Dead Island 2

Dambuster Studios, Nottingham, UK – Lead Narrative Designer

Dead Island 2 was an amazing project to help create.

I wrangled a team of four narrative designers, two of whom I hired, and together we brought a game that had been in development hell for a decade over the finish line with style, panache, and decent Metacritic scores.

I also had the privilege of announcing it at Gamescom 2022’s Opening Night Live, onstage with Geoff Keighley.

At Dambuster, I was the primary writer until my departure for the player character “Dani”.

It was a challenge for someone who sounds American to write an Irish character authentically… but never underestimate the power of my fully-operational research skills!

Irish players thought I did all right.

As Lead Narrative Designer, I had a major role in casting and directing the voice actors, preparing for their recording sessions, directing many sessions, and throughout, working with the Creative Director to walk a tricky tonal tightrope in our scripts.

We needed writing and performances that left room for serious moments but still conveyed the humor and absurdity of the Dead Island franchise’s pulpy, larger-than-life vibes without straying into anything quippy, self-referential, or Whedonesque.

IGN seems to have believed that we succeeded, though their review of the rest of the game was more mixed.

https://www.ign.com/articles/dead-island-2-review

I’m very proud of my team’s successful collaboration with the environment art, level design, and audio teams on the game’s environmental storytelling, which was also received quite positively by both players and critics.

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And just for funsies, please now enjoy this article I wrote when I was still a Principal Narrative Designer (I was promoted to Lead before my promotion was up) and feel free to send it to any youngsters in your life asking about what narrative design means in games:

Interview: “An Introduction to Narrative Design”, Oct 28, 2020