My Bad Game Development Skills

[@thechino]

I know it's only been three (edit: actually five) months, but now, I can't imagine an evening spent without settling in, getting comfortable, and hearing Tim talk.

[@zc8673]

It's only been three months???

[@PaintsAreOp]

For me it's usually a morning ritual.

[@jess648]

very enlightening stuff!!

[@BuzzKirill3D]

It's been three months already?! feels like I saw the first video just yesterday

[@Eldrick_]

He's such a charming and kind-hearted guy.

[@mercer6323]

"Too short" has to be the BEST criticism for your game to get, they are saying they want MORE :D

[@JediMB]

Unless they go "too short, refunded".

[@mercer6323]

@@JediMB You got me there.

[@christopherr.561]

Good self reflective video. Enjoyed it. As someone who is over 50 it’s important to learn what you are and are not good at and what you do and don’t enjoy.

[@TorQueMoD]

You've probably had a bunch of people tell you this already Tim, but I really love the parasocial relationship I have with you now :P I watch your videos every night before bed, and they always manage to ignite my passion for game design. I've spent most nights in the last few months dreaming about my game projects, even more than I ever did before. Thank you for starting this YT channel :)

[@Noowai]

Hi, Tim, I'm here in the comments only to tell you how I love what you do and all of the games you did. Thank you, you inspire me. 💌

[@bluemooninthedaylight8073]

I see what Tim Cain means about a shorter playtime being a better downside than bugs and other issues. I found The Outer Worlds almost bug free, pretty smooth, and just goofy fun. In many ways, I think a longer playtime may have made that game worse, as by the time I was halfway through Monarch (The largest area) I began to feel burned out. Bigger isn't always better. Too many open world games go for big, empty spaces with little to no story, and I feel like I'm doing busywork instead of being a part some grand adventure. New Vegas is big and buggy, but that game is an outlier in that it's so rich and fun, one plays it in spite of the bugs.

[@lrinfi]

I'm always suspicious of the "arguments" of people who can find nothing but technical issues, which are a given in any game, to use as a nonreason to pan the game in its entirety. There are always elements of a game to point to as being genuinely enjoyable whether one finds the game overall is or not. Instead, we hear a lot of comments to the effect that "this game is a buggy mess," when the author's issue with it is probably something quite different, e.g. the "big, empty" (shallow and superficial) space you mention. I'll never understand the mentality of just shoving more and more "stuff to do" into certain games to try and make them *seem* less shallow and uninteresting than they actually are. It doesn't work.

[@mediocreatbest1269]

Hey Tim, my dad recently passed away and I just wanted you to know that watching these helps fill the void I’ve been feeling.. you give such wisdom full advice and I am grateful.. thank you so much :) also my dads name is Tim too, so I thought that was such a great coincidence I found you just recently. Anyway, thank you again. Stay healthy and kind :)

[@TKsMantis]

This is such great insight. Takes a lot to talk about what you think you do poorly and I respect it!

[@lonneansekishoku8288]

9:20 Smart guy, I like it. He used a [Speech 100] for that contract. XD

[@jeffstevens9491]

I would like to hear more about contracts. I've dealt with them in government software, but it's pretty interesting to hear about your experiences because it seems way less formal than what I've seen. Everything I see is pretty standardized across the government. Pretty cool to hear about all the interesting clauses you could add to your software career field.

[@AnvilOfDoom]

Favorite ending of a video so far. I'm very glad that you are happy, Tim :)

[@Mayhzon]

Still playing Temple of Elemental Evil to this day, with the Circle of Eight mod pack. Great stuff. Unique experience that will stick with me til the day I die. Thank you.

[@StavrosNikolaou]

I'm so happy you are not as good at showing restraint with features.. Your kitchen-sink game is one of the best RPGs out there to this day!!! Thank you Tim! Have a great day 😊

[@TheYoungtrust]

Thanks for the advice, senpai.

[@honaleri]

When I get to be as young as you are, I want to sit down and speak on any memory, and have people as captivated by my stories and experiences as you do right now. I'd love to be as well experienced and expert-like as you one day.

[@mordicai4296]

I love you Tim, thank you for this channel!

[@BearBoyJW]

This is my second video I'm watching and man I am learning sooooo god damn much from these. Thank you for sharing all of this knowledge with us.

[@Chrono-and-Co]

I have been blessed to find my favorite person's channel AND he uploads daily!

[@aaronasissoard1098]

Hearing your stories and life experiences is very inspiring and informative which is so important to some people who learn through experience and examples. I also love the rawness of your videos the pauses in between your thoughts are so calculated. You can tell that you are conscious of the information you are sharing

[@vagabundorkchaosmagick-use2898]

On Human Resources: Only good, decent and empathy people are good at HR because good, decent and empathy people care about other people and what's good for them, but at the same time good, decent, empathy people hate HR because they HAVE TO do bad things as well, it is almost unavoidable. You have to fire people, you have to lower wages, you have to reject leaves, you are the bearer of bad news, and yes all the paperwork, most of which is absurd, redundant, unnecessary, meaningless. It is a little like being a teacher for primary or high school (6-15 year old kids). Good, decent, empathy people care for the students and really want to teach them things they need, but you have to face the institution (and tons of paperwork), which doesn't want well educated kids, they want obeying kids that never question authority, that never cause trouble (for the upper classes or hierarchies). I have done both. I hate both for the same reasons.

[@joshsopko6584]

Tim, thank you for inspiring me to continue looking for what I am happy doing and what I’m good at as well as what I’ll get paid to do. I loved that statement, I can tell it came from your heart.

[@nosferadu]

Hey Tim! I like routine, community and farm work, so I took your advice and joined a cult in Utah. Couldn't be happier.

[@JausTine]

This info about patches really hits home. I'm still engrossed in a 25 year old game called Starsiege that only ever got 4 patches. The community puts one out whenever there is a new version of windows though!

[@FluffySylveonBoi]

11:53 is what happens in Fallout credits if you type "boom" on keyboard!

[@bobfunk5055]

Love the talks ! A little fade between the title screen and the video would make me very happy !

[@0x44_]

Working on a game right now, and there's so many things that can go wrong that people take for granted.

[@spaghettioso2799]

It's always a pleasure watching your videos Tim, thanks for another great one!

[@valdenn3073]

Thank you for these videos and your immense contributions to video games. It’s refreshing to see a veteran game developer be so open about their experiences and thoughts on as public a forum as KZbin.

[@VengeanceMkII]

I totally agree and should note this down that IP reversion must be a thing. Too often good IPs are shoved away for no reason, never to come again.

[@ethanwasme4307]

i also love to make sure my systems are as robust as possible, and agree it can hinder when deving for edge cases that aren't going to happen

[@MatthewScheffel]

Love the punishment-for-dishonesty clauses. Beautiful.

[@nicholasallen9035]

Another great and encouraging video.

[@mistermetokur218]

being the least experienced person in a startup its interesting to hear your stories.

[@louistrinh3608]

Hi Tim, I think compensation is a very intersting topic. Can you teach people how to properly negotiate their cut? How much should people expect to be paid for certain roles, what's the royalty should be, what's the bonus should be. What happen when DLC is involved.

[@niira8575]

oh wow, so thats why those games didnt get patches after a while...wow, just wow...thank you for this revelation!

[@lrinfi]

Dialogue is deceptively hard to write. You wouldn't think so because we all engage in dialogue every day, but just trying to make dialogue sound natural can prove to be a true bugbear. You have these specific ideas that must be conveyed via the dialogue, but if you feel like you have to make an effort to fit them in there, especially, so many times you'll go back over it and think, "*Nobody* talks like this!" A few voice actors that come to mind are exceptionally good at making even "bad" dialogue sound just as natural as you please. There have been times an actor made a character believable who probably would have been a laughing stock otherwise. (FO4's Nick comes to mind.) That takes some (usually undreappreciated) talent on the part of the actor. Otoh, "bad" dialogue can be what makes a comedy, especially, funny in the first place. (Thinking:: Princess Bride and the like.) I envy writers (and actors) who do it so well, you don't even notice unless you're actively thinking about it.

[@Gnurklesquimp2]

I think ''too'' many systems and parts within those is often mostly just a matter of preference/compromise, assuming you can manage to pull it off. I notice I really crave both, a vast mess is fun to explore too, a completely different kinda experience. I do love the elegance from games like Baba is You and I would personally go down that route for the sake of scope, but I'm really glad there's studios that capitalize on the polar opposite's charm. You want fun toys? You get fun toys. Crazy personalization and variety, cool concepts that wouldn't have made it into something more focused on making sure every aspect of everything is in service of what the game is about and/or achieving that with as few parts as possible. For the sake of example, I wanna make a simple game, I'm creating guns for a top-down shooter. Let's say I want it to be about clear and intuitive counters, Terraria has one of my favorites: The bubble gun shoots a slow spread of bubbles with limited travel, this has several consequences. Bigger target = more single-target dps cause all the shots land. If they're moving towards you, you get more effective range, it can quickly kill trash mobs or smaller mobile mobs if they're squishy. There's even this one big boss that does quick straving as he closes in, moving through your bubbles. (Too bad he's the one who drops the weapon!) Terraria has a ton of this, but it's NOT trying to make every gun a masterclass in design like that, and it's better off for it, cause it's a crazy colorful sandbox full of shiny toys before anything else. It could totally lean into it even more, but having that volume of stuff is great, and fun interactions emerge from that too, tons of things to leverage even if it isn't a particularly clean problem/solution situation when determining what's ideal. Also, I would still like an elegant game to be all about amazing weapon designs like this, not number-crunching and dmg type multipliers etc., just intuitive interactions with very few arbitrary aspects.

[@qpid8110]

More H&R and contract negotiation stories! ♥️♥️♥️

[@Anubis1101]

I would love a plushie for Gorgoth or the Stillwater Giant (which needs to turn inside out into its other form)

[@cmdr.jabozerstorer3968]

*Jason Anderson's wife Oops at that faux pas there, Tim!

[@CainOnGames]

Oops! Sorry Sharon!

[@lukusridley]

"too many mechanics" is almost a summary of *why* your games have their own specific mechanical aesthetic. That feeling that the mechanics are important - the primacy of interaction and so on - comes out in how those games behave and play. Of course it causes other issues, but it feels more like an aesthetic preference that causes problems instead of a bad skill as such, perhaps? Somebody making the "good" decision to strip things back would never have produced the glorious, beautiful mess that is arcanum. And that's pretty cool! EDIT: I suppose all I'm really getting at is that aesthetic interests always feel like they are inherently unbalanced. Interesting aesthetic objects are made by people with unbalanced interests and that is why they produce cool things!

[@CainOnGames]

That’s the kindest way of describing my unbalanced games that anyone has ever said. Thank you.

[@gregpeterson5857]

The problem with a non-use rights reversion is when they just shovel something out just keep the license. See the various Sony Fantastic Four movies for example. In an alternate universe I'm sure there are people wishing that Arcanum just died instead of getting all of the horrible sequels 😀

[@lordlawless5183]

I'd argue ensuring that particular build can complete the main campaign, IS balancing.

[@insidiousmaximus]

Game development; the only place where "it's too short" is a compliment

[@BlackJar72]

A reversion of IP clause is precisely why my favorite edition of D&D existed....

[@skittlesbarber25]

Outer Worlds did feel short, but indeed the first thing I noticed was precisely "wow, I see what they did there, a polished and manageable Fallout-like game", kinda left leaving wanting for a bit more of that, but overall felt very pleasant and 'healthy'

[@PullingTheBasement]

Brilliant distillation at the end. Most people get as far as "do what you love!" or "don't get a job doing what you love because then it turns into work and work sucks!" That binary never made sense to me. Turns out you need 3 points to find a plane.

[@MrJballn]

Please tell us the door isn't shut completely on an Arcanum continuation? Tell us in the form of what you'd need to see from a suitor studio in order to be on board? I'd love to hear your concept and the ways you imagine it would be evolved and the ways you imagine it would be rooted in the original, but I fully understand that's giving the cow away. With that said, please tell us from the perspective of receiving the pitch what would and what wouldn't stand out.

[@SuperQGS_]

One thing I’d be wary about with the contract condition of getting the IP after 10 years of disuse, is that the company would probably release something very small every 10 years to maintain the IP. It’d be heartbreaking to see them do nothing with the ip for 9 years just to see them release something tiny that clearly only exists to keep the IP. I’m not a lawyer but I’ve heard of companies doing things like this for copywrite stuff to maintain IP. The condition might have to cover some weasel stuff like this, maybe with conditions of the magnitude of use

[@EB-cz4te]

Golems must have souls because Harm does good work against those haha.

[@nonono9681]

8:25 So that was the reason!, damn, thats a weird clause

[@EvanChantland]

It's kinda funny that since you've learned all these lessons, you'd be better at handling it now... but because you had to learn those lessons you'd never want to deal with it again.

[@alexalaserbean]

Hi Tim in a previous video you talk about what would you like to see in a fallout remake, could you the same with temple and arcanum. Hope to hear more about Temple. Also when we getting the Tim baking channel?

[@SoaringMoon]

Yeah the game I'm making now has too many system mechanics. :P I'm just refusing to let them go.

[@Theopheus]

"You can't finish the game with this build" Explain why I always get wrecked by Super Mutants in Fallout 1 and I've never finished it!?

[@GaffelGutt]

Hey, Mister Cain. What is your thought's on the game Baldurs Gate 3 and the media attention around it?

[@meanmole3212]

What do you think of the Duty Calls' (BulletStorm's Call of Duty parody) opening speech that uses Fallout's opening speech as its main inspiration?

[@michal1743]

Hi Tim, given your comments on how much time of your day game development take, how do you find time to play other games? As i think you mentioned it is important to play other games.

[@zeeeeeeeeeev6493]

Hey, as a student, id like to hear about your college/uni experience 😁

[@JackBurkhardt]

I'm curious, what is the QA process for these kinda of RPG games? How do you make sure all of those builds work?

[@s.a.l.1974]

I need an Arcanum plushie ngl

[@zhulikkulik]

12:28 Pardon for a poor translation A client takes his car from service. Looks through the bill and asks: what's this position “managed - $9999.99”? The guy from service: didn't manage... let me cross it out.

[@wadewade3790]

Considering in Fallout 1 you can initiate combat with any NPC, how much thought was given to how well maps would play as Combat Zones in addition to Exploration/Quest Hub Zones?

[@protomorphius]

Tim, do you have any stories about the Highwayman in F2?

[@tysonybalogna]

You forgot finding all the white chocolate bars.

[@kambion]

Bro, so many mechanics in Arcanum. Also, I prefer saying it "ar-kah-numb

[@tepid7422]

Hi Tim. Big fan of your channel, and I hope you’re doing well. I know you probably get asked a lot about the current things Unity the company is doing with their changes to fees and revenue share. I also know you still do some work for Obsidian who has games made in the Unity engine. Are you at liberty to comment on the Unity changes or are you not able to say anything (either contractually or out of not wishing to cause issues for your client)?

[@albert_vds]

Devs can't make unofficial patches? You can't say what's in a contract? I did not know that. Makes it even worse when fans pick the side of the publisher, when the actual devs are the ones who are passionate about the game and are bound up by legal stuff.

[@skittlesbarber25]

How would you fix the Harm spell?

[@stuartmorley6894]

Balance in a single player game is a choice. If you know a skill or perk is overly strong you don't have to take it. Obviously if its the first time you play it and you have no background information then it happens. If you specifically look online to find over powered stuff, or cheats or quick solutions then you as a gamer have made the decision to do it. If youve played it before and still choose it again your choice. In a single player game thats on me or you. Blaming the developer when you choose to game the game seems silly. Obviously a great balance is fun, and a heavily underbalanced game where there's really only a few viable choices is bad.

[@scoutthespirit1133]

I really love Outer Worlds, that game really showed me how much the writing can elevate the whole game

[@moosecannibal8224]

Still experiencing all of the Outer Worlds personally, love it, everything feels like it works with everything else, just wish it had the chance to be expanded on a liiiittle bit more mechanically. I wish player builds could be a little more definingly different in gameplay Not a lot, just a little. (balance would likely suffer, I see why this likely wasn't done, just personal preference) No game is perfect but Outer Worlds still manages to keep me more interested than Fallout 3 or 4 ever could, and I've played New Vegas to death so there's no chance of a reprisal there. If you ever are a large contributor of another game I hope you tell us!! lack of certain strengths notwithstanding, you're still the lead behind some of my favourite games and franchises.

[@zb3485]

legend