Gadgetory

welcome back to the show our guest today is a real-life paid Hollywood writer not just some Rando in a coffee shop working on his magnum opus uh you might know him from such games as ratchet and clank and he's also a creative consultant for Hasbro we are excited to welcome TJ fix men thanks for being here man you have me so good um so okay a lot of people out there first of all love video games many many people love video games uh love rochon clink and you you've written retching Clint games how many of them oh god yeah you know I have to go to IMDB to be sure but i think it's either seven or nine it sits up there it's up there how great is it that ratchet clank is back at the top of the charts again with an amazing installment I mean oh I think people that are playing really good what even alive when's the first one came down I think so I mean I think the first one came out in 2002 so yeah this is and this one is a sort of reimagining of that first game so it's very cool and it's phenomenal I mean I am loving it I just got my job back oh nice did I may get back on gas bar um so I have a film and there's a film yeah great Josh and cleaner are big and back and ready to rock this weekend the movie comes out um but I want to a lot of people really wonder what it takes to be a videogame writer because i think that sort of a job that like has a lot of mystery sorry yeah because at in early days of gaming there was just sort of like well let's just have our producers kind of come up with something we'll have some bear coating our programmers come up with something let's have a sort of basic thing and then you ended up with you know the end of ghosts and goblins where where is this orly you know I got to the end of ghosting that's true nobody ever did that um but and now we are seeing very much so in last you know 10 or 15 years of video games we've seen really screenwriters people who are actually invested in story structure for manual things like that coming into gaming you got into video game writing kind of in a really weird way and it's one of my favorite stories of starting in that industry and I like can you tell our viewers because I think they'll join as much as I did yeah sure I mean I came out to I came out to Los Angeles with a degree in computer animation and hopes of writing and and the the dribble animation was very much my safety fall back because I knew the odds of becoming a working on Plan B are you exactly is that they're astronomical so I ended up out here simultaneously like writing and trying to develop like a 3d animated show by myself one person in the room which is which is well I said it because it's impossible I'm not saying well with me I'm saying it's impossible to do so after like two years I've done almost nothing done and I was um I was working at insomnia games as a QA tester and this was on back in the resistance fall of man days back with a ps3 I'd just come out and my contract was wrapping up I'd sort of finished the game and I was going to leave and I didn't have any job lined up afterwards I had an agent I've been taking meetings I've been trying to get my scripts up but like nothing was hitting so like I was looking at a bank account ID two hundred fifty dollars left in my bank account I had no backup plan I think a lot of people don't realize as a QA tester that in gaming like you don't stay at the company usually when you're done testing that particular game like you're on a contract and when that game is done being tested you are also done yeah it's a contract job you know that going in and so so like it's so like I finished the game and it was very much time to say okay you know so long and thanks for all the fish sure and I'm at and I was I was packing up my desk and I did I was unaware of the time but the writer that was on rachel klein tools destruction at the time for whatever reason it wasn't working out between him and insomniac so they're gonna part ways but he had somehow read some of my scripts and like we've talked to the hospital but I'd show him anything I guess just the script sort of get around in this town Wow and he's like I'm sorry that I didn't work out but actually i read that guy stuff and it's really good you sure like film specs procedure these are gasp excerpts that I'd written and apparently he'd he'd read some woman he recommended me so as I'm packing on my stuff eh our director came out to me and asked if I would come back on Monday an interview for the job as a writer Wow so I spent that entire weekend unemployed you know two inch of those of a bank account like talking to my parents but how I'm going to be able to basically have to move home and figure out my back in New Jersey I couldn't even afford the move so I wasn't sure how is how to get back yeah uh and monday i came and interviewed for it they gave me the job and i think i started like on wednesday so that was that's incredible and you know a working writer ever since yes I'm not say no but yes yes ever since uh yeah and I stayed in something for a good long time I think was like seven or eight years is and then I moved on in 2013 now I've been sort of contract mostly doing a feature work but doing of course the Hasbro stuff as well so what is the difference between writing for interactive entertainment as opposed to writing for films and TV I mean it's it's it's a totally different ball wax it's super interesting i always tell like writers who are coming in like if you ever want to sort of see what you're made of like boot camp is like video game writing is boot camp essentially because imagine hiring everybody at once the director of the actors the production team without a script ready just saying everybody go all right all right I'll catch up exactly so laying down the track space is the train is coming through wow so it teaches you to be agile teaches you not to be too precious which is a big like it's tough for a lot of writers taste the idea that they don't just submit a script and it's just mad you know like sighs I've never finished but I think it's more it's more so video games where nothing like you can write the perfect third act twist it is the example it was usually write the perfect third act twist in the designer can come up to you like but I'm so sorry we just cut that level yeah oh can you just make it work like yeah sure love this right now see no no we don't have any more any more time for scenes just make it work just find some way of sort of tying it together my question to you about that because as a player you you feel that right and I wonder if you feel like games need to get to a place where that is more valued like the narrative experience is more valued and and there's a shift apprised as far as 12 video games are made right to say like this is a great script let's make it into a game like this is a great game script or great you know sort of synopsis or log line for a game like let's make it that I think I think there are I think nowadays there are studios that are getting more and more story conscious like if you look at a rational with like ken Levine oh whatever Bioshock if you look at what Amy honey did with the Uncharted series there are more and more students who are adopting that philosophy yeah but production is always against us like there's always gonna be something this happens if you pursuant to a small degree accept it starts with this is the story that yeah starts with a scrub but like with with video games it's always going to start with the tech so if a video game studio finds that they can do 0g really well well guess what kind of game you're ready you're a space game dad if you have a great zombie game sort of luck that's so interesting to me about it's like well we have this really great we developed this really great technology gee like let's craft a game around it and it's like like I said it's a mechanic something that we've developed and it's like man we have to use this in a game like let's make that work well look so interesting look at portal like like portal is the best example that portal had one mechanic right which is this week and it was an amazing Academy no I try they built this amazing story around it was like all set in one location with like one you know like 110 gigantic yeah and it was amazing so I feel so like you know it sounds when you lay it out doesn't sound like the ideal way to work but it's very much the way that the entire industry operates into a small other great features and you just learned to deal the end and it that's what you need to learn as a writer regardless of about you going to video games we have to learn not to be precious well I like your work with Hasbro is probably from the same vein because you start with a an IP right you start on send and you have to build a world around that exactly that's the thing that I love doing the most like I like when people ask me if I'm a writer I always sort of say yes I read a bit i'm also a world builder because there's something fun about not just building a building I like a three-act story but saying here's how the world works here's how the characters interact with each other that's really really fun so to get to go into Hasbro who has all these amazing IP like transformers and GI Joe and micronauts and like and get to sort of play around with that figure out how it can all connect like that that's that's really cool i feel like i feel kinda like Tom Hanks in Big when I say toys it's gay it's like tie it all together yeah it's cool and you know like they give me lots of toys which is always a plus and you know yeah now you um mr. zircon is I think one of my favorite Oh evil robots know many favor of a lot exact lattice you've got feel like I've really do I love evil robot HK 47 I mean I just really love them in gaming and so mr. zircon also a favorite but it can be really difficult i remember we're talking about this the other day it's really difficult to continue to come up with you one liners oh yeah he has to constantly have these you know quips in the game as you summon him and it's like they have they can't be too repetitive yeah so over the course of however many rich 729 Ratchet and Clank games like how many why isn't mr. zircon would you say you've written easily 500 easily but and probably closer to a thousand under start thinking like what probably what made it into the game right funny thing with like mr. zircon was that like when we first started him he was just like a little bot that would sort of fly around you and he didn't look he didn't look like he did now he looked what we call a consumer by just one of the bots that sort of fly on the levels they did snap with your range and I have to concur editor Brian I'll guide for this was brian l guy my creative director was like you know something like we can give personality to this thing so let's give it a name it's called mr. zircon we're gonna overhaul its looks at what would you do with it and I was like what if he just thought everything was stupid what if he let me talk to the third person and he'd any trash talk but it was just in the most like obvious like sort of chuck norris style yeah yeah t like all mr. Zhou is bored exactly or like mr. Khan doesn't need nanotech to survive because on the fear of others are calm will punch you in the face with bullets like I mean yeah real zinger yeah he will give you a concerto of suffering it's something like that that way you're right it it looks dumb and when you recording like that sounds dumb but let someone when you get in the game you're like that's actually yes worth it works but it's really funny I became like this fan favorite ever since so so I you know I I take it as a source of a great pride that it's become this big you know uh uh weapon in the game that I don't think they would do a wretch like it but that one else kind of the groover try now the people yeah people just expect it this is a CNN with the characters yeah yeah it's personality so you you came into the industry and such a roundabout way what would you say is your advice to people who want to get in starting QA and then just hang around I just secretly drop scripts next to the right exactly and hope there's your bank account yeah yeah well I gave the thing that people do incorrectly is they go to school for I can get like a degree in Game writing and they apply for and they look for game writing jobs game writing jobs really aren't advertised online maybe that will change and like I've seen a couple pop up here and there but really that like they game studiously their hire from within or they'll they'll reach out to people who have representation of an agent or have done a lot of samples but either way the trick is to have lots of samples ready to get a degree or some sort of experience inside a game studio or a computer animation agree let's say or like a design degree because it you know I think one of the reasons why game studios lean in towards producers or people who have game experience or animation experiences because they understand or the other departments to really understand that process yeah and it's a very complicated like process with tons different departments all working you know 60 70 hour weeks to get this gaming so like I think when people just sort of get a degree in writing and just expect to go in there and pitch a game idea all that that doesn't do anything for against you because kids kiddies are not it wants a lot like they've got plenty of their ideas I can find people who can read stuff but what they need is somebody who understands the different departments so if you've got a design degree if you have even an art degree or an animation degree you're gonna be ahead of where just you know I was somebody with a writing background if I if I was had just been a writer didn't have the background in computer animation I don't think I would have gotten a job because while i was doing resistance fall of man they needed somebody who from QA who could handle collision or who could handle over they call navmesh in which is a sort of mapping out where enemies can walk i think they've got programmers that can do this automatically now but back in the day yeah you have somebody yeah sit in an office until I four in the morning actual work yeah so like I think while I was doing that it was sort of proving to the people who I worked with like okay like he's not just a writer but he also understands she gets it yeah he understands what the other departments are up against so you're not just sort of coming down from your ivory tower saying here is my script yeah maybe so I'm also like there's an understanding of like when you're as you're writing you can think of you can keep other departments in consideration where you say like if I'm writing something like how are they ever going to program this like this is not realistic you can actually edit that down in a way that a writer not experienced in the games industry would not be able to do absolutely i've since animation as well because there's there's there's things that like I'm dealing with like on pop by now because I'm going to pop by for certain animation where if you know what's an intensive animation seeing what's not the production team will love you for it like I know that I can't write all crowd scenes because Craig exact specs really tough it's tough it's expensive it's time intensive and epistles animators often they come for you with about the wood pittore that's the one on ones in Popeye exactly that's thing if you could write and just say hey reaction shot well something happens off camera it's like people will see like okay like you understand that they can't just flow from your head and being considerate you're being considered the people you work with in a narrative way which I think a lot of people don't really a lot of people don't grab on to that as much as I think they like you see things or people well why didn't they just write a scene like this like you know you see all these like are you doing yeah it's like to see armchair quarterbacks online they go well they should have written this scene and it's like we have to consider all of the different departments that would have had to have contributed to that scene and how expensive it would have been and you know and is that part of the budget and is it this and it's like there's usually a good reason for why something didn't exist oh yeah I mean look we live with these games for you know anyways between one years and three years so we with every we've had many many meetings about every single possible iteration of a scenic and possibly be sure but you know like I remember seeing one common where someone's like why aren't like you know Ratchanok line sequence is more like a final fantasy I'm like final fantasy will have 500 person team yeah we're like everything that was done that insomniac was done in house which is which is very rare yeah you know I like so it yes like there are certain things who want that we wanted to but it's always about picking your battles and saying okay like what is this story really about is is there something that we're putting in just for the sake of flash or is there something that that we think we're saying really matters yeah yeah awesome i'm excited for a pop-up movie i'll tell you i am tale that's great I mean I haven't seen its ever since the Robin Williams when I've been like one of the again what am I gonna get an animated papa I just wondered um yeah I'm excited about that will uh will wrap things up we'll let you go I'm sure you you are very busy man she on this show for like two months I have so many meetings i'm sorry i'm so busy i can't huh but we're really excited you can check out ratchet clank the movie drops in theaters this weekend which which is cool you wrote the first draft for that and and then also you can of course check out retching click the game which jeff and i have been greatly enjoying is really really fast and if you've never met mr. zircon well just let me tell you for a treat and and then you can follow TJ on twitter by just add to to fix mine at TJ fix minh and thank you so much for coming on the show me for sure we'll be right back with an amazing package about drone racing that producer logan put together so stick around its tomorrow daily