Script Lock

We've returned with a more focused episode on the Ghost of Yotei, and we're joined by Courtney (Senior Writer on Yotei, previously a Lead Writer & Narrative Director on Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic remake for Aspyr Media, and a Writer on Bioware's Dragon Age: Inquisition: The Descent, and Star Wars: The Old Republic: Knights of the Fallen Empire) and Ari (Senior Writer on Yotei, and previously a Narrative Director at Postcard Game Studio, Writer on Guerilla's Horizon Forbidden West, Narrative Designer at Capcom, and teacher of game writing at Vancouver Film School) to discuss the relationship between theme parks and game design, Ghost of Yotei’s open world design, the narrative tool developed for the game, exposition rules, their relationship with design, making weapon tutorials more resonant, what makes ideas worthy for games as opposed to other mediums, not getting lost in the details of a game, and some of their favorite people they’ve worked with.

 

Stuff We Talked About

GDC 2026: Flipping the Script: Overhauling Sucker Punch's Writing Pipeline for 'Ghost of Yotei' (GDC vault members only)

Sucker Punch's other talks from GDC 2026

 

Our theme music was composed by Isabella Ness, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita

Happy holidays!!! We have returned from the crisp winter cold of work deadlines with a brand new episode containing Yuri Lowenthal (Actor on such games as Marvel’s Spider-Man, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, Persona 3 and 4, Final Fantasy VII Remake and Rebirth, Helldivers 2, and more, not to mention his work in cartoons and anime. He also co-wrote the book Voice-Over Voice Actor with his wife Tara) AND Nhi Do (Actress and producer of the stage and screen, and voiced the lead character in the Peadbody-winning 1000xResist. Her other recent projects include Invasion, The Irrational, Sight Unseen, Spread, Door Mouse, and more)! They join us to discuss coming from theater, crazy requests they’ve made in the booth, how they’ve managed to develop deep relationships were certain studios, not knowing where your character is going in a story, how they prefer to receive direction, favorite/least favorite pieces of direction, do they ever push back when they see a line that doesn’t feel right for the characters, has the way they’ve handled auditions changed over the years, what it’s like being married to actors, how often they make discoveries with a character after they’ve started recording, is there a game or character they’ve wished they worked on, and so much more!
Our Guests
Yuri Lowenthal, and his new acting class: Voice-Over Voice Actor: The Course
Nhi Do, and her upcoming film: Sawtooth Mountain
Stuff We Talked About
1000xRESIST
Grendel
Remy Siu's GDC talk is in the vault still, but here's a version of the talk he gave at Full Indie Summit: Controlled Chaos in the Writer's Room of 1000xRESIST
Devised Theater
Marvel’s Spider-Man
Beyond: Two Souls
Bioshock 2
Double Fine PsychOdyssey
Voice-Over Voice Actor by Yuri Lowenthal and Tara Platt
Our theme music was composed by Isabella Ness, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita

We're over halfway through 2025 and we've got Karrie (Lead Writer and Lead Narrative Designer of Pacific Drive, previously wrote and designed on League of Legends for Riot Games, Totemic for Collage Games, and Not Tonight 2 for Panic Barn. Also worked as a Director of Marketing at Strangely Compelling Multimedia, a Producer at tinyBuild Games, a Lead Narrative Designer at The Exit Game, and was a BAFTA Breakthrough talent for 2024) and Ros (Senior Mission Designer on the upcoming game Last Sentinel, previously Senior Narrative Designer on Clockwork Revolution, Narrative Designer on Deathloop, Narrative Designer and Audio Lead on Battlefield V, and an audio designer on Star Wars Battlefront X-Wing VR, Star Wars Battlefront 2, and Battlefield One) in to talk about breaking into games via Craigslist, what Ros has been up to since working on Battlefield 1, who/what taught them the most about storytelling, changing a game in response to fans, how Karrie’s experience making escape rooms and working in marketing influenced her narrative work, handholding players too much, rules they adhere to for getting exposition across successfully to players, how to make a good opening, how they feel about games that get “good” after a certain amount of time, favorite openings, favorite and least favorite tools for storytelling, strategies for breaking through creative blocks, things they’ve had to unlearn in their work, the rule of cool, how do you tell when something is funny enough, and how open you should be with artistic intent after releasing something.
Our Guests
Karrie's Website and Bluesky
Ros' Website
Stuff We Talked About
Craigslist
Pacific Drive
LOST
Bioshock’s Opening
Final Fantasy X-2’s Opening
Inscryption
Skin Deep
Our theme music was composed by Isabella Ness, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita

Hello hello! We're back with returning guests Brendon Chung (founder of Blendo Games and creator of such games as Gravity Bone, Flotilla, Atom Zombie Smasher, Thirty Flights of Loving, Quadrilateral Cowboy, and the recently released Skin Deep) and Laura Michet (writer and editor who's worked on such games as Where the Water Tastes Like Wine, Frog Fractions 2, Swan Hill, You Got This, Brutadon!, The Brigand’s Story, and more. She was a Principal Writer and Editor at Riot Games, was the Narrative Director on Skin Deep, and is currently a Narrative Director at Heart Machine) to talk about the recently-released Skin Deep as well as Brendon working with VO for the first time, the goals that came out of deciding Skin Deep would be a comedy game, earnestness in storytelling, making a comedy game with multiple writers, documentation, their process working together as a married couple, the narrative challenges of working on a sim game, what they think makes a good game opening, advice for people wanting to get better at writing dialogue, their processes for writing down ideas, how they power through blocks, what they’re playing and watching these days that gets them excited, how they toe the line between creative expression and making a living, explaining and over-explaining things, how do they not overwrite outlines while providing openings for design, deranged subreddits, and a whole lot more!
Our Guests
Brendon Chung and Laura Michet would love it if you played Skin Deep and left a review on Steam!
Stuff We Talked About
Skin Deep
Thief
Deus Ex
System Shock
The Substance
Dredd
Splinter Cell: Conviction
Hitman
Wheel World
Prey (and Mooncrash)
Another World
Mercenaries
Workflowy
The Devil’s Plan
Physical: 100
Culinary Class Wars
Our theme music was composed by Isabella Ness, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita

We return with another grab bag episode for GDC 2025! Like last year, we brought a bunch of simple questions to ask folks, and in these three groups you get to hear how their answers differed. In our first group we had Chase Dodge (NYU student), Ruari Root (NYU student), Calliope Ryder (prev Lead Producer on Tales of the Shire at Weta Workshop), Chandana Ekanayake (Co-Founder and Creative Director of Outerloop Games), Hudson Janow (NYU student, Gay Gaming Professionals scholar), Apollo Umbra (Northwestern student, Gay Gaming Professionals scholar). Our second group had Lis Moberly (Lead Game Designer at Walt Disney Company, 20th Century Games), Vincent Perea (Senior Art Director at Disney Experiences), Lola Shiraishi (Co-Founder of Stellium Studios), and Meghan Thornton (Story Manger at Insomniac Games). And our last group had Emma Kidwell (Writer at Firaxis Games), Natalie Checo (PR Consultant at Future Friends Games, Journalist, and Game Writer/Editor), Sam Low (Global Communications Exec at Neon Noroshi, and SEA Brand Development Manager for Critical Reflex), Nessa Cannon (Game Writer and Narrative Designer), and Bria Davis (Community Director at Young Horses)
Topics included: favorite people they’ve worked with, hobbies that have paid off the most in their work, underrated game faves, ideas and mechanics that they are keen to put in their next games, what to do when you’re feeling drained and in need of inspiration, most recent games they’ve been playing, someone in the industry who did something nice for them, games they keep returning to, if they could force developers to do one thing what would it be, times they’ve messed up and what they learned from it, game character crushes, something they do as their process that saves time, what they would have on their ideal writing/narrative design test, how they creatively rejuvenate themselves, and more!
Our Guests
Group 1: Chase Dodge, Ruari Root, Calliope Ryder, Chandana Ekanayake, Hudson Janow, Apollo Umbra
Group 2: Lis Moberly, Vincent Perea, Lola Shiraishi, Meghan Thornton
Group 3: Emma Kidwell, Nessa Cannon, Natalie Checo, Sam Low, Bria Davis
Stuff We Talked About
Fear the Spotlight
Tangle Tower
Chants of Senaar
30 Flights of Loving
Spiritfarer
MÖRK BORG
Hues and Cues
Life is Strange
Papers, Please
Urban Shadows
Arctic Eggs
Citizen Sleeper
Metaphor Refantazio
Rimworld
Frostpunk 2
Monster Hunter Wilds
Hades 2
Return of the Obra Dinn
Dragon Quest V
Subnautica
The Artist’s Way
Final Fantasy VII
Our theme music was composed by Isabella Ness, and our logo was created by Lily Nishita.