Chris Avellone Gives Advice to Aspiring Narrative Designers

Obsidian’s co-founder and chief creative officer Chris Avellone has penned a blog post focused on giving advice to people who want to enter the game industry in a narrative designer position. Some of it you’ll probably have already heard if you have followed his blog posts or read similar advice from other developers, but it still makes for an interesting read.

– Being published can help your resume, but not necessary. Screenwriting definitely helps, however.

– Having your narrative work used in a mod or indie title is great.

– If you can’t find a narrative design position (and they’re rare), sometimes integrating yourself into a game company can be done through another position (like the ones above), and you can make better contacts that way.

– Always start with companies who make games you’d want to write for, don’t settle. If they turn you down, pay attention to the test critique they gave you (and they should give you one), learn from it, and then tackle the next company on your list.

– In general, most narrative-focused companies have specific tests they send to test applicants, so as a result, your portfolio may not matter to them. Don’t feel that you have to have samples to show first, the proof of your skills will come in how you demonstrate your skills in the test they send. And as no surprise, it’ll likely be focused on one of their franchises, so be sure you’ve played them, know the lore, know the scripting conventions, characters, and more.

– I also believe that the IGDA has a special writer’s group that’s worth joining up with (and they have gatherings at GDC, I believe).

– Lastly, the best way to break in is to actually write for games, even if it’s for free and as a hobby. There are plenty of mods and game editors out there that you should be able to work on or contribute to, and finished mods are something that game companies either look at in terms of resumes or while they’re looking to see what cool things have been done for their games (for example, in Fallout New Vegas, we checked out the cool mods that people had done as inspiration for our DLCs, and they’d made some great stuff).