Up Close With...Pete Hines

Posted 4 years ago By - Jay Acevedo

Even if the game has been out for a few months, I have to congratulate you and the whole team at Bethesda once more on the success Fallout 3 is having up until today. After gathering many awards and honors from around the world, can you tell us if we’re seeing the game as it was intended to be from Day 1?

In a general sense it’s the game we intended to make. Our philosophy is to focus on the kind of experience we want the player to have, but during development we really spend a lot of time playing the game and seeing how it feels. As a result of this, we change and tweak a lot of aspects of the game until we feel we have them “right.” So for example, the world of Fallout 3 was actually quite a bit bigger than you see it now. The downtown area just felt too large, and so we felt in order for the game to be better we needed to shrink it, so we cut the size of downtown about in half. That’s a lot of work to throw out, but we thought it was necessary.

How difficult was it to balance bringing the classic feel of the original two Fallout games into a 3D more action based world of Fallout 3 knowing it would certainly annoy at the very least the die hard fans? In my opinion Fallout 3 is where the series needed to go, sticking with a turn based system, even if it moved into a full 3D world would not have pleased any fans even if they believe it would.

More than anything, role-playing with guns is a real challenge. You spend a ton of time messing with “the numbers.” How often do you hit, how much damage do you do, how much of your accuracy is based on your skills vs. your character’s skills, etc. It’s a never-ending process to make sure the player feels like they’re in control of what they are doing, but there’s still a reason to keep bumping up the skills of your character. That was really the tough part, I think. Getting the environments and story right was no easy task either, but it’s a different kind of challenge. You’re trying to capture the spirit of these games that came before but in your own voice, in a new setting. I think we did a good job on both fronts.

How easy or difficult was it to market the "retro ’60’s sci-fi" atmosphere of Fallout 3? Was it hard to balance between the comical aspects of retro vibe with the seriousness of the game?

Not really. The key is just to stay true to what the game is about. That was a big focus for me and my team. Whatever we do, it has to be true to the experience of the game. And so that was our focus for everything, from the items we gave away to the web site to the packaging, and so on. I really feel like if you can make the development team proud of the work you’re doing in promoting your title, you know you’re doing it right. When the people making the game say “that’s how I want people to experience and learn about the game I’m making” then you know you’re on the right track.

What mistakes and triumphs did Bethesda learned from Oblivion that helped you with Fallout 3?

A lot of it was learning about the big, open-ended experience. What kinds of things did people like or not like? How do we do that better, and different, in the Fallout universe. Technically we learned a lot about how to make the game run better on all these platforms, but much of it comes from the player experience and what they can do, and see, from moment to moment. I’m sure we’ll learn a lot from Fallout 3 we can put into our next project.

Did it shock you at the negative feedback over the game just ending where it did? Or was it expected?

I think it surprised us a bit. Look, 99% of games out there end. Every game I’ve played over the last year came to an end. So given the history of the Fallout series, and the fact that most games do have an ending, we really didn’t think people would have that big a deal with it. But it’s clear that with our games, they expect to be able to keep playing, which is a good thing.

What was your first memory of a videogame?

My first non-specific memory was typing in code from the latest issue of Run magazine into my Vic 20 with my brother and saving it to a cassette tape drive. My first real gaming moments were playing Ultima on a Commodore 64…flipping the disk drive open when we died, charting out all the dungeons with graph paper. Good times.

We know that you worked for the American College of Cardiology and the American Association of Blood Banks prior to work for Bethesda. Was this your plan all along or was it a coincidence? Tell us how everything began for you.

My path to the gaming industry was not exactly “traditional.” My first job out of college was working at a Catholic high school in North Carolina as their director of development and admissions. After a couple of years there I moved to DC and took a job with the ACC and went to MBA school part-time. It was while I was there that I started writing for The Adrenaline Vault part time; I think I was the second writer they ever hired. So I did both, and went to school, for a while. Then went to AABB for about a year. So my years writing for AVault were really my foot in the door in the industry. The one common thread between all my jobs was they were with smaller organizations where they needed someone to come in and wear a lot of hats and do a lot of different things. I think they gave me a chance to show my skills in different areas, something I’ve continued to try to do in my 9+ years at Bethesda.

There’s always something that makes you say: “this is what I want to do for the rest of my life”. What made you realize that?

The fact that it just came naturally to me. I had to work hard to learn about minimally invasive bypass surgery. Videogames just came naturally to me, and so did PR and marketing, so it just felt really comfortable.

Do you think videogames are necessary? Can we live without them?

I don’t think I could live without them. It’s the best form of escapism there is.

Speaking on how journalistic experience is useful for games designers, you once said: "it gives you the chance to show that you know about games, can break down why a game is good, or isn’t, and make good arguments and give compelling reasons." Do you think that we are going to start seeing more Pete Hines-prototypes in the future?

God I hope not. There are folks that would argue one Pete Hines is already one too many. There are quite a few folks on this side of the business that got their start as journalists. Emil Pagliarulo and I have been friends since we worked together at AVault, and all he’s done is work on the Thief series, Oblivion, and as lead designer of Fallout 3. Jordan Thomas once slept on my hotel floor at E3 when he worked at AVault, and now he’s creative director of Bioshock 2.

Bethesda is definitely one of the premier and most respected developers in the industry. What makes Bethesda successful?

Good people with good ideas in a good environment. Not a lot of egos, not a lot of nonsense, just smart, creative people doing what they do best.

If you had to create “the ultimate game” what would it be?

The original X-Com, on steroids, in HD.

Ok, As a huge fan of the entire Elder Scrolls series (I am waiting for a re-release of Daggerfall btw), I have to ask, what’s the word on The Elder Scrolls 5? And please tell me it will stay single player, that is one of the things I love about the series, you are not trying to please two masters (Single Player and Multiplayer Gamers).

There’s gonna be an Elder Scrolls 5? Sweet.

March 15th 2009 :: Interview: Up Close with Pete Hines

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