Managing expectations: joining a game writing team

You’ve learned what it takes to work in a writing team. You’re full of ideas; you’re raring to go.  There’s just one problem.  You’re not the only one.  Maybe you’ve worked in a team before.  Maybe this is your first time.  Either way, joining a team differs each time you do it, because you will be working with different personalities, differing needs, and often different rules.  The secret to success is to manage expectations - your lead’s, your co-workers’, and your own. 

Upon joining a team, your first step should be to get a lay of the land by learning what is expected of you.  Whether you are freelance or working on staff, you will be working for someone, so now’s the time to ask your superior to clarify your role as the project moves forward. 

• How do you prefer to write?  This question you can ask colleagues as well as your superiors.  Do not assume everyone writes the same way you do.  Some may prefer to start with a story premise and move forward.  Some may start with gameplay.  Others may start with theme.  Knowing how your superior likes to develop a story can prevent misunderstandings going forward. 
• How open are you to suggestions or comments at this stage?
• What is the vision for this project?
• What support do you need from me?

While asking these questions up front should smooth your transition onto the team, keep in mind you should continue to ask these types of questions at each stage of the project.  Don’t ever stop asking “How am I doing?”  Honest answers to these questions will allow you to correct problems before they become too hard to handle.

The second step to joining a team requires letting others know what to expect from you.  You can answer some of the questions above, or come up with your own.  For example, once upon a time, a writer told his lead that he wasn’t good at pitching ideas orally and added, half-jokingly, that he was “never going to get better.”  This information helped his lead understand problems ”in the room” and may have opened a door for this writer to pitch via e-mail instead.  By taking a risk and being honest, the writer headed off a problem before it got too big.   

Anyone have any horror stories about joining a team — or times when you inadvertently used this advice with positive results?

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Writing the Witcher and Andrzej Sapkowski

You’re playing THE WITCHER and you want to know more — about the game, and about the original novels that inspired the game. You’re in luck. You’re about to get both. Here we attempt to answer those burning questions — and encourage you to ask a few more.

The reason we’re all here: Andrzej Sapkowski
Andrzej Sapkowski introduced Geralt, the witcher, in a series of short stories and novels. While these novels are best-sellers in Europe, they have yet to jump the pond (as of October 2007). THE LAST WISH, the original collection of short stories featuring Geralt, has been translated into English since we began work on THE WITCHER. However, I ended up reading the book in French, because it was the only version available at the time that I could understand. To supplement the material we had received from CDProjekt and Atari, I wrote an extended synopsis of the book, which we used as inspiration in writing the English script. The book and writing are fabulous — we highly recommend it.

If you want information about what happened in the first or subsequent books, you have a number of options. First of all, feel free to ask us and we’ll do our best to answer. You can also hear about what happened in the stories and novels by asking certain NPCs in-game. You can also buy the English translation of THE LAST WISH. If you want a preview of Sapkowski’s writing before buying, you can also read an English translation of Sapkowski’s short story based on Arthurian Legend.

Writing THE WITCHER game
Now, it’s no secret that the English version of THE WITCHER has been edited down. As writers, we accept that when we hand over the script, there’s always the possibility it will get changed. (Just to clarify, we were not the translators, but the writers working on the English adaptation.) Although every detail was not able to be retained, ideally the cuts were conducted in a fashion so as to keep the spirit of the original meaning. As far as we know, these cuts happened for production reasons only. The cuts were not done for reasons of censorship. As with most production- related reasons, you would not have the game in hand had these cuts not occurred. Moreover, we think CDProjekt has done a phenomenal job.

We also understand that some of the cuts have caused some confusion. If you have any questions about an in-game dialog, we’ll do our best to find the original line and tell you its meaning. We only ask for patience in return. So ask away!

Guess that game dialog becomes What’s your favorite line? Today’s line: “A witcher! Quick, hide your women!” What’s your favorite line?

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