Geppert couldn't talk about what the studio is working on next, but she will be part of the creative process, including the writing. Watching an actual person is too personal, which is one reason why her future projects will, according to her, draw less on personal experience.Įarlier this year, Jo-Mei received funding for their next game, codenamed "Ocean" at the moment. But last time I ran away."Ĭo-workers will pass on anecdotes, but in terms of processing feedback, Geppert sticks to reading reviews from critics-that's it. It's so weird for me to see somebody consuming the art you did in a real emotional way. I hear what others tell me how they reacted. "I have to be honest," she said, "I watched the testers back in the days because I needed to. Geppert then worked hand-in-hand with Bell to figure out how to rewrite and reconfigure. What was left was then handed to writer Stephen Bell, who contributed to indie darling What Remains of Edith Finch and has been a narrative consultant on a number of other games. In the end, roughly a third of the script was removed, words now deemed unnecessary. Specifically, she pointed to numerous instances where the game's main character, Kay, would explain what the player was seeing.while the player was looking directly at it. It is great but it could have been less." But when the game came out, many said "it's so on the nose, it's so much" and they were right! I hate it! No, no, no, no, no. "I don't want people to miss what I want to say. "So I sat there and thought about it and thought this is likely true," she said. "I remember I was talking to some journalists who talked badly about Sea of Solitude's script and everything, and they were always surprised when I was like, 'Yeah, I agree with you. The publisher was fine with whatever direction Geppert went in, but Geppert recalls agreeing with their analysis, resulting in a game script that was overly talkative, holding the player's hand. She recalled a meeting with Electronic Arts, in which the publisher said Sea of Solitude was, perhaps, in danger of being misunderstood by relying too much on subtleties and metaphors. The first thing that needed to change, in Geppert's mind, was the script. "The first console game, the first time I ever wrote a story. "When we made Sea of Solitude, it was so many firsts," said Geppert. She could rewrite the script, rework the story around it, employ professional voice actors (the original game used some in-house employees), and update the cutscenes. Quantic Dream's offer was to let Geppert take another pass at Sea of Solitude. Geppert explained how the game's publisher, Electronic Arts, has never really embraced Nintendo's machine, and so the option never came up. The two traded emails, and later, Fondaumière sent Geppert a note and asked why Sea of Solitude hadn't appeared on Switch. Except, she joked, "for the ending."įondaumière reportedly mentioned how several people at Quantic Dream enjoyed Sea of Solitude, and the two went back and forth before it was time to head back inside. Geppert said she's long been a fan of Quantic Dream's early game, Fahrenheit. But at Gamescom 2019, Geppert found herself smoking an e-cigarette outside of a hotel with Quantic Dream co-CEO Guillaume de Fondaumière, and the two began chatting about shared admiration. For Sea of Solitude developer Jo-Mei Games, this was its first foray outside of free-to-play browser games, so of course such a hard pivot would have its issues. In most cases, that's that, and everyone looks towards the next game.
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