A Clarifying Visitation
👋🏻
We have an outline. ✨ Oooohhh ahhhhhh. ✨ Be excited!
Earlier this week I sat down with all the research and thoughts I did three months ago and reacquainted myself. Sort of like how Stephen King tucks a manuscript away for six weeks when the first go is done.
Rereading all my work reminded me why I was excited about this idea in the first place. It was invigorating. It also (re)prompted me to zero in on the question of what this essay is really about. The scope of a topic like breaking the fourth wall can...quickly...get out of hand. In my time away, my imagination let that scope swell. Coming back has let me lock in.
I am taking cues from the film essayist realm of channels like Every Frame a Painting and CinemaStix (whom I just had on the podcast and will definitely be cribbing more inspiration from his workflow soon 👀).
I want to focus on both an aspect of design (in this case breaking the fourth wall in games) and why it worked so well in a specific example (in this case, the end of Astro Bot). Those decisions gave me immediate clarity and I whipped up a solid outline in no time.
I don't think I will share the outline itself here, but I do have a solid list of B- and G-Roll to get. All I need to do now is write the script, which I think can happen in a week. Maybe that's too ambitious, but this one should be a 10-13 minute video, not a monster edit. Is even saying total wrap by end of June too ambitious? I'm not sure, but let's just speculate that here for now.
Until next time...
This letter is one block from the newsletter Memory Card by Max Roberts. Thoughts? Send me an email at max@maxfrequency.net.
Max is the writer and producer behind Max Frequency. cultivate and curate curiosity—both for himself and for others—by delighting in the details and growing greatness from small beginnings.
He's written a rich history and dive on the making of Naughty Dog's The Last of Us Part II, celebrated the 15th anniversary of Super Smash Bros. Brawl with the voice behind its hype, and examined how Zelda "stole" Fortnite's best mechanic.
Memory Card is a real-ish time, raw, drip feed newsletter of his creative process for telling these stories. It’s how The Thing™ gets made.
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