The Writer’s Guild of America is a somewhat elusive entity to those unfamiliar with the entertainment industry, although you may recall the 2007-2008 WGA-lead writers’ strike that left us watching terrible movies and TV for two or so years after. (Remember Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen?)
But for four years now, the influential WGA has honored writing not just for film and television but also for videogames. The nominees for this year include a large and strange array of projects:
Assassin’s Creed: Revelations, Story by Alexandre Amancio, Jean Guesdon, Corey May, Darby McDevitt; Multiplayer Story by Stéphane Blais, Richard Farrese, Jeffrey Yohalem; Lead Script Writer Darby McDevitt; Script Writers Richard Farrese, Nicholas Grimwood, Corey May, Jeffrey Yohalem; Greek and Turkish Ambient Dialogue Writer Vincenzo Beretta; Ubisoft
Batman: Arkham City, Lead Narrative Designer Paul Crocker; Story Written by Paul Dini, Paul Crocker andSefton Hill; Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment
Brink, Lead Writer Edward “Bongoboy” Stern; Bethesda Softworks
Mortal Kombat, Story by John Vogel, Brian Chard, Dominic Cianciolo, Alexander Barrentine, Jon Greenberg; Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment
Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception, Written by Amy Hennig; Sony Computer Entertainment
While the results seem pretty good, the bigger deal is that this corner of the industry is giving due recognition to games. Hopefully this will draw quality film and television writers into the gaming world.
– Lyndsey Edelman