Burning Ambition Part 3-A: The origin of an intellectual property
by at March 12, 2008 11:00 am
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As I had written last week, Burning Man Studios (BMS) was originally developing an original IP called, Ruthless Earth. As it became clear to company director Steven Hammans that he might loose his IP the further we got into production, the decision was made to move in a new direction with a new IP, one that both he and I could bare to loose if need be. It isn’t to say that CoH isn’t near and dear to my heart. But as any good writer will tell you, he or she always has another great story to tell.
Conquest of Heroes’ story was primarily inspired by two things. First, a girl named Tina Yap, who is also the inspiration for the game’s lead character, Velvet. I had met Tina while playing City of Heroes and she helped give me the strength and courage to overcome my demons and chase a few dreams. The second is simply my love of comic books, namely the X-Men. It is in the long and brilliantly written history of Marvel Comics’ X-Men that I drew many of the central themes and characters in CoH.
Add in my own devotion to science fiction, history (namely Roman) and the military and Conquest of Heroes is born.
While some stories might take months or even years to develop, Conquest of Heroes was something that just came easily. I had drawn on all my influences and general interest to try and create a story that would both be appealing to a reader and players as well as go beyond just a game.
I firmly believe that when creating a IP, all developers should think about more than just how interesting their premise might be as a game, but think how far they can possibly take the themes and the heart of the story. Plenty of big motion pictures with two hundred million dollar budgets are forgotten just a year after its release, yet, a great movie, or game can be remember for years to come. None of us recall classic game series because of their amazing graphics, which change by the year, but we still remain in love with the series that had a story to tell.
In creating Conquest of Heroes, which will be available first as a novel later this year, I hope that people will enjoy the obvious thing that are cool and fun to read, as well as watch. But, too, I hope that the message and themes of hope, lose, forgiveness, redemption and pride in our world, nation and peoples, gamers and readers will take to heart.
Of course, turning a story idea into a game, is a whole other story.
Read all 10 weeks of “Burning Ambition: How to make your mark on the videogame industry:”
Site [Burning Man Studios]
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