![]() As designers we can also try to imagine how some of the returning characters might have evolved. ![]() From a character perspective this involves balancing the addition of new mercs with old favorites. With each new installment in the franchise one of the challenges is keeping it feeling fresh. To accomplish this in a strategy game setting was an interesting challenge and in order to make 40 different mercenaries unique we leaned on ethnicities, attitudes, interesting backgrounds, accents and of course good voice acting. Well of course that was one of the main goals of the JA franchise: to create interesting (and hopefully memorable) characters. How do you develop the old mercs further in JA3, and how do you bring new characters like Livewire to life? JA2 offers dozens of mercs who are way more than just characters with certain skills shown in numbers: everyone has a background, strengths and weaknesses, is commenting what’s going on. So perhaps we might reference something that only players familiar with JA2 may pick up on, but do it in a way that still works fine for new players. An analogy might be how Pixar can make very entertaining movies that include humor only adults will understand without diminishing the entertainment value for younger viewers. Well, that task goes beyond just the writing of course, but I think from a writing perspective you want to be able to reward veteran players without confusing new players. As a writer, how do you reconcile these JA rookies and the veterans? The last installment of Jagged 2 is over two decades old, so a big part of today’s strategy gamers didn’t play it, or even don’t know it. Working with the team, I also gave feedback on many things that weren’t writing related, but I think that’s just part of being a game developer. In a nutshell, my job was to make certain that the writing was of the quality that fans of JA would expect. Part of the role was to ensure consistency regarding grammar, culture, etc., but also with the JA franchise in general. This meant reviewing all the writing done by others and of course, producing a lot of new text (which included everything from dialogue to non-spoken text). My role was to help ensure that the writing was high quality, both creatively and technically. Your official title is writer, but what’s your exact part in the team? Recently Ian Currie had a brief interview about Jagged Alliance 3 with the German-speaking outlet and we thought you guys would be very interested in what was asked and more importantly what he said.
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