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This book is a theoretical and practical deep dive into the craft of worldbuilding for video games, with an explicit focus on how different job disciplines contribute to worldbuilding. In addition to providing lenses for recognizing the various components in creating fictional and digital worlds, the author positions worldbuilding as a reciprocal and dynamic process, a process which acknowledges that worldbuilding is both created by and instrumental in the design of narrative, gameplay, art, audio, and more. Collaborative Worldbuilding for Video Games encourages mutual respect and collaboration among teams and provides game writers and narrative designers tools for effectively incorporating other job roles into their own worldbuilding practice and vice versa.
Features:
- Provides in-depth exploration of worldbuilding via respective job disciplines
- Deep dives and case studies into a variety of games, both AAA and indie
- Includes boxed articles for deeper interrogation and exploration of key ideas
- Contains templates and checklists for practical tips on worldbuilding
List of contents
Author. Acknowledgments. Introduction: Being in Awe. Chapter 1 Overview of Worldbuilding. Chapter 2 A Cross-Discipline Breakdown of Worldbuilding. Chapter 3 How to Get Started Creating a World. Chapter 4 Collaboration in Worldbuilding: A Series of Deeper Dives. Chapter 5 Identity, World Systems, and Responsibility. Chapter 6 Conclusion: It's in the Details. INDEX.
About the author
Kaitlin Tremblay (they/she) is a writer and game designer, as well as a former book editor and media critic. For over the past 10 years, Tremblay has worked across the video game industry, including on titles such as Watch Dogs Legion (Ubisoft), Grindstone (Capybara Games), and A Mortician’s Tale (Laundry Bear Games). Tremblay’s personal game development work has focused on making horror games about difficult subject matter, and they are a public speaker and community organiser, serving on the board of advisors for GDC’s Independent Games Summit. Tremblay is also a speculative fiction writer, with a focus on horror, and was the co-editor of the award-nominated anthology Those Who Make Us: Canadian Creature, Myth, and Monster Stories (Exile Editions). They are also the author of the deep dive into the Borderlands franchise and its storytelling, Ain’t No Place for a Hero: Borderlands (ECW Press). Their full work can be found on their website: www.thatmonstergames.com
Summary
Worldbuilding Together is a book focused on providing a deep dive into worldbuilding for video games, but with an explicit focus on how narrative designers can collaborate with other job disciplines in doing so.
Report
"Written in accessible and somewhat self-deprecating language, clearly grounded in theory, and supported by exhaustive citations, this book provides a thoughtful and useful road map for designing worlds in video games."
-- E. Bertozzi, Quinnipiac University
