Writing for New IP - Professional Techniques for Video Game Writing - page 146

a game to cover an element of the franchise world that isn't necessarily covered in,
say, an upcoming movie is starting to become quite popular.
Just look at the success Starbreeze had with the The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape
from Butcher Bay ,whichranasaprequelto Pitch Black , which was released alongside
the movie sequel entitled The Chronicles of Riddick . Arguably, the game was much
better received than the movie. Starbreeze also went on to follow this up with an-
other franchise tie-in, The Darkness (originally a comic), which also received the twin
golden kisses of critical and sales success.
14.3 Building Narrative Worlds
The narrative elements of a game have their own pre-production phase, too. This
is unlikely to run alongside the rest of the game's pre-production phase, unless the
studio has a dedicated narrative team as part of their day-to-day staff.
Inthecaseof Heavenly Sword , there was actually a first draft script in place
when I came onboard, which had been written by Tameem Antoniades, the game's
Creative Director. The story, or at least the spine of it, had been conceived before the
gameplay and levels had been completely nailed down, which almost never happens
in the game industry. My role was to help flesh out the world, the characters, their
relationships, backstories, and character arcs through the game, as well as doing a
full, page-one rewrite on the script.
Flesh on the Bones
The important thing to remember when faced with creating a narrative world is that
there are usually a lot of team members who will also need to be involved in this
process; predominately art and design, because narrative world design is rarely just
about the words. Bioshock and Half-Life 2 are great examples of where the story
is told as much through what you see as what you hear, demonstrating one of the
greatest rules of visual narrative: “show don't tell.� Unfortunately, as desirable as that
is, the game industry is in the rather unfortunate position that showing can often
cost just as much as, if not a lot more than, telling!
I've always found it beneficial to flesh out the world as much as possible for my
own benefit as a writer, even if it never gets further than a Word document. In
all likelihood, like the proverbial iceberg, the players will only see the actual tip of
it in the game. Nevertheless, that narrative support structure is vital for a writer.
Not only does working out things like the politics, socioeconomic make-up, power-
structure, industry structure, and world history actually help develop your characters
and support level design and narrative, but it also provides great fodder for expanding
the world further down the line. Story, character, and even gameplay can be far better
supported in a world that feels real, or at the very least coherent, in its structure
If a game has a heavy story element then it may be part of your role to create
a story bible for that world that is easily accessible by all members of the team but
with its content controlled by you. This should contain information on the main