In the serious game discussion side of the web, there has been a bit of a bruhaha over an editorial saying that game developer do not need writers. As one would expect there has been a shit ton of responses.
Rightfully so, because the author of the piece shows a complete lack of understanding of just what is writing. He says that a writer works in a straight line from a to b and that (somehow) makes him less abled than a designer.
Which is completely laughable. Writers work out of order all the time. Neil Gaiman talks about going back in his books once they are in the editing process and adding whole new chapters. I will write chapters out of order if I am currently experiencing a block to help get back into writing. And this is just talking about prose. I’ve never worked on a game, but I would assume it is the same way. Having to write a whole new set of scenes because the head designer decided he wanted to add this spunky girl character after you’ve just gotten near the final version of the script.
To be honest, writing for video games requires a very different skillset from prose writing that requires a different skill set from comic writing which is different from tv screenplays which is different from screenplays.
I will admit that writing is not the most important part of a game. That is obviously gameplay. But a good writer can elevate any game to a higher plateau. Even a sandbox game.
Where do you think all of those immersion elements come from? Most of them were the idea of some writer.
