The Game & Word Podcast: Volume 4, Episode 1: Story Mode (ft. Jennifer Allaway)

Welcome, dear readers, to The Game & Word Podcast! I’ve got a wonderful show for you today.

My guest this week is Jennifer Allaway, Senior Game Writer at Monolith Productions. We talked about about narrative design, what goes into building an effective branching narrative, and tips for any of you current or aspiring writers who are thinking of breaking into the game industry.

[Here’s a hint for one of them: play D&D. Yes, as in “Dungeons & Dragons.” Yes, I’m serious. You’ll just have to listen to find out why!]

It was a most enlightening and fun conversation. Jen is an industry veteran who’s worked as a game writer and narrative designer for many years, and her advice is sound, practical, actionable, and backed by her experience working in video games. I hope you find it useful and illuminating!

Now, before we proceed, I do want to get a couple of housekeeping items out of the way. First… if I sound a little funny in the intro and outro, it’s because I’m fighting a nasty bug that’s clogged my sinuses and messed up my throat. Fortunately, I recorded the main episode ahead of time, so don’t worry, you won’t have to listen to me talk strange for long! I appreciate you bearing with me.

Second, please take note of the following notices:

🚨🚨🚨 SPOILER ALERT 🚨🚨🚨
This episode contains SPOILERS for the Banner Saga Trilogy. If you’ve yet to play the games, and think you might play them someday, you might want to skip this one. Unless you don’t mind spoilers, in which case, carry on!
⚖️⚖️⚖️ ETHICS DISCLOSURE ⚖️⚖️⚖️
The episode notes contain affiliate links. If you click on any such link and purchase the linked product, Game & Word gets a small cut of the sale. This helps keep the newsletter sustainable without needing to put up paywalls or ads.

Third, join us over at the Game & Word subscriber chat to hang out with me and your fellow curious gamers (and gamer-adjacent folks!). Much like you would on Twitter, but with none of the toxic nonsense. As I record this, you do need to have the Substack iOS app installed to join the chat—once you’ve installed it, be sure and follow the directions linked here to join in the fun:

Game & Word

Just a Quick (But Big) Update

Good morning, dear readers: If you live somewhere that observes Daylight Saving’s Time, I hope you enjoyed the extra hour of sleep last night! If not, all good! I hope you’re having a wonderful weekend, regardless of where you are. As for me? I’m still polishing up the next issue of…

3 months ago · 8 likes · Jay 🎮➕✍🏼

Oh, yeah—you also need to subscribe to the Game & Word Substack to participate. Whether you’re a free or paid subscriber, you’re welcome to chat… but it IS called subscriber chat for a reason!

Finally, I’d like to thank Game & Word’s founding members for making this video possible:

Le_Takas, from Luzern, Switzerland (Member since April 14, 2022)
Ela F., from San Diego, CA (Member since April 24, 2022)
Alexi F., from Chicago, IL (Member since May 13, 2022)
Elvira O., from Mexico City, Mexico (Member since May 18, 2022)

Thank you all for listening today! Episode notes and links are below. Enjoy the show, and see you next week (or before then, on the subscriber chat!)

Podcast Notes & References

Theme Music Attribution

Simply Me by Deoxys Beats | https://soundcloud.com/deoxysbeats1
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en_US

Our Guest: Jennifer Allaway

Twitter: @allawayj
Monolith Productions

Games Referenced:

Banner Saga [Purchase: Nintendo Switch | PS4 | Xbox One]
Disco Elysium
Wadget Eye Games
- Shardlight
- Unavowed
2064 Read Only Memories
Choices: Stories You Play
Wonder Woman
Other Resources:
NYU Game Center Program
IndieCade

The G&W Podcast: Story Mode, ft. Jennifer…