A reflection from Studio Lead and CEO Hannah Nicklin on moving Die Gute Fabrik to a 4-day week.

In Q1 of 2020 I moved Die Gute Fabrik to a 4-day week. I came on board as CEO and Studio Lead over a number of months in early 2019, and at that time I had to pick up a lot of moving parts to ship Mutazione, so it was a time for learning rather than change. But moving to our next project gave me a unique opportunity to re-think how we work, and to take care to carefully plan and revise our processes so they were more humane, more accessible, and more welcoming to marginalised folks. Part of that included introducing a 4-day week.

This is not an article advocating for a 4-day week's benefits - rather explaining how we did it. There are many articles and experiments with much larger sample sizes and more robust methodologies which you can turn to for that*. And our specific form as a studio with only the board + me as the MVP (minimum viable) team between projects meant that actually a new project means a new constellation of collaborators - so comparing before and after isn't something we could do rigorously anyway.

* Try this experiment using 1% of Iceland's workforce, or this report which shows that it can also reduce environmental impact. There's also NZ firm Perpetual Guardians collaboration with academics to evaluate their turn to a 4-day week here - this is the most recent large scale study, I believe.

I'm writing this article, instead, because I was really surprised to read someone on Twitter post the question 'but how did you do it?' - it never occurred to me that it required anything but just a little re-inventive thinking. But then I come from a process-driven art background, where at the beginning of every project you ask the question 'what's the best way to make this thing'. Moving to a 4-day week was just a question of 'how do we re-shape the company and practices to support this?' But there are some questions it turns out, and because I do think that it's been excellent for us, I want to share what our answers were to these questions. They're not even all the best answers, I'm sure! But maybe - for those of you in a small-scale company - they will help.

The Vital Statistics

One of the reasons I don’t think you can use us for a case study of happiness or productivity is because as said above, we don’t have a ‘before’ comparison. As well as being a new project with a new constellation of collaborators, our move to a 4-day week after a couple of months suddenly also coincided with COVID, and a planned (pre-COVID) transition to a full-remote workplace (I wanted more flexibility to hire diverse global talent, and I don't think mixed-remote/local workplaces work). So for you to draw the most useful conclusions from how my thoughts relate to your workplace, I thought it would be useful to lay out the material conditions for our team.

• Co-owned by a board of 3 directors, the original founders, only one of whom works day to day.
• I'm the Studio Lead & CEO and only other base-level staff member.
• At the time we made this transition we had 2 full time (me and co-owner) and 1 part time employee. And no contractors.
• I can't be super explicit about our funding past or present because of NDAs, which is a shame because it's obviously relevant. What I can say is that we're funded on a project-basis so the company shrinks and grows per project. When I started the move to a 4-day week we were 'in between' projects, and our new project wasn't funded. We secured external funding for a prototype during this time. We also have members of the board work 'in kind' as owner investment which supplements our work.
• Our funding right now is private - not public - money. But we have also run R&D and various other parts of past projects on public money. That's both a luxury of a good public funding sector, but also our being able to parlay public investment into private investment (then you pay them taxes and they're happy) puts us in the advantageous position of not having to adhere to any limits connected to public money - for example arts and film public funding in Denmark and the UK both limit the amount you can pay people you work with to some idea of 'decorum' around the spending of public money.  I'm not going to get too far into funding here because that's not what it's about, you just need to understand that it's all very complicated - working across so many different economies of scale and borders and sources of money. And our situation right now is that we work on project-based private funding.
• To be explicit: project-based funding and in-between project transition is important and relevant because it allowed me to write a new project budget featuring the changes I've made - from the flat rate, to scoping work for a 4-day week. Every project I get a 'do-over' to better think through and build evidence for running the company better, so I can make that argument for the budget to a funder. Not all industries are like that!
• Because we work fully remotely many of our collaborators are contractors (as employment across borders is beyond the resources of our small org.)
• We transitioned in between projects so were able to scope and build the new project structure and personnel plans around a 4-day week.
• This means we hire people to a 4-day week.
• The company is now approx 15-20 people, depending how and when in this project you count.
• We make video games - cross border online comms is pretty common, as are staggered comms over timezones. We have some external comms with funders, platforms, and consultants, and sometimes I teach and mentor - but pretty much on a regular basis I am the only person daily in contact with folks outside the company.

In order to understand what people might want to know about how we did it, I posed the question on Twitter, so bear that in mind when it comes to the kinds of questions I'm answering.

Okay, let's get to it.

Why did you do it?

Honestly, many people talk about the production benefits - happier and more balanced workers who (it's proven) are as productive as over a 5 day week, but with more goodwill and wellbeing, etc. But I just personally believe in radical workplace reform. Die Gute Fabrik right now doesn't have much room with regards to some radical practices in decision making (although in that case KO_OP are a great example to look to), but where I can, I've tried to make our workplace more humane, and the time our workers spend labouring for others better organised.  Not because it makes the work better, but as it doesn't make it worse, and it does make our lives better, it's kind of a no-brainer to me.

This wasn't the only change I made - I also introduced a 'flat rate' - everyone in the company is paid the same (including me - and featuring some maths to turn it from employee wage in Denmark to contractor wage for outside of Denmark), 1 flat rate for your first year with us, and then a step up to a slightly higher rate after a year, to encourage people to grow with us. It's rare a project will last longer than 3 years or so, so I'll revisit those rates again next project. I also wrote a handbook with a bunch of revised cultural stuff & values which is agreed to as part of signing a contract with us, and introduced some trainee and entry level positions to the project plan.

And finally I introduced a 'Success Pool' (a more egalitarian form of profit share, where anyone working on the game for 6 months or more (if you work part time that still counts - and we use that month number as it's the Danish trial period length) is entered into a pool for an equal share of 20% of the game's profits) - the equal share is important to me as a writer, who has rarely ever even been offered rev shares, coming in later, or not being even considered a 'real' dev. No one takes a hit on their immediate rates as an 'advance' on those monies either.

All of which is to say - this is the best way I could see to run a company in humane a way as possible in alignment with my beliefs around labour. And it's not the only gesture I'm doing towards this.

How did you handle the transition?

We did the transition with a new project - starting from a skeleton crew of 2.5, so we didn’t have to deal with a transition for most people, this was super convenient because we then (as I touch on above) could plan our collaboration, process, and workflows together as we developed them. We wrapped our previous project, and then as we scaled down, we made the transition, and then as we scaled up again, we hired people to the 4-day week.

If I were transitioning with a full team, I might want to start with one Friday off a month, then every other Friday off, and build up to the full-whack, so everyone can acclimatise to what changes to mind-sets, workflows, and scoping were necessary.

Did you consult your team?

As I mention above, the team at the moment of transition was very small, I chatted with everyone and did float other options - a research day every week, but every time I said that, it really didn't sit well with me, because to me 'research' can be a long walk, or doing the laundry - it's the stuff I do so that at other times I can sit down and concentrate.

Did you consider shorter days instead - 5*6h?

Part of my handbook rewrite was a clear statement that we don't expect a full work day to always be 8 hours including lunch. When creative coding, writing, thinking, working, doing a string of video meetings - sometimes 5 or 6 hours is the limit of your tolerance. So technically we do 4 * 6-8h. Contractors bill by half or quarter days but I don't make anyone keep time. And anyway in Denmark it's very common for people with kids to work 9-3:30 until school pick up. Sure for people already on strict 5*8, a 5*6 week could be a big improvement, but we already had that. And still maintain that a 6 hour day is okay. But a shorter day is a vastly different thing to a not work day to me personally, and that's the model I wanted us to work to. I've heard some people describe a 4-day week as 4*10h days and really, no, you're not doing that right.

How do you square it with a country set to a 5 day week?

We do have to do some things to communicate to the Danish government about our employees to make sure everyone receives the correct benefits and status to the state. For us 'full time' is 4-days per week, but for the filing of 'full time' in systems built for a 5-day week, we effectively pay everyone on the team to spend Fridays in concentrating on their wellbeing. This means their benefits and holiday time isn't treated oddly.

Did you change holiday?

The holiday you accrue as an employee (contractors can't accrue holiday across borders, and so their fee accounts for that using some clever maths) isn't changed. That means the 5 weeks paid holiday mandated by the Danish state actually just goes further - 25 days now covers just over 6 weeks, rather than 5. That seemed fair to me, and also saves a complicated argument with the state (I didn't know about the second half of that until about a year in, so I'm doubly glad I made this decision).

Why don't you let people pick their day off?

Our weekends are Friday - Sunday inclusive. Friday is not a work day for Die Gute Fabrik. Contractors can't work on Friday. We also have a 1:1 time off in lieu system so if for example I have to work a 5 day week in the run up to an external milestone, I can take that day 'back' by taking it off the next week. Which is a kind of psychological protective of that Friday.

We did briefly try letting people pick a day - but even on a tiny team it was the one thing we found very very quickly did not work. The second someone is working on a day it creates work for others. If you ask people not to communicate, it then creates a comms vacuum which is an issue moving forwards. I was asked on Twitter 'why not a midweek break' and honestly - maybe that would work for a different company who took a vote from their workers, or worked with a union rep on how to implement a 4-day week, but at this point, I'm in charge and I prefer to give more decompression time, than an 'interrupted' time. In the end, this formulation was my choice.

Although I suspect with a much larger team, perhaps whole teams could work in a staggered way - meaning that external partners are met on all days, and half of the teams work Mon-Thurs, and the other half Tues-Fri. But that wasn't something we needed to tackle. And I suspect you'd still have the comms problems.

How does it impact contractors?

Contractors can't work on Fridays if working with us, but also we adjusted their day rate to account for a 4-day week so they're also encouraged to not work on that day - their rate is the employee rate + holiday pay / worked days in a year on the basis of a 4-day week.

Do you pay the same?

This question astonished me! If you pay less for a 4-day week, you're not running a 4-day week, you're making everyone go part time. Yes we pay the same. Although technically we pay differently since I implemented the flat rate at the same time as the 4-day week - but no one took a pay cut in either process.

We also have some contractors and employees (about half) who work 2 or 3 day weeks, and are therefore 0.5/0.75 employees, or bill us for 2/3 days (if contractors), but on the same basis of a 4-day week calculation.

Don't some external people want to have meetings on Fridays?

Because of the kind of work we do, pretty much I am the only person regularly receiving emails and doing meetings with external folks. Our Creative Producer does some emails around recruitment, but I'm the only one daily meeting outside the company. Here's what I do:

• Don't arrange meetings on Fridays (it's fairly simple for us, when arranging meetings we don't offer Fridays, and it's rare anyone gives me only one day if they're arranging one)
• Have the fact the studio is 4 days a week in your email signature. Anyone corresponding with you will have a reminder that if emailing you on a Friday you won't respond to Monday.
• Be clear with partners and regular contacts that Friday isn't a work day (this is another way having a fixed rather than floating 3rd weekend day is important)
• Yes I do deal with emergencies, but as CEO/Studio Lead I consider that 'on call' a factor of the responsibilities of the job. Eventually I will vest in (when I can afford to) and that's the value of the 'above and beyond' I do sometimes do, as far as I'm concerned.
• In the extraordinary case Friday meetings are necessary, the 1:1 TOIL system accounts for it, you work an hour fewer the next week (or however long). I think the rest of the team have maybe in the past year had 3-4 Friday things? I've probably had about that myself.
• If you have deadlines which are 'End of Week' for external partners - deliver it on Thursday. If you wouldn't plan to deliver on a Saturday, don't plan for a Friday. No one ever minds getting a delivery a day early in their book, and for you - 'on time' is Thursday. That's it.

What about 'on call' people - community managers, bug fixes?

I read a well-meaning tweet a few months ago which said something along the lines of 'you might think you have a nice office that runs on a 4-day week but I promise that your community manager is working 24/7'. I get it, but I also think that it suffers from a lack of imagination (or the company it's subtweeting do). There are two concerns here: 24/7 parts of a development or production process for 'regular' workers, and 24/7 parts of the same for people like me who (will soon be) vested in and therefore receive greater value than an 'average' worker. For the latter - I consider monitoring our social media, some long weeks, etc., labour I do in exchange for the opportunity to vest. I'm building the company and that's separate to the project - on which every other member of the team is employed/contracted. So far, I'm the only 24/7 person.

As for community mangers, or post-launch bug fixes, and the extra responsibilities of Leads like Katrin (Tech), or Char (Story), this hasn't come up for this project cycle yet, but I intend to introduce an 'on call' top-up to our flat rate to account for out of hours work post-launch. As for 'what about your community managers' who might need to attend quickly to something before it spirals out of control? The solution there is a combination of TOIL, and hiring two people to cover the week. It would cost us the same as one contractor working 7 days, but we hire two people, each for 4 days week max, and maybe on, say a 2 day pw minimum, and then they scale if needed, but they're never 'on call' every day. Then if they need more than their max, time off in lieu comes in to play.

I can't guarantee that I or others will never work overtime, but the TOIL system is the backstop there.

How do you make sure it doesn't affect your work output?

We don't formally track our individual productivity - just our project progress vis-a-vis our project planning. We might once we can resource a Project Manager but right now, we don't formally do so. So I can't tell you anything for certain. And also - I didn't do this to make us more productive, I did it to make our workplace more humane.

Here are some things I can tell you:

• It is absolutely one of the reasons I personally was able to maintain resilience during a COVID spent abroad, unable to see family, and only recently moved so I have few friends. There were weeks I had very shaky mental health, and a four day week enabled me to care for myself in a much more effective way.
• One day for chores and two days for leisure is beautiful and I want it for everyone.

Okay but more seriously - adaptations that we've made to our processes and workflows as we've built them to account for the 4-day week:

• Meetings need to be as efficient as possible. Under my watch we were always going to have a system of clear meeting agendas, purposes, note-taking etc., but in the context of a 4-day week you really need to invest in keeping meetings to time, and with materials for prep distributed ahead of time. Time where everyone is together is more valuable and you should treat it with respect. This also means making sure any prep is highlighted, that people do the prep, and that you make time for quieter team members to speak if they want.
• Some people will miss unstructured design time, so make dedicated time for that too. Some people don't need it and like to respond to design docs. For that reason we have 2h 'freeform' meetings before a feature sprint, where you can talk in any direction and hash things out in speech. This gets turned into a design doc so structured thinkers can prep and think quietly before an 'all hands' sprint prep meeting. There we have clear outcomes of a final design, and two follow ups with a proposal for the work, and a final task management meeting. Then weekly sprint check ins, etc. throughout.
• We don't have video-on calls. Honestly this isn't a 4 day week thing, but a general resilience thing - when you want to be as efficient as possible you don't want to people who feel pressure because of either patriarchy or dysphoria to tend to their appearances disproportionately to others on the team. It's also proven that video-on calls are more costly wrt energy - video-off calls are proven to reduce exhaustion and boost engagement, especially for gender marginalised folks and new comers.
• Social events are super necessary as part of a remote workplace but can feel more pressured in a 4 day week. It requires management to acknowledge that building relationships with your co-workers is work. We've got quite firm weekly plans for them.
• We do need to plan and scope realistically, but that's a part of any good production process, I hope!
• We use a system called Spock - integrated into Slack - to track worked days, holiday, sickness and TOIL which has adapted fine to a 4 day week. I didn't do that wizardry, but I def know it's possible.
• Have at least one meeting-free day per week, to also mark out that deep concentration time.

How can I advocate for this in my company?

This was in many ways easy for me to implement because I was already convinced, and I have a very supportive board. So really, I'm the boss, and so I was allowed to make it up. If there was a challenge, I worked out a solution.

For those advocating for this in their own workplaces, I can recommend collective bargaining: union membership - and getting your workplace to unionise - can give you access to the power of a collective, and to a union rep who can negotiate on your behalf. If you want resources to 'prove' it, the studies I linked at the beginning were pretty good, and I've also since discovered 4dayweek.io - I can't personally vouch for them, but they'd be a great place to find software companies already running 4-day weeks - maybe you can intro your leadership team to those companies to ask more about transition!

Conclusions

As I mentioned at the top of this post, I haven't done a survey of the team, or any meaningful work tracking - so I can't tell you in a quantitive way (or from a personal perspective for anyone other than me) that a 4-day work week definitely made us more productive. This past year is actually probably is the most productive and effective the company has ever been - but that had been for a number of reasons; change of leadership ethos, hiring people, production models, full rather than part remote, etc.

I hope I've answered the common questions I had about 'how I did it'. And honestly, there have been enough studies now saying it's better for people and at worst doesn't make productivity less. The productivity arguments aren't of interest to me, but if you want them - they're out there. At this point the reason we're still all working 5 days a week is mostly inertia.

Don't get me wrong - it's a big load of inertia, and I'm not dismissing the work of culture shift. It's taken me 2 years to shift the culture of our company and I have been extremely empowered by the co-owners, and benefitted from a company model which is scale-down scale-up (not in itself great unless you have a social system which supports a mobile labour force - FYI Denmark pays ~90% of your previous wage when you're unemployed using the A KASSE system).

But I hope that through going through these 2 or so years of culture change, and ~1.5 years of a 4-day week, I have faced down most of the challenges it brings, and come up with humane and worker-centric solutions to them. Perhaps some of my solutions wouldn't suit your workplace, but it doesn't mean there aren't solutions.

The last challenge will be shipping a game on this system. I try and make sure that when the system breaks, it breaks on me first. That's what CEO/Studio Lead is to me. But on-time, on-budget, and on-spec will provide different challenges with a 4-day week. Most of all I will keep a keen eye on scope, make decisions on cuts where they're needed, build systems for people to communicate well, and track production process for failures as well as success. Where I fail, well, failing into a 5 day week is better than failing into a 6 day one. I will continue to watch, analyse, and improve, with the support of my excellent board, and brilliant co-workers. I'm doing my best.

(P.S. since I drafted this, but before I published it, another indie studio Young Horses announced their transition to a 4-day week! Stoked for them.)

Editor's Note: this is a reflection from Ida Hartmann, our first Writing & Narrative Design intern, on how she found the process, what she learned, and how she hopes to carry it forward in her work. You can read more from our intern process via this tag. Enjoy!

Begin

Embark on a hopeful journey through terrific Danglish language, transformative peer mentorship, and a ton of tricky variables in our heroine’s quest for professionalism and a future in the game industry. An intellectually stimulating, sometimes uneventful, and humorous point-and-click-click-click puzzle adventure where the protagonist struggles with writing dialogue and choices while juggling scripts and shadows of her past.

Choose carefully now:
*[Continue reading] -> ContinueReading
*[Stop reading this gamification of mundane experiences] -> ContinueReadingBecauseYouAlreadyClickedTheLinkToTheWebsite
AndBesidesYouAreLookingForProcastinationAndYouAreCurious ->
ContinueReading

= ContinueReading
Okay. We can continue.

Warm Open

I’m sitting in a house north of Copenhagen. It’s summer. The ocean tastes salty, the birds chirp loudly, my ankles already swollen with mosquito bites. Last summer I was sitting in the same house with bleeding gums and shaking hands, preparing the release of my first game Stilstand. My teeth luckily stayed in place and now, a year has passed, and I have transformed professionally. In this blog post, I will reflect on how my internship the last five months at Die very Gute Fabrik has helped me to this point.

Becoming an Intern

When I first arrived at Die Gute Fabrik's doorstep, I felt like a stray cat: slightly shabby and (professionally) homeless. Stepping into the Fabrik was like stepping into a safe home with soft furniture and milk (I'm still a cat in this analogy), where I could piece myself together under the careful guidance of experienced cat-carers. Instead of splashing directly into a demanding game writer and narrative designer position, I got the wonderful opportunity to be an intern.

A freeing aspect of being an intern is being in a learning position - the possibility, (almost demand) of testing yourself, and experimenting with the freedom to fail safely. While some companies mistake an intern as a way to exploit free labour, Die Gute Fabrik’s internship was an actual apprenticeship - giving me the much-needed space to grow and develop as a writer and designer. And not only this, the position was also paid, which made the freedom and room for growing even bigger. In other words: A huge and rare privilege.

The internship wasn’t defined beforehand, instead, it has been in a constant shaping process aligned with both me and Die Gute Fabrik's needs. I was met with a lot of patience and guidance, having been thrown into a completely new territory of writing dialogue (in British English!), and handling files and variables in their dialogue editing systems, all while reflecting on my creative processes, past and present.

Becoming a Game Writer

In Denmark, our popular culture is extremely influenced by both British and American language and culture - from when we are children the English language is present everywhere. But - even though my favourite movie aged 10 was Bridget Jones' Diary - it hasn’t made me fluent in writing English. So getting used to a writing environment that eventually needs perfect British English (no American!), I panicked: Can I somehow take a quick crash course in British culture in order to become that fierce, poetic game writer I’ve always dreamed of being? ... Reading Shakespeare, watching Barnaby, chanting my favourite sitcom quotes with a horrible accent, and and and -

I hyper-focussed at the beginning on writing because of this. I wanted to write in perfect English. But with the help of my mentors, I was able to quickly realise that truly immersing myself in the language to this end would have to mean some drastic changes to my life - perhaps moving to an English talking country, simply just stop talking Danish and then... of course, buying a fancy bowler hat.

After realising that I will never become a new Shakespeare (or buy a bowler hat), it became much easier to produce written content, knowing that there was a whole structure around writing in the game. It wasn't just me in there - the native speakers would Britishfy my language in a polish phase. The best thing for me to do was to just write. By collaborating with other amazing and experienced writers, we could all contribute, discuss, redraft, polish. Having always worked alone, this has been a tremendous experience and eye-opener. I understand now how valuable collaboration with others can be.

Editor's note - I am changing a lot of o to ou, and z to s :) also if you want a bowler hat as a parting gift, lmk.

Becoming a Narrative Designer

I learned a new term: Narrative Designer. A role I did not understand until I started at Die Gute Fabrik. In the past, my work has been under mishmash of different titles, but funnily enough, never Narrative Designer. I learned that Narrative Designer is a role that fits well with a person who is good at world-building, character development, and creating structures for storytelling.

Because I had the possibility to try different parts of the disciplines of game writing and narrative design, I found that I actually make a great Narrative Designer. Through the guidance of my mentors, I was helped to understand where my strengths are, which has been exciting to pin down and explore. I found that I'm very good at:

• Finding the core of storylets as they add to the main story - "the golden seed" - which can be fun or whimsical, and always pointing to the centre.
• Keeping track of spreadsheets, files, and working with story structures.
• I also have a good sense of what will work well in a story, I can always spot what’s missing, etc.

I realise that this is also how I’ve always worked; both as a comic writer and illustrator when approaching and working my imagination. Creating worlds, moods, characters, story structures, getting fun and weird ideas for stories. Now that I have learned what Narrative Designer means, I only wish to become better at it and see where it takes me.

Valuable Insights

While experimenting and growing as a writer and designer by working on the TBA game from Die Gute Fabrik, I also had the privilege to be mentored by Studio Lead Hannah Nicklin. Our mentor talks gave me a lot of great tools on how to create stories and structures, from figuring out a strategy for developing seeds for stories, characters, voices, to formalising a creative process, and developing a story vocabulary. We set homework and deadlines together, helping me to create something, structure it, plan it, and push my craft forward.

The company also sent me books on script writing, artistry, and creativity, in order for me to formulate my own journey as an artist, inspire me, and encourage me to find ways to plan a bit ahead. Being a “go with the flow” kinda person (aka. chaotic), it was both daunting and wonderful to try express what do I want, what kind of life do I want, who do I want to be, what’s important, etc. through the lens of my storytelling practice.

I also gained a deeper understanding of the game industry and what one can encounter in terms of challenges, both emotionally and legally, especially as a woman and story-focussed professional. Sometimes this would feel like an extremely tall, impossible mountain to climb - and honestly very exhausting. But I learned how valuable and important a network and support system is, in order to stay on that mountain, to find camps to rest in along the way.

It has been empowering to work at a company that for example priorities

1. Employee rights and well-being,
2. Marginalised groups in the games industry
3. The artform and its place in the world.

It has been a privilege to be a part of such idealism and I feel that I take those same demands, that openness, and awareness with me as I continue on my journey.

The Next Chapter

Now we reach the moment that I get tossed (not really, but I like the image of it) out on the other side, standing much stronger than before, two feet on the ground and able to move forward. I feel like a little wooden figure who has finally been sanded and varnished, ready to work and truly understand my work, far more than when Stilstand was released.

This is what I know: I want to work in companies that, like Die Gute Fabrik, prioritise a healthy work environment, employee wellbeing, and rights, and have an appreciation of the artistic dimension of a game.

Luckily I now plan to join the award-winning indie studio Triple Topping for a while, where I’m excited to use my new skills as a narrative designer in practice. Six months ago I wouldn’t feel as professional as I do now, going into a job like that. It’s incredible how much more confident I now feel, equipped with a vocabulary, industry insight, structured design processes, and a caring support system.

So here we are, at the very end, though it’s not Game Over or Play Again. Instead, it is:
[Start Next Chapter]
How thrilling!

Hello Die Gute Fabrik pals! We're stoked to share with you news of a 'bucket raffle' we're running this June 2021. A 'bucket rattle' is where you encourage people to pop their spare change in a bucket in order to raise money at an event or protest. Our 'bucket rattle raffle' is exactly that, but we're encouraging you to donate to a charity AND be entered into a raffle to win one of five free keys to MUTAZIONE on console or desktop.

While Danish/European Pride is in August, we're also aware that many of our community are marking Pride in June, and so we wanted to do something for both events. We worked with our LGBTQ+ team members to try and think of something to do which felt more meaningful than simply turning our logo rainbow. Which is when we came up with the idea of a bucket raffle rattle for an important Danish LGBTQ+ migrant rights charity.

The Danish LGBTQ+ migrant rights charity lgbtasylum.dk do important work (which is entirely funded by donations) offering social and legal support, counselling and networks to LGBTQ+ asylum seekers and LGBTQ+ refugees in Denmark. See above for a pic from a beautiful (and sunny!) social event they recently ran for the folks they support.

How to take part:

To enter the DGF Pride BUCKET RAFFLE RATTLE, simply donate what you can via this link, & send us a receipt (black out identifying info) via twitter DM, & at the end of June we'll announce 5 lucky winners of keys.

If you have any accessibility issues in participating, please send us a DM on Twitter. And Either way please do check out the excellent work of @lgbt_asylum in advocating for the rights of LGBTQ+ persons in the Danish asylum system & for the rights of LGBTQ+ refugees in DK.

Thanks to LGBT Asylum for sharing this lovely photo of a recent social. And can't wait to see your entries to the BUCKET RATTLE RAFFLE - every donation counts.

Welcome our latest post in a regular series where we invite members of our team to talk about One Cool Thing (not necessarily from games) and if/how it influences/reflects on their work. While we're not able to talk about the exciting things we're working on right now, we hope this will be a nice little series of introductions to the interests & practices of our excellent team.

Here we have an entry from our Lead Programmer: Katrin-Anna Zibuschka. You can also check out Roxanne van Dam on "Doing the Disco", Harry Josephine Giles on Brave Sparrow, Sharna Jackson on Joana Choumali, Angus Dick on Fantastic Planet, Ben Wilson on Leaderboards, and Char Putney on Randomness.

Here's Katrin on Co-op Experiences!

One Cool Thing: Co-operative Experiences

When I first was asked to write a “One Cool Thing” post I thought - the only cool thing that inspires me to make my own games are the people I work with! But... No, too cheesy. How would I even write about that?

Weeks went by, I completely forgot about the task. Hannah approached me again and said it was time to finally think about it. I sat down and tried to figure out what I spend my days with... I could only come up with specific games I enjoyed over the last few years. Then it hit me: all of those games had one thing in common. They are “co-operative experiences”. And of course, the types of games I enjoy on a daily basis are also the thing that affects my personal and professional life the most.

What do I mean when I say “co-operative experience”.

Basically anything you’d do with someone else. It could be video and board games, but also work related or maybe even doing chores with your housemates.

Why I love co-operative experiences.

I greatly enjoy working together with others efficiently and effectively. Here are some points that help me achieve this and that I appreciate most when doing things as a team:

Learning

Getting to know other people, their stories and experiences and not only learning about their strengths and weaknesses but also my own, helps me a lot to learn new ways of thinking and gaining different perspectives.

Communicating

I can enjoy myself best when I make sure everyone is involved, feels welcome and helpful. Sometimes this not only means to ask questions and listen but also to pay attention to things that weren’t spoken out loud.

Solving problems

It’s a great feeling to work towards common goals and share passions. To get to that stage though, it’s sometimes necessary to find out if everyone is actually working toward the same goal and making compromises, aligning goals and solving problems together are means to achieve this.

Belonging

It sometimes doesn’t really matter what game you play or project you work on, if you do it with people you can enjoy yourself with. Even when failing you’re doing it as a team. There is still the sense of belonging, and celebrating all of the delightful hours spent together is rewarding in any case.

Board Games

I can highly recommend the EXIT escape room board game series, which have great puzzle design and fulfil all of the above points. Here are some other co-op board games I immensely enjoy:

• Eldritch Horror - This game is mostly about making the most efficient and effective plans together, but also solving problems as they arise. It helped me greatly to be a bit less controlling and let others help instead of doing everything by myself.
• Forgotten Waters - In Forgotten Waters you play as a chaotic group of pirates who all have their own unique goal but also need to work together to achieve the overall goal. It’s an awesome roleplaying experience, because everyone is extremely involved and it helps me become a bit more spontaneous.
• Tainted Grail - Tainted Grail offers everything from an intense, diverse story to planning and tactical fights and additionally is very rewarding. I enjoy it greatly because there are so many different things you can do so it never gets boring.

Video Games

Apart from Divinity: Original Sin 2, which is a tactical role-playing masterpiece, these are my 3 recommended co-op video game gems:

• Nine Parchments - Nine parchments has loads of re-playability with all the characters you can unlock and the different types of people you can play it with, it’s different every time. It needs quite a bit of co-ordination and teamwork, especially considering the friendly fire. On the other hand, exactly this makes it especially enjoyable, because you can tease each other a little bit from time to time.
• Conduct Together - I have never laughed more when playing any game than when playing Conduct Together. It feels very rewarding and has an extremely simple concept which fits perfectly with all the chaos and explosion.
• Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes - This game helps so much in getting better at communicating, learning new ways to express yourself and understanding others. Every time we finished a level, we had the urge to replay it and get better together.

We hope you enjoyed this selection of co-operative experiences that inspires our Lead Programmer Katrin, and remember you can check out our other One Cool Thing posts over here!

A news post from Studio Lead Hannah Nicklin.

Phew! I can barely get through the title of this post without feeling out of breath! That's right, today we're delighted to announce that Mutazione is being release in several new and exciting ways. Here are the highlights:

Switch and Xbox ports.

Possibly the question we're asked the most is whether or not we will be releasing Mutazione on Switch, well, as of today I'm delighted to be able to tell you that we will be releasing the game on the 26th May! And you can wishlist it in the store right now!

Xbox platforms are also a really exciting new place to be brining the game to - the indie representation on Xbox is getting really impressive. And in testing Mutazione on there I've especially enjoyed how my little jokes in the achievements come across in their UI. If you're an Xbox fan, you can play Mutazione there from the 26th May!

Physical Editions

We're also absolutely delighted to announce a collaboration with Iam8bit! They're going to be producing a Nintendo Switch and PlayStation physical edition of the game, with exclusive cover art, gorgeous plant poster, and a 'seed packet' which will include a special code to a rare plant for you to add to your gardens in Garden Mode. Nils Deneken has done such a wonderful job on the designs, and Iam8bit have been a delight to work with. You can preorder them from Iam8bit.com right now!

Double LP

And the final thing we have to announce is a dream-come-true for a game which was founded on its experimental musical gardens - we're also working with Iam8bit to produce a double LP collecting not just music from the Mutazione soundtrack, but also a second LP which is exclusive, never before heard 'performances' by Mutazione composer Alessandro Coronas, working within the magical musical garden music systems. Nils, not to be outdone of course, has produced an equally stunning gatefold design inspired by 70s psychedelia and the 'new age' era in which Mutazione is set. Pre order the stunning double LP now from Iam8bit.

Phew!

That's us for now, we're so delighted to be able to finally release these exciting collaborations, thanks to Iam8bit for their excellent partnership, and to our publishers Akupara for their dedication and hard work in bringing our magical, musical, supernatural story-drive adventure Mutazione to so many new audiences and form-factors.

You can find links to all stores, merch and more at: mutazionegame.com

At Die Gute Fabrik we're eager to support emerging talent as well as collaborating with existing talent, and so too are we invested in supporting the local emerging game dev community. Which in part is thriving because we're lucky enough to have one of the foremost game design masters degrees in the business right on our doorstep: ITU. We support the course as an advisor, mentor many of its graduates, and count its graduates amongst our team!

That's also why we were delighted to find ourselves this year in the very rare circumstance of being in a position to offer a company collaboration - something which is only a good fit every 5 years or so. And so welcomed Daria Radu and Alexandra Labusová on board to work on a well-supported and mentored self-contained part of our unannounced project. It will be a long time before we can talk with specificity about the excellent work they have done, so in the meantime, we wanted to provide room for each of them to introduce themselves, and strongly recommend both of them as excellent for any future collaborators.

Welcome Alexandra!

Who are you and what is your background?

Hello there, or how we say in Slovakia - Ahoj! I am Alexandra, soon to be an ITU Game Design graduate. Although I had quite a long and winding journey to this point!

I first moved to Denmark 6 years ago, after studying English Language and Literature in the Czech Republic. I found I wanted a slightly more creative area of study, so I moved to Copenhagen to study Multimedia design at KEA. This decision turned out to be perfect for me. Besides learning the basics of design, studying at KEA also taught me the basics of web development programming. And to my surprise, programming was uniquely enjoyable for me: it connected with a really specific part of my creative side - creative problem solving and the ability to create something from nothing. I came away from KEA wanting to learn more, design more, and code more. Therefore I decided to continue my Bachelor degree with a top-up in Web Development.

From there I started working at a marketing agency as a front end developer. I was still really keen on learning more and continuing my studies in something that would involve both technology and design. Picking a master degree was therefore a really hard choice since the majority of my options focused on either design or programming. That's precisely why Game Design felt like a best fit, and I was pleased when it proved to be exactly what I wanted it to be for me: very challenging, demanding in both design and tech, as well as offering a deeper understanding of academic concepts around games and game development.

Sometime I feel like my journey to games has not been very intentional! I am definitely not one of those people who knew what they wanted to be when they were 10 years old… not even at 23, if I'm honest. I think for me this is not a reflection of indecisiveness, however, but rather an affirmation of my trust in process - always turning towards what fascinates and challenges me. That's why I plan to keep involving myself with the still transforming world of games: trusting the process and enjoying the journey.

What are your primary interests/skills?

When it comes to games, I am a very casual player. I don't tend to play a lot of games myself and if I do I am very picky about what I spend my time on. On the other hand, I enjoy watching other people play all kinds of games. It's a great kind of background noise for me when working.

From the games I played and really enjoyed I can mention Gris, Mutazione, Animals Crossing and Welcome to Elk. In general I tend to prefer more artistic, narrative-driven games (though I don't mind if they're serious or silly!) and those are the kinds of games I would like to work on.

I am a very visual person, therefore I want my practice to be connected to the visual side of game development, preferably through both design and programming. However, being very new to the games industry, I am still in the process of figuring out what exactly that means to me and how it translates into my career and practice.

What have you learned about yourself and your practice in your company collaboration?

Aside from a number of small personal discoveries about how I work and collaborate with others in a professional environment, it was really great to see the overall working culture of Die Gute Fabrik. Communicating with the rest of the team remotely seemed like a complicated task at the beginning. Especially when it comes to games development, where interdisciplinary communication is crucial. Nonetheless, everyone was very proactive in their communication which soon led me to learn from people around me and also took a lot of stress off my shoulders. I always felt I am part of a team, which is not always true when it comes to internships. It was also very clear from the beginning that Die Gute Fabrik wants to make sure we get as much out of this collaboration as we can, which I truly appreciate. Especially the one-on-one mentoring session with different members of the team, which helped me learn more about the different aspects of game development.

Where would you like to be in 3-5 year’s time?

I think from my previous answers it is quite clear that I am not a person who will find it easy to answer this question! In following the process, I don't always know what the product of that journey will be.

However, in 3-5 years time I would like to have figured out more specifically my professional angle in games. In this time span I would also like to have figured out whether freelancing or starting my own game studio is something I would enjoy. I don't talk about it much... but it has been at the back of my mind in the past year or so. Additionally, I plan to keep readjusting and getting to know myself better.  

Can you tell us something fun/surprising about yourself?

This might get a bit strange, but bear with me while I tell you a short story. One day my friend got locked out of her apartment and was having a very bad day. Fortunately she left a tiny window above her door open, I even found a picture of it.

I immediately wanted to help her, but was a bit hesitant to climb through the window... Right until the moment someone told me it is absolutely impossible to break into someone's apartment through such a small space. I, of course, could not accept such nonsense, tuned into my inner escapologist (or in-scapologist) and saved the day!

So what does this story say about me besides me being a person of rather slight stature? I am stubborn, especially in tricky or difficult situations when other people say I should give up. This is also something that reflects in my work. When things are not working out it makes me care more and find a solution. Even more so when I get to help someone else in the process, because let me tell you, I probably wouldn't have climbed that window if it was my room that we were locked out of.  

You can find Alexandra's portfolio at  imalexandra.com, and follow her on twitter at @Sashena_Lab

At Die Gute Fabrik we're eager to support emerging talent as well as collaborating with existing talent, and so too are we invested in supporting the local emerging game dev community. Which in part is thriving because we're lucky enough to have one of the foremost game design masters degrees in the business right on our doorstep: ITU. We support the course as an advisor, mentor many of its graduates, and count its graduates amongst our team!

That's also why we were delighted to find ourselves this year in the very rare circumstance of being in a position to offer a company collaboration - something which is only a good fit every 5 years or so. And so welcomed Daria Radu and Alexandra Labusová on board to work on a well-supported and mentored self-contained part of our unannounced project. It will be a long time before we can talk with specificity about the excellent work they have done, so in the meantime, we wanted to provide room for each of them to introduce themselves, and strongly recommend both of them as excellent for any future collaborators.

Welcome: Daria!

Who are you and what is your background?

Hello, I am Daria and I am a web and game developer! I moved to Denmark from Romania (almost) 6 years ago looking for a degree that would suit both my overflowing creativity and my (then underdeveloped) talent in programming. My dream at the beginning was to become a video editor - so I chose to study an AP Degree in Multimedia Design and Communication at Copenhagen School of Design and Technology (KEA). However, somehow my path always ends up with me programming something - so I extended my degree into a BA in Web Development, which led to me working in Web Dev for a couple of years. And then I went on a journey of  trying to have a taste of everything - frontend development, backend development, devops, freelancing, even being a teacher assistant.

I really love programming, and I always try to take on new challenges, so I decided to switch my field a little - and dove into a MSc in Games (Technology) at ITU, which I am now very close to finishing! I had done a little bit of game programming in my Bachelor’s as well, and I have had so much fun developing my skills at ITU - it offers much more room for my own creativity, so I wanted to keep exploring the medium. Therefore, the past two years have been full of projects, group work and the collaborative business of making games, and I was eager see what it’s like to do this on a professional level as well. This brings us to the present, where I am currently part of a super cool placement project at Die Gute Fabrik in order to do my thesis together with Alexandra, my fellow game designer.

What are your primary interests/skills?

Many - I actually switch up my interests quite often, since I love trying out new things and learning along the way. But I love developing software. Games, websites, services, you name it. It’s always a new challenge - especially with games. The architecture is always different and it’s always fun to play around with so many new technologies, I think this interest in architecture is why I usually tend to go towards a more backend role. Currently, I am diving into AI and Machine Learning in games, which I have also been able to use as part of my placement at Die Gute Fabrik (super excited for everyone to see the results when we can talk about it!).  It’s definitely the area that attracts me the most right now, and I would love to take on more projects and expand my skills.

When I am not developing software, I love expressing myself through dance - and that is the one skill I have constantly developed in my life. And it keeps both my mind and my body active and creative.

What have you learned about yourself and your practice in your company collaboration?

I have learned plenty, but most importantly: how to create and plan technical architecture. Because our part of the project could be so self-contained, I was given the responsibility for making the big decisions regarding tech in our placement project. This meant constantly updating my knowledge with what are the current best practices. It also meant paying attention to resource management and how to maintain code quality. I have learned so much, and am excited to continue to develop my knowledge and instincts here.

In addition, being on a time-limited project, there was a lot of time management and planning involved. Together with Alexandra (and also with the help of our lovely colleagues at Die Gute Fabrik), we managed a pretty clean and organised production process. Which is awesome.

However, my favourite thing that I have learned during my work with Die Gute Fabrik is that it’s okay to start not really know what you are doing. Especially early in your career, it can be daunting to take on a task that you have no idea how to complete yet. But those are probably the best kinds of task -  they force you to dive into unknown territory and learn. Plus, you are never alone - ask around! “Steal” knowledge from people. Take your time. It’s so satisfying when you do actually find the solution to that one “scary” task.

Where would you like to be in 3-5 year’s time?

I am at a point in my life where my goals are very rapidly changing. And that is okay - life is so full of opportunities, why stick to only one road? Nevertheless, my answer right now would be: hopefully in a place where I am confident enough to lead a team of developers. I think that is such an interesting challenge, and it would also allow me to take more responsibility with my work. This new goal of mine is actually a personal discovery that I made at Die Gute Fabrik (extra kudos to Hannah and Katrin for spending so much of their time sharing their knowledge and experiences with me!).

And also - hopefully travelling lots. I love travelling.

Can you tell us something fun/surprising about yourself/your work with DGF?

I love pink and cute things! Is it important? No, not really. But it actually tells so much about me. It actually took me years to admit I like pink, due to how society tends to add stereotypes/associations to this colour - and I never wanted to fit into a stereotype. Also, how could people take me seriously as a programmer?

Until one day, I said it out loud. I love pink! And got myself pink clothes and a big Jigglypuff plushie. And it was so relieving.

But the main point of this story is: I am currently learning to unapologetically be myself. And this reflects so much in the work that I do - I love developing casual, cosy games (see the hundreds of hours I spent in Animal Crossing) that are really colourful and bring a sense of calm and “hygge”, and the story-driven games that Die Gute Fabrik do are right up my alley. And I hope I get to do more of these in the future.

Editor's note - check out the curatorial work of Rachel Simone Weil for a video game history preservation approach to foregrounding how pink and femme-coded aesthetics have always been a part of games! The online collection can be found at Femicom.org. Games are pink!

Where can we find you?

I'm on Twitter, owning my aesthetic as @sparklesdaria. You can take a look at my Portfolio at dariaradu.com and I'm on LinkedIn here. Do come say 'hi'!

Welcome to the sixth post in a regular series where we invite members of our team to talk about One Cool Thing (not necessarily from games) and if/how it influences/reflects on their work. While we're not able to talk about the exciting things we're working on right now, we hope this will be a nice little series of introductions to the interests & practices of our excellent new team.

Here we have an entry from one of our new programming team: Roxanne van Dam. You can also check out Harry Josephine Giles on Brave Sparrow, Sharna Jackson on Joana Choumali, Angus Dick on Fantastic Planet, Ben Wilson on Leaderboards, and Char Putney on Randomness.

All images in this post are press images shared by Studio ZA/UM.

One Cool Thing: Doing the Disco

Since I started working at Die Gute Fabrik at the beginning of this year, I’ve been trying out more story-driven games. I wanted to get more familiar with these kinds of games as a programmer working at a story-driven studio.

The latest game I’ve been playing is Disco Elysium. The game recently released "The Final Cut" version, which I thought was a great reason to try it out. (I’m loving all the amazing voice acting!)

One cool thing I’ve noticed while playing Disco Elysium is the moment where it feels like the choices you’ve made earlier in the game get thrown back to you at a later point. It happens quite often in Disco Elysium and I love how it feels like the game is noticing all your choices, even the very small ones, which you don’t expect would have an impact.

Two friends of mine, Marlène and Jordy, even gave this phenomenon a name: “Doing the Disco” which, as you might have guessed, is named after Disco Elysium. When playing Disco Elysium it feels to us like everything you do in the game can be commented on by NPCs. When even 'throwaway' decisions are noted, it feels like the game really pays attention to what the player does. In fact sometimes it's more effective when it's the small things which are remembered: at the beginning of the game, you can decide to pick up only one shoe: at the end of the day, your partner asks: “how have you managed to run around all day wearing only one shoe?"

Another example is that Disco Elysium also comments on the way you move in the game. If you’ve played any 'point and click' game, you might have noticed that double clicking makes the character run to the location you clicked instead of walking. Being as impatient as I am, I’m always running from point to point. Then, at the end of the day, your partner asks “what’s with all the running?”. I was really surprised when I read these dialogue options during my playthrough. These things make your relationships and actions in the game feel both more consequential, and more human.

I think it’s really cool when a game is - as me and my friends say - “Doing the Disco”. In making small things consequential, it makes you feel like your agency is always active. And in a detective game - making you feel that all the details are important is very effective. As a programmer, this speaks to me because it implies there’s a larger system underneath that’s paying attention and selecting these dialogue options.

I would love to think more about this in games systems I work on, as I think this creates richer, more cohesive game-story experiences. In most games, you see gameplay and narrative do separate things. For example, Hades: another recent game with a great story but that’s not “Doing the Disco”. In Hades, there is a clear separation between the gameplay part (top down hack-and-slashing) and the story part (visual novel style conversations). The conversations rarely comment on what you did in the gameplay part, an NPC does comment on the way you last died, but for me it doesn’t feel very surprising as that conversation happens immediately after you died and not at some later point in the game. On the other hand, when looking at Disco Elysium, it feels like the gameplay meaningfully “modifies” the narrative in a way which is not built on a visible formula. The underlying systems may be quite simple, but in making surprising things 'call back' in a humane rather than an obvious format way - it makes you feel like everything has a potential consequence.

In writing this blog post, it's been great to talk with my game developer friends about this topic, and to think through how the games we're working on can also “Do the Disco” - how we can use small moments to surprise the player about their agency in the story. I think this is awesome as I’d love to see this in more games. Maybe by writing this post, I’ll make more people aware of how cool “Doing the Disco” is and maybe (if you’re a game developer) you’ll start thinking about it too...

Thanks for reading!

This is the first post in a new series for the Die Gute Fabrik blog: Redux, from Game Designer and Co-Owner Douglas Wilson, takes some of his old game design posts from around 2012, published on our old blog, and re-posts them here, sometimes with additional commentary. Some of these posts have been linked from various places, and so we wanted to save them from the abyss!

[This post was originally published on October 9, 2012]

Content note: the game explained in this post uses both gun imagery and pointing 'finger guns’ at yourself as central mechanics.

Time to teach another one of my favorite folk/playground games!

Standoff is a simple game for two or more players – ideally a group of 5 to 10 people. It’s kind of like Rock-Paper-Scissors meets John Woo action flick.

The game and its variants go by many different names, but "Standoff" is the name that I use these days. I originally learned the game from my friend (and then-roommate) John Shedletsky. In this post, I’m going to explain several variations of the game, including my own favorite version.

Standoff – Version #1 (Recommended)

Players stand in a circle, facing each other. The game plays out as a series of rounds.

Before each round, each player pantomimes a pistol with one hand, placing it in an imaginary holster by their waist.

Then, on the count of three, all players simultaneously act out one of three choices:

1. Target an opponent – point your imaginary pistol at an opponent of your choice
2. Target yourself – point your imaginary pistol at yourself, touching your temple
3. Target nobody – point your imaginary pistol at the sky

Players then hold their pose while they collectively figure out who has been eliminated.

Targeting an opponent eliminates that opponent… unless they are pointing at themselves. In that case, your attack is reflected and you are eliminated. Pointing at yourself reflects all attacks on you, so you could potentially eliminate a whole slew of attackers at once.

If you point at yourself but nobody aims at you, you actually do end up attacking yourself and you get eliminated. But you do survive if you reflected any attackers.

If two players aim at one another, both players are eliminated. Note that it is also possible to be eliminated in a whole circular chain of people targeting one another.

Finally, pointing at the air serves as a kind of risk-averse move, played if you think all your opponents might try to target themselves.

The remaining players continue to the next round. The game continues until only one player remains. That player is the winner. Note that it’s possible for all players to get eliminated, in which case there are no winners!

As with most folk games, performative embellishments are encouraged for maximum fun. For example, my friends and I often pretend to reload our imaginary pistols before each round, with the appropriate gesture and sound effect and everything. Maybe that sounds goofy, but do what feels fun for your group.

Even within this particular version, there are a few house rules you might want to try. In my own personal favorite modification, each player gets two pistols, one on each hand. After all, it feels way more theatrical to wield dual pistols! In this mode, you can either aim both hands at the same target, or point them at different targets. We typically play that two pistols beats one pistol – both when targeting one another, and when targeting someone who is pointing at themselves.

Another house rule I often teach is giving each player two lives. When you get hit the first time, you go down to your knees, as if injured, visually signaling that you have one live left. Typically, we play you can only lose one life per round, even if you're targeted by multiple players. When you get hit again, you lie down on the ground, as if dead, now eliminated from the game. This adds a bit of performative flare to the game, and it also helps lengthen the duration of the game and adds the dramatic possibility of comeback victories.

Obviously, you could add all sorts of house rules, in many different combination. One way to combine the two house rules above is to make each player lose one of their pistols each time they are hit. This effectively gives each player two lives, but makes them less powerful after losing their first life.

Standoff – Version #2

This version of the game works similarly – players stand in a circle and try to be the last player standing. However, the three actions you can take differ in this version:

1. Attack – point your imaginary pistols at an opponent of your choice
2. Reload – holster your two pistols by you waist
3. Block – place your two arms in an x-shape across your chest

Note that in this version, you almost always play with dual pistols, because you’ll have to use both of your arms anyway for the block gesture. However, in the standard version, you can’t direct your two pistols at different targets or actions.

In this version, each pistol can only hold one pretend bullet. That’s why the reload action exists – you have to reload before you can attack again. Players themselves are responsible for remembering who is loaded and who isn’t.

Blocking, as is probably obvious, successfully deflects an attack. However, blocking does not reflect an attack, like shooting yourself does in Version #1 (see above).

The key decision in this version is gambling on when to reload. This choice is especially foregrounded when only two players remain, one loaded and the other not. The loaded player only wants to attack when they think the unloaded player will reload.

As in Variation #1, there are lots of possible variations here. Tim Garbos taught me one variation where reloading your gun three times gets you a bazooka! A bazooka can shoot through a block, but is beaten by a (faster) regular attack. In this variation, part of the challenge is to keep track of your opponents’ reload counts.

Comparing Version #1 vs Version #2

As I see it, a big shortcoming of Version #2 is having to remember who is loaded and who isn’t. In the chaos of competition, it can be easy to forget – even your own status! On the flip side, one might argue that this is an advantage – that keeping track of the current "game state" is one of the intended challenges of the game.

A common criticism of Version #1 is the lack of narrative plausibility. Why does targeting yourself reflect attacks? It doesn’t really make sense, and some players get hung up on that lack of coherence. That said, I personally feel like the strange game logic is actually an advantage. My friend Dick Hogg put it best:

"I actually like the wrongthink of it. [...] It makes no sense but it has the authentic feeling of weird warped logic that you get in kids games, playground games etc."

Another key selling point of Version #1 is that targeting yourself feels fun. Even just physically, holding up your finger to your temple makes the gambit seem all the gutsier, as if you were playing Russian Roulette or something.

However, my main advice on this point is to find a particular ruleset that you (and your friends) like best. Try improvising your own modifications! And let me know if you invent any particularly good ones.

2021 Afterword

I still play Standoff regularly, and it has become a major component of my undergraduate teaching. I'm a Senior Lecturer at RMIT University, in the Bachelor of Design (Games) program. I've been teaching our intro game design class for six years now, and every year I open the very first class with Standoff.

First, I teach the basic rules. Then I have the students try a couple different sets of house rules (two pistols, and then two lives - as described above). Finally, I have students work in groups to design their own house rules.

This is one of my favorite classroom activities, and I highly recommend it. First, Standoff functions as an effective social ice breaker. Second, the whole concept of "house rules" is a useful foundation upon which to build the entire ethos of the class. The goal is to remind the students that they aren't just players of games, they are also makers. The takeaway is that "making games" isn't restricted to the digital realm; playfulness is an attitude, a way of going about games and life.

Every year I'm surprised and impressed by my students' creativity. The groups usually present a very diverse range of modifications. We discuss how we can focus our modifications on physical theatricality, or strategy, or narrative.... or some combination thereof. There are many different pleasures of play/games!

This past year, because of the ongoing covid pandemic, I've had to move all my teaching online. But I decided I liked my Standoff activity too much to let it slip, so I needed to improvise a way to run it online.

Pretty quickly, I decided that it would be infeasible to play Standoff via videochat. In a game of simultaneous actions, you'd have to account for video lag. In addition, it would be pretty difficult to point at a particular person in the group!

Instead, I realized that I could teach Standoff as a card game, via my favorite website playingcards.io. Here's a look at the custom table I improvised:

My table template supports up to six players. I made a separate deck for each player, consisting of possible targets: nobody, and every player, including "myself". I also color-decorated the different players, for easy visual reference.

Sure, this version doesn't offer the same physical fun as pointing a finger pistol at an opponent. But it does allows me to cover all the key pedagogical takeaways online, in a format that suits the context.

This re-imagining of Standoff also affords new game design possibilities. The students quickly realized they could use the material properties of playingcards.io to inspire their house rules. Features like counters, random spinners, and tokens allow the students to modify Standoff in ways that would be infeasible in the physical in-person version.

If there's ever any interest in my table template, feel free to message me on Twitter, I'd be happy to share it more widely.

Studio Lead Hannah Nicklin does a deep dive on the design of the Intern Recruitment process, what we did, how it worked, and what we learned. You can also take a look at Char Putney's advice to applicants post, and read Ida Hartmann - our first intern recruited through this process - speak about her individual experience of it.

Opening Credits

I want to start off by saying that while I set the framework for our internship - the pay rate, the aims, and worked closely with others on the copy and its presentation, it was also co-led and administered by the hard work of Creative Producer Ben Wilson, and the bulk assessment was in tandem with Story Lead Char Putney - there's no way this would have existed - or have been so thoroughly evaluated - without their hard work. We're also grateful to the input of the full Die Gute Fabrik team on the video, and other aspects. And the Board and Co-Owners, for supporting my wish to provide entry-level positions as well as expert-level positions in a diverse team.

Also, if at any point any of the language in here feels a little legal or careful it's likely because our excellent Danish lawyers have helped us make sure we're saying things correctly and in a way that doesn't make us liable legally. I would of course always love to be more radical, but if I don't have a company to make games with because someone sued us, I can't provide any internships at all.

Finally I would like to credit the more general industry level advocacy of groups like POC in Play - who help all of us do better in designing work opportunities which are open to as many people as possible.

The Aim

I wanted to produce an entry-level Narrative Design & Writing Internship recruitment process that did the following:

• Open & welcoming to people from other disciplines transitioning to games
• Open & welcoming to people with caring responsibilities, older
• Open & welcoming to marginalised folks
• Easy to apply to in stage one and with no additional labour apart from a simple light-touch first application process
• A paid test.

Part of this was in the design of the actual internship - if we want to be welcoming to people transitioning between industries who might be mid-career, or single parents, etc., we need the internship to be paid, and paid in a way that a single parent can support a family with. This is in part solved by the fact I run a 'flat rate' in the studio (which stops pay disparity across both disciplines and for marginalised folks), which I also extended to the internship, and includes making sure that any writing tests were paid.

The rate for these is based on a Danish tax rate and cost of living (for example, I pay 40-50% tax, do a weekly shop of fairly middle class standards of around $150-200 USD to feed one person, and pay rent and bills of a small 1 bedroom apartment costing around $2000 USD per month, which leaves me around $500-750USD disposable income a month) it is enough for a single person to be comfortable, but most importantly, for a single parent to live their life. That's my measure of the flat rate for the studio.

I also included the following in the design of the internship:

1. A laptop - one of the biggest barriers to working in games for many people is affording the hardware to run the software. I wanted to solve this up front.
2. A mentoring programme as well as the work - designed around the mentee, allowing them to choose who on the team they wanted to learn from. Meaning that if being mentored by a Black or LGBTQ+ or woman was more comfortable or useful to them, we could resource that.
3. Remote, and accepting applications for anyone with a decent timezone match (we said 4 hours of working hour cross over 10am-6pm). Plenty of applicants explicitly ignored this, and I'm sorry to everyone who applied from e.g. West Coast America, or Australia, New Zealand etc. Many roles can work asynchronously, people do run game dev that way. But this role's direct supervisor felt (and I agreed) that this particular role did need both a decent crossover with us in order to be supportive, and also to attend the meetings and mentorships that would make it effective. Many applicants did say that they would be happy working e.g. 2am-8am if it meant they could do the role, and while I might consider that for a peer who could explain why it would fit with their work/life balance, caring responsibilities, and health and wellbeing - in this case I didn't feel like informed consent was possible because of the power differential of an entry level position in a hugely under-supported field. (That is also why I'm writing this post - to perhaps equip more companies around the world in other timezones with the experience I gained in running one!)
4. Constructing the 'what we're looking for' in a way which was explicit that it was about aptitude (which anyone can have) and not experience (which privileged folks are more likely to have access to.
5. Where possible using accessible and simple English (though of course as the applicant will have to write in English, we did need to ask for samples in English). (We did not ask for English-as-first-language people, though, it should be noted. Fluency only). A lot of business acronyms (WFH, 0.5, pro rata, etc. are country-specific, e.g. in Denmark people don't write 'part time' as 0.5 or 0.25, etc.)
6. Including a video which featured us all as people, saying hello, showing the present scale and diversity of the team. Plus a clear contact for asking questions (thanks, Ben, for fielding most of those - I only handled the ones sent to us over Twitter DMs).
7. And a 3-step process, Stage One: which was very simple and light touch to begin with meaning the barrier to entry was low and open, then Stage Two: a paid test using some mocked-up tasks which a very much like tasks the intern would do as a part of the role (a research task, a dialogue task, and a world-building task), followed by Stage Three: an interview. We had the funding only for 15 paid tests, though, which was a tough first round cutoff.

You can re-read the advert text here if you want to track those in the application. And here's our video!

The Mailing List

I also had a section in the Stage 1 application asking people if they wanted (all GDPR-compliant) to opt into a mailing list for future DGF opportunities. AND a second mailing list which we have permission to send other opportunities to.

That means I have a rich, diverse, and wonderfully enthusiastic GDPR-compliant mailing list of people looking for entry-level work in storytelling in games. If you are at all interested in setting up your own internship, please reach out to us and we will send them your job ad!

What it cost:

If you are looking to pitch something similar in your own studio, I can summarise the headline costs of administering the process in person hours, and the cost of the 5 month internship itself:

Costs:

• Laptop: approx $1000 USD
• 16 Paid Tests (we stretched to one more). Around $240 USD (1500 DKK) for a 4 hour test = $4000 USD (rounding up)
• Wage expressed as a day rate (I won't give the Danish employer costs) and rounded to 9 days per month (between 8 and 10 depending on length of month) = $21,000 USD (after Danish base rate tax that would be around $12,600 for 5 months)

Total Monetary Cost (remembering that you also get, y'know, 5 months of an extra person working on the game!) $26,000 USD.

Person hours administering entire process featuring ~3000 applicants.

• Application process drawing up - approx 20 person hours across two people
• Stage One assessment person hours - approx 50 across three people
• Stage Two assessment person hours - approx 20 across three people
• Stage Three assessment person hours - approx 20 across three people
• Mentoring (in addition to onboarding and supervision which isn't covered here) - approx 20 person hours over the period of the 5 months.

Total person hours: 130 person hours, which if a day is 7 hours long, is approx 19 days (rounded) of person time.

The Challenges

If I weren't in charge of the company, and well-supported by both the Board & Co-owners, and by the hard work of Ben Wilson, I might have been more challenged in arguing to resource the opportunity in terms of pay structure, funding, equipment, and the argument for investing in emerging talent at all. As it is the biggest challenge I faced was where the company is based, that is:

• Danish legal frameworks

Unlike in the UK and USA (I don't know enough to point to other examples) positive action (i.e. directly appealing to or shortlisting around 'protected groups' (UK term) of under-represented people in an industry or country) has no general supporting legal framework in Denmark.

There is a law protecting against negative discrimination. The ‘law prohibiting discrimination in the labour market, etc.’ (in Danish: Bekendtgørelse af lov om forbud mod forskelsbehandling på arbejdsmarkedet m.v.). The law prohibiting employment discrimination prohibits both direct and indirect discrimination. This is on the basis of: Race, skin colour or ethnic origin, Religion or faith, LGBTQ+ identity, National or social origin, Political views, Age, Disability.

But - largely speaking - positive action would also breach this legislation - as I wouldn't be treating unmarginalised people equally. There are some exceptions, but most of them involve applying to a government ministry for the relevant industry for permission. I would have to go through the process of appealing to the Ministry for Employment if I wanted to make this opportunity open only to marginalised folks. This is out of my reach right now for a number of reasons - preparing the case isn't something I had time for and would probably reduce 3 internships over 3 years into 1 over 3 years, and with no guarantee that my case would be considered justified by the end (in fact for cultural reasons I'll touch on shortly, I would expect it not to be - examples of ministry exceptions given to me by our legal team were religious groups, political parties etc.).

Also, while it is permissible to encourage someone from an underrepresented group to apply for employment, it is a condition the job advertisement states that all applicants will be considered and that the underrepresented group does not have priority. That’s why our lawyers said it was necessary to add the sentence “We encourage anyone interested in the internship to apply, irrespective of race, colour, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability or age” - note the 'irrespective' set up as opposed to reaching out specifically to marginalised groups. That kind of language feels mealy-mouthed and not honest in the context of an international industry, but in Denmark, it is the best we can legally do.

Why does this matter? And how come it works this way? The politics of Labour in Denmark are very different to the UK and USA in some excellent ways - it's an incredibly unionised workforce (around 70% of the workforce) and instead of a minimum wage, most industry's wages are set by collective bargaining - at the behest of the workers, and not the state. (In fact this detail is also stopping an EU-wide minimum wage being set because it's much lower than the collective bargaining and unions worry that it would drag down average wages.).

However there are also some downsides to a Labour market which is set up around industries and unions and resistant to state intervention - this (in my opinion but I am of course eager to hear from Danish experts in the matter) leads to little state-level proactive equalities legislation - that is it produces legislation that defends against discrimination on an individual level (and that can be proven, and that someone has the resources to prove in court/with the support of their union). Rather than materially working the structures that already exist proactively (how I would describe positive action).  

Then on top of that there is a wider cultural issue of silence around all forms of discrimination - perhaps born out of the same 'Janteloven'-driven solidarity which also makes the unions so strong - of a populace who have made so much progress in workers' rights and the welfare state that there is (from my outsider perspective) a sense that equality is 'solved' and that you shouldn't stand out.  

This matters to a Danish-based company, with a British CEO, recruiting people from all over the world. There is a mis-match in language in appealing outside of Denmark, and in operating in Denmark the structures that do exist are discretionary, and underlain by a culture which often refuses to acknowledge structural oppression.

There is - and I have seen this in the media and press as recent #metoo and BlackLivesMatter discourses have reached Denmark - real resistance to the idea racism or sexism or anti-LGBTQ+ attitudes can be possible in a society which prides itself on being equal - discussions in parliament are defensive. And at a state level it's hard to find that discrimination is even being counted (again, maybe I miss this as I read most of my Danish media in translation, but I rarely hear of polls and statistical studies accounting for discrimination in Denmark, and EU-wide studies and articles tend to corroborate my view here).  UK and American-led discourses around anti-racism, for example, are often articulated as an 'import' to Denmark (an excellent article on hyggeracism and the specific flavour of Danish prejudice which is about 'not talking about it' can be read here).  

As a migrant I'm just going to point out that I feel very lucky to live in Denmark for many reasons - and that my critique here is the best way I know of being a citizen; holding a society to account as well as celebrating it where it's due. I want to be a part of making Denmark even better. I hope in highlighting the specific cultural and legal restrictions in even setting up this posting I can show how it makes the Danish business I run less competitive, and less constructive. In the UK I may have even set up a traineeship aimed specifically at a marginalised group. Whereas in Denmark it's not only illegal for me to do so - I cannot even explicitly encourage marginalised groups to apply over others. It needs to be 'irrespective'.

(There was a lot of back and forth with this section with our lawyers - thanks again for the support, if you're reading!)

This is a problem for us in videogames - an international industry so influenced by relatively progressive UK and USA diversity practices. It means that someone glancing at our advert would assume we're not welcoming because we didn't explicitly state it. It meant I had instead to encode it in non-explicit ways: a video from all members of our existing diverse team, and find ways to make sure in practice the application was as accessible as possible without promoting it as so. That it allows you to articulate your pronouns if you wish (but does not require it). That allows you to share with us your context if you wish (but does not require it).

I suspect if I really want to make a wider difference in the game scene in Denmark - and in its ability to advertise to and recruit diverse international talent - I should also spend some of my time lobbying my union (PROSA), and other tech and creative industry unions and local political representative for protection for principles of Positive Action in Labour law and practices. I have put this in my to do list for later on in the year.

And for absolute clarity: please do not think that I'm suggesting a unionised workforce is anything other than good. It is just part of the context which has in this case produced the circumstance I'm describing - nor is it inevitable a unionised workforce would produce this, unionism can and should be internationalist and anti-racist. It also often hasn't been - I know that as the descendent of union activists going back generations.  Please don't read this as a simplistic conclusion, or that I'm even anywhere near having understood all of the fine grain Danish context for it yet.

The Marginalisation Question & Assessment Criteria.

I draw up this complex context, however, because led to one of the most unsatisfactory compromises in the application process: our marginalisation question. I wanted to give people room to discuss the context of themselves and how that affects their experience - to give them room to be heard and seen. I also wanted to track the success of our application in being accessible to diverse candidates. I also wanted to ask in a way which acknowledges that for example, a Black person applying who lives in Nigeria is marginalised in the wider games industry, but wouldn't experience the day-to-day racism in their career that at Black person living in the United States, France, or Denmark would.

But on the emphatic advice of our lawyers we couldn't ask anything specific and mandatory (and be accused of discrimination on its basis). They also recommended we formally write up our criteria and process in advance in a system which could capture date/time of its being first drafted (GoogleDocs) so that if we were challenged by someone who thought we hadn't treated their application equally because e.g. they were a cis white man we could point to how our process and criteria were 'equal'.

This goes against my actual beliefs and well-research principles around 'equal' - in the context of structural oppressions when not everyone will be starting from the same place ('equal' is not always 'fair'). But it's the law in Denmark. The marginalisation question was not a part of our 'marking' sheets (which were filtered out by some clever spreadsheet work by Ben). And we have a clear scoring criteria for each question which we can point to.

I'm choosing not to share this criteria here (and indeed openly) in detail because I believe that privileged people are often taught to 'write to the test' in their education, and that to do so might disadvantage people in future application processes who aren't taught this skill because of a test-focussed education system, or because of tutoring or private schooling. But here is the criteria for one of the questions with weighing and specifics removed as an example:

• Good basic storytelling instincts
• A good ear for dialogue, tone and format
• A fresh perspective.
• Fluency and flair.
• Potential for development within the context of our project and team.

I cannot also meaningfully (or in good faith - as it wasn't for public consumption) summarise our responses to the Marginalisation question, but I can confirm very roughly that over 75% of our applicants were in some way from a background marginal in the Western games industry (which might be: people of colour, LGBTQ+ folks, women, people living with disabilities, and people from non-Western countries). This is something I believe to at least be in some part a vindication of our hard work in encoding what we couldn't be explicit about.

However, there are some real problems with our solution to measuring the success of this outside of more simple (but not legally compatible) monitoring using tick boxes around race, gender, country of residence, sexuality, physical impairments, mental health, etc. Which are at least simple, dry, and crucially - low on labour. Some of the applicants wrote huge essays in the marginalisation field which I am very grateful for their sharing - but equally I would hate for applicants to feel as though they had to perform their trauma in order to earn the position. It was an optional field, and we were clear it was for monitoring, and some people welcomed the nuance of being able to talk about their context, but I'm certain it also weighed on others.

Another person also told us that 'marginalisation' specifically is a problematic term (it is!) and we're better asking how people relate to hegemonic power structures in their work/life (it was a bit more complicated than this as a proposal but again, I'll avoid directly quoting something not for public consumption). And that's both true, and I believe, begins to be a less accessible way to present the question - some people outside of USA and UK diversity discourse might struggle to assess how to respond to a complicated question about hegemonic power structures. This isn't something I have a good solution to yet, and it's likely I will work the most hard in the next intern recruitment process (if we can resource one - it depends on company funding situations) on workshopping and phrasing and testing how to include room for people to be seen and heard in this way, but not feel pressured or diminished by it.

We also checked this specifically in our survey, and while 2/3 of people were happy with how the question was phrased, there was a significant enough dissatisfaction that I want to continue to work on it.

The Response

The response to the posting was in some ways a vindication of all the above hard work. I will break it down more soon, but we had several thousand people apply, at least ten times more than we expected. We had worried about making sure we advertised the position via advocacy groups and via personalities who have diverse following, but in the end we didn't need to do that much outreach because enough was designed in the fabric of the posting that people shared it for us, without having to do targeted outreach (though Ben still did research and do this in a smaller way).

This presented its own challenges, we had to massively extend our assessment period in a way which made some applicants feel hard done by. We only had me, Char, and Ben, and we also had to do our jobs at the same time. We collected email addresses but had to write to them via a mailing list because of the magnitude of applications, for that reason, typos in the email address and junk mail filters meant a few people never heard back from us. We emailed everyone with a new timeline as soon as we were aware we would need more time, but it was still frustrating to some applicants. And it also absolutely meant there was no meaningful way for us to be able to offer feedback to Stage 1 applicants. I don't know that a studio of our size can solve that problem.

Evaluation Methodology

We have included both quantitative and qualitative methods in evaluating the effectiveness of our posting. Listening to people's feedback throughout, running a survey for applicants which collected both numbers and 'free' text, and also on the basis of  some necessary 'eyeballing' - i.e. that we're not actually (as mentioned) in Denmark allowed to meaningfully collect any information on our applicants beyond an optional question on 'marginalisation' which was long argued over and edited with the help of our excellent Danish lawyers.

I've already touched upon the complicated local context when speaking to international expectations around positive action and monitoring applicant's relative diversity - much of which we aren't able to do from a Danish context, and won't repeat that above.

A screengrab of the feedback survey can be seen here. It was sent to all applicants who agreed to be on our mailing list, and over 300 people responded - more than 10% of total applicants. We also Thanks especially to everyone who took the time to fill out the survey! At the end of this post you can go to the Notion Page where we've summarised everything.

Quantitative feedback

Here's a summary of advert and application-completion accessibility as garnered from our feedback survey, here 1 is the most negative, and 10 the most positive. Extra credits here to Ben Wilson for compiling it all and producing the nice graphs <3

And a summary of the countries of residence of applicants. We had applicants from 91 countries in total.

Overall I'm pleased with these responses. I think an FAQ will improve the accessibility score, and we're better equipped to build one having run the process once, and I think a spread of applications of 91 countries is excellent, and especially showing a top 10 which isn't only European (though obviously our time zone needs will curtail the scope this can ever reach. And there are a lot of chancers in Australia.)

Written Feedback from respondents: Positive

This is supposed to be a what-we-learned post, so I'm not going to dwell too much on these, but it was usefully affirming to see that some of what we tried to do was successful for some people. People spoke positively about the following themes:

• The post was accessible and the company seemed welcoming.
• The process was streamlined and had a good low bar of energy for entry.
• It seemed fair and inclusive.
• It was good that the company responded to everyone at every stage of the process.
• Opening the opportunity internationally.
• Specific and open questions instead of sending a cover letter.
• Open to non-game discipline experience.

Feedback from respondents: Negative.

I'm going to highlight some common themes here. With the full context of this post, you can hopefully understand why some of these things were common themes:

1. No individual feedback
2. Too long to respond
3. Application was too general feeling
4. Position was too well-paid (!)
5. No clue was given as to what you wanted/how it would be assessed.

Point 4 is interesting. Some people felt like the pay meant that it was too competitive and likely to attract people who weren't entry level. But I'm confident in my process here - the flat rate in the company is meaningful to me as a Studio Lead*, and not something I'm willing to compromise on. Also, as someone assessing the applications I can assure people that we are also looking for people who will grow with and benefit most from working with us - this absolutely does disqualify very experienced people.

* Read this thread for a bit more context on this, it's a tad complicated but here isn't really the place to go into it.

On points 3 & 5: Many of the things which made the application feel general (and why we didn't list how things would be 'marked') are part of the intentional design of the process so that we could try and make it as accessible to people from many levels of experience and background. Some people (especially those who have come from middle and upper class tutored backgrounds and schooling) are taught how to 'write to the marking' in a way in which other cultures and class backgrounds are not. I think the solution to this for next time is an FAQ.

I want to be clear that I'm not dismissing these feedbacks. I think it could be easy to read through the 'what would you change' free-feedback and discount it using one or all of the following though processes:

• All of these have a direct opposite opinion in the 'what was good about it' feedback, and so they 'cancel out'.
• Many of these things were beyond our physical capacity.
• Many of the things critiqued were part of the intentional design of the process so that we could try and make it as accessible to people from many levels of experience and background.

But I want to be clear, even if I want to keep some of these intentional design decisions in the process and I can't add more resources in to respond to each Stage 1 applicant individually, I can do better at providing the applicants information on what to expect. It was hard to strike a balance for the position's copy between readable and easy to process, and answering every question. The same too with the form - provide an application form wide enough to welcome all, but specific enough to make you feel like you know what's 'wanted'. But now we've done this evaluation work we can provide an accompanying FAQ which explains (along with other common questions):

• We can't offer feedback at Stage 1 because of our resources (2-3 people who also have to do the rest of their jobs while processing applicants).
• We have left the form short and the questions general for accessibility - because we don't want anyone to count themselves out, and we're interested in people transitioning between disciplines as well as e.g. recent game graduates. Also because we think unpaid tests are unfair, and that greater specification privileges certain backgrounds.
• Why (if we continue to do so) we choose not to share our assessment criteria. I'm not sure about this and will think on it more with the team.
• Positive advice on how to apply, now summarised in an excellent blog post by Char Putney.

Conclusions

I've been writing this post for a long time, and you've been reading for a long time too! So I'm going to be short and sweet here about our takeaways.

Good things:

• I'm proud of how we resourced this application process.
• Providing tech, money, and implicit context in the wording, video and presentation of the company made a difference to those applying.
• The laptop wasn't a priority for most (0.3% of respondents) but its cost is such a minor factor in the whole of the things, I feel like it's valuable to include (and demonstrates our ethos).
• We reached a large pool of countries of residence through the remote nature of the listing.
• Those who made it to Stage 2 and 3 were grateful for the feedback we were able to resource.
• 15.6% of people applied because of the way the posting was worded, 8% listed the video as a motivation for applying, and 7% the People Page (i.e. our existing team).
• When asked about the top 3 priorities for applying, 11.5% counted the company ethos among them, 10.5% the pay, 12.6% remote work, and 8% the mentorship.

I believe this vindicates a lot of our efforts.

What I will do differently next time:

• Prepare a timescale that can accommodate 3000 applicants
• Provide an FAQ on response time, feedback to be expected, how to apply, and many of the other FAQs we received. I will explain the reasoning behind some of the common negative themes which I think enhance the accessibility of the posting.
• Ask people to check their email is correct by submitting it twice, and to whitelist the company email.
• Make sure our server can handle a lot of sudden attention.
• Because of the popularity of the ad, some applicants (I didn't have room to go into this but it sucked) applied via third party websites who - without our permission - copied our ad, but made you pay to sign up to be linked to our page, and others who took their submission and didn't send it anywhere. We need to be clear the only place to apply is via our form.
• Work harder on the means of phrasing the marginalisation question.
• Have a tick box where people specifically have to agree they fit the time zone requirements.
• Work with Ben and Char to think about how much of our assessment criteria it's supportive to be transparent about.
• Workshop the marginalisation question (and run it past our Danish lawyers again).
• Try and represent the needs of the company & games industry within the larger diversity and labour discourse of Denmark (not just through lobbying, but also being on industry panels, education panels, speak at events etc., I'm already doing this a fair amount so really 'how do I change the law' is the question here).

I hope that's useful, interesting, and a valuable insight in some way to anyone who's made it this far into the article. Please do get in contact if we can help you advocate in any way within your own companies to build more opportunities like this. And remember we have a mailing list of people eager to hear from you when you do!

I know I put the credits up front, but I'm especially going to foreground Ben Wilson and Char Putney here, for being the other 2/3 of the 130 person hours which went into this process.

Full transparency

Finally, you can also see a summary and excerpts of the 'free' feedback all laid out in one place in this public Notion page.

Notion – The all-in-one workspace for your notes, tasks, wikis, and databases.

A new tool that blends your everyday work apps into one. It’s the all-in-one workspace for you and your team

Notion

Pictured: Some draft documentation from the process of editing Mutazione.

Welcome to the first in a few blog posts we're hoping reflect on the process of the Narrative Design & Writing Internship. We're going to be reflecting on our own process (what worked, and how we can improve it) soon, but here we also wanted to provide past & future applicants with some advice on the many applications we saw. With a team of just 2-3 reviewing applications there was no way we could offer meaningful feedback on individual stage 1 apps, but here Char Putney will summarise some key lessons for all who applied.

Here at Die Gute Fabrik we were amazed to receive almost 4000 applications for our latest Writing & Narrative Design Internship position. Yes, four thousand applications. As you can imagine, it took us quite a while to sift through them all. We gave every application a fair chance on an equal footing - we read the letters, read/played the samples, and carefully considered each and every one. So it’s fair to say that we’ve built a pretty vibrant picture of what a good application looks like.

We’re delighted to now have the wonderful Ida Hartmann with us for the next few months as our current intern. We’re hoping to open up our internship programme again later this year for another round, and if you’re considering applying for an internship - with us, or anywhere else - I want to help you!

Before I moved into games, I worked at management level with hiring responsibility at Google and Facebook for almost a decade, so I’ve got a lot of experience looking at applications with a beady eye. Two beady eyes, even! And I can tell you that in a competitive environment there are two main things to keep in mind. First, you want to demonstrate some capability or potential capability for the role. Second, you want to stand out from the crowd.

With those two principles in mind, I’ve compiled a bunch of tips that might help when compiling an internship application.

1. Have a portfolio.

It’s astonishing how many applicants neglect to attach a portfolio or sample of any kind. Some mention not “having time” to make any sample work. But there are plenty of other applicants who have taken the time to put together a small sample of what they can do - even one page of a writing sample is better than nothing. It’s important. It shows you have skin in the game. It shows you take your craft and ambitions seriously. It shows that you are not just “an ideas person” (spoiler: there is no role for “ideas person”).

2. Make sure your portfolio is easy to access.

I had quite a few weird experiences with trying to access applicants’ portfolios. Here are those that I encountered multiple times:

• Password-protected portfolios. I am not going to email you to ask for the password, so your application will not go forward.
• Broken links. I am not going to email you to request a working link, so your application will not go forward. Please, before you submit - check your links on a browser you are not signed into, especially when using Google Drive as it seems many people do not adequately understand their sharing settings for folders.
• Links to Itch/Steam/Kindle paid content. I am not going to pay for the privilege of checking out your portfolio, so your application will not go forward.
• Portfolio in a different language than the role requires. If I can’t understand your sample, then it’s no good to me in determining whether you’ll be a good fit for the role, so your application will not go forward.

3. Read the instructions.

Attention to detail is worth its weight in gold in a team environment. Before you submit your application, read all of the questions again and make sure you are addressing each one. For example, one of the questions on our last round asked applicants to “provide a link to something you've made that you're particularly proud of, and talk a bit about it”. To this question, many people responded with a link to a sample and absolutely zero context. Every part of every question is important.

4. Consider what you can bring to the role.

Look, I’ll just say that there was a lot of me-me-me in the answers. I saw a lot of describing why the applicant is great and a lot of describing how much of an impact this opportunity could have on their life. And I am not opposed to that… except, what’s the flip side of that coin? What are you bringing to the company in return? What talents and skills and aptitudes will you use to better our culture and processes and game? We want the internship to be great for the intern, of course! We also want someone self-aware enough to be bringing something to the table to share.

5. Consider the audience of your application.

At about 3pm, after looking at several hundred applications so far in the day, my grace and sense of humour tended to flag a bit. Re-read your application and imagine that the person reading it has already read 250 applications today. That person is still on the lookout for gems! That person is still using every ounce of energy to give you a chance! So, with that in mind - just check:

• Am I being too “cute” or over-familiar?
• Am I trying to explain the job/industry to a person with many years experience in it?
• Am I undermining myself by talking myself too far down?
• Do I seem conceited by talking myself too far up?
• Have I run this application through a spellchecker to catch any stray errors?

Maybe, once you’ve read over your application with the above in mind, you might read it aloud, or ask someone you trust to read it over too? Others can often catch things we can’t catch ourselves (especially for those of us who routinely undermine ourselves!).

And then go back over your application and remove anything that smacks of the following phrases that I must have read well over 1000 times during the last review process (and never want to read again!):

• “I’ve played games since I was a kid...”
• “Avid gamer...”
• “I’ve always known I was a storyteller…"
• “Since I was a child…."

6. Consider your unique offering.

Look. You’ve got something. You know what it is. I don’t know what it is unless you tell me. So please tell me! Show me the gems of originality that make you stand out from the crowd! I guarantee that every single person who applied for our internship has something special going on - because every single human being on this planet does.

At the end of the day, the real trick is knowing what your something is… and then figuring out how to show it.

This is the first post in a new series for the Die Gute Fabrik blog. Redux, from Game Designer and Co-Owner Douglas Wilson, takes some of his old game design posts from 2012, published on our former blog, and re-posts them here, sometimes with additional commentary. Some of these posts have been linked from various places, and so we wanted to save them from the abyss.

[This post was originally published on October 5, 2012]

Today, my roommate Nicklas – the renown Swedish indie developer better known as Nifflas – beat the secret “Hell” world in Spelunky. It was truly a run for the ages, full of daring feats of skill and a well-timed miracle or two.

But I’m getting ahead of myself! First, some background:

Spelunky is an addictive, procedurally generated platformer game for XBLA. It’s the follow-up the widely acclaimed (and freely available) classic version.

Over the course of this past summer, I gradually got sucked into the game. Nifflas is very good at the original version, and so he’s been teaching me along the way. Of course, Nifflas has had to adjust to the new XBLA controls, so we’ve both been honing our skills.

About a month ago, Nifflas and I started a daily tradition – a ritual, if you will. Every night, each of us gets one – and only one – Spelunky run. The other sits and watches, cheering along and providing advice. On rare days we’ll indulge in a few practice runs, but it’s only the “official” run that really matters – at least to us!

This ritual has been deeply enjoyable for several reasons. First, the tradition gives us something to look forward to every evening. Second, the “stakes” of the game feel so much more real when you only get one shot. One error and you’re done for the day. Nerve-wracking, but invigorating! Third, and perhaps most importantly, I find that it’s far more rewarding to play the game with somebody spectating – a witness with whom to share your triumphs and tribulations. After all, Spelunky is all about the stories you the player end up producing. As my hero Hannah Arendt puts it: “The presence of others who see what we see and hear what we hear assures us of the reality of the world and ourselves.”

Jokingly, before each run, we make a little prayer to Derek Yu, the game’s creator. (For example: “Derek Yu, please grant us plentiful bombs and protect us from dark levels. Amen.”). The prayer has itself become a key part of our daily ritual – to the point where we feel like we’ve almost created a Spelunky religion/cult. Like, why do bad things happen to good Spelunky players? And does Derek Yu even exist? Spelunky theology is tricky!

This leads us to Nifflas’ epic victory today. (Warning: spoilers ahead).

Hell is a secret world in the XBLA version of Spelunky. Actually, it’s a kind of secret within a secret. First, you have to make it to the well-hidden City of Gold – a difficult task that itself relies on beating a very particular sequence of secret challenges. I myself have managed to make it past the City of Gold, but I’ve never made it to the Hell world.

There were many highlights of Nifflas’ run, including how he (barely) managed to rob the Black Market (and the Ankh) despite the level being shrouded in darkness. However, there is one particular moment that stands out – a genuine Spelunky miracle.

By the time Nifflas had reached Olmec (the boss of World 4), he was almost out of ropes, and almost out of bombs. Worse yet, he possessed no flying gear (cape or jetpack). Of course, it would have been possible to beat Olmec, though trickier. But forget conquering Hell without flying gear – it just wouldn’t have happened.

Now, above Olmec, if you can make it up that high, you’ll find a treasure trove of crates and items. Nifflas proceeded to use the rest of his ropes, making it up to one platform with one crate. Unfortunately, the other crate-harboring platforms were out of reach.

And what did he find in that crate?

A jetpack. A fucking jetpack!

Unbelievable! With hope all but lost, Nifflas found exactly the item he needed. First, it allowed him to scour the rest of the level to collect the bombs he needed to defeat Olmec. Second, that jetpack would allow him to safely navigate the treacherous Hell levels.

I want to take a moment to emphasize how miraculous this turn of events was. I have played Spelunky for hours and hours, raiding countless crates, and I have never found a jetpack. The odds must be one in thousands. We felt like Derek Yu had finally answered our prayers – like Derek Yu himself was blessing the run. “Yes, Nifflas. After countless deaths, you have finally paid your dues. Go forth to Hell, and godspeed.”

I almost wonder whether the Spelunky code knew to “load the dice” in this situation. Did the game “know” that Nifflas desperately needed a jetpack? If so, Derek Yu (and his team) is a goddamn genius. Thinking about game design and procedural content, it seems to me that games like Spelunky should load the dice in very rare situations like this one. Don’t ever let the player know of course, but grant them some miracles… occasionally. Enable these kinds of epic tales! A powerful design trick indeed (albeit a dangerous one).

Well, Nifflas made good on his opportunity, and managed to conquer Hell – on his very first go! Some tips we learned along the way: in retrospect, it was fortunate indeed that he had robbed the Black Market. As it turns out, angry shopkeepers still guard the exits in Hell (who knew?). This allowed Nifflas to acquire a shotgun, which proves very useful against the final boss. Earlier in the run, he had also picked up a pitcher’s mitt and sticky bombs – both critically important for beating the boss in his final floating-head incarnation.

All in all, I feel very lucky to have witnessed Nifflas’ Spelunky miracle. Maybe it’s one of those things where “you just had to be there,” but it certainly ranks among my most memorable videogame moments.

Perhaps it’s Yang who puts it best: “the journey is its own reward and mastery is the greatest treasure of them all!” Or maybe Yang only has it partly right. Mastery, yes, but also camaraderie, as we’ve learned from our daily Spelunky ritual.

2021 Afterword

I have to admit, I feel equal parts nostalgic and embarrassed by this post. But I do still very fondly remember this ritual. This post was published mere weeks before I moved away from Copenhagen.

I'm honored that this little ritual of ours played a part in inspiring Derek and Andy to add a formalized "Daily Challenge" feature to the game, starting with the Steam release in 2013. Our ritual even gets a couple mentions in Derek's excellent book about the making of the game:

There was one aspect of Doug and Nifflas’s ritual that we couldn’t simulate with the Daily Challenge: having a witness to share your triumphs and tribulations with. For that, we’d have to depend on players to share their experiences online themselves.

In the nine years since this blog post, I have played a lot more Spelunky. In 2013, I wrote a big Polygon piece covering another incredible Spelunky feat — the infamous "Eggplant run."

I also started a Spelunky-themed podcast, The Spelunky Showlike, with my friends Zach Gage, Nick Suttner, and Andy Nealen. In recent years we rebranded the podcast as Eggplant (as we cover more games than just Spelunky), but we did recently do an in-depth miniseries about the sequel, Spelunky 2.

All of which is to say: big thanks to Derek and the various Spelunky dev teams for all these good times over the years! <3

Title image shared via CC license by RL GNZLZ on Flickr. Welcome to the fifth post in a regular series where we're going to be inviting members of our team to talk about One Cool Thing (not necessarily from games) and if/how it influences/reflects on their work. While we're not able to talk about the exciting things we're working on right now, we hope this will be a nice little series of introductions to the interests & practices of our excellent new team.

Here we have an entry from current collaborator Harry Josephine Giles. You can also check out Sharna Jackson on Joana Choumali, Angus Dick on Fantastic Planet, Ben Wilson on Leaderboards, and Char Putney on Randomness.

Brave Sparrow

I stumbled into making games as a poet, as someone who loves doing twisty things with language. I think about poetry a bit like I think about magic: if you say the right words in the right order, it can make a change happen in the world, or at least in your mind. After all, if you change your mind then you change the world. I'd played games ever since I got a Commodore 64 aged 5, but I always thought of myself as a writer, and I wasn't sure how that fitted together with games.

Avery Alder's Brave Sparrow is one of the games that showed me how poetry and games (and magic!) could go together.  Brave Sparrow is a game for one, and a pervasive game: it's something you play continuously in your daily life. In Brave Sparrow, you are a sparrow who has lost their wings, and you are working in a sparrow underground to recover them. It has all the main parts of a game: there's a back story, items to collect, missions to undertake, a win condition. It's only around 2000 words of rules, but everything is there to make it a game. And yet it is also completely unlike any other game I'd read before.

The first thing that I loved about Brave Sparrow was that it felt like reading the game was also a way to play it. I've played a good few roleplaying games, but I've downloaded the pdfs of many more, reading the rules, imagining what it would be like to play them. Sometimes I grieve for all the lost games, the games that were abandoned right after the character sheets got filled out, the gamebooks stuck at the back of the shelf. But Brave Sparrow isn't like that: when I read it, a world and a character unfolded in my mind, played all the way from opening montage to final confrontation. Even without beginning to play the game in the world, something in my mind was changing.

The second thing that I loved about Brave Sparrow was its impossibility. It seemed like it would be very hard to play. I don't want to spoil anything about it, but there are certain challenges in accomplishing the goals the game sets for you that make it difficult to imagine how you might win. Difficult but, crucially, not impossible. Not without a little magic, anyway. In that way it reminded me of the kind of absurdist games you'd find in the Fluxus Workbook or Yoko Ono's Grapefruit: games where the fun was trying and failing to imagine how you'd play. But there was something else, too.

The something else is the third thing I love about Brave Sparrow, which is its commitment to magic. To play Brave Sparrow, you need to believe, and you need to believe in magic. As Avery Alder writes in "Variations on Your Body", her book of four pervasive games in which Brave Sparrow is published:

"It’s important to sincerely imagine impossible things, to develop empathy towards impossible creatures, to practice being impossible. When we learn to see ourselves in the fantastical, the impossible, the absurd — when we construct new lenses by which to understand our own power and identities — we also put forward a challenge to the world around us."

"Practising being impossible" — that's what magic is. It's putting words and actions in the right order so that a change happens in your mind, your body, your world. Which is also, I think, another way of describing "playing a game".

I started using the word "gamepoem" to describe this kind of writing and playing. I started making up games to play (or fail to play) while I was walking around a city or beneath a mountain. I still do this compulsively, making up strange and small sets of rules to make being in the world a bit more magical. But I'm also thinking about how to bring the approach of a game-poem-spell into different kinds of writing.

How can we bring the magic of a poem into a videogame? When I'm playing a game, often I'm controlling a character who isn't quite me, in a world that isn't quite mine. Sometimes the gap between me and the screen feels too big to cross, and the magic doesn't happen. But even in the biggest, most dramatic game, sometimes there's a moment for a spell, or a poem. When I'm writing, what I try to do is put words in an order that will come out of the screen, into your mind, and make a little change. That's a practice I carry with me.

I'm also still practising how to be a brave sparrow.

We're delighted to welcome our first (of hopefully many more) Writing & Narrative Design Interns: Ida Hartmann.

As part of reflecting on and making more useful our development opportunities we're working on gathering the feedback of all our internship applicants, and will also write an evaluation of the process as a whole, and offer a blog post on 'do's and 'don't's for anyone applying to this kind of opportunity. In the meantime, we wanted to invite Ida to introduce herself. And tell you a little more about how she found the application process.

Tell us a little about yourself

When I first saw the advert from Die Gute Fabrik about the internship as a game writer and narrative designer, I was at my office in an old villa somewhere in Copenhagen, unable to grasp each day as they got sucked into the endless void that I  - under normal circumstances - would call November. It was a couple of months since the release of my first game, the interactive comic Stilstand. I’d been floating around in a non-creative vacuum ever since, only able to make figurative, therapeutic watercolour paintings and play Assasins Creed Odyssey on my Playstation.

My mind dwelling on both the eternal Corona lockdown and the absence of my creativity, it seemed like an absurd idea to even consider doing something new. Though I primarily see myself as a comic artist, I have for many years wanted to be able to write fiction without it relying on visual skills or (rather poor) drawing techniques.

The process with Stilstand was very unstructured, as I had never before taken on such a big fictional work and had no training in it. Instead, I relied on the collaboration with the game studio, Niila Games, and my own crumbling intuition. An intuition mostly based on being a snobbish film buff in my early twenties, reading my own emotional diary entries, and from the time I made comics in my spare time at university, where I took my master’s degree in digital culture and transmedia storytelling.

What drew you to apply?

After the release of Stilstand, I knew I wanted to continue to work with pushing the limits for storytelling in games, but I had no clue about where to start or how to do it. When I came across the advert from DGF on Twitter, it seemed like the perfect fit. Them: offering mentorship, game writer experience, and technological advancement; and me: offering my self-taught writing ability and a massive desire to grow as a writer and artist. I talked about the internship to my peers (mostly just shouting “I WANT IT!!!”), treating it almost like a piece of fiction. Then, when I found out that a whopping 3800 applied for the same position, it felt like winning a futuristic lottery (where the prize is a workplace) when I got invited to the next phases of the process.

What were the next steps like?

The next step was The Writing Test (which was paid), where I tried out three different writing disciplines connected to the internship. It was fun and challenging, and it convinced me how much I wanted to work with this, and with them. When I afterward got invited to the interview, I was glad I had worked on the writing test. This way they already knew my voice and how I could contribute to their company. In general, all phases of the hiring process made it clear for me, what kind of workplace DGF is and how I would fit into it. I felt respected and taken care of. That I had something to be proud of - even for just applying.

What are you looking forward to learning?

I sometimes still wonder why DGF wants to make such an effort just for an internship. Especially when it is an artistic and creative one, and for a role that is usually not prioritised in the game industry. It’s thrilling to be part of something that tries to create new values in the industry, and I would advise future applicants for next year’s internship is to continue to work with stories, regardless of platform, previous training, or culture. Find your own voice, and open your mind to what games can be and what storytelling you would like to contribute with.

At the moment I’m in the middle of my third work week, trying to catch up on all company readings as well as participating in CEO Hannah Nicklin’s dialogue workshop and taking the first small steps into the actual writing. It’s absolutely wonderful to be working on a project again, all the while Stilstand still has its own life. Recently it got submitted for the IGF (Independent Games Festival), and hopefully, other exciting things will happen in 2021. Sometimes I get messages from people who have played it, saying that they relate to the content - that they felt that they were seen. It gives me the fuel to continue writing from the heart, but also to learn how to do it in a professional and structured manner - to develop the tools to be able to get the stories out. Because... this is why you become a writer, isn’t it? To get your stories out to other people? I definitely think I came to the right place to do this.

This is the fifth post in Hannah Nicklin's #Craft series. In this series of posts Storyteller and Studio Lead Hannah Nicklin will be touching on elements of the craft of storytelling in games. This might be vocabulary, useful exercises, opinion pieces, or in this case, a two day workshop for improving your listening and writing skills around dialogue.

Writing begins with listening

This is a 2 day workshop that I've recently run as part of unifying the voice of a group of writers, but is also an excellent entry-level practical set of exercises for developing naturalistic, character-driven dialogue for contexts such as video games, TV and theatre.

There will be additional stylistic and formal needs of those media (is it a Tolkien-esque fantasy setting; or a noir detective show; or made for performers who can work with bodies as well as voice; made for animation - where the animation needs space to be expressive; what line length works comfortably on screen; are you writing for 'sounds like speaking' or are you writing for 'sounds like you're reading a book' etc.).

But no matter who you are and what you're writing for, if you want your characters to sound roughly like 'real people', then this is a good foundational workshop. It's best done with at least 2 people, because like any good creative process it's made immeasurably better through discussion and crit.  

Summary

Aims:

• To develop a common vocabulary for dialogue.
• To develop a sense of what it means to construct naturalistic dialogue.
• To practice and reflect in a supportive peer environment.

Resources

What you will need.

Worksheets:

Find the character and voice sample sheets here. Feel free to add sections!

Link to shared drive folder with resources.

Listening:

Normally, if this were non-pandemic times, the first half of this workshop would be to send you out to cafes for a day just to listen. To go to places and record snippets and listen. To make sure you capture people with different ages, backgrounds, ethnicities, power differentials (i.e. friend to friend, adult to child, colleagues), gender IDs, etc., as possible, and to listen. In a world without that possibility the next best thing is to try and find youtube, tiktok, etc. footage of people talking 'naturally' - not podcasts really (people are still performing).

If you're struggling for sources, I can recommend the Listening Project, which is a British Library and BBC UK-wide project of one-to-one conversations between people who know each other (not totally natural, but close). What's especially good about this is the regional variation.

Listening Project - Oral history | British Library - Sounds

One-to-one conversations on a topic of the speakers’ choice recorded by BBC Nations and Regions

Sounds

Reading:

Playwriting from Stephen Jeffreys - 'Dialogue' chapter:
Stephen Jeffreys - Playwriting -  Dialogue chapter.pdf
Buy the full book here: https://www.nickhernbooks.co.uk/playwriting

Day 1: Listening

Start off by meeting for 30-45 minutes with your peers and reflecting on how you currently feel about your dialogue skills - where you want to develop, the challenges you feel you face, influences and the context for your learning. This will help you support one another in a more targeted way as you crit throughout the day, and help everyone realise where they're starting from.

Exercise 1: Group work half of the day

30-45 mins: Listen

Listen to excerpts of 4-5 of the Listening Project conversations. OR find a conversation online which is 'natural' and not too performative (tic toc, youtube, etc. all good resources), and not actors performing or improvising.

30-45 mins: Transcribe

Then choose a short excerpt from 1-2 of them to transcribe.

1 hour: Describe

Once you have written it word-for-word, choose one of the speakers, and build a character & voice sheet for them. The aim is to build on what you have learned from the listening. This might include:

• Name
• Age
• Appearance
• Mannerisms
• Voice
• Vocal tics, habits
• Imagery
• Idioms
• Rhythms
• Pauses
• Interruptions
• Motivations in life
• History/education
• Character traits
• More!
• Moments of poetry

This is as if you were creating a character for a work of game, TV, theatre etc. (whatever your context is), based on the person you have listened to.

1 hour: Reflect:

When you have at least one character/voice sheet each, come back together to talk about the exercises, share your character sheets, what you pulled out, what you noted, and why you made those decisions.

Self-Guided half of the day.

1. Read (1 hour): The 'Dialogue' chapter from Stephen Jeffrey's Playwriting linked in Resources
2. Find (2 hours) an example of a scene you really like from a piece of popular television with a strongly presence voice/format. E.g. Bridgerton, Avatar the Last Airbender, Star Trek Deep Space Nine. Transcribe the dialogue, including stage directions and write some notes on how the dialogue is effective at communicating/using:

• Character
• Power dynamics
• Interruptions
• How does it feel natural
• How is it actually stylised
• Anything else you've learned from the Reading

3. Write (1 hour): Take two characters drawn from the recordings - the sheets made by everyone (i.e. you can choose other people's characters), and write a 1-2 page scenario between them, where character 1 tries to convince character 2 to do something they are unsure about. This is not about the story/plot/setting, choose a silly thing like 'get them to lend them a book', or 'get them to allow them to borrow a dress', make it set in 'our' world, the crucial thing here is to focus of the construction of the character through voice.

Aim to produce naturalistic dialogue where if you cover the character names you can still tell who is talking. Aim for people who talk in natural rhythms, with natural hesitations and constructions, but with enough style to be readable. Aim to use stage directions to hint at body language where people would naturally do that rather than speak their subtext. The first two reading and transcription exercises should have provided you with a good foundation for this task.

Day 2: Writing - part 1

Today you're going to reflect on the work you did in the second half of the previous day, and you're also going to do writing from the world and characters of one of your own works, or if you're not working on something currently, using existing characters. You will use everything learned the day before to inform your dialogue style, structure, etc.

If in day 1 you found one issue you had was to over-write lines (most people do not talk in paragraphs) today (if you write in google docs or word or a script editor) I want you to switch to A5 page format. If you write in a text editor, resize the margins or the window. Reduce your page width, and use this to be mindful of line-length.

2 hours: Share and reflect 1:

Come together and share and reflect on our work from the previous day.

Start off by discussing the reading - what did it help you articulate? Was there anything you took away which was valuable? Did you disagree anywhere?

Follow by sharing the transcriptions - what did you learn from these? How did they differ from the 'natural' speech of the listening exercise? How have they stylised characters, patterns of speech, and made their dialogue demonstrate the relationship between characters, and exposition of the plot?

Then do a group crit on the writing exercise, perform the scripts together - you will already immediately get a sense of what feels 'natural' and what feels stilted just from reading out loud. Discuss what feels effective, and what might need more work, discuss character mannerisms, voices, line length, rhythm, identity, think together about what a redraft could focus on.  

Then we'll do a final writing exercise. To prepare for this read the following and help one another to prepare a scenario. You will all write for the same scenario.

1 hour - Prepare: Collaboratively.

Take the world of one of the shows which you transcribed the exchange from, and choose two characters from the show. Together, collaboratively create a character and voice sheet for the characters, and decide between you on a scenario where one of them wants to get something from the other. Make any rough planning notes you might need to write the scene. Refer to the previous day's work if you wish.

1 hour - Write: Individually.

Individually: Write a 1-3 page scene based on the scenario, including stage directions.

Strive for a dialogue style which is strong in characterisation, and fairly natural in terms of brevity, and sentence structure, but reads much more neatly than dialogue-for-speaking.

(if you're writing for games, then you might like to finish the scenario with an interesting choice, of 1-5 words, that a player could make.)

1 hours - Share & Reflect 2:

As a group read and reflect on the scripts you have written. As you will have worked on the same characters and scenario it will be interesting to see how someone else has approached the task, and hopefully you will be able to draw out the places where you have all made good choices.

2 hours - Redraft, Edit

Some choices for this final work time, choose on the basis of what you feel will be most interesting/useful

1. Spend at least a short time redrafting one or both of your written pieces.
2. Spend some time editing someone else's script
3. Repeat any of the exercises using what you have learned

1 hours - present and reflect:

You present your work, you reflect and discuss:

• What did you find easy?
• What was difficult?
• What did you like?
• What did you learn?
• How might you develop either of the pieces/voices/characters?

Before you finish, make notes somewhere you can come back to when you pick up writing work in the future - a notebook where each week you note down what you learned that week - a text doc you add to with things you learn - or some post its you can stick on your wall.

I hope you found this useful! Tweet me @hannahnicklin if you follow the workshop, I'd love to hear if it worked for you <3