Abstract
Problem: What is tone in video games, why does it matter, and how do developers define and manage it?
Approach: Tim Cain draws on his experience directing Fallout, Arcanum, and The Outer Worlds to explain tone through definitions, comparisons, and concrete examples of tonal decisions — including things he cut from his own games.
Findings: Tone is the overall attitude and emotional feel a game conveys — distinct from setting, theme, or difficulty, though conveyed through all of them. It must be actively managed by directors, and tonal consistency is what makes games memorable. Tonal mishaps — good ideas that don't fit the game's feel — are one of the biggest threats to a cohesive experience.
Key insight: Tone is hard to define and quantify, but a game without a well-defined tone is just as flawed as one without a well-defined story, setting, or mechanics.
What Tone Is (And Isn't)
Tone is about the feels — the attitude the developer wants the player to have while playing. Tim suggests "vibes" as a modern equivalent. He explicitly separates tone from things people commonly conflate it with:
- It's not the setting
- It's not the theme
- It's not the humor
- It's not the difficulty
However, tone is conveyed through all of these things. A post-apocalyptic setting supports a dark and gritty tone. Sad mechanics reinforce a melancholy tone. The distinction is that tone is the emotional throughline, while setting, story, and mechanics are the vehicles that carry it.
How Tone Is Conveyed
Art Style
Art style is one of the strongest carriers of tone. A cartoony art style fighting against a sad story creates dissonance — unless the tonal shift is intentional and designed to hit the player harder at a specific moment.
Music
Music is uniquely powerful because it bypasses the player's conscious filters. Where a player might intellectually resist a character's dialogue or a visual they dislike, music goes straight to the emotional centers — making them feel creepy, sad, or uneasy without them actively processing why.
Narrative Style
How characters talk — their vocabulary, pacing, sentence construction, and vocal delivery — all convey tone. Tim notes this is something he personally recognizes well in games but considers himself bad at writing.
Tone Is What Differentiates Similar Games
Tim uses pairs of games with similar premises to illustrate how tone creates completely different experiences:
Fallout vs. Wasteland: Both are post-apocalyptic games about venturing into the wasteland to stop threats. But Fallout has a 1950s retro-future aesthetic with dark humor, exploring how power corrupts and how situations almost always lead to violence. Wasteland focuses more on tactical combat decisions without that same thematic undercurrent.
Arcanum vs. Shadowrun: Both combine magic and technology. But Arcanum draws on Tolkien-esque fantasy mixed with steampunk — a deliberate, grounded divergence. Shadowrun smashes high fantasy and cyberpunk together, making the magic-tech split far more extreme and stylistically wild.
Tonal Mishaps: Good Ideas That Don't Fit
Tim introduces the internal term "tonal mishaps" — ideas that aren't bad on their own but violate the game's established tone. He shares several from his own projects:
Fallout
- The Terminator robot: Someone wanted a Terminator-style endoskeleton robot. Tim rejected it because Fallout's 1950s retro-future tone demanded robots like Mr. Handy — bulky, whimsical, analog. Mr. Handy and a Terminator don't belong in the same universe.
- The talking raccoon race: Cut not because it was a bad idea, but because it didn't match the game's tone.
Arcanum
- Magic-tech mixing: Tim insisted magic and technology could never be combined. Their underlying principles are fundamentally opposed in the game's world. He also banned sleek, advanced-looking technology — even high-level tech had to maintain a Victorian aesthetic. No silvery, cool-looking gadgets.
The Outer Worlds
- No aliens: Alien creatures on planets were fine, but no intelligent alien species. The game didn't need that element.
- No supernatural: No telekinesis, ghosts, or anything spooky. There was already enough going on without introducing that tonal layer.
- Discrimination through class only: The team made a deliberate choice to channel all discrimination stories through societal class (janitor vs. doctor) rather than race or gender. This gave the game a distinctive tone that some players noticed felt "off" — they sensed discrimination themes but filtered through an unfamiliar lens.
Who Manages Tone?
Tone is difficult to put in a design document because it's inherently hard to quantify. Tim explains how studios typically handle it:
Defining Tone
Design docs usually define tone through references — "we look like this movie" or "our characters talk like the characters in this TV show." They provide example vocabulary, art style references, and mood boards rather than trying to write a precise tonal definition.
The Director Hierarchy
Tone is managed through what Tim calls "director fiat":
- Narrative Director — final word on story, characters, and whether writing matches the tone
- Art Director — final word on visual style and consistency
- Design Director — final word on whether mechanics fit the tone
- Game Director — breaks ties between the other directors when their domains conflict
Tim gives an example of a real conflict: an art director wanted certain weapons restricted to specific classes for visual consistency, but the design director objected because it would wreck loot tables and game balance. The game director has to make the final call in situations like these.
Why Tone Matters
A game without a well-defined tone is as flawed as one without a well-defined story, setting, art direction, or mechanics. Tone is what makes a game memorable. It's subjective, soft, and hard to pin down — but it's not optional. If you want players to remember your game, you need to nail the tone.
References
- Tim Cain. YouTube video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tL4N3fPZ28A