and you should be good to go.

I was thinking the same thing.

 

[NecroLord]

Anyway, Tim likes to tell the story of how Troika (as the developer) was barred from releasing patches for TOEE. Probably got hit with a bunch of legal mumbo jumbo back then and got the shit scared out of him, and has never looked at it again. He's the type to go "well ackshually" when you tell him that you patched or modded this game you have no rights to.

At least Avellone acknowledges and even praises the efforts of modders.
Something Tim doesn't quite seem to do.

 

[Wesp5]

Something Tim doesn't quite seem to do.

He praised my Unofficial Patch in one of his video comments, and it would be really cool if he could fix the fundamental engine issues with Bloodlines that I wouldn't even know how to do!

 

[NecroLord]

the fundamental engine issues with Bloodlines

The VTMB Source Engine version?
What's wrong with it?

 

[agris]

Something Tim doesn't quite seem to do.

He praised my Unofficial Patch in one of his video comments, and it would be really cool if he could fix the fundamental engine issues with Bloodlines that I wouldn't even know how to do!

Make it easy for him, write a bulleted list!

 

[StrongBelwas]

Can't talk about the Outer Worlds as much as his other titles because a lot of that work also involves talking about stuff going on with Outer Worlds 2 and that would hit NDA problems.
5 million TOW sales doesn't include game pass, Outer Worlds is easily his best selling game ever. Made him decide to talk about marketing today.
For early games, particularly in 80s/early 90s had relatively little marketing. Maybe an ad in Byte magazine, there wasn't really a computer gaming specific magazine. Then came along CGW, Bard's Tale Construction probably got an ad, Cain has a copy of the Dragon Magazine 5 star review. Fallout got two or three ads.
Cain's role was pretty much just signing off on whatever marketing came up with in a separate meeting. Mainly there for accuracy and just to say it's OK.
Outer Worlds was very different, marketing budget was enormous. Private Division being part of take two gave them a dedicated team that involved the ToW team in marketing. Sometimes tele conferenced, other times the marketing team would meet them for a one on one meeting to see what they felt was important about the game.
People from marketing noticed the Moonman mascot and corporate slogans and and wanted to use them in the ads for the game. Lots of meetings involving the marketers pulling stuff from the game instead of creating their own
A company in LA called Buddha Jones was involved and Cain has a very positive impression of their team, one of the marketers had played their older titles (Cains, Obsidians, he doesn't specify) and specifically asked to be involved in the campaign. Cain assumed they were there to pitch ideas to them, they mainly wanted to talk about the ideas behind the game. They made the trailers for the game. They picked the music, Cain liked their choices. Cain liked that they understood the humor of the game.
Cain was surprised by this level of coherence , his impression of marketing was that would go in and tell him what they were doing, these marketers wanted to know what he was doing and how they could use that, was impressed by the 15/30/60 second trailers they made.
Never been easier to make games then right now, "If you're not making a game right now, you don't want to, you just want to talk about making one." But now it is harder then ever to find a game.
Outer World's marketing campaign did a good job of showing the essence of the game without misleading anyone and making it easy to find in Cain's opinion.
Really good game goes hand in hand with having really good marketing, many games have development/marketing budgets of similar levels and Cain knows several where the marketing budget was bigger than the game budget.

 

[NecroLord]

Can't talk about the Outer Worlds as much as his other titles because a lot of that work also involves talking about stuff going on with Outer Worlds 2 and that would hit NDA problems.
5 million TOW sales doesn't include game pass, Outer Worlds is easily his best selling game ever. Made him decide to talk about marketing today.
For early games, particularly in 80s/early 90s had relatively little marketing. Maybe an ad in Byte magazine, there wasn't really a computer gaming specific magazine. Then came along CGW, Bard's Tale Construction probably got an ad, Cain has a copy of the Dragon Magazine 5 star review. Fallout got two or three ads.
Cain's role was pretty much just signing off on whatever marketing came up with in a separate meeting. Mainly there for accuracy and just to say it's OK.
Outer Worlds was very different, marketing budget was enormous. Private Division being part of take two gave them a dedicated team that involved the ToW team in marketing. Sometimes tele conferenced, other times the marketing team would meet them for a one on one meeting to see what they felt was important about the game.
People from marketing noticed the Moonman mascot and corporate slogans and and wanted to use them in the ads for the game. Lots of meetings involving the marketers pulling stuff from the game instead of creating their own
A company in LA called Buddha Jones was involved and Cain has a very positive impression of their team, one of the marketers had played their older titles (Cains, Obsidians, he doesn't specify) and specifically asked to be involved in the campaign. Cain assumed they were there to pitch ideas to them, they mainly wanted to talk about the ideas behind the game. They made the trailers for the game. They picked the music, Cain liked their choices. Cain liked that they understood the humor of the game.
Cain was surprised by this level of coherence , his impression of marketing was that would go in and tell him what they were doing, these marketers wanted to know what he was doing and how they could use that, was impressed by the 15/30/60 second trailers they made.
Never been easier to make games then right now, "If you're not making a game right now, you don't want to, you just want to talk about making one." But now it is harder then ever to find a game.
Outer World's marketing campaign did a good job of showing the essence of the game without misleading anyone and making it easy to find in Cain's opinion.
Really good game goes hand in hand with having really good marketing, many games have development/marketing budgets of similar levels and Cain knows several where the marketing budget was bigger than the game budget.

Has Tim made a video on why exactly The Outer Worlds is such shit?
I wonder if he will...

 

[Russia is over. The end.]

Cain liked that they understood the humor of the game.

Maybe they can explain it to us? I wish I understood.

 

[Roguey]

Has Tim made a video on why exactly The Outer Worlds is such shit?
I wonder if he will...

He thinks it's a good game, but not as good as it could be because they had a low budget. The target market was also casuals.

 

[0sacred]

But now it is harder then ever to find a game.

git gud, join Codex. I never bother to look for games myself anymore. Certainly better than looking at low IQ ads.

 

[NecroLord]

He thinks it's a good game

Hah!

That's rich...

 

[Gandalf]

One can hate the full non-technical package that comes with a game, but does it really make it a bad game, if it is well programmed and designed?
It's like with the new Star Wars trilogy. One can hate the script, cast, acting, costumes and all that jazz, but pacing is good, frames are well shot, it looks stunning.
Yeah, I think it is a good comparison. Some filmmakers will say thery're good movies, likewise some game devs will say the games are good, because they're looking at the core craft values.

 

[NecroLord]

One can hate the full non-technical package that comes with a game, but does it really make it a bad game, if it is well programmed and designed?
It's like with the new Star Wars trilogy. One can hate the script, cast, acting, costumes and all that jazz, but pacing is good, frames are well shot, it looks stunning.
Yeah, I think it is a good comparison. Some filmmakers will say thery're good movies, likewise some game devs will say the games are good, because they're looking at the core craft values.

A polished turd is still a turd.

 

[scytheavatar]

One can hate the full non-technical package that comes with a game, but does it really make it a bad game, if it is well programmed and designed?
It's like with the new Star Wars trilogy. One can hate the script, cast, acting, costumes and all that jazz, but pacing is good, frames are well shot, it looks stunning.
Yeah, I think it is a good comparison. Some filmmakers will say thery're good movies, likewise some game devs will say the games are good, because they're looking at the core craft values.

If you think that a movie with bad script, cast, acting, costumes and all that jazz can be considered good because "pacing is good, frames are well shot, it looks stunning" then you obviously cannot have your opinions on movies taken seriously.

Having said that let's face it, we can shit on TOW as much as we want but the reality is that it IS a good game in comparison to Starfield.

 

[Infinitron]

I talk about game features that excite me that would seem insignificant to the average gamer.

 

[Roguey]

The list:

• minor cosmetic reactivity (floats that comment on your appearance for example)
• themed skeuomorphic mini maps
• inventories that allow you to mark items as junk and then sell all
• environmental storytelling (for some reason he didn't know the term for this)
• being able to delay leveling and bank skillpoints for later (Rusty disapproves)
• perks that broaden the effects of an ability instead of being straight upgrades of what they already do

He also talks in the beginning how he hates unskippable cutscenes and will put off playing games if he knows they're there. It's unpausable cutscenes that annoy me more. A lack of a pause is even more inconsiderate.

 

[0sacred]

• perks that broaden the effects of an ability instead of being straight upgrades of what they already do

if your game uses perks, this is not an insignificant feature.

 

[NecroLord]

• perks that broaden the effects of an ability instead of being straight upgrades of what they already do

if your game uses perks, this is not an insignificant feature.

Skyrimjob.

 

[__scribbles__]

I talk about my top five video games of all time...and why they are my top five.

 

[StrongBelwas]

Top five games, but going by chronology, not order.
1)Star Raiders, Atari 800 version, amazed by the game being full 3d on such a small size, the clone of the game he made in Unity is eighty times bigger just from the executable.
Uses sprites, but the game has proper 3d location tracking and rotates properly. So amazed by the game he figured out how to extract the assembly code the game was made on and studied it. His research of it probably led to him getting his first job.
2)Ultima III: Exodus. Didn't play it until 1987, didn't play the first two. First RPG love. Loved the party control and puzzles, particularly Moongates. Praises the final encounter. Liked that there was level scaling on the outside but that the dungeons had fixed levels that could be quite high. Spent a whole summer playing it. Cain has played RPGs with better graphics/stories/characters/mechanics, but Ultima III lit the cRPG spark.
3) Star Control II. Played the first star control, but mainly just messing with the two player combat mode with a friend. Loved the nonlinear, open world, excellent narrative and characters. Appreciated the dark storyline despite the funny characters, major influence for Fallout. Loved the combat. Still hums the music from time to time. Considers Star Control II an RPG, if you consider your character the ship, everything about it makes it a CRPG. Reference to writing about it in felipepepe's book.
4) Star Wars X Wing. Played Wing Commander, but loved (original trilogy) star wars and preferred this game. Bought a joystick just to play it. Loved the game being true 3d compared to Wing Commander and Star Trek 25th Anniversary's sprites. Liked power control. Played it to the point he wore out his joystick, won another joystick at a Logitech booth at the first GDC, but can't remember what for.
5) Everquest. Got addicted to it. Appreciated differences between singleplayer and multiplayer games in terms of difficulty and storytelling. Goes over the spice girls/necromancer/all hobbit groups he built that he previously mentioned. Directly led to him wanting to make an MMO which lead to him working at Carbine.

 

[0sacred]

RPG dev actually has RPG's in his top 5, Soyer take note

edit: "I can not understate" I can not overstate, Tim.

 

[Roguey]

RPG dev actually has RPG's in his top 5, Soyer take note

edit: "I can not understate" I can not overstate, Tim.

Sawyer's top three were Fallout, Darklands, and Pool of Radiance.

 

[0sacred]

RPG dev actually has RPG's in his top 5, Soyer take note

edit: "I can not understate" I can not overstate, Tim.

Sawyer's top three were Fallout, Darklands, and Pool of Radiance.

I was talking about that recent tweet of his