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Writer's Guild Nominates Game Writing
Ars Technica's Opposable Thumbs blog notes that the Writer's Guild of America stepped back from the picket line long enough to nominate a few 2007 games for great writing. Unfortunately, their nominees suck. The list of nominees consists of: "Crash of the Titans, Written by Christopher Mitchell, Sierra Entertainment. Dead Head Fred, Written by Dave Ellis and Adam Cogan, D3 Publisher. The Simpsons Game, Lead Writer Matt Selman, Written by Tim Long and Matt Warburton, Dialogue by Jeff Poliquin, Electronic Arts. The Witcher, Lead Story Designer Artur Ganszyniec, Dialogue Sebastian Stepien, Additional Dialogue Marcin Blacha, Writers Sande Chen and Anne Toole, Atari. World in Conflict, Story Design Christofer Emgard, Story Consultant Larry Bond, Script Consultant Ed Zuckerman, Sierra Entertainment." No Mass Effect? Nothing at all from the Orange Box? No BioShock? For shame, WGA.
Am I only only one who is shocked to see that two of the nominees aren't movie cash-ins/tie-ins?
I havn't heard of most of them, but World in Conflict had the best plot I've ever seen in an RTS, and possibly one of the best I've seen in a game at all. It's certainly one of the few RTS games I've played where I actually cared about the characters, and felt that I was fighting for a reason beyond "because I am".
The studio execs agreed to nothing. They offered up their own formula for residuals on internet use that the WGA rejected. The AMPTP (studio execs) then left saying that will be their only offer until the other demands are removed.
The AMPTP isn't willing to negotiate anything, they just want to make demands.
That's probably a translation issue - there are a few things that sound out of place in the game - although supposedly Sapkowski's books also use fairly modern language compared to most fantasy, so I'm not sure...
But part of what makes the game good is that it isn't your typical fantasy.