My Lost Decade

tim-cain work-life-balance crunch game-industry personal-history fallout arcanum troika

Abstract

Problem: What happens to a person's life when they pour a full decade into nothing but making video games?

Approach: Tim Cain reflects on the period from 1993 to 2003 — from shipping Rags to Riches through Temple of Elemental Evil — which he calls his "lost decade," describing the daily reality of extreme work habits and total cultural isolation.

Findings: During those ten years, Cain worked 10–14 hour days (often seven days a week during crunch), missed virtually all contemporary movies, music, and TV, shopped for groceries at 2 AM, and was so invisible to his neighbors they nicknamed him "the hermit." He emerged in 2003 feeling culturally stuck in his twenties despite being in his thirties, but had created some of his most beloved games including Fallout and Arcanum.

Key insight: "I wouldn't recommend it, but I certainly don't regret it" — the lost decade produced cult classics, but came at an enormous personal cost that Cain openly acknowledges was unsustainable.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZyK9V9Q-xY

1. The Lost Decade Defined

Tim Cain defines his "lost decade" as the period from 1993 to 2003 — beginning at the end of Rags to Riches and ending near the completion of Temple of Elemental Evil. During this time, he did essentially nothing except work on video games.

His typical schedule before crunch: roughly 10 hours a day on weekdays. Three to six months before asking anyone else to crunch, he'd ramp up to 10–12 hours a day plus Saturdays. Once full crunch hit: 12–14 hours a day, every day.

2. Total Cultural Isolation

The work schedule meant complete disconnection from popular culture:

  • No current movies for the entire ten-year span (number one films went from Aladdin to Return of the King)
  • No current music (chart-toppers shifted from Whitney Houston to 50 Cent)
  • No current TV (top show went from 60 Minutes to CSI)
  • No cable TV at home — no point, he was never there to watch it

The one exception: Interplay's Thursday game nights, where coworkers might bring in a movie or show. He recalls watching ReBoot there. After founding Troika in 1998, even that social outlet disappeared.

2.1. The Britney Spears Incident

In a memorable anecdote, during Arcanum development, programmer Jesse Reynolds mentioned Britney Spears. Cain looked up in genuine confusion and asked: "Is that a new weapon in the game?" Reynolds stared at him and said, "You need to get out more." The team then showed him one of her music videos to bring him up to speed.

3. Daily Life of the Hermit

Cain's routine during crunch paints a stark picture:

  • Never saw his home in daylight — left in the dark, returned in the dark, sometimes for months straight
  • Weekly laundry ritual — start a load upon arriving home, eat something, watch a Simpsons episode, switch to dryer, pass out, grab clean clothes in the morning
  • 2 AM grocery shopping — found a 24-hour store and became a regular at that hour, getting to know the night-shift staff who assumed he worked a swing shift
  • Never saw the deli, butcher, pharmacy, or café — those sections weren't open at 2 AM. His mother visited once and brought home fried chicken from his own grocery store — a store that sold freshly made food he'd never known about

3.1. "The Hermit"

During the final stretch of Fallout (1997), his neighbors concluded he had moved out. They literally never saw him, and his house was dark at night. When he learned this, he bought lamp timers to simulate someone being home. His neighborhood nickname became "the hermit."

4. Games He Played

Despite the isolation, Cain did play games — it was both research and his one form of entertainment:

  • Most RPGs released in that period
  • Puzzle games (Chips Challenge, Sherlock)
  • EverQuest — he got "hugely into it" starting in 1998, playing intensely for three years with both solo and group characters. He describes the "Necro Squad" — six necromancers grouped together, a composition others said was a mistake, but which proved devastatingly effective by cycling pets against enemies far above their level.

5. Coming Out of the Decade

Around the last six months of Temple of Elemental Evil, already deep in crunch, Cain hit a breaking point: "This has to end. I can't keep doing this. I'm in my thirties."

He joined Match.com, having no social connections after a decade of isolation. He met an architect and began experiencing the world again — nice restaurants, charity events, travel to France, Hawaii, and South Korea. He discovered he actually enjoyed traveling, contrary to what he'd believed based on earlier experiences.

5.1. The Donald Glover Parallel

Cain relates his experience to a Donald Glover interview where Glover described growing up in a strict religious household without TV, movies, or most music. When Glover discovered those things as an adult, they fascinated him far more than they fascinated peers who'd grown up with them. Cain felt the same way — emerging in 2003, things like cell phone culture (texting, picture messaging) amazed him in ways that seemed odd for someone his age.

6. The Troika Shutdown Call

In a twist of timing, when Troika Games shut down, Cain was in South Korea working on a theme park project with the architect. He received a call from Eric DeMilt (producer on Fallout 2) asking if he wanted to join Carbine Studios. When told to visit the home office in Korea, Cain had to explain he wasn't there for games — he was designing a theme park.

7. Was It Worth It?

Cain's reflection is characteristically honest and unresolved:

  • He acknowledges his work-life balance was "way out of whack" — even compared to the rest of his career, which also lacked balance
  • He made some of his most popular and enduring games during this period — the cult classics — and doesn't regret their existence
  • He missed developmental life experiences that people normally have in their twenties and thirties, creating a persistent disconnect with peers that only faded with age
  • Having started in the game industry at 16, he also skipped typical teenage jobs, compounding the experiential gaps

His final verdict: "I wouldn't recommend it, but I certainly don't regret it."

8. References