Course Lab: Lessons from Successful Online Course Creators Writing for Video Games (ft. Susan O’Connor)
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Episode summary: These days, video game writers are taking something old - storytelling - and marrying it to something new - technology. In this way, writers are redefining what it means to tell a story in the 21st century, just as screenwriters did in the 20th century. Now more than ever, great games deserve great stories.
In this episode, hosts Danny Iny and Abe Crystal interview Susan O’Connor, the creator of the multifaceted course “How to write for video games.” Susan's been writing for many years and learned everything the hard way, which meant screwing up and mostly screwing up in public. Why should other writers have to go through this hard process, she asked herself? Why not go through a class? So, she created one that’s achieving “pinnacle results” for her students.
In this episode we discuss:
- “The digital campfire” model; creating a space for writers to build a community - they LOVE it.
- How she constructed the content of the course and its multifaceted structure.
- How the TA (teacher assistant) strategy enabled Susan to scale.
- What she's charging for her course(s), and why she has class 1 and class 2.
- How Susan is able to get her students jobs in the industry.
- Danny’s and Abe’s debrief after the interview
“I created a buddy system. I waited a couple of weeks until we'd had a chance to know each other. But I would partner people up so that they could have a go-to person to discuss that week's homework assignment. And then I changed up the buddies every week.” – Susan O’Connor
Guest Bio:
Susan’s first job as a game writer was for “a slumber party game - for girls!” She’s gone on to work on over 25 projects, including award-winning titles in the BioShock, Far Cry and Tomb Raider franchises. Titles in her portfolio have sold over 30 million copies and generated over $500 million in sales. She is an adjunct professor at UT Austin, where she teaches a course on writing for games. A long time ago, she founded the Game Narrative Summit at GDC. Now, she partners with studios, publishers, and writers to help teams ship great games with great stories. She is dedicated to supporting creatives in the games industry so that they can do their best work.
Susan O'Connor
Resources or websites mentioned in this episode:
Credits:
- Guest - Susan O’Connor
- Hosts - Danny Iny & Abe Crystal
- Producer - Cynthia Lamb
- Executive producer - Danny Iny
- Writer - Michi Lantz and Cynthia Lamb
- Assembled by - Geoff Govertsen
- Audio Post Supervisor: Evan Miles, Christopher Martin
- Audio Post Production by Post Office Sound
- Music soundscape: Chad Michael Snavely
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Music and SFX credits:
1. Track Title: Access
Artist Name(s): OBOY
Writer Name: Martin Hampton
Writer Name: Matej Djajkovski
Publisher Name: A SOUNDSTRIPE PRODUCTION
2. Track Title: Bossa BB
Artist Name(s): Marie
Writer Name: Chelsea McGough
Publisher Name: BOSS SOUNDSTRIPE PRODUCTIONS
3. Track Title: Carousel Lights
Artist Name(s): Chelsea McGough
Writer Name: Chelsea McGough
Writer Name: Matthew Wigton
Publisher Name: A SOUNDSTRIPE PRODUCTION
Publisher Name: BOSS SOUNDSTRIPE PRODUCTIONS
4. Track Title: Grace
Artist Name(s): Shimmer
Writer Name: Matthew Wigton
Publisher Name: A SOUNDSTRIPE PRODUCTION
- Episode transcript: Writing for Video Games (ft. Susan O’Connor)
- [00:00:01] Danny Iny: Mirasee
- [00:00:05] Susan O'Connor: I had to learn everything the hard way, which means screwing up and mostly screwing up in public, but I learned and it was great, you know? And so I thought gosh, why should other writers have to go through this hard process? Why why not go through a class? Why can't I just make it easy for them? Okay.
- [00:00:25] Danny: Hello and welcome to Course Lab, the show that teaches course creators like you how to make better online courses. I'm Danny, me the founder of Mirasee an education company and I'm here with my co host Abe Crystal, the co founder of Ruzuku. In each episode we're going to showcase of course and horse creator who is doing something really interesting with their course. Our guest today is Susan O'Connor. Susan. Welcome to course Lab.
- [00:00:54] Susan: Thanks Danny. I'm thrilled to be here. Hi Abe.
- [00:00:58] Abe: Hello there.
- [00:00:59] Danny: So let's start at the beginning, Susan. For people who are not familiar with you and your work, who are you, what do you do? How did you come to the world of online courses and what is your course about who does it serve? Give us the give us the whole picture.
- [00:01:14] Susan: I am a writer and a teacher and I have a very unusual specialty. I actually for years and years now have been writing scripts and storylines for video games. Which is a lot like writing scripts and stories for movies. But instead of for movies it's for games.
- [00:01:32] Danny: Are there some games you've worked on that we might have heard of?
- [00:01:35]