Jess goes to GDC, gathers her people, and hits the books
Finishing a big project, award nominations, a return to GDC, and my group for game editors starting to look real.
Hello!
I said I might only eke out a couple of these updates a year, and here I am back already with hardly two months elapsed.
But a lot has been happening since I last wrote, including finishing a big project, some more award nominations, a return to GDC after five years, and my new group for game editors rapidly starting to look like a real thing.
(This is Jess Verbs Nouns, the new vehicle for occasional updates about my work, life, and play. You can subscribe, unsubscribe from emails, follow via RSS, or view the archive.)
Lately I’ve been…
Gathering laurels
Following on our Adventure Game of the Year win for Best Visual Art and Animation and IndieCade nominations earlier this year, Rosewater has been further honored with nominations for Best Acting and Best Traditional Adventure in the first-ever Adventure Game Hotshot awards.
And Foolish Mortals, for which Francisco and I produced the voiceover, picked up nominations in almost every category, including for Best Acting alongside Rosewater.
Results announced on March 6!
On which note…
Wrapping up Titanium Court
Last time, I alluded to an exciting unannounced game I was having a blast editing but couldn’t talk much about. The next day, the game became un-unannounced when it received four IGF nominations (for Excellence in Design, Excellence in Narrative, the Nuovo Award, and the Seumas McNally Grand Prize) and some buzz from amped jury members busting to sing its praises.
That game is AP Thomson’s Titanium Court, which he describes as a “surreal strategy game for clowns and criminals.” I’ll call it the “best match-three game that let me live out my dreams of being a faerie queen and forever changed the way I think about NPC dialogue.” Also genuinely one of the most pleasurable projects I’ve done.
Everything that made this game award-worthy happened well before I came on the scene, but it was a delight to help put the finishing touches on the snappy (and surprisingly voluminous) script.
And though it’s essentially a solo project, AP has very graciously let me ride the resulting wave by extending me a complimentary festival pass as part of his team contingent—which means I’ll be attending GDC for the first time since the pandemic.
On which note…
Going to GDC
It’s next week, ahh!
If you’ve got tips or leads for people I should meet (including yourself!), places I should go, or things I should do/see while I’m there, send ’em my way.
My mission is manifold:
Reconnect with friends I can’t easily see in NYC.
Catch as many sessions as I can about editing, narrative, and voiceover.
Find out if all the narrative folks still hang out at the Golden Gate Taproom in the evenings.
Go to some cool parties without stress about going to all the cool parties.
Absorb the vibe and take stock of this whole new “Festival of Gaming” format.
Try not to get too depressed about the state of San Francisco or the game industry.
Meet prospective clients—especially publishers—and get leads for editing and voiceover projects.
Gather likeminded folks and spread the word about my new networking group for game editors.
On which note…
Getting the Game Editorial Network off the ground
Things are moving fast! We now have a name (the Game Editorial Network, or GEN), a domain, and a placeholder website at gameeditorial.net with an interest form you can fill out to get in the loop.
We’ve also got a live event for an in-person meetup at GDC on Monday!
All spots are currently full, but there’s a waitlist you can join—and if the demand is there, we might look at ways to accommodate a larger crowd.
It’s been exciting to see the interest in starting a group like this that puts game editors at the forefront. We don’t know yet quite what form it’ll take or what platform(s) we’ll use–those are things we can decide together. For now, it’s been great hearing from folks working in this field and seeing that the need is there. Can’t wait to sit down face-to-face with a few of them in just under a week from now!
Other doings…
Trying to find a home for a proposed discussion panel of all-star game editors that wasn’t a fit for NarraScope, which I belatedly realize doesn’t really do panels. But I’m excited about this lineup, so I’m exploring options to make it happen elsewhere. Another conference? Online? Podcast? Self-hosted event?
Been taking myself back to school and using my free time the past couple months to load up on workshops, book clubs, and courses: game writing and narrative workshops from Nouveau Narrative and Trope Informed; NYU faculty exchanges and workshops on teaching writing; our long-running regular Discord Literature Club (reading: The Thorn Birds); the New York Tea Society gongfu book club (read: For All The Tea in China); and an inspiring six-week deep-dive course on Moby-Dick from Weirdosphere that just wrapped yesterday. Phew! Now I’m enviously eyeing their upcoming course on music and Tarot…
Hosting the March NYC Indie Games Social, which is in two days! Miraculously, there are still a few spots left.
Robbing a bank with my gang of shotgun grannies tonight. (In GTA, as our Discord group chat title clarifies, for any government spies keeping tabs.)
Ok, that’s enough for now. Got lots to do to get ready for my upcoming trip/social/heist. Thanks for reading, until next time!
Cheers,
Jess
Personal site: https://jesshaskins.com
The Game Editors: https://thegameeditors.com
NYC Indie Games Social: https://jesshaskins.com/nycindiegames
Game Editorial Network: https://gameeditorial.net
Buy me a tea: PayPal, Venmo