The Developers of Total Annihilation

Total Annihilation was made by Cavedog Entertainment and released in September 1997. Chris Taylor designed it and led the project, Clayton Kauzlaric led the art, and Ron Gilbert produced it. Several members of the team later worked on Supreme Commander, the Elder Scrolls series and Planetary Annihilation.

Cavedog Entertainment

Cavedog was a division of Humongous Entertainment, a maker of children's games that Ron Gilbert and Shelley Day founded in 1992. Humongous created Cavedog in 1995 to make games for a general audience. GT Interactive bought Humongous in 1996 and published Total Annihilation.

Also in 1996, Squaresoft closed its office in Redmond, Washington, and Cavedog hired many of its former developers. They included the composer Jeremy Soule and the artist Clayton Kauzlaric, who also designed the Cavedog logo. In 1997 the studio was based in Bothell, Washington, and had about 20 employees.

Chris Taylor joined Cavedog in January 1996. Total Annihilation was released about 20 months later, in late September 1997; sources give dates from 25 to 30 September. Two expansions followed in 1998: The Core Contingency and Battle Tactics.

A fall in game sales hurt GT Interactive, which went into debt. By January 2000, Cavedog's 3 unfinished games had been cancelled: Amen: The Awakening, Elysium and Good & Evil. Infogrames then bought GT Interactive, and Cavedog closed. Sources date the closure between late 1999 and February 2000. Its remaining staff moved to Humongous.

The names and roles below are printed exactly as in the credits of the 2000 English re-release manual. The 1997 manual has no credits page. People with several credits appear once, in the group of their main role.

Design

Name Role on the game What they did
Chris Taylor Designer & Project Lead; Game Programming Designed the game, led the project and wrote part of the game code. He left Cavedog in March 1998 and founded Gas Powered Games in May 1998, which made Dungeon Siege (2002) and Supreme Commander (2007).
Nathan Doster Lead Mission Designer Led the design of the campaign missions. He was later co-project leader and mission designer of The Core Contingency.
Richard W. Smith Additional Designers; Manual Contributed to the game design and worked on the manual. He later designed Battle Tactics.
Brad Lyons Mission Assistants; Testing; Manual Helped build the missions, tested the game and worked on the manual.
Jason "Crash" Stiney Mission Assistants; Testing Helped build the missions and tested the game.
Matt Schroeder Mission Assistants; Testing Helped build the missions and tested the game.

Ron Gilbert and Jacob McMahon are also credited as additional designers. They are listed under Production.

Programming

Name Role on the game What they did
Jeff Petkau Game Programming; A.I. Programming Wrote core game code and worked on the computer opponents.
Brian W. Brown Game Programming; Editors and Tools Wrote game code and built the in-house editors and tools. He later led the programming of TA: Kingdoms.
Jon Mavor Game Programming Wrote the graphics engine. He was later lead programmer on Supreme Commander, and in 2008 he co-founded Uber Entertainment, which made Planetary Annihilation (2014).
Bart Kijanka A.I. Programming Worked on the computer opponents. In May 1998 he was one of the founders of Gas Powered Games, credited there as Bartosz Kijanka.
Rick Lambright Network Programming Worked on the network code for multiplayer games. On TA: Kingdoms he was Director of Online Technology for the Boneyards online service.
Kurt Pfiefer Network Programming; Frontend Programming Worked on the network code and on the front end, the menu and setup screens.
Kevin Smith Frontend Programming Programmed the front end, the menu and setup screens.
Jason King Editors and Tools Built in-house editors and tools. He was also one of the programmers of the map and mission editor (TAE) that Cavedog later released to players.
Brad Taylor Editors and Tools Built in-house editors and tools.

Chris Taylor is also credited for game programming. He is listed under Design.

Art

Name Role on the game What they did
Clayton Kauzlaric Art Lead; Background Art Led the art team and made background art for the maps. He was later lead designer of TA: Kingdoms, and in 2000 he founded Beep Industries, which made Voodoo Vince (2003).
Kevin Pun 3D Units and Buildings; Movie Supervisor Built 3D models of units and buildings, and supervised the game's movies.
Clay Corbisier 3D Units and Buildings; Movie Team Built 3D models of units and buildings, and worked on the movies.
Mike Fisher 3D Units and Buildings; Movie Team Built 3D models of units and buildings, and worked on the movies.
Steve Thompson Movie Team; Background Art Worked on the movies and the background art. He later worked on Supreme Commander and created the art style of Planetary Annihilation.
Rebecca Coffman Movie Team; Interface Art Worked on the movies and the interface art.
Jarrett Holderby Mission Paintings Painted the artwork for the missions.

Also credited for art:

  • Background Art: John Baron, Mark West, Casey Burpee
  • Interface Art: Mark Collen, Adrian Bourne, Cory Hamilton
  • Movie Team: Scott Robinson

Audio and Music

Name Role on the game What they did
Jeremy Soule Musical Composition Composed the orchestral score, his first work with a live orchestra. GameSpot named it the best game music of 1997.
Frank Bry Sound Design Created the sound effects. He later ran The Recordist, an independent sound effects company, and worked on the sound of Dungeon Siege, Neverwinter Nights and Metroid Prime.
John Lowrie Narrator Voiced the narration. As John Patrick Lowrie, he later voiced the Sniper in Team Fortress 2 (2007) and narrated Planetary Annihilation.
Cullen Thomas Conductor Conducted the orchestra for the recording.
Larry Kenton Orchestration Arranged the score for the instruments of the orchestra.
Benoit Grey Computer Score Transcription Turned the computer version of the score into written music.
Audrey deRoche Music Coordinator Coordinated the music production.
Simon James Orchestra Contractor Booked the musicians of the orchestra.
Rick Winquest Orchestra Recorded and Mixed by Recorded and mixed the orchestra.
Reed Ruddy Studio Manager Managed Studio X, where the orchestra was recorded.
John Burton 2nd Engineers Assisted with the recording.
Sam Hofstedt 2nd Engineers Assisted with the recording.

The Northwest Sinfonia performed the score at Studio X. Wikipedia describes it as a 95-piece orchestra. Jeremy Soule later scored Icewind Dale (2000) and Supreme Commander (2007). He also scored 3 Elder Scrolls games: Morrowind (2002), Oblivion (2006) and Skyrim (2011).

Production

Name Role on the game What they did
Ron Gilbert Producer; Additional Designers Produced the game and contributed to its design. Before Humongous, he worked at Lucasfilm Games on Maniac Mansion (1987) and The Secret of Monkey Island (1990). He later made Thimbleweed Park (2017) and Return to Monkey Island (2022).
Jacob McMahon Assistant Producer; Additional Designers; Manual Assisted the producer, contributed to the design and worked on the manual. He was later associate producer of The Core Contingency.

Also credited for production:

  • Production Assistants: Shane Hendrix, Lawton Watkins

Testing and Support

Name Role on the game What they did
David Nixon Quality Assurance Manager Managed the quality assurance team.
Ruth Lopez Test Lead Led the test team. Also listed among the testers as Ruth A. Lopez.
Cullen Hadersberger QA Hardware Technician Looked after the computers and hardware used for testing.

Also credited for testing:

  • Testing: Kyle Casperson, Todd Clausen, Justin Isaac Copeland, Eric Helbig, Dirk Hunter, Matt Julich, Aaron Kempf, Marcus King, Jim Krieger, Steve Kuo, Miene Lee, John Lewis, Garrett Link, Ruth A. Lopez, Brad Lyons, Bryan Macdonald, Joe Mullinex, Randy Ochs, Wade Racine, Charles Roberts, Tariq Sahal, Matt Schroeder, Eric Snyder, Casey D. Stein, Jason "Crash" Stiney, James Willich, Tim Wright

Others

Name Role on the game What they did
Dave Grossman Writer Wrote for the game. He had been a designer on The Secret of Monkey Island (1990) and Day of the Tentacle (1993). He was later a lead designer at Telltale Games.

Also credited:

  • Manual: Dirk Hunter, Brad Lyons, Jim Krieger, Jacob McMahon, Richard W. Smith, Ingrid Sutherland, Nic Lavroff, Ingrid Berendt
  • Special Thanks: William Kidd, John Uppendahl, Ralph Giuffre, Patricia Longeran, Marsh Macy, Sam Linse, Mark Maling, Dave Timoney

The Core Contingency

The Core Contingency was released on 29 April 1998. It added 25 campaign missions and included the map and mission editor. Chris Taylor led the project, but he left Cavedog in March 1998, shortly before the release. Nathan Doster was co-project leader, and Kellyn Beeck was the producer.

The team below is as credited in the expansion's readme.

Role on the game Names
Project Leader Chris Taylor
Co-Project Leader & Mission Designer Nathan Doster
Lead Artist Clayton Kauzlaric
Producer Kellyn Beeck
Executive Producer Ron Gilbert
Associate Producer Jacob McMahon
Assistant Producer Steve Kuo
Production Assistants Shane Hendrix, Steve Snow
Unit Designs Nathan Doster, Jacob McMahon, Chris Taylor
Map Designs John Baron, Nathan Doster, Clayton Kauzlaric, Garrett Link, Mark West
Programmers Bruce Dawson, Bartosz Kijanka, Steve Miale, Rick Saenz, Kevin Smith
Network Programming Rick Lambright, Kurt Pfeifer, David Satnik
Total Annihilation Engine Brian Brown, Bruce Dawson, Bartosz Kijanka, Jason King, Jonathan Mavor, Jeff Petkau, Rick Saenz, Kevin Smith, Chris Taylor
Background Artists John Baron, Kevin Chung, Mike Denlinger, Peter Fries, Jarrett Holderby, Clayton Kauzlaric, Mark West
Unit Artists Rebecca Coffman, Dan Cole, Clay Corbisier, John Gronquist, Bob Koshi, Steve Thompson
Interface Art Mark DiGiacomo, Peter Fries
Sound Design Frank Bry
Musical Composition Jeremy Soule
Writer Dave Grossman
Foreign Languages Ingrid Berendt
Quality Assurance Manager David Nixon
Quality Assurance Lead Ruth A. Lopez
Testing Patty Bradley-Bunn, Kyle Casperson, Kevin Collar, Eric "Frog" Elders, Sharon Evans, Eric Fjellanger, Shannon Hill, Bob Lenth, Brad Lyons, Bryan Macdonald, Emily Mannon, Elizabeth McClean, Brian Moore, Joe Mullenix, Phillip M. Nelson, Randy Ochs, Wade Racine, Theresa Robinson, Caroline Sherley, Matt Skau, Eric Snyder, Casey D. Stein, Jason "Crash" Stiney, TJ Wright

In May 1998, Bartosz Kijanka and Rick Saenz were among the founders of Gas Powered Games with Chris Taylor. The editor's own readme credits Jason King, Rick Saenz and Jon Mavor for its programming. It credits Eric "Frog" Elders, Brad Lyons, Randy Ochs and Jason "Crash" Stiney for documentation and testing.

Battle Tactics

Battle Tactics was released in July 1998. It added new units, new maps and 100 missions. Richard W. Smith designed it, and Kellyn Beeck produced it. Garrett Link is credited for the Coremageddon map.

These names and roles are also taken from the expansion's readme.

Role on the game Names
Design Richard W. Smith
Producer Kellyn Beeck
Assistant Producers Steve Kuo, Garrett Link
Map and Mission Creation Torrey Froese, Richard W. Smith, Ian Fox, Pasha Smith, Garrett Link (Coremageddon)
Localization Coordinator Ingrid Berendt
Test Lead Ruth A. Lopez
Testers Eric Elders, Shannon Hill, Brad Lyons, Bryan Macdonald, Joe Mullenix, Randy Ochs, Eric Snyder, Jason "Crash" Stiney, Casey Stein, TJ Wright
Playtesters Dave Einstein, Eddie Blake
Thanks To Steve Perrot, Travis Grey, Jacob McMahon, Bob Wilson

Sources