The Australian Writers’ Guild is encouraging writers and narrative designers who work in the games industry to enter the Interactive Media & Gaming Category for the 2023 AWGIE Awards, which recognises the best work from Australian writers on screen, stage, and audio. Entries close on 5 October 2023.
The Interactive Media & Gaming category judges writing for digital, interactive mediums where narrative plays a strong component, and the writer is a key creative contributor. It includes digital games of course, but also interactive graphic novels, apps, and other kinds of interactive fiction. Entrants are required to submit a full script for consideration, for a small fee.
Time-looping narrative game The Forgotten City was the recipient of this particular prize during the 2016 AWGIE Awards. The game took the form of a Skyrim mod at this time, and creator Nick Pearce told GamesHub that the award was a factor that encouraged him to remake it into a standalone title – which was subsequently very well received by critics globally.
Read: Behind the high-risk development of The Forgotten City
You can enter the Interactive Media & Gaming category of the 2023 AWGIE awards on the official website. Entries close on 5 October 2023.
Elsewhere, the Australian Writers’ Guild is hosting a series of talks centered around game narrative design in September and October 2023, in tandem with major games industry events like Melbourne International Games Week.
- JoJo Zhou: In Conversation with Ellen Jurik centres around a conversation about Zhou’s work on Cult of the Lamb, and is a digital event on 25 September 2023.
- Narrative Direction: Get Pitch Ready! will run as part of Melbourne International Games Week, and feature narrative designer Alexander Swords speaking about the process of pitching your projects to potential stakeholders on 30 September 2023.
- Finally, Lunch Break: Directing the Narrative will feature a conversation between Alexander Swords and fellow narrative designers Cam Rogers (Digital Extremes) and Matt Zagurak (formerly Ubisoft). It will be a digital event running on 4 October 2024.
Those interested can find out more on the Australian Writers’ Guild website.
