My Game Writing Deal

Late last year I blogged about the possibilities of writing fiction for computer games. My point was that, rather than fretting about competing attractions like games, we should embrace them and see them as an opportunity. Andy Yates then wrote a great guest post about interactive fiction.


As a lover of games as well as fiction, this all intrigued me very much. Which is why I'm delighted to announce that I've come to a deal with top indie game house Rusty Axe to write the text for an Elmore Leonardesque adventure game, along with an accompanying novella based on the same characters and events. Exciting stuff! The game/story is currently titled Hurricane Bob.

We're still at the stage of brainstorming ideas and plot-arcs, but once we're there and all parties are happy, we'll sign contracts and the writing can begin in earnest. This promises to be a lot of fun. On the one hand there's going to be all the conventional writerly stuff of character development, dialogue etc. On the other there are the more technical demands of creating a believable game-flow that allows the reader/player control over events. Hopefully my years as a software developer will be of use as well as my writing skills.

It's going to be an interesting process, not least because I won't have complete control over what happens. This is a collaboration between myself, a software developer, an artist and perhaps a musician. So a bit of an experiment. 

I'll keep you all posted on progress. When it's done the game and novella should be available on a wide variety of platforms : PC, Apple iDevices, Androids etc. etc.

Exciting times we live in!