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Fallout: The first modern role-playing game
This is a weekly column focusing on "Western" role-playing games: their stories, their histories, their mechanics, their insanity, and their inanity. It wasn't supposed to be Fallout. After the role-playing game genre crashed in 1995, new models for the style began to appear. Smart money would have been on the wildly popular Diablo to become the trendsetter, where Fallout was an underdog from the start. At the 2012 Game Developers Conference, Fallout's lead producer, Tim Cain, described its creation: he was the only Interplay employee assigned to the game for months, it was almost canceled twice, and when it shipped Cain was told it was a "risk" despite the low level of company investment. Despite all that, the original Fallout has become widely known as one of the greatest and most influential games of all time, and the model for the biggest RPGs of recent years. Several weeks ago I argued that Ultima was the most important game series of all time, but Ultima's influence through new games was almost gone in 1997. Fallout was its replacement; it was the first modern role-playing game.
WildStar design director Tim Cain joins Obsidian Entertainment
It would appear that Carbine Studios is down one great talent, as the studio's former Design Director, Fallout designer Tim Cain, has departed for greener pastures. The news was discovered via Cain's Linkedin account, confirming rumors of his departure that abounded over the summer. Greener pastures, in this case, means Obsidian Entertainment, which is perhaps best-known for Neverwinter Nights 2, Knights of The Old Republic 2, and Fallout: New Vegas. The studio is currently working on a game based on Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time book series. While it's unknown whether or not Cain will be returning to his old stomping grounds of the Fallout universe, it would be considerably apropos. As for Carbine, it remains to be seen who will replace Cain in the position of Design Director, but here's to hoping it's someone who can do justice to the promising sci-fi MMO.
Original Fallout designer expresses concern for Fallout MMO
What could possibly be a bad idea about an impending MMO based in the Fallout universe? We've heard the rumors, and we're very excited about the possibilities. So why would it be a bad idea? Well, according to original Fallout designer and newly-promoted Carbine Studios Design Director Tim Cain, "It's not necessarily the direction I would've gone."Cain's main concern with a Fallout MMO is that the original game was designed to make you feel like you were living in a post-apocalyptic world. In other words, there's not going to be 100+ other players running around you killing (Oh God, please no!) the same 10 boars as you in the same area. Although Cain doesn't really offer any alternatives to this, would a Guild Wars-style instanced world be the solution? We'll have to wait and see what Interplay has up their sleeves.
Fallout's Tim Cain promoted for unnamed Carbine MMO
NCsoft's Carbine Studios has just announced the promotion of Tim Cain from programming director to design director for an unannounced project that is in the works. Tim Cain, for anyone keeping score at home, is the former producer and designer for Fallout and Fallout 2, and has been with Carbine Studios since its inception in 2005. Before you get too excited about Carbine's MMO project being a Fallout-themed MMO, that has already been claimed by Interplay.So what does this promotion really mean for Cain? Our friends at Joystiq pondered this very question and asked Cain to clarify: "As the programming director, I was responsible for trying to realize the ideas of the design director. I would take his requests for features and system specifications and coordinate my team of programmers to create those features and systems. If game development was a train, I was shoveling the coal into the engine to keep it chugging along. Now as the design director, I am the conductor of the train. I get to decide where we go and where we stop."We wish Cain the best of luck in his new position as we anxiously await more information on this new project.
Tim Cain becomes design director for unannounced NCsoft title
NCsoft's Carbine Studios announced today that Fallout and Fallout 2 producer and designer Tim Cain has been named design director for the company's unannounced project. Carbine has pretty much been off the radar since last year when the studio was first announced and Tim Cain had the title of programmer director.We're not that well versed in nit-picky game designer titles, so we actually asked Tim Cain what his new title means. Cain writes us: "As the programming director, I was responsible for trying to realize the ideas of the design director. I would take his requests for features and system specifications and coordinate my team of programmers to create those features and systems. If game development was a train, I was shoveling the coal into the engine to keep it chugging along. Now as the design director, I am the conductor of the train. I get to decide where we go and where we stop."Now we patiently wait on a name for this secret project that's apparently been in development since the studio's inception in 2005.
