Privateer 2 Script Writer Making Convention Appearances

• LACon IV, the 64th World Science Fiction Convention (Worldcon), Anaheim, CA, USA: 23-27 August 2006.
• CopperCon 26, Tempe, Arizona, USA: September 1-5, 2006: as co-Writer Guest of Honor (with Peter Morwood).
• Fargo Fantasy Festival, Fargo, ND, USA: October 13-15, 2006: as co-Writer Guest of Honor (with Peter Morwood).
• Nippon 2007, the 65th World Science Fiction Convention / 46th Japan Science Fiction Convention, Yokohama, Japan, August 30 - September 3, 2007.

"Emotion" is the key to reaching a wider audience, Roberts believes, and the only way to have people emotionally and interactively involved is to give them characters they care about and some kind of say in what happens to them. That means bringing in experienced writers, directors and actors.

With The Darkening, the basic story and setting were devised by Roberts and his team, and then a script was commissioned from Diane (Duane), a US television writer for such shows as Star Trek: The Next Generation. Roberts then approached Steve Hilliker, a young British director with experience in pop videos and television, to direct the live action sequences. Hilliker was sceptical. "I told them that I didn't know anything about computer games but they loved that because they thought I could bring them something they wouldn't get from within the games world." They sent him (Duane's) monster 500-page script (a normal film script runs to about 120 pages). "When I read it I was totally confused I had never seen a script that had choices before."

He had to read it twice more before he understood that the concept was a variation on the standard alternative endings approach that most interactive narrative projects seem to follow (see Narrative Futures, right). With The Darkening, the viewer decides what Lev Arris does, but there is only one ending to the story. The aim of the game is to reach that conclusion. It takes a long time to reach it because there are dozens of subplots like branches off the main trunk of a tree. These subplots are to do with the strategy element of the game Arris has to earn money to afford to travel and follow up the clues to his identity. Along the way, he has to fight the people out to kill him. In effect, The Darkening is a weird cross-breed between a film, a strategy game and what the games industry calls a "shoot 'em up".