Meet the Fallout 3 devs - Nathan McDyer

Nathan X. McDyer

Today’s Q&A (questions courtesy of our forums) is with Nathan McDyer. Nate started out as a QA intern, worked his way up to QA tester and is now an associate producer.

'''What’s your job at Bethesda?

I’m an associate producer of content for Bethesda Game Studios. I mostly deal in trying to figure out how to get all the environment and special effects art that people want done in the time allotted. Basically I hammer square pegs into round holes. '''What prior projects have you worked on?

As an associate producer I’ve worked on Shivering Isles and Knights of the Nine. Prior to that, I was a quality assurance tester on Pirates of the Caribbean: Legend of Jack Sparrow, Oblivion, Call of Cthulhu, Airborne Troopers, IHRA Drag Racing 2005, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Bloodmoon. '''What have you drawn on for inspiration in developing Fallout 3? Books, movies, music, etc would be fine, if you don’t want to name any games.

Obviously Fallout 1 and 2 are the main sources of inspiration. Since I’m more involved in the visual look of the game, I look at movies and comics like The Iron Giant, Mad Max, Children of Men, The Hills Have Eyes, Sky Captain, Metropolis, and Tank Girl (the Jamie Hewlett comic not the terrible movie). '''How is the work-environment? Is it competitive or co-op? Do the different teams talk together? Everyone here is a big dork that wants to make great games. It’s awesome. '''What is your favorite type of game to play (RTS,FPS,RPG etc)

I’m an RTS junkie. There is a boxed copy of Dune 2 sitting in my cube. Right now Dawn of War is my favorite game series. Nothing beats humiliating people by destroying them with a hot pink and lavender space marine army. How long have you been playing Fallout, and how would you describe your feelings towards the franchise?

Unfortunately I got in to Fallout late. I was unemployed and in high school with Fallout 1 and when 2 came out Starcraft had consumed my free time. So my first foray into Fallout wasn’t until about 3 years ago, I picked up the first one had a blast with it. Who knew that MacGuyver could be such an evil ****? '''Çonsidering that much of the game will probably be in a wild wasteland, do any of you spend much time hiking, camping, etc, and if so where?

I’m prone to melanoma, so I try not to let the sun kill me. The most I do is taking my two wiener dogs out for walks. '''What’s the last game you bought? Did you like it?

Overlord for 360. I can light hills of screaming hobbits on fire and my goblins wear rats for helmets. How could I not love it? '''What games are you looking forward to on the horizon?

Like Emil, who is my gamerscore rival, I play just about everything. So here’s an abbreviated list of what I want: Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts, Enemy Territory, Bioshock, Mass Effect, GTA IV, Assasin’s Creed, Rock Band, Guitar Hero 3, Call of Duty 4, Blue Dragon, and Team Fortress 2. Other than videogames, what are your interests? (Board games, reading, music, etc)

There are too many hobbies that consume my time and income. I’m currently learning to play bass guitar, I paint and play Hordes tabletop miniature game, I have an ever growing collection of 300+ movies, and I read comics. '''Have you played the VanBuren Alpha? If so, what were your feelings on it?

Nope. '''Bonus Round: Pitch me your dream game in a sentence or less. Go.

Take 28 Days Later, put it on an island city, give it fully destructable environments (Zombies breaking through sheet rock), whatever I can hold can be a weapon, and make me try to survive and escape. My love of Zombies outweighs my love of RTS games. '''Finally, time for a rant. Go.

Ok, I’m half Chinese so I have to complain about bad Chinese food. If you know I’m half Chinese and you think the egg foo young, crab Rangoon, and chop suey is Chinese food, do not take me to a Chinese restaurant. It tastes terrible, especially if the menu is a bunch of backlit pictures above the register. You need to get yourself some hot pepper stir fry or pork with dried bean curd.

Source
Nathan McDyer at Bethlog