BETA | PRODUCTION // DIRECTING
Direct action
A new wave of traditional directors from fi lm, television and theatre are taking an interest in working in games. Will Freeman talks to some that have already made the transition about the challenges and opportunities
OMUK’s Mark Estdale and directors Delyth Thomas and John Dower are championing the increasing use of directing games to their peers
Telltale is developing a game adaptation of hit television and book series Game of Thrones (below), which will be directed by OMUK’s Mark Estdale
THE TITLE ‘DIRECTOR’ has appeared on business cards throughout the games development sector for many years. Those that sport the ‘creative director’ role are likely the term’s most common adopters, but what of the role of the traditional director from the realms of theatre, fi lm and television? Arguably the art of direction has been relevant in the industry for years, with acting, motion capture performance, voice work and cutscenes standing as long-established tenants of the video game form. But those that specialise in traditional performance direction for games are few and far between. That is beginning to change, however, as directors from other fi elds take an interest in the potential and challenge of games. John Dower made the move ahead of most. A former director of television shows including
the UK’s iconic Eastenders, The Bill and Casualty, he joined Lionhead in 2007, fascinated by the opportunity.
“I think directors should approach games ‘because they are there’,” confi rms Dower, now a freelance director with a long list of game projects to his name. “I don’t think it’s sensible today for a director to say ‘I just like fi lm’, ‘I just like telly’ or ‘theatre is the pure art’. “Games are bigger than all that now, so I think it would be snobby for a director not to take a game seriously. That’s not to say I think all games are great or that their direction can’t be much better, because it can. But I don’t want to get left behind as directing changes, and I don’t think other directors should either.” Dower certainly isn’t alone, and fellow UK Board of Directors member Delyth Thomas is endeavouring to introduce more peers to the world of games.
“Games are in that fascinating place where they’re not live action or just animation, which I’ve often worked with before,” explains the BAFTA-nominated Thomas, whose showreel is packed with an impressive range of comedy and children’s fi lm and TV work. “So often in games these actors are working without visuals – or without many visuals – and they tend to over compensate for that fact. “So there’s a challenge there as a director of having the visuals in your head and bringing the performances to match that vision and the gameplay. It’s a fascinating challenge, and so should be really appealing for some directors.”
24 | JULY 2014
That challenge may be exciting and motivating, but it’s certainly not insignifi cant, as games makers and directors have to match their contrasting experience sets for the good of games, learning one another’s creative language and methods, and melding the two. Put simply, the coupling presents a meeting of those with a long heritage in linear scripts and direction of straightforward performances with the makers of interactive worlds, which are defi ned by something quite ghastly to a traditional director.
THE PLAYER DIRECTOR
The player, after all, can control camera, pace, narrative order and much else beside, like some unruly audience member of a theatre production stepping forward as a creative backseat driver.
Dower breaks it down into two schools of directing; the linear, and what he calls ‘interactive directing’, which is at the crux of what developers must be prepared to support if they are to reap the rewards of welcoming those from fi lm, TV and theatre to their studios. A specialist in that very skill is Mark Estdale, MD of game dialogue production studio OMUK, and a professional devotee to stage sound and lighting since the early 1980s. “I think directors that ignore this
opportunity are as daft as brushes, really, as it’s the most exciting opportunity for directors on the planet,” says Estdale, who is currently at work on Telltale’s coming Game of Thrones
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