Fallout creator Tim Cain has for the first time revealed his role in the cancelation of Interplay’s Van Buren, the codename for what was intended to be the original Fallout 3.
Van Buren was in development at Interplay-owned Black Isle Studios in the early 2000s, but was canceled amid significant financial problems at the company.
Cain, who worked on the first two, much-loved Fallout games in the mid-to late 90s before leaving Interplay to start a new studio called Troika Games, has now revealed the role he played in the cancelation of Van Buren as part of his ongoing YouTube series focused on video game development.
Cain revealed that in the middle of 2003, an unnamed Interplay vice president asked him to play the Van Buren prototype, saying: “I don’t think they can get it done, so I’m just going to cancel it. But if you look over it and give me an estimate there’s a chance I wouldn’t cancel it.”
Cain said he played the prototype for two hours and asked the development team a number of questions before delivering his verdict to the vice president.
“I said, ‘I’m convinced in 18 months you could have a really good game shipped.’ And he said, ‘huh, could it be done any faster?’ And I was like, ‘oh, shoot, I’ve said too long.’ I said, ‘well, even if you did a death march crunch I don’t think you could do it faster than 12, and then you’d be shipping something that was unbalanced and buggy, and the team would be destroyed. So I don’t recommend that.’
“And he said, ‘ok, thanks.’ As we walked out he basically explained any answer over six months was going to result in him having to cancel it, meaning the answer I just gave got the game canceled. But he was going to cancel it anyway. He thought it couldn’t be done in six months, and I just confirmed that to him.”
According to Cain, the cancelation of Van Buren was, ultimately, about money; Interplay’s dire financial situation meant it simply did not have enough cash to fund more than six months of further development. But fans have always questioned Interplay and then majority owner Titus Interactive management, and the controversial decision to shift focus away from PC games to console games.
Interplay went on to close down Black Isle Studios and cut its entire staff. The company released console spin-off Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel in 2004 for the Xbox and PlayStation 2, but it was not enough. That same year, Interplay announced a licensing deal with The Elder Scrolls developer Bethesda for future Fallout games, and in 2007, Interplay sold the Fallout IP to Bethesda outright. The rest is history.
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
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