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TERA writer discusses the labor of love behind game writing
There's a conception among some gamers that working with video games for a living entails more "video games" than "working." A new development diary by TERA's writing team manager David Noonan is quick to disabuse readers of that notion. He does see the job as a labor of love, but he also freely admits that every day brings the question of how much time will be "love" and how much time will be plain old "labor." Noonan explains the way that he and his team look at bug reports relating to their department. Sometimes, the only thing that needs to be changed is a simple typo; other times, the dialogue of an entire quest chain will need to be rewritten from the start. But that doesn't negate the joy of filling in a story and creating a world, from the major quests down to the item names. If you have an interest in TERA's writing, game writing in general, or both, Noonan has some interesting insights to share. [Thanks to Mike for the tip!]
The Observer watches as novelists and journalists jump to game writing
"Who writes this stuff?" It's something considerate game players and critics often ask aloud -- and they're barely heard over the sound of a laser chainsaw going into some monster's maw. The New York Observer has published an interesting piece on writing in games, with a focus on novelists, screenwriters and journalists that have made the leap to interactive storytelling. Some of these writers seem to have a higher profile than the plots, characters and dialogue they provide. "What I found on the other side was that I'd never really understood how hard it was to get any kind of coherent story into a game, let alone a good one," said Rhianna Pratchett, former journalist and writer behind the Overlord games. Her observation isn't just critical of the quality of games writing, but of how late it finds its place in the development process -- if it's incorporated at all. Extra Lives: Why Video Games Matter author Tom Bissell and his writing partner, Rob Auten, were apparently called in to fix the dialogue for an upcoming franchise reboot at a stage where the game was "largely finished." "I always say that the games industry makes Hollywood look like avant-garde poetry publishers," Bissell said. Games writing pays a lot less than Hollywood, of course, and doesn't offer the same kind of recognition. Marc Laidlaw, novelist and writer at Valve, believes the world of books provides a more apt rival. "I think you learn a lot about writing dialogue and stuff from movies," he said, "but games just compare more closely to novels, I think, because you immerse yourself in them and they take up a big part of your life for a very long time." Valve is anomalous in having in-house writers like Laidlaw, and the studio's games, like Portal and Half-Life 2, are anomalous in being commended not just for dialogue or individual scenes, but for how well their scenarios and characters fit within the unique structure of a game. If writers become part of the collaboration at an earlier stage, we might again ask, "Who writes this stuff? And where can we play more of it?"
The Daily Grind: What is your quest?
One of the things that we can't seem to get away from no matter what MMO we're playing is the presence of Monty Python quotes. A particularly funny exchange combined with the daily news surfing brought the concept of open-source GPL MMOs (like PlaneShift) to mind. These worlds essentially allow talented folk to join the team and make up their own quests using the world that is already established. For today we thought we'd ask -- if you had the knowledge and time, what kind of a quest would you make? Now let's take it a step further and ask about the worlds you play in; if you could write a quest for any MMO, either currently available or in beta, what game would you write it for, and what kind of quest would it be? Would you make up one of the "go collect x items" quests, or would you write in more history, instead sending players all over the place? Would it be really easy, or really hard? Would it be a holiday event or daily quest? Would it involve killer rabbits?
Writer's Guild of America recognizes game writing, announces award
Video game writing is a mixed bag, running the gamut from the thoughtful story and dialogue of Bioshock to "wizard needs food badly." Still, no form of writing should be without its accolades, and it's encouraging to see the Writer's Guild of America finally calling attention to the often-thankless field of writing for video games.The Guild's New Media Caucus has officially announced the Video Game Writing Award, which will first be presented in Los Angeles at the Writer's Guild Awards on February 9, 2008. According to GamesIndustry.biz, the award has been introduced to broaden the Guild's repertoire of acknowledged writing fields, as well as promote awareness of game writing as a craft, and hopefully raise the bar on the quality of game writing as well. No words yet on the nominees, but we can probably make a few guesses.[Via Gay Gamer]
Carnival of Gamers rolls on to Virgin Worlds
Following on from last month's stop at Slashdot, March's Carnival of Gamers brings you a selection of interesting points of view from game bloggers around the Web. From gold farming to EVE Online, with a dash of common sense and fun to go, the Carnival's cross-section of culture never fails to amaze. Bookmark 'em, print 'em out, just make sure they end up on your reading list somewhere.
