Freelance Video Game Writing by Finley Toiya Kristen;

Author:Finley, Toiya Kristen;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Group
Published: 2022-03-08T00:00:00+00:00

Nonmod Projects

You can work on nonmod projects, but you should keep the same expectations in mind. Everyone you work with needs to understand how much more difficult it will be to develop a game when no one is getting paid, and they will have to find the time and energy to invest in it when they’re not working their day jobs.

Get Gigs in Adjacent Industries

Sometimes, I think people get the perspective that if they’re trying to be a part of the game industry, they can’t do anything else. If they take a job outside of games after trying to find an elusive game gig, they’ve somehow failed. For me, this is the wrong way to look at things. Any type of writing job—in any industry—is going to make you a better writer. The same is true for any editing job and your growth as an editor. In addition, that job outside of games still grows the skills you’ll need for games, and it adds to your work history. This is impressive experience to have. Plus, it keeps you paid.

Get work where you can find it.

The oldest client I have is a university. I copyedit their online courses. I can definitely say that it’s sharpened my editing skills. In the past few years, I’ve gotten both copyediting and developmental editing work on game projects. My work with this university client, for as long as I’ve been with them, has proved my expertise as an editor.

Interview with Lisa Hunter

Lisa Hunter is a Narrative Director for Compulsion Games, an Xbox first-party studio. Before joining Compulsion in 2016, she was a screenwriter for film and television, with nearly 100 produced credits. She cocreated Cirque du Soleil’s TV series Big Top Academy and was head writer on the International Emmy-nominated kids’ series Look Kool. She has a B.A. in writing from Barnard College.

What led you to pursue freelancing, instead of employment?

When I lived in New York, I always had full-time jobs just to have health insurance. When I moved to Montreal (to be with my partner), I suddenly didn’t need a full-time job to have that security net anymore because of Canada’s social safety net. The freedom to become a freelancer was scary but also exciting.

Did you get your start in games, TV, or film? What led to a desire to work in the other two?

I started in television, but was simultaneously working on film projects, too. That’s normal in Canada—people go back and forth here. In the States, you used to be categorized as one type of writer or the other (though that’s changing now, too, with the ubiquity of streaming services). I like working in both TV and film, depending on whether I want to write a fictional world for multiple episodes, or whether I want to tell the single most important story in a character’s life (which is what film tends to be). Games are a weird hybrid—for a big AAA game, you have reams of content like TV, but the overarching story is often a film-like hero’s journey.

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