Questions I Can't (Or Won't) Answer

1. Questions He Can't Answer

1.1. Source Code Requests

People frequently ask Tim to show or upload code from games like Arcanum or Temple of Elemental Evil. Despite owning the code (per his contract), he's contractually forbidden from releasing source code or issuing unauthorized patches. The publisher included this restriction to prevent piracy circumvention. Even though the original publisher (Sierra) no longer exists, someone else bought the rights and inherited the contract. The restriction stands regardless.

1.2. Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines Design Questions

Tim wasn't on the Vampire team for nearly the first two years of development. When he joined, he mainly worked on AI for some of the bosses. He can talk about things like the sheriff boss fight (picking up trucks, hookers, and cops), but anything else about the game's design would need to come from Jason Anderson.

1.3. Indie Development

Tim has never worked in the indie space. He enjoys many indie games as a consumer, but has no insider knowledge to share. He's in the same position as any other player when it comes to indie development.

1.4. Tech Company Comparisons

People ask him to compare working at a game company versus a pure tech company like Google or Microsoft. He can't — he's only ever worked at game companies, starting at age 16. He's been paid to teach university classes (as a TA at UC Irvine during his PhD and later at Troika), but game companies are all he knows.

1.5. Development Methodologies (Scrum, Agile, etc.)

These methodologies were all created after Tim left school, so he was never formally taught them. His observation: people tend to love one methodology and hate the others for poorly defined reasons. He compares it to the "when you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail" adage. No single methodology works for every phase of game development — it might suit R&D, production, post-launch patching, or DLC, but not all of them. He lets people figure that out for themselves after a few years in the industry.

1.6. Non-Programming Career Advice

When artists, sound engineers, or QA testers ask for career advice, Tim can offer only generic guidance. He was hired as a programmer and designer, and has done production work — that's the extent of his roles. Asking him about art careers is like asking someone on the street; you're better off finding someone who actually does that work.

2. Questions He Won't Answer

2.1. Current Projects

Tim was working as a contractor at Obsidian on The Outer Worlds 2 and at another unannounced company. He can't discuss any of it. People try to trick him with indirect questions like "what would you have improved in The Outer Worlds?" or "what was the cut content?" — but those lead directly into what's happening in the sequel, so he avoids them entirely. He doesn't even want to reveal his recommendations that didn't make it in, to avoid creating a public checklist of "Tim wanted this and they're not doing it."

2.2. Current Events and Controversies

Tim deliberately keeps his channel timeless. Questions about the Unity pricing controversy or the Baldur's Gate 3 bear sex discourse are things nobody will care about in a few months. He'd rather the channel remain useful to someone discovering it years later, with lasting insights about design, production, and the industry. For current drama, he suggests game news channels.

2.3. Teaching Code and Streaming

People request coding tutorials in C/C++, Unreal, or Unity. Tim feels there are far better channels for that. He also notes he's not particularly proud of his older code — "stuff I wrote 20 years ago" isn't the most efficient. Similarly, he declines requests to stream gameplay or live coding. He simply doesn't want to, and that's reason enough.

2.4. Game Reviews and Comparisons

Tim won't review games or compare others' games to his own. Better reviewers exist, and comparing your own game to someone else's feels "mildly narcissistic."

2.5. Repeatedly Asked Questions

After answering the same question in videos or multiple times in comments, Tim eventually stops responding. He encourages people to search his existing content.

3. How to Get Tim to Answer Your Question

Tim closes with practical advice for viewers who want engagement:

• Ask something new — do a quick search first to make sure he hasn't already covered it
• Check his career summary video — if he doesn't have experience in the area you're asking about, he probably won't answer
• Ask rich questions — not yes/no or one-word answers. "What language did you write Fallout in?" gets "C" and that's the end of it
• Focus on game development process, code issues, or design problems — "How did you do this?" and "How did you figure this out?" are the kinds of questions that get full video responses
• Look at videos where he credits a commenter's question — those examples show the type of question he gravitates toward

4. References

• Tim Cain. YouTube video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TtR8YjmdnA