Get Social, Get Writing, Get Educated

Since GDC09, we’ve been busy with appearances and projects.  Anne recently spoke at Digital L.A.’s Games Go Social panel in May and discussed the social aspects of games and how successful social games, iPhone games, and casual MMOs are bringing games to the mainstream.  Meanwhile, I analyzed the current crop of social games and offered design ideals for the next generation of social games in an article for Gamasutra, called “The Social Game Boom.”

Next week, I’ll be at CMU for the 2009 Game Education Summit, on June 16-17, 2009.  I’ll be on a panel with noted game writers and academics Lee Sheldon, Richard Dansky, Drew Davidson, and Elisabeth Nonas addressing last year’s hullabaloo on how game writers don’t belong in the game industry.  We’ll also be discussing narrative design and writing for ARGs and non-AAA games.

Additionally, I’ll be co-presenting with Ricardo Rademacher, CEO of Futur-E-Scape, in a session entitled “Creativity, Constraints, and Compromises.” Ricardo Rademacher recently presented his educational theory of MMOGs at the Independent MMO Game Developers Conference in Las Vegas last April.  We’ll be discussing how his educational theory meshed with narrative design to develop a fantasy MMORPG that also teaches physics.  In fact, this game was a case study in our chapter for the book, Writing for Video Game Genres.

Next, I’ll be moderating a panel on educational MMOs and virtual worlds at State of Play VI, on June 19-20, 2009 at New York Law School.  In this panel discussion, leading researchers and creators of educational virtual worlds will discuss the challenges of aligning curriculum and learning with fun. A central theme to the discussion will be to try and establish some best practices for the integration of theory and curriculum into educational virtual worlds.

Attending any of these conferences?  Let me know!

Posted by Sande for Writers Cabal, a game writing and design partnership.

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Highlights from GDC 2009

Authors from Writing for Video Game Genres: From FPS to RPG

If you were at the book signing for Writing For Video Game Genres: From FPS to RPG at GDC 2009, thank you for coming!

As you can see from the photo, several of the authors were in attendance.  The interest was so high that the publishers even brought down the first IGDA Writers SIG book, Professional Techniques for Video Game Writing and sold those too.  In a rare instance, my co-author David Michael and I also signed our book, Serious Games: Games That Educate, Train, and Inform.

For photo highlights, check out David Michael’s blog, Joe Indie.  (Quick, before he starts blogging about something else!)

I contributed to Edge Online’s GDC 2009 coverage and will also be contributing session write-ups to GameDev’s GDC 2009 coverage, including Patrick Redding’s talk on AI dialog systems.

In addition, I’m starting up my twitter channel, so if you would like to keep tabs on Game Design Aspect of the Month or my other blogs, please do visit or subscribe.

Posted by Sande for Writers Cabal, a game writing and design partnership.

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Book Signing at GDC 2009

If you’re headed to GDC next week, be sure to pick up the latest IGDA Writers SIG book, Writing for Video Game Genres: From FPS to RPG.  It’ll be on sale at the GDC bookstore as well as on AK Peters’ Web site, Amazon.com, Borders.com, and in most major bookstores.

Plus, a special “Meet the Authors” book signing event will take place on Thursday, March 26, 2009 from 5:30p.m. to 6:30 p.m. at San Francisco’s Moscone Convention Center, 747 Howard St., San Francisco, CA 94103, at the IGDA booth in the lobby outside of the exhibit hall.  We’ll be there and so will other game writers like Haris Orkin, Richard Dansky, Evan Skolnick, and John Feil.

Let us know if you can make it and we’ll say hello!

This post brought to you by Writers Cabal, a game writing and design partnership.

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Five for Writing Interview

Short post, short interview up on Richard Dansky’s personal site, Snowbird Gothic.

Each week, he gives five questions to writers of all kinds: game writers, comic book writers, novelists, etc.  This week, it’s me.

Also, if you’d like to vote on Game Design Aspect of the Month’s next topic, please go here.

Posted by Sande for Writers Cabal, a game writing and design partnership.

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Game Console Photo Spread

Think you know game consoles?  Then take a walk down memory lane with Sande’s presentation at the IGDA NYC’s Pecha Kucha night!

For Pecha Kucha night, each slide lasts 20 seconds.  There are 20 slides in all.  Are you ready? Here we go!

Did you manage to guess any names or dates?

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Writing for Video Game Genres book available!

We are very pleased to announce that the third IGDA Writers SIG book is now available for pre-order from the publisher:

Writing for Video Game Genres: From FPS to RPG

http://www.akpeters.com/product.asp?ProdCode=4179

According to the editor, “So far, everyone who has looked at it has been pretty excited about the content. I’m very pleased with how it turned out. We’ve got some really excellent writers just downloading their brains onto paper.  Love it!”

Now, for the fun part.  Can you guess which chapter we wrote?

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The Witcher heads to XBox 360 and PS3

If you haven’t heard the news already, the Witcher is making its way onto consoles!  The Witcher: Rise of the White Wolf will feature a totally new engine, new artwork, and a new interface.  As you can see, it’s not an ordinary port.  It’s a whole new reconstruction of the Witcher for the XBox 360 and the PS3.  The only thing that remains the same is the story.

Electric Playground, a daily video game news show broadcast on G4 Canada, recently interviewed Sande about her experiences working on The Witcher.  You can see the interview here.

For new screenshots, check out the latest CDProjekt interview at IGN and see below for the trailer.

This post brought to you by Writers Cabal, a game writing and design partnership.
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Writers Cabal’s 2008 Year in Review

We had an amazing year in 2008 and we hope you did too!  We started the year out with a Writers Guild nomination for THE WITCHER, spoke at the South by Southwest Interactive Festival and the ION Game Conference, and somehow we managed to continually write and consult on a number of projects, both big and small, including WIZARD 101.  We reconnected with friends during travels and made new friends as well.

Here are some highlights from our year:

1.  Writers Guild nomination

Anne was in L.A. while Sande was in Paris.   Anne generally doesn’t answer the phone when working, so it was a good thing she did on that fateful Friday.  It was the WGA calling to say we had been nominated for the first ever WGA Award in Videogame Writing!  Excitedly, Anne relayed the news to Sande via Skype.

Artur Ganszyniec, Sebastian Stepien, Writers Cabal

We attended both WGA ceremonies in NYC and in L.A.  We spent the NYC ceremony trying to find our Polish co-nominees on THE WITCHER. While they had spoken to Sande on the phone and may have seen her on videocam via Skype, we had nothing to go by.  But as you can see, we did find them.

2.  Travels

It seems like every month, we were traveling.  Ah, the life of the itinerant writer!  While Anne did speak at a Writers Guild Foundation seminar and other events in Los Angeles and Sande spoke at IGDA NYC’s Pecha Kucha night, we were world trekkers this year, making our appearances at game conferences around the U.S. and internationally.

We were in Taiwan for Chinese New Year and then went straight to GDC in S.F. to celebrate our First Anniversary!  SXSW soon followed, where we presented our session, Creating Passionate Games: A Multidisciplinary Approach. While in Austin, Sande attended EIEIO and Anne (lucky her) won a XBox 360 and GUITAR HERO at a SXSW party.  Then it was off to Seattle for the ION Game Conference (now called the LOGIN Conference) for our session, Story vs. Story: Redefining Narrative and Player Engagement in MMOs.  Additionally, Anne attended the San Diego Comic Con.

Sande captured at VGXPO

In September, Anne flew to Finland to present at the first ever Nokia Open Labs Workshop.  That same day, Sande flew to S.F. and ended up stranded there due to Hurricane Ike.  Rather than return to her home in coastal TX, she flew directly to Austin for AGDC, hoping to contact her neighbors in the disaster zone.  Despite a lost cell phone and the lack of electricity, gas, and food at home, Sande pulled through and flew to NY for the NY Games Conference the following week.  Sande rounded out the year by attending VGXPO in Philadelphia.

3.  Publications

In 2008, we contributed the chapter, “Writing in a Team” to the IGDA Writers SIG-produced book, Professional Techniques for Video Game Writing. We also contributed a chapter to the 3rd book, so stay tuned in 2009!

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