Game Designs That Impressed Me

tim-cain system-design game-mechanics procedural-generation ui-design rpg fallout ultima diablo everquest star-control

Abstract

Problem: What game designs from other developers made veteran RPG designer Tim Cain stop and think "I wish I had thought of that"?

Approach: Tim shares six games spanning from the 1980s to the 2010s, each with a mechanic or design philosophy that deeply impressed him as a designer.

Findings: The best designs share common traits: they are systemically elegant, intuitive through UI presentation, and create meaningful player decisions. Examples range from Ultima III's moon-phase teleportation to Fallout 4's radiation-as-health-bar — a mechanic Tim considers a "perfectly implemented design feature."

Key insight: Great game design marries system mechanics with UI clarity and player agency — when all three align, the result feels inevitable and brilliant.

Ultima III: Moon Gates and Wind

Tim's earliest "wow" moment came from Ultima III (1983), his favorite in the series. The game featured moon gates — teleporters that appeared random but were actually controlled by the phases of two moons displayed at the top of the screen. Most players (Tim included) initially assumed the moon indicators were just flavor for time passage.

Once you cracked the system, a glance at the moon phases told you exactly where a gate would send you. Tim loved how the game hid a deep, predictable system behind an interface element that seemed decorative.

A secondary design he appreciated was wind direction affecting boat travel — you couldn't sail directly into the wind. A small, logical constraint that added texture to exploration.

Star Control 2: Hit Points as Crew Members

Tim considers Star Control 2 a full RPG (open world, dialogue, inventory, quests, levels) — it just happens that "you" are a ship. The design that struck him: hit points were crew members. When your ship took damage, the health bar represented crew dying.

One ship even powered its weapon by consuming hit points — literally shoveling crew into a furnace to fire. This recontextualization of an abstract resource (HP) into something narratively visceral left a lasting impression on Tim's "early-20-something brain."

Diablo: Procedural Dungeon Generation

When Tim first played Diablo, he reached the Butcher and compared notes with friends — their dungeon layouts were different. The levels were procedurally generated, with certain key rooms staying fixed while the connective tissue changed each playthrough.

Tim has been a fan of procedural generation since high school, where he used the random dungeon tables from the AD&D Dungeon Master's Guide to generate dungeons on graph paper (he still has the notebook). His D&D group never realized they were playing through procedurally generated content — "it just seemed like a typical dungeon to them."

He sees modern AI as a natural evolution of this approach — not just for conversation, but for procedural generation of world details.

EverQuest: The MUD Goes Graphical

After years playing LP MUDs, Tim's reaction to EverQuest was immediate: "This is literally LP MUD with a graphics front end." He recognized it as transformative — the moment that would change online RPGs forever.

While acknowledging Ultima Online came slightly earlier, EverQuest was the game that made him think "it's the late 90s — things are never going to be the same again." He valued EverQuest's ideas over polish, noting it was "jam-packed with really good ideas" even if later MMOs were more refined.

Fallout 3: Repair With Similar Items

In Fallout 3, weapons and armor degraded but could be repaired using similar items rather than generic repair materials. Tim loved several aspects of this:

  • Repair skill mattered — the amount restored was proportional to your skill level
  • Rarity created natural difficulty curves — common weapons were easy to maintain because drops were plentiful; rare items like radiation suits were expensive to keep repaired
  • Player choice emerged organically — using a found item to repair vs. selling it was entirely the player's decision
  • It made intuitive sense — scavenging parts from a similar item to fix yours feels logical

Tim would sometimes wear a fresh radiation suit alongside his damaged one, letting both degrade slightly before combining them — a satisfying emergent strategy.

Fallout 4: Radiation as Health Bar

Tim's most enthusiastic praise goes to Fallout 4's radiation system, which he calls a "perfectly implemented design feature" and uses as a teaching example for junior designers.

The design: radiation damage reduces your maximum health, visually filling the health bar from the top with a red overlay. This creates a single meter representing two stats. The elegance compounds:

  • UI clarity — you immediately see radiation eating into your health ceiling
  • Layered recovery — curing radiation (RadAway) restores the cap, but your actual health remains low; you still need stimpacks, a doctor, or sleep to heal
  • Systemic coherence — radiation and health are separate systems with separate cures, but displayed on one bar
  • Player comprehension — it's instantly understandable and forces meaningful decisions

Tim's design pillars for a great mechanic — easy to understand, requires player response, makes sense in how you handle it — are all satisfied by this single feature.

The Common Thread

Across all six games (Ultima III, Star Control 2, Diablo, EverQuest, Fallout 3, Fallout 4), Tim identifies designs that work on multiple levels simultaneously: they are systemically sound, clearly communicated through UI, and generate meaningful player decisions. The best mechanics don't just function — they feel inevitable.

Source: Tim Cain — "Game Designs That Impressed Me"

References