Crafty Game Writing

Secrets of Great Videogame Narrative

By: Alex Epstein

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eText | 30 April 2025 | Edition Number 1

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Every writer dreams of creating their own game world and telling their own stories. But creating a new game from scratch is different from working on an established franchise. If you're writing for Star Wars or Assassin's Creed or the Marvel Universe, the groundwork has already been laid for you. But what if you are the person who has to lay that groundwork? Where do you start? How do you decide which, among the endless story options, is the right one? How do you create a story that plays nice with the gameplay and pulls the player in?

Alex Epstein, an experienced narrative director who has worked on half a dozen new IPs, takes you step by step through the process of creating compelling new worlds and characters that feel real.

Of course, many challenges are the same, whether you're creating your own game or working within a franchise. How do you make players think they have maximum freedom when they absolutely do not? What makes players inhabit a game story, not just skip past it? How can "dirty narrative" (a term Epstein coined) increase player engagement?

Packed with practical tips, Crafty Game Writing: Secrets of Great Videogame Narrative will help you understand the invisible infrastructure of player-pulled storytelling for video games - whether you aspire to make your own indie game or create the Next Big Thing for a AAA studio.

Features:

This book is packed with tools to help the writer not only know what to write, but also how to write it well.
The author has created the narrative for half a dozen entirely new games (not based on prior IP) and discusses how to build characters and worlds out of nothing. (Note: most video game writers, including game writing book writers, have worked in franchises.)
This book includes the semi-heretical "dirty narrative" writing technique, using mysteries, absences, and translucent liars to pull the player into engagement with the game world and story.