Career Summary 1981-2023

1. Early Career: Cybron (1981–1987)

Tim started at Cybron (originally Pegasus Software) in Reston/Herndon, Virginia. He was offered the job at 15 but couldn't legally work office jobs in Virginia until 16, so his 16th birthday was both driver's license day and first day of work.

Cybron made games for cable set-top boxes played with TV remotes. Tim built art tools on the Atari 800 in BASIC. During college summers at the University of Virginia (1983 onward), he kept returning to Cybron, learning Pascal and C along the way.

His notable project there was Grand Slam Bridge for Electronic Arts (shipped 1986) — coded in C. Tim knew C better than the lead programmer. Ironically, he still doesn't know how to play bridge; he just converted the designer's flowcharts into code.

2. Graduate School: UCI (1987–1991)

In 1987, Tim left Virginia for UC Irvine's grad program. He completed his Master's and started a PhD but dropped out to make games. Nearly everyone — his PhD advisor, colleagues, professors, friends, and family — told him he was making a huge mistake. The lone exception was his mom, who said "yeah, that sounds like you."

3. Interplay (1991–1998)

Tim joined Interplay as a contractor in fall 1991, becoming full-time in January 1992. After 10 years in the industry, this was his first major studio role.

3.1. Early Projects

• Bard's Tale Construction Set — made in just over 14 weeks
• Rags to Riches — a business simulation (shipped 1993). Tim wanted to work on Lord of the Rings instead, but a swap with the other programmer wasn't allowed
• Star Trek: 25th Anniversary and Stonekeep — contributed to both
• Built a universal installer generator after noticing every game's installer followed the same pattern

3.2. Tools and Engine Work

Tim spent significant time building reusable tools and engines:

• Genoa/GANOS — an OS wrapper for DOS that handled keyboard/mouse input, millisecond timers, and screen blitting across different video cards (including the pain of Super VGA bank switching)
• Built an isometric engine, a 3D engine, and a voxel engine
• Genoa was later used in Starfleet Academy and Atomic Bomberman (Max), winning an award

3.3. Fallout (shipped 1997)

The isometric engine became Fallout. After shipping, Tim was steered toward Fallout 2 rather than moving to a new project.

4. Troika Games (1998–2005)

Tim co-founded Troika on April 1, 1998 with Leonard Boyarsky (lead artist/designer on Fallout) and Jason Anderson (technical artist/designer). He was excited about running his own studio — he could bring his dog to work — but was unprepared for the realities of renting office space, buying furniture, handling HR, and managing publishers.

4.1. Projects

• Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura (2001) — "take fantasy and move it into the Industrial Age." Fun to make, reviewed and sold the best of Troika's three games
• Temple of Elemental Evil (2003) — Tim led this for Atari while Leonard and Jason worked on Bloodlines for Activision. Tim wasn't involved in Bloodlines for the first 20 months. Reviewed poorly but sold okay
• Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines (2004) — Tim's first C++ game, built on Valve's Source engine. Arduous production. Did not sell well

Troika closed in February 2005. Shutting down a company proved complicated — Tim worked from home with no income until about September 2005.

5. Carbine Studios / NCSoft (2005–2011)

Tim was hired in August 2005. Carbine was a division of NCSoft (large Korean company with North American offices in Austin). His interview process was unusual: separate lunchtime interviews every day Monday through Thursday — with founders, programmers, the producer (Eric DeMille from Fallout 2), and finally NCSoft executives including Richard Garriott.

Tim got his first professional headshot here, wearing heavy pancake makeup. The makeup artist's other notable client: Tom Hanks.

5.1. WildStar

Tim served as programming director (2005–2008), building an engine from scratch with brilliant programmers — including someone he calls "the best programmer and smartest man I've ever met." After three years, design was lagging behind the tech, and NCSoft grew concerned.

Tim was made design director (2008–2011), working to lock down design and align the team. He left in July 2011. WildStar shipped three years later in 2014 — nine years total development. Tim thought it was gorgeous and fun but it "never found its niche."

6. Obsidian Entertainment (2011–2023)

Tim joined Obsidian in October 2011, initially for a six-month temporary position helping with code on South Park: The Stick of Truth. He stayed for over a decade.

6.1. Projects at Obsidian

• South Park: The Stick of Truth (2014) — Tim's first console game. C++ on Xbox (straightforward, PC-like) and PlayStation 3 (notoriously difficult cell architecture). He was "super excited" about console development
• Pillars of Eternity (2015) — Tim's first Unity/C# game. Fortunately he already knew C#. Designed the Monk, Cipher, and stronghold systems (all filtered through lead designer Josh Sawyer)
• Tyranny (2016) — "What if Sauron won?" Dark, fun, built on the same Unity/Pillars codebase. Tim did pure programming, no design. Described working on it as "oddly relaxing"
• Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire — Tim started on this after Tyranny but was pulled away within 2-3 months
• The Outer Worlds (2019) — Tim was convinced to become game director despite not wanting the role. Built on Unreal Engine (C++), took about three years. His highest-profile directorial role
• Outer Worlds DLCs — Murder on Eridanos (which Tim loved for its humor, especially the Discrepancy Detector weapon) and Peril on Gorgon, each with their own directors

6.2. Move to Seattle

In May 2020, mid-pandemic, Tim and his husband packed up their Tustin, California home, loaded furniture into a moving pod, and drove straight up the coast to Seattle with their Labrador Retriever — a 20+ hour nonstop trip with limited food stops due to COVID closures.

Because Obsidian wasn't set up for out-of-state employees, Tim switched to contractor status, which allowed him to take on additional consulting work.

7. Semi-Retirement (2023)

As of the video's recording, Tim calls himself "semi-retired" after 42 years and one month in the industry (August 1981 to September 2023). He has paid consulting projects and is in early stages of potentially joining additional ones as a contractor.

8. Career Patterns

Looking across Tim's career, several patterns emerge:

• Language evolution: BASIC → Pascal → C → C++ → C# → back to C++ (Unreal), always learning what each project demanded
• Role expansion: Tool programmer → engine programmer → lead programmer → company founder → programming director → design director → game director
• Engine diversity: Custom engines (Genoa, Fallout engine, Carbine engine) → licensed engines (Source, Unity, Unreal)
• The mom test: When everyone says you're making a mistake but your gut (and your mom) says otherwise, it might be worth the risk

9. References

• Tim Cain. YouTube video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d3Udo6XjMhY