When I first steped into these forums, nay when I first decided to make games, I was furious. I said "Writers are so badly needed by the community, why are they so spurned?!" It really pissed me off. Among other things, I insisted to the GDNet staff that the site needed a writing forum. They rejected it. (but since, of course, they have seen the light. ) If you''re a gamewriter, you''ve already noticed this. There is a HUGE amount of resistance to amatuers. It''s incredibly discouraging. And it gets you to wondering: why''s it gotta be this way? When I first came into the field (admittedly only last year) I was gung ho about gamewriting. Writers should be the MOST IMPORTANT person on the team, I said. Since then, I''ve become my teams supervisor (not writer), and it''s given me some insight into this connundrum. REASONS WHY WRITERS GET REJECTED 1. Everybody and their mother wants to write for video games. It''s easy, it seems like a dream job. You come up with a story for an RPG (for example) and someone else does all the dirty work. I''ll admit it, that''s why I started, and it''s still my goal. But the fact is that the people who ARE doing the dirty work want the privledge of deciding what they''re going to work on. And they''re just more essential to the process than a writer is (let''s face it, plenty of best sellers have been churned out without dedicated writers on the staff...) 2. Writing is impossible to quantify. Nobody wants to take a risk on a newbie writer. they want EXPERIENCE. Assessing the quality of writing is a matter of personal taste, and if you couldn''t tell, most game producers don''t have ANY (myself included). They don''t trust their own opinions, but instead they go for experience. If it''s good enough for someone else it''s good enough for me. 3. Most "gamewriters" aren''t that good. Let''s face it, if you were destined to be a writer, would you really be trying to write video games? Sure, it affords some interesting opportunities as a divergent medium, but let''s face it, most of us are kids who play video games and dream of one day being able to say "that was me." Even professional games have substandard writing sometimes... (evil beware) Gamewriters are notoriously arrogant when it comes to becoming good writers. We have the collective lazyness of a cheap fantasy novelist. No, I''ll pass on reading that book about story structure or good characterization... I''m fine just making it up as I go along. Faced with picking the talented out of a sea of these creeps, it''s no wonder a producer would rather just say "no" to the whole lot and call in someone with some experience. 4.The industry still believes they''re making just games. Games don''t need writers. Games aren''t an artistic medium. Games don''t need to tell stories to sell. This is true for games. Now, (IMO) somewhere along the line we started making something else in addition to games. These games DO need dedicated writers, they ARE an artistic medium, they DO need good stories to sell. But the majority of the industry is too myopic to see past quake (ironically, even quake had a story, kind of...) 5.Writers are notoriously unwilling to work hard. In my never ending quest to boslter Landfish''s ranks as a game devhouse, I come across a lot of "writers" willing to do "high-level work". Meaning, they want to tell someone the story and have them write it. Or, they want to write a story out in prose and have someone convert it for them into something useable for the artists and tech people, voice directors and musical composers. Fat chance. To be fair, these people get the same fate as the artists only willing to do the game''s concept art. Rejection. Writing is hard. Really hard. At the end of a day of writing for money you should be just about ready to pass out. Of course, this is just the tip of the iceberg. But it''s what i''ve learned, as a reformed wannabe writer, and so I thought I''d put it here for the benefit of all who are as idealistic as I was.

quote: Original post by Landfish

REASONS WHY WRITERS GET REJECTED
1. Everybody and their mother wants to write for video games.

Aye. The same is true for designers. Actually, it''s not as bad as everyone and their mother, but it is fairly competitive. However, the good news: Thank god it''s not screenplay writing, or retail fiction... yech! Talk about everybody and their mother!!!!!

quote:
2. Writing is impossible to quantify.

It''s a religion of taste. That''s one of the things I got sick of about content creation in general. If I code an program, mathematics and system resources will tell me how well or poorly I''ve done. But with writing or designing, it''s part art, part random will of the gods. (or should that be )

quote:
Games don''t need to tell stories to sell.

I know this is difficult to accept (for some), but for some games this is true. These games will need someone to write the manual, but the core activity has nothing to do with narrative.

For others, though, skimping on the writing is an invitation to disaster. Companies will realize this when their other forms of leverage (graphical technology, mostly, and, soon, maybe AI) reach a period of stasis. That''s what I believe happened to Half-Life. In order to differentiate, it was necessary to do something beyond new weapons, new gfx, and new monsters.






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Just waiting for the mothership...

Ok, everything you say is true for amateur writers. But, there must be some hard working professional writers out there, because good stories get produced. Somewhere in the production line is a hard-working, diligent writer. Most likely he''s one of the programmers or artists. Maybe even the company owner. Regardless, my point is the same: Just because there are many crappy, lazy, amateur writers out there it does not make the definition of a game writer.

I would never try to get a job as a "game writer" unless I had some brilliant idea that was gauranteed to make tons of money somehow (never happened, but you can always hope). No, the way in is through pure hard work. Be one of the extreme low-level programmers who doesn''t make any decisions and just programs what they are told. Then climb your way up the ladder. Come up with game ideas in your spare time. Fully develop them into working game models. Then show some to your superiors. Gradually (if you''re good) they might recognize the quality of your ideas and use it. Then you''ll have been a game writer. Don''t expect a bag share of the profits or a lot of fame, but at least you''ll know that you came up with the idea.

"When i was a child I caught a fleeting glimpse, out of
the corner of my mind. I turned to look, but it was
gone, I cannot put my finger on it now. The child has
grown, the dream has gone." -Pink Floyd

I have to agree on the aspect of experience. The suits who control the money flow for a certain game project must have their fingers on all the veins of the production. The rely on the managers to do this for them and give them results. Managers hire people who are going to be of service to the team, and they don''t like to take too many risks. Unheard-of writers have nothing but their writing to back them up, so most managers won''t even consider hiring them.

Since hiring a programmer or artist depends on merit and experience, why should hiring a writer be any different? Managers can put out requests for artists who can draw in Medieval style or programmers who can deal with 3D graphics without giving away too many secrets about the hgame they have planned. But asking for a writer who can write, for example, a detailed plot involving 3 different characters classes, lots of magical medieval weapons, elemental magic, religion, and evil dog-like monsters would pretty much (in the manager''s eyes) give up the farm.

Writers who want to work in the game industry should write, and not be lazy. But they think they can get away with writing the least amount possible? Think storyboards, dialogue, scene descriptions, character profiles, allusions/themes and coherency. It''s not about churning out a bunch of crap, it takes time to get a decent script or game plot written out. People who realize this usually discover their work ethic through some other means, as school never really compels students to write freely about a topic they enjoy...that would break the concept of creating mindless followers (joking...) but it still happens. Programmers, artists, managers all develop a work ethic while doing their jobs, so they make themselves better inclined to write fully-developed plots. Writers are created, not born.

anthalaris.8k.com

I think we mostly agree.

Here''s my personnal experience.
I''m ''software engineer''.
I was trying to make a game, I was already an experienced story writer (10 years of weekly RPG in which I created my own world and my stories), and I learn Game Design.
(A game just isn''t a Story.)

I sent my Design to all the french firm I knew and UBISoft replied.
I asked if they were having story writers and they replied they didn''t, they only had Game Designers.

I was very surprised and suddenly understood why all that games sucked. (IMO)
I tried to get a job at UBISoft but failed my 2nd meeting.

I decided to make my game free and to build a team on the internet, but I did not find any coder (I mean good ).
So I learnt 3D basics, DirectX6 and 7, OpenGL...

And I joined other teams as... 3D engine coder...


I realised that I didn''t accept that people took all decision from me, and I wanted some of my ideas in the game.
Learning the team work was interesting.

My Game Design is not terminated at this time, more than a year after it''s initial release (when I sent it to UBISoft...), my game Story is almost completed but as been modified by the GD.
I''ve almost finished planning my 3D engine, know named OctoPort, and I''m working as a 3D coder for teams on the web.

I''m a professionnal web developer, using JAVA everyday, far from the job I dream of...

The point is that in fact we have very little clue of how it works, people in the industry don''t tell newbies/newcomers how it works and why, and Game Designer is the most ''valuable'' status one can have, and so the hardest place to reach.

Publishers don''t know their job at all, they can''t recognise a good game from a bad one.
Developers are reduced to do enhanced games, because publishers can easily see/understand how much it can give them money...

In fact the Game Industry is the harder to get in and the harder to stay in...

/* ... I missed the point */

-* So many things to do, so little time to spend. *-

That is why I think the indi game scene exists. There needs to be a way for these people to vent their frustrations. Hell, if Dwarfsoft gets off the ground in reasonable fasion, I think that most people here would cut the grade. Writers are DEFINITELY needed in the games that I like

-Chris Bennett of Dwarfsoft - Site:"The Philosophers'' Stone of Programming Alchemy" - IOL
The future of RPGs - Thanks to all the goblins over in our little Game Design Corner niche