Which type of game writer are you looking for? Part 1

Confused about what kind of game writer you want?  You’re not alone!  The game industry constantly struggles with titles in every department, and writing is no exception.  When looking for a game writer, story designer, narrative designer, dialog writer, etc., make sure you’re looking for the right kind.  For this series, we teamed up with Chris Avellone, writer and co-founder of Obsidian Entertainment, who offered up his characteristic artwork for this issue.

Writer/Co-Founder

This writer is so good s/he started a company to share the shiny goodness
Known for: Great writing, good management, and the ability to walk on water

Narrative Designer

Writer who knows the ultimate truth that game story doesn’t begin and end with the written word
Known for: Using a holistic approach to game development, and having it all figured out 😉

Narrative Designer

Now, no name-calling

This type of ND acts as champion for a game writer’s work within a company, especially if game writer works on contract.
Known for: Diplomacy, good eye for great writers (like us!)

Content Designer

Someone who works on staff, writes some storylines, then implements them into the game with tools. Someone who will rise in the design department, rather than being relegated to the “writer ghetto” that exists on some staffs
Known for: Having a career path, a pile of story ideas, and a secret desire to shed the designer title and be a WRITER FOREVER!

All done?  Not so fast…  Next week we’ll put up more game writers, including the game writer vs. game writer confusion.  Subscribe to make sure you’re getting the right writer!

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You don’t know Austin GDC 2008 until you’ve read this

Sande trekked over to Austin to get you the latest on what’s going on at the Game Developers Conference.  Whether you attended these sessions or not, check out what you missed by reading Sande’s articles over at Edge Online.

Know Your Characters

Tom Abernathy tells you that story comes from character.  He goes further to say character inspires mechanics.  Now if only we can get developers to develop characters before mechanics and we’ll be all set!

What’s Wrong With Questing and How to Fix It

Attendees brainstorm on solutions to the seminal text box for delivering quests.  Many MMOs and games have taken a stab at it.  Added benefit of eliminating the text box in favor of icons or one-liners?  You save your writers’ time so they can focus on making a good adventure.

Future Gaming

Where will games be in 35 years?  Find out what a towel has to do with it!

Google Lively Becoming Game-Friendly

Worlds in Motion Summit reveals that Google isn’t interested in dollars.  Oh, I’m sorry.  Virtual dollars.

Other News from Austin:

Breaking the Sound Barrier

Cartoon Network Flexes IP in MMO

Building an Online Disneyland

Anything from AGDC you’re just dying to learn about?  Got any hot tips?  Click on the comment below and do your magic.

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New, Better, More and other lies about game sequels

“Compete in quality, not size.” The words of a wannabe? A lunatic? Or Mike Capps, president of Epic Games? Capps was talking about developing sequels as part of his talk in Leipzig. While he seems to be on the right track, his process didn’t always match his goal of quality.  What exactly is better when it comes to making game sequels?

New, Better, More
When developing GEARS OF WAR 2, Capps developed with the mantra: “New, Better, More.”  For him, that means more guns and better guns.  Ironically, this approach contradicts his goal of competing on a quality level.  We’ve often said that less is more when it comes to dialog, and its just the same with design.  The key with any creative endeavor is to approach everything with an editing eye.  Quantity has never equaled quality.  Writers Cabal reader Nick commented that “better” depends on the game; the same amount or fewer hours of gameplay could actually improve the quality of a game.

Design Cabal
When developing the sequel, Capps assembled a “design cabal.”  We commend him on the term as well as the approach.  The team focused on the vision for the game (it’s not just about the fun!), then brainstormed ideas.  Following the focus on quality, they recognized, for instance, that there was actually no story in their story for the original GEARS OF WAR, so they decided to add more plot.  If GoW2 has a great story, I will be thrilled, but we’re always wary of someone who’s looking to add “plot” instead of story.  We recently were approached to develop concepts for a game sequel.  The reason?  They wanted to get writers in the process earlier to avoid issues they had with the original.  Whenever gathering together a design cabal, consider a writers cabal as well, to tell the story using all the tools games offer.

Move to Switzerland
In the end, Capps likened developing games to an arms race, and suggested ultimately that to create the best sequels, you should move to proverbial Switzerland.  The best advice is to ignore everyone else and try to do your own thing.  You may just end up with the new, better, and “more” after all.  Just make sure you know what “better” means for your game.

Which game sequels do you think have actually improved on the original?  Or do you think they’re a lost cause?

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Freelance game designers get a long vacation

I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed with the quantity of projects on my plate at the moment, but apparently as a game designer, I only have to wait four months until I get a long vacation.  Of course, they don’t mention that a long vacation will involve looking for the next gig…

From Great Careers with Long Vacations:

“Freelance Game Designer

As many a game designer will tell you, game development companies only produce a few titles a year. A production may take four months to complete, with work piling up at burn-out levels as the game advances deep into the production schedule. That’s why companies find it advantageous to hire designers on a freelance basis. Do the job and you’ll be asked back again when another idea hits the table. That means plenty of time between gigs to relax at the beach. ”

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Comic-con 2008 and the quest for new IP

Think the intellectual property (IP) you choose doesn’t have a big impact on how your game does?  According to a recent Gamasutra article, lack of first-party IPs explains slow sales of the PS3.  Namco is ramping up its development of original IP.  So which IPs are the one to go for?  Well, you’re in luck.  At comic-con last week, I joined a feature creative exec in search of new intellectual property. 

I spent most of Thursday going from booth to booth, checking out the trends in comics.  The exec’s mandate was simple: no aliens, superheroes, or supernatural.  Not surprisingly, that was just about everything out there.  The descriptions all started out the same: “Joe is a mild-mannered X,” then the second sentence would be something about aliens.  If you’re developing original IP, you’ll be up against a heap of competition if you play in these types of worlds. 

No matter what IP you buy or develop, make sure to get out of the way of your fans.  As Will Wright said at comic-con, eventually your players are going to entertain you more than you entertain them.  You want to give them the tools to do so, then get out of their way. 

With the alien/sci fi, supernatural, and superhero genres covered in comics and games and the war genre pretty much covered in games, what storytelling genres do you think are underserved in games?

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Bartle versus MMOs, but solutions are in sight

I cannot believe I missed this.  Our new ION buddy Scott Jennings, who’s working on an unannounced MMO, posted a link on his blog to an interview with Bartle.  It spawned a lengthy conversation in comments, with Bartle himself weighing in several times.  Here’s the crux of Bartle’s argument:

1. MMO designers don’t have the interest or ability to improve on the MMO genre in general
2. MMO designers don’t give any reason or meaning to the worlds they create

Commenters immediately went to town on Bartle, condemning him for only being a consultant among other issues.  In the interest of full disclosure, we are actually consulting on an MMO where Bartle is also a consultant.  That said, having both consulted and worked on a number of MMOs, I have to agree that if you’ve worked on more than one, you get an idea of what is innovative and what isn’t.  If you happen to work on more than one during the course of a year, you really get to see what’s going on currently in the world of MMOs.  As for Jennings and Bartle’s assertion that designers don’t have knowledge of game design history, here’s a quick refresher from a game story perspective.

On the second issue, I can’t claim to know what is going on in the minds of all MMO designers, and neither does Bartle.  However, assuming Bartle is correct, starting with a unique vision, then setting up your world and gameplay to convey it is a step in the right direction.  It’s not enough to say “sci fi world” or “fantasy world,” because this type of world could fit into any game of the genre (not for nothing, but we presented a panel on Writing for Fantasy Worlds).  The worlds of Warhammer, Age of Conan, and World of Warcraft all take place in fantasy worlds, but fantasy worlds — and fantasy games — shouldn’t be interchangable.

Hop on over to broken toys and throw your comment into the mix, or drop your comment down below and tell me if you think Bartle’s dim view of MMO innovation is right or wrong, especially when it comes to MMO game story.   

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More story in the design: what you missed at ION 08

A few weeks ago we spoke at the ION Game Conference on Story vs. Story: Redefining Narrative and Player Engagement in MMOs. As shocking as it may seem, we actually weren’t the only ones talking about story and MMOs. Think story in MMOs is only for writers? Here’s what you may have missed.

BlackStar Designer Reinhart On Design Doc Alternatives
Reinhart uses a few tricks of the writing trade to make your game concepts more palatable to those who don’t like to read massive design docs. Check out the comments on this article.

Microsoft’s Hanna On The Fight For Shadowrun Audience
What I didn’t see in this article is how the entire game story was thrown out right around E3, so they had to rebuild it from scratch and in a hurry. Turns out you really do need to get buy-in from your fanbase on game story early and often. Who knew? Oh, we did 🙂

Joe Ludwig on Pirates of the Burning Sea
Highlighted some of the interesting bits about Pirates of the Burning Sea — including an emphasis on storytelling for single players. How cunning! We almost forgive them for sharing our time slot at the conference.

A five year forecast for MMOs
Five years in the future you will find Scott Jennings and Damion Schubert. Who knew? Presentation covered business models and trends, but one take-home can be applied to storytelling: embrace your genre and learn to love the niche. Powerpoint!

I predict there will be increasing efforts to incorporate quality story into MMOs, because we’ve already seen that trend on published and up-coming MMOs. What do you predict for the future of MMOs and storytelling?

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Digital Hollywood: can content help online games?

I’m attending Digital Hollywood today, a conference allegedly focusing on the intersection between Hollywood content and digital technology.  One panel particularly caught my attention, since we’ll be speaking next week at the ION Game Conference on a similar topic: “Innovation in Games, Game Networks and Social Gaming – Massive User Communities and Commerce.”  This panel brought to light how online communities and content can have an impact on each other, as well as pointing out a few more trends in the online space.

The online or social component of games is what makes them viral or “sticky.”  Gene Mauro of Bunchball discussed how the internet creates a new form of social status online.  People can invest in online communities and build equity online, the same way others might buy a BMW to gain status in the real world.  Chris Donahue, from a company that legitimately sells gold and other virtual goods online, noted that users ascribe value to his product, rather than it having any inherent value.  Of course, something like WoW gold has value in-game, but only if the user values the experience or status you get there. 

How does this tie in with story or content?  The developer behind NBC’s THE OFFICE virtual world/experience incorporates fans’ love of the show into an interactive, game-like experience.  Fans create video, mashups, and answer trivia to earn virtual bucks that buy merchandise.  Connection to the content reinforces the social status loop, which in turn reinforces the connection to the content.  While this example may seem like a fabulous reason to license existing properties, games have shown they can develop fans of original content as well. 

The biggest changes in MMOs especially will have an impact on community, story, and design.  While the subscription model of MMOs encourages and caters to the hard-core player, the free-to-play models work better for other types of players.  Would that mean fewer WoW-esque MMOs, both in terms of story and design?  Another trend online is the growth of asynchronous play, like with Scrabulous.  What impact will this have, if any, on MMOs, which historically encourage synchronous play?  What do you think?

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