Script Lock

We're captivated by our guests this week, as Meg (creator of Samsara, lead writer on 80 Days, and contributor on Sunless Sea) and Richard (game designer on Gex, Pandemonium, the Soul Reaver series, lead game designer on Jak X and the first three Uncharted games, and Associate Professor in the Interactive Media and Games Division at USC) talk about the cultural influences of tabletop, LARPing and interactive theatre on games, the woes of being a freelance writer, finding work-life balance, the importance and need for editors, the propensity for systemic thinking, unfairness in games, following the rules of fiction vs the rules of games, systemizing choice, the structure of 80 Days, research giving safety to the player, whether genres are useful, the generic influences of The Velvet Underground and The Doors, games confident enough to not explode all over your face when you start them up, and taking responsibility for the stories and games we put out into the world. Our Guests on the Internet Meg's Twitter and Website. Richard's Twitter and Website. Stuff We Talked About The Art of Fiction #2: Meg Jayanth by Duncan Fyfe The Masque of the Red Death Sleep No More The Meadow EA_Spouse Henry Miller’s 11 Commandments of Writing Meg's GDC 2015 talk - Leading Players Astray : 80 Days & Unexpected Stories Dogme 95 All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace by Adam Curtis Thinking in Systems: A Primer by Donella H. Meadows Cybernetics: or the Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine by Norbert Wiener Meg's PRACTICE 2015 talk on Unfairness in Games The Year of the Crush: How the Radically Unfair Candy Crush Saga Took Over Our Lives by Tevis Thompson Donkeyspace by Frank Lantz Towards a Steampunk Without Steam by Amal El-Mohtar Wheels of Aurelia Our theme music was composed by 2Mello, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita.

Social simulations and the storytelling potential of hardware-based games are the main topics in today's discussion with Mitu (Creator of Redshirt, PhD holder in Aesthetics of Interactivity in Video Games, and current Assistant Arts Professor at NYU's Game Center) and Jerry (Game designer and developer behind Robo Mama’s Cooking Kitchen, MysteryPhone, Discourse, The Choosatron, and Afterglow)! We talk about the importance of player choice, The Witness and the dialogue that happens between a creator and the player, why freedom in games isn't always a good thing, how controllers and interfaces affect the way we think about games, why Animal Crossing is an amazing social simulator, how fleshing out a game's world can influence the design, the problems with making a social simulation, what happens to our engagement with games as interfaces become more mimetic, slaying Chris Crawford's Dragon, and man, that's just the stuff that's off the top of our heads! Our Guests on the Internet Mitu's Twitter and The Tiniest Shark Jerry's Twitter and Website Stuff We Talked About Mitu's GDC Talk - Thinking About People: Designing Games for Social Simulation ELIZA and The ELIZA Effect Loved by Alexander Ocias The Immersive Fallacy (excerpted from Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals) by Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman Lygia Clark Redshirt Notary Bear by Lisa Brown Chris Crawford's Dragon Speech Our theme music was composed by 2Mello, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita.

2016 has been put on notice by our guests Jill (writer on Your Shape: Fitness Evolved and the Assassin’s Creed series, including Liberation, Black Flag, and Freedom Cry) and Corey (writer on Prince of Persia: Warrior Within, The Two Thrones, Batman: Arkham Origins, and lead writer on Assassin's Creed 1, 2, and 3), who are here to talk about how everything is writing even if nobody will believe you, staying creatively refreshed, the brain’s thirst for motor activities during procrastination, how one is never done writing a game even after shipping, the insularity of the games industry vs other mediums, the treatment of making games as software instead of entertainment, why it's so hard to get rid of the cutscene/gameplay/cutscene structure, how games have a lot to learn about nonverbal storytelling from dance, the need to embrace failure, how pressure does NOT make diamonds in game development, working with a nonexistent creative vision, being forced to make decisions and live with them as early as possible, not holding out for a better idea, and more things The Good Wife can teach us about narrative design. Our Guests on the Internet Jill's Twitter, Website, Discoglobe Interactive Inc., and Moon Hunters. Corey's Twitter. Stuff We Talked About The Other Side of Paradise: A Memoir by Staceyann Chin Time Machine VR The Good Wife Our theme music was composed by 2Mello, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita.

Our last episode of the year is here and it's super writing-focused! Cara Ellison (Writer, game critic, narrative designer, creator of Sacrilege, and writer on Dishonored 2) and Jack de Quidt (Writer/composer of Castles in the Sky, and writer of Veracity & Purpose and Dr. Langeskov, The Tiger, and The Terribly Cursed Emerald: A Whirlwind Heist) join us to talk about their writing processes, working on a narrative when it's fractured across an entire team, why fetch quests occur even though everyone HATES them, the narrative design in The Witcher and Kentucky Route Zero, why a lot of studios are afraid of trusting the player, narrative problem-solving, the verbs that happen in games, navigating breaking the fourth wall, the portrayal of relationships in games, the importance of humor, how to handle pacing, required reading for people working in the industry that isn't about making games, and much, much more. Our Guests on the Internet Cara's Twitter, Website, Dishonored 2, Sacrilege, and you can buy Embed with Games here. Jack's Twitter, Crows Crows Crows, and Friends at the Table. Stuff We Talked About On Pointlessness by Steve Gaynor Dr. Langeskov, The Tiger, and The Terribly Cursed Emerald: A Whirlwind Heist (it's free!) TO THE WRITERS OF THE UNIT by David Mamet On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King Clint Hocking's Blog Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino Spider and Web by Andrew Plotkin Kentucky Route Zero and the Poetics of Space by Cara Ellison Werner Herzog's Rogue Film School Jessica Jones on Netflix Fargo on Hulu Fiasco Our theme music was composed by 2Mello, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita.

LucasArts is in the house with our guests Graham (animator on Full Throttle, The Dig, The Curse of Monkey Island, and more. Former creative director at Telltale, creator of Grickle and the Puzzle Agent series, and currently at Laika) and Malena (sound dept. at LucasArts, and later joined Double Fine as a producer, including VO and localization, on pretty much every game they've released). We cover RTX Red Rock, wearing many hats as a producer and creative director, Telltale’s first year, course correcting your game, localization vs translating, how writers can make producers’ lives easier, similarities between miniature set design and game development, and the unnerving speed of technological change in games. Our Guests on the Internet Graham's Twitter, Youtube, and Vine Malena is NOWHERE, but you can donate to Psychonauts 2 here Stuff We Talked About RTX: Red Rock Our theme music was composed by 2Mello, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita.

Come for the discussions about writing on an open world game with C.J. (lead writer on Homefront, scriptwriter on Rainbox 6, Your Shape, Far Cry 4, Assassin's Creed, and currently senior narrative designer on Homefront: The Revolution,) and Liz (scriptwriter on Far Cry 4, Far Cry 4: Valley of the Yetis), stay for the talks on how to write a good bark, working with localization, pickled toes, writing Far Cry 4, exposition, maintaining urgency in an open word, catching players back up with the story, the importance of asking why manhole covers are round, and GTA 5 role-playing. Our Guests on the Internet C.J.'s Twitter Liz's Website and Twitter Our theme music was composed by 2Mello, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita.

Two of the happiest people in games, Khris (VO/casting director and creative consultant for such places as LucasArts, Double Fine, EA, THQ, Ubisoft, and Telltale Games) and Brad (project lead of Iron Brigade, Brazen, and MASSIVE CHALICE) talk to us about pitching games to studios, working with the story for MASSIVE CHALICE, directing voice over, working with actors, how to deal with differences of opinion, the importance of staying positive, creating stories in games when you're not a "story person", narrative and gameplay dissonance, linearity of AAA game stories, the future of performances in games, and how we've evolved for hugging. Our Guests on the Internet Khris' Twitter Brad's Twitter Stuff We Talked About Double Fine Adventure documentary Amnesia Fortnight 2014 documentary Our theme music was composed by 2Mello, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita.

We dive deep into empathy with Robin (designer on The Sims 2: Open for Business, MySims, producer on Journey, Glitch, co-founder of Funomena where she's currently working on Wattam and Luna) this week. Other topics include Robin’s pitch for a Street Angel game, games being systems that run on the software of us, what producers actually do, how to design for and instill empathy in players, fostering a genuine non-adversarial connection between players, how to reward contemplative play, games that celebrate mistakes, why aren’t we making games about being loved, the future of AI and storytelling, and how to stave off creative starvation. Our Guest on the Internet Robin's Twitter Funomena's Website and Twitter Stuff We Talked About Street Angel: The Princess of Poverty Vol 1 The Timeless Way of Building by Christopher Alexander The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin Robin's GDC Indie Gamemaker Rant Tales of Tales’ Cathedral in the Clouds Kickstarter GDC Experimental Gameplay Workshop Our theme music was composed by 2Mello, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita. -Also Sleep No More is Macbeth, not Hamlet, as Robin pointed out to us after recording this-

We're all about ARGs and procedural generation on this week's discussion with Tanya (designer on Age of Conan, Dungeons of Fayte, The Secret World, Shattered Planet and Moon Hunters) and Rob (writer on ALFA-ARKIV, Gears of War: Judgment, The Vanishing of Ethan Carter, Playmation, and Battlefield Hardline). Our sprawling conversation includes chatbots, transmedia narratives, creating mythologies, binary morality systems, pacing in a procedurally generated game, why haven't we moved past cutscenes in games, how procedural and systemic gameplay affects development and writing, and games based on information retrieval. Our Guests on the Internet Tanya's Website and Twitter Rob's Twitter Stuff We Talked About Moon Hunters on Steam ALFA-ARKIV app itch.io Chatscript Versu The Fake 'Terrorist' Conspiracy Game That Fooled People For Years by Patricia Hernandez GDC Talk: AI-driven Dynamic Dialog through Fuzzy Pattern Matching by Elan Ruskin Our theme music was composed by 2Mello, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita.

We've brought in Brian (who has a huge reel including: animator on Boogerman, storyboard artist for Warner Bros, writer on Jade Empire and Mass Effect 2, and lead writer on Starcraft 2 and Diablo 3) and Diandra (editor formerly at Bioware, Riot, Snail Games, XSEED, and currently Carbine Studios) for discussions on Boogerman, working at Bioware, what being an editor in games is like, application processes for writers, writing born from constraint, why we haven't seen The Wire: The Game yet, and what RTS' can do with storytelling that no other genre can do. Our Guests on the Internet Brian's Website and Twitter. Diandra's Twitter. Our theme music was composed by 2Mello, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita.