Fallout's Creator is Back At Obsidian - Says You'll Never Guess His New Game

Tim Cain, the programmer and producer who helped build the original Fallout back in 1997, is back at Obsidian Entertainment - this time as a full-time, in-office employee under Xbox.

He revealed the move in a new video on his YouTube channel, saying he's already working on a secret project at the studio. He can't say what it is, and he's very clear on one thing: don't waste time guessing, because you are "not going to guess right."

For anyone in the UAE sitting on an Xbox Series X|S and a Game Pass sub, that’s a big deal. Cain’s name is tied to some of the most talked-about RPGs of the last three decades – from Fallout to Pillars of Eternity to The Outer Worlds – and now he’s back in Xbox’s first-party stable.

Who is Tim Cain and why should you care?

Cain isn’t just “a guy who worked on Fallout”. He helped define what PC RPGs looked like in the late ’90s and has kept influencing them ever since.

• Producer and lead programmer on the original Fallout
• Designer on Fallout 2
• Co-founder of Troika Games (Arcanum, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines)
• Senior programmer and later co-director on Obsidian RPGs like Pillars of Eternity and The Outer Worlds

Cain’s games share a few things: dark humour, proper consequences to your choices, and systems that let you break quests in fun ways. If you liked how The Outer Worlds handled dialogue and weird quests, you’ve already felt his influence.

In recent years he’s been semi-retired, making surprisingly blunt videos on his YouTube channel about how game development actually works. Now he says he’s “a lot less retired” after moving back to Southern California to rejoin Obsidian in person.

Back at Obsidian – but on a secret project

Cain first joined Obsidian in 2011, worked on South Park: The Stick of Truth, Pillars of Eternity and co-directed The Outer Worlds, then left full-time in 2020 to work as a contractor.

• He’s now a full-time, in-office employee again
• He’s no longer contracting for other studios
• He’s attached to one unannounced Obsidian project under NDA
• He insists fans won’t guess what the game is

In his new video, Cain says he’s back at Obsidian as a permanent staffer, not remote and not freelancing for anyone else anymore. That alone makes this different from his consulting role on The Outer Worlds 2, where he was helping the team avoid design pitfalls from the first game.

There is one firm detail on the mystery game: you’re not getting it right in the comments. Cain flat-out says people shouldn’t bother guessing, which makes a straight-up Fallout: New Vegas 2 or some obvious sequel look very unlikely.

What does this mean for Obsidian’s future games?

Obsidian is already busy. In 2025 alone, the studio has launched Avowed, The Outer Worlds 2 and put Grounded 2 into early access.

• Obsidian now has a stacked RPG pipeline under Xbox Game Studios
• Cain’s return adds more old-school RPG experience to the team
• The secret project is in addition to titles we already know about
• It fits Microsoft’s push for more day-one RPGs on Game Pass

Obsidian already sits at the “deep RPGs” end of Xbox’s first-party line-up. With Cain back inside the building, the studio gains someone who knows how to keep complex systems readable and stories reactive without turning development into chaos. That’s useful if you’re juggling multiple big RPGs for console, PC and Game Pass all at the same time.

It also tells you something about Microsoft’s mood: they’re clearly happy to put veteran names back into key roles while Bethesda is busy with Starfield and endless questions about The Elder Scrolls 6 and future Fallout titles.

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