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When writing for games, I tend to take the approach that allows me to feel the most involved and informed - particularly when it comes to the characters. If given the opportunity to help develop characters or worlds, I love to be a part of the research in particular. I find that it allows for not only new ideas when brainstorming, but also creates a mental (or physical) log of ways to create unique and memorable moments for the player as they come across something perhaps factual or inspired by real locations, events or people. I mostly have world-building experience when it comes to creating a city and building out the locations/NPCs/social system, then expanding out to the rest of the world. However, I also enjoy adding content or side quests that flesh out an existing location or world, and that goes back to my love of lore keeping and research. My strengths in the script and content writing phrase are character voices and aesthetic descriptions of locations and interact-able objects.
My internship at Blindlight in voiceover casting and production taught me a great deal about immersion, dialogue that doesn't grow stale with replays, and character voice. Thanks to my continuing experience with production, through freelance projects and my Producer role on the Toontown Rewritten team, I have become passionate about raising my team's voices, ensuring workflows and sprint schedules are reasonable for our resources, and offering support through feedback and clear meeting notes. While I am driven to aim for high-quality, on-time content, I'm also passionate about keeping up team morale and excitement for the project at hand. |
Toontown Rewritten
Role: Producer
Status: TTR has been running for 10 years as of September! My project has been in the works for about a year, and will hopefully release by end of next year, then continue in post-launch updates.
Context: Toontown Rewritten is the volunteer-led reboot of the original game, Toontown, which was operated by Disney. Our team of over 100 industry professionals all put in unpaid time towards maintaining this family-friendly MMO which has over 2 million users. My project can't be talked about in specifics, but will be a major update to the content of the game. I lead about 20 members of the team from the audio, art, narrative, design, and programming departments, and we are soon to bring on more people to work specifically on our project. Part of my role is to onboard new trials and associate producers, but I also create the task boards, project timeline and tasks on Notion, as well as handling scheduling of meetings, playtesting, and note-taking during the weekly syncs that I run. I also create monthly status updates and progress presentations to show the full team.
Status: TTR has been running for 10 years as of September! My project has been in the works for about a year, and will hopefully release by end of next year, then continue in post-launch updates.
Context: Toontown Rewritten is the volunteer-led reboot of the original game, Toontown, which was operated by Disney. Our team of over 100 industry professionals all put in unpaid time towards maintaining this family-friendly MMO which has over 2 million users. My project can't be talked about in specifics, but will be a major update to the content of the game. I lead about 20 members of the team from the audio, art, narrative, design, and programming departments, and we are soon to bring on more people to work specifically on our project. Part of my role is to onboard new trials and associate producers, but I also create the task boards, project timeline and tasks on Notion, as well as handling scheduling of meetings, playtesting, and note-taking during the weekly syncs that I run. I also create monthly status updates and progress presentations to show the full team.
The Ouroboros Express
Role: Editor for first release; to be Voiceover Producer for forthcoming update. All work done remotely.
Status: Released on itch.io April 2024.
Context: This dating sim style dark fantasy game was developed by Small Loan Studio as part of the NaNoReNo game jam. I was brought on partway through to provide editing services for the writing team. In total, the script was about 54,000 words across the branching choices and various ending options, and our team had 41 members. Our next release is going to be an update including voiceover of all dialogue.
How to Engage: https://smallloanstudio.itch.io/the-ouroboros-express
Status: Released on itch.io April 2024.
Context: This dating sim style dark fantasy game was developed by Small Loan Studio as part of the NaNoReNo game jam. I was brought on partway through to provide editing services for the writing team. In total, the script was about 54,000 words across the branching choices and various ending options, and our team had 41 members. Our next release is going to be an update including voiceover of all dialogue.
How to Engage: https://smallloanstudio.itch.io/the-ouroboros-express
Starfield
Role: Production (Voiceover) Intern at Blindlight in Los Angeles, CA
Status: Released September 6, 2023
Context: My work on Starfield consisted of assisting the Blindlight team with schedule coordination, live voiceover sessions, script formatting and communication with talent and their agent -- all for the purpose of recording thousands of voice lines for hundreds of characters across the Starfield universe. From collecting avails from agents to aligning those avails with our studios', directors', coordinators' and sound engineers' schedules, the work involved a great deal of organization, flexibility and understanding of the clients' needs in terms of budget, schedule and which lines they needed more than others. Prioritizing and finding efficiency are two particular skills I honed while working on this project.
Status: Released September 6, 2023
Context: My work on Starfield consisted of assisting the Blindlight team with schedule coordination, live voiceover sessions, script formatting and communication with talent and their agent -- all for the purpose of recording thousands of voice lines for hundreds of characters across the Starfield universe. From collecting avails from agents to aligning those avails with our studios', directors', coordinators' and sound engineers' schedules, the work involved a great deal of organization, flexibility and understanding of the clients' needs in terms of budget, schedule and which lines they needed more than others. Prioritizing and finding efficiency are two particular skills I honed while working on this project.
The Ashcroft Anthology
My Role: Game Writer, Casting/Voice Director, Producer, Anthology Lore Keeper
Status: In progress
Context: Bitsy integrated with Twine, Psychological Horror
The Story: Ashcroft is the first in a series of games that myself and Nina Martinez intend to turn into a broader anthology. While the anthology will include different genres, engines and styles, the overarching story will be borne out of/inspired by the same initial one:
Lesly, a Dorm Manager at a university in Texas, moves into the newly remodeled all-girls dormitory that was donated decades ago by Eliza Ashcroft. Soon after moving in, Lesly begins to notice strange noises, objects moving - the usual suspects when it comes to a haunted house. However, no one believes her - even when she begins to see flashbacks of Eliza's life as though Lesly herself was there. When the other Resident Assistants and students move in for the fall, the activity in the house only picks up further until Lesly's self-isolation and paranoia reaches an all-time high.
How to Engage: Check out our Twitter @AshcroftGame, or get in touch for samples of the script!
Status: In progress
Context: Bitsy integrated with Twine, Psychological Horror
The Story: Ashcroft is the first in a series of games that myself and Nina Martinez intend to turn into a broader anthology. While the anthology will include different genres, engines and styles, the overarching story will be borne out of/inspired by the same initial one:
Lesly, a Dorm Manager at a university in Texas, moves into the newly remodeled all-girls dormitory that was donated decades ago by Eliza Ashcroft. Soon after moving in, Lesly begins to notice strange noises, objects moving - the usual suspects when it comes to a haunted house. However, no one believes her - even when she begins to see flashbacks of Eliza's life as though Lesly herself was there. When the other Resident Assistants and students move in for the fall, the activity in the house only picks up further until Lesly's self-isolation and paranoia reaches an all-time high.
How to Engage: Check out our Twitter @AshcroftGame, or get in touch for samples of the script!
The Cursed Crowns
Role: Writer/Designer
Status: Posted but going through revisions to add sound/images.
Context: 1st draft was written for The Narrative Department's Game Writing Masterclass. Built in Twine and posted to itch.io.
The Story: Inspired by an assignment prompt requiring us to create a Twine retelling of a fairytale. I chose The Seven Ravens, a lesser-known Grimm Brothers tale that had some strange plot twists that needed revisions. In the original tale, seven brothers were sent to retrieve water for their sister's baptism as she was due to be born that evening. They did not return in time, so the King went outside and asked that they be cursed and turned into Ravens. When the Princess is old enough, she goes searching for her brothers and speaks to celestial figures to gain their assistance. In the end, she has to cut off her finger to use as a key that frees them from a glass mountain where they've been trapped ever since.
In my Twine adaptation, many elements are the same - the King doesn't specifically request Ravens, however, and the events are less gruesome in the "lost digits" department. Key gameplay mechanics include inventory-based choice options, utilizing player character status to gain preferable outcomes from the celestial entities, and options in combat scenarios that can end in the player character losing their life. Oh, and there is not a glass mountain (because obviously someone would've noticed that by now). There are 5 different endings to the branching story options, and 5 inventory items that can be collected in several different combinations. The story focuses on not only player choice and an economy system that rewards thoughtful choices, but also on family dynamics and whether forgiveness is an easy thing to achieve.
How to Engage: Check out the game here: https://lindsayhwrites.itch.io/the-cursed-crowns
Status: Posted but going through revisions to add sound/images.
Context: 1st draft was written for The Narrative Department's Game Writing Masterclass. Built in Twine and posted to itch.io.
The Story: Inspired by an assignment prompt requiring us to create a Twine retelling of a fairytale. I chose The Seven Ravens, a lesser-known Grimm Brothers tale that had some strange plot twists that needed revisions. In the original tale, seven brothers were sent to retrieve water for their sister's baptism as she was due to be born that evening. They did not return in time, so the King went outside and asked that they be cursed and turned into Ravens. When the Princess is old enough, she goes searching for her brothers and speaks to celestial figures to gain their assistance. In the end, she has to cut off her finger to use as a key that frees them from a glass mountain where they've been trapped ever since.
In my Twine adaptation, many elements are the same - the King doesn't specifically request Ravens, however, and the events are less gruesome in the "lost digits" department. Key gameplay mechanics include inventory-based choice options, utilizing player character status to gain preferable outcomes from the celestial entities, and options in combat scenarios that can end in the player character losing their life. Oh, and there is not a glass mountain (because obviously someone would've noticed that by now). There are 5 different endings to the branching story options, and 5 inventory items that can be collected in several different combinations. The story focuses on not only player choice and an economy system that rewards thoughtful choices, but also on family dynamics and whether forgiveness is an easy thing to achieve.
How to Engage: Check out the game here: https://lindsayhwrites.itch.io/the-cursed-crowns
Call of Dragons
Role: Voiceover Casting & Production Intern at Blindlight in Los Angeles, CA
Status: Shipped March 20, 2023
Context: Mobile app, RTS based around hero collection and resource management
My work on the casting side involved receiving and processing audition files, assisting the Creative Director and Assistant Creative Director in pulling selects for the client, and tracking offers made to the chosen talent.
In the production phase, I communicated with agents to check talent availability, to hold and book them, and to send out scripts and call sheets. I also shadowed voice directors Maddie Stratton and Mose Coote in sessions with A-list voice talent. In those sessions, I acted as an assistant to the coordinator and tracked takes, selects and alts. I was even able to assist with localization (as the project was translated from French to English and required some adjustments mid-session or while formatting the voiceover scripts) to ensure the voiceover quality and comprehension was up to the clients' standards.
My Takeaways: From this internship, I gained new insight into dialogue in particular. Although I've worked with dialogue a lot in both prose and screenwriting, hearing hundreds of auditions for the same block of dialogue made it so much more clear how engaging each line has to be in order to hold a player's attention. Should they be stuck on a particular level, they may listen to that line dozens of times. Or if they're more interested in gameplay, perhaps they don't care about the narrative as much - so if it's key to their ability to follow along and be immersed, only the most engaging version of a line can be selected. The same goes for the casting choice made for voiceover.
Status: Shipped March 20, 2023
Context: Mobile app, RTS based around hero collection and resource management
My work on the casting side involved receiving and processing audition files, assisting the Creative Director and Assistant Creative Director in pulling selects for the client, and tracking offers made to the chosen talent.
In the production phase, I communicated with agents to check talent availability, to hold and book them, and to send out scripts and call sheets. I also shadowed voice directors Maddie Stratton and Mose Coote in sessions with A-list voice talent. In those sessions, I acted as an assistant to the coordinator and tracked takes, selects and alts. I was even able to assist with localization (as the project was translated from French to English and required some adjustments mid-session or while formatting the voiceover scripts) to ensure the voiceover quality and comprehension was up to the clients' standards.
My Takeaways: From this internship, I gained new insight into dialogue in particular. Although I've worked with dialogue a lot in both prose and screenwriting, hearing hundreds of auditions for the same block of dialogue made it so much more clear how engaging each line has to be in order to hold a player's attention. Should they be stuck on a particular level, they may listen to that line dozens of times. Or if they're more interested in gameplay, perhaps they don't care about the narrative as much - so if it's key to their ability to follow along and be immersed, only the most engaging version of a line can be selected. The same goes for the casting choice made for voiceover.
Sample Barks
Context: These were written as part of The Narrative Department's Game Writing Masterclass, in the final week. The first set of prompts were provided by Susan O'Connor, and the others were self-generated.
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Bonus Sample!
Context: This one I'm adding in for fun, should someone have the time to give it a read. The Narrative Department had another assignment I loved, which required us to choose three characters and write a 3-5pg. cutscene with the prompt: "The characters get stuck in an elevator." With the knowledge that, in this case, they exist in the same world.
I chose Dusa from Hades, Sam from Until Dawn, and Vincent from Stardew Valley. This trio made sense to me because when I thought of elevator, I wanted a different kind - I chose a mine shaft lift instead. So my immediate thought was Sam with the Until Dawn mines; then Dusa, who also had powers to potential fight monsters if she lived in Sam's world. There was also something interesting to me about Dusa taking an elevator down into a frightening place, as she's of course from Hades' household. And then I wanted a figure they would need to protect, who could throw extra chaos into the scene, so Vincent (little troublemaker that he is) seemed perfect due to his repeated desire in the game to be more like his older sibling. I saw him as someone who would try to help even when uninvited.
I chose Dusa from Hades, Sam from Until Dawn, and Vincent from Stardew Valley. This trio made sense to me because when I thought of elevator, I wanted a different kind - I chose a mine shaft lift instead. So my immediate thought was Sam with the Until Dawn mines; then Dusa, who also had powers to potential fight monsters if she lived in Sam's world. There was also something interesting to me about Dusa taking an elevator down into a frightening place, as she's of course from Hades' household. And then I wanted a figure they would need to protect, who could throw extra chaos into the scene, so Vincent (little troublemaker that he is) seemed perfect due to his repeated desire in the game to be more like his older sibling. I saw him as someone who would try to help even when uninvited.
