Fallout co-creator Tim Cain returns to Obsidian full time, says remote work 'isn't all sunshine'

Fallout co-creator Tim Cain has left semi-retirement and is now back in California working full-time for Obsidian, the studio behind The Outer Worlds, he says in a recent YouTube video. Cain describes the five-year period between June 2020 and December 2025 as a time of semi-retirement when he worked as a remote consultant.

Cain says his previous role was freelance and remote, and that after moving to Seattle he couldn’t stay at Obsidian full time because the studio wasn’t prepared to have out-of-state employees. Now he is exclusive to Obsidian in a deeper consulting role: “I’m not in charge of a project, I’m not a director,” he says, calling his work more of a consultant role that lets him get into the weeds with teams.

On remote work, Cain offers a blunt assessment: “Remote work isn’t all sunshine and lollipops, and it doesn’t work for everybody. It just doesn’t,” he says. He adds that people who insist remote work is universally superior either don’t know all the data or have personal reasons for staying remote and are trying to rationalize them professionally.

Cain says the best part of being back in an office has been the spontaneous, fruitful conversations with artists, level designers, narrative designers, system designers and audio people: “Just in the last seven weeks, I’ve had so many interesting conversations… These conversations would never have happened over a video call.

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