(Part 2 of 2)

In part one of this interview, writer Adam Moore discussed how he broke into the entertainment industry and what it means to be a writer working in an omnimedia landscape. If you haven't read it already, check out "Adam Moore: Writing in an Omnimedia Landscape (Part 1 of 2)." Here in part two, Moore discusses what a writer needs to know to be prepared for the omnimedia market.

Q: What does the omnimedia market offer screenwriters?

A: Companies are starting to connect the dots between video games and films and comic books. So, it's really a strategy. With "Vendor," the easiest route was a comic book publisher, because otherwise it was a $150 million film and we're not quite ready to set up a $150 million film right now.

Our big spec that went out that got us a lot of attention was called "The Pinkertons." It is about Allan Pinkerton and the formation of the Pinkerton Detective Agency. Right now, it's being packaged over at WME Entertainment. In that case, we thought it would be a cool TV show; a fun video game; a detective story in the Wild West with the emergence of forensic technology. We decided, in consultation with our representation, to write it as a spec. They said, "If you write this as a spec, we can do a lot with it." We said, "Okay. This becomes a spec." That's really how we operate.

Q: Where are these markets and what should interested writers have ready as writing samples?

A: The important thing to remember is that video games, movies, TV, kids animation and comic books are all part of one big industry. DC Comics is owned by Warner Bros. Marvel is owned by Disney. Having said that, you need to have a good spec script. You can write a spec game design document, a spec animated episode of "Kim Possible" or "Batman" or something like that, but the screenplay remains the standard by which all writers in Hollywood are judged. I had a panel discussion in one of my classes the other night and I brought in an animation writer to talk about how to get into writing for kids animation. That writer has written literally hundreds of episodes of animated TV, he's made a fantastic living at it, and yet, he is still not taken seriously by people in the film industry because he writes for animated TV -- for animated shows that have won awards. So, you want to have that great screenplay.

On top of that, you have to start going out and writing for yourself. For example, my partner and I wrote a graphic novel called "Vendor." It was for Viper Comics and was published in 2008. We wrote it, not to make money as comic book writers, but to establish ourselves in that world and show we have our chops in the comic book world; and also to create other things based on that. So, one thing we can do when we go out on meetings is say, "We've written this comic book." Our comic book -- I'll call it a graphic novel because it sounds far more impressive -- our graphic novel got us our manager, Jake Wagner, which eventually led to us getting signed by William Morris Agency [now merged with Endeavor to form WME Entertainment].

So, what did we have? We had the graphic novel which got published and launched at Comic-Con. We got a little buzz off of that and we went on a bunch of meetings. But we also had a great spec screenplay, very commercial, very four-quadrant. The comic book along with that is what made people sit up and say, "Okay, these guys know what to do." In fact, my manager has told me, "If you guys didn't pitch me that spec script idea, I never would have signed you. So many people write a comic book and think they're screenwriters, and guess what? They're not screenwriters. They're comic book writers," (which I disagree with because I think writing is writing). You have to have that spec script so people in Hollywood can go and look you up on the tracking boards; you can go on general meetings and build yourself from there.

We also wrote a game design document based on our own comic book. We had a meeting at Bruckheimer films and we were talking about one project of ours, and Bruckheimer films has a film division, a TV division and a video game division. When we went in, it was to meet with one of their film execs, but it became a meeting about more than just film because they recognized, in the room, that we have chops in the omnimedia landscape. So, the exec in the meeting said, "You need to meet with the head of our game division and I want to sit you down and talk about the script with the TV people because maybe it could become a TV pilot." If we'd just come in with a screenplay, it would have been, "These guys are screenwriters." In the film industry in general, if you come in with a screenplay and they read the screenplay, then they think you're a screenwriter. They don't realize that you're capable of doing anything else at all.

So, our concept went out to production companies. It's a little dark and it's also the first volume of a three-volume series. When we sent it out, we said, "Consider this act one." And development execs read it and got back to us and said, "It feels like it's unfinished. It feels like it's act one of a story." And we said, "We know. There's more to it than that." They said, "It's too dark for us. We don't like these elements of it." And we said, "You know what? We can change it. We can modify it. We are looking to develop the idea with you."

That's why you want to come prepared with all these different things. You've got your comic book under your belt. You've got your game design document under your belt and preferably, a credit. Any credit will work in the video game world. And then suddenly, they don't think of you just as a screenwriter, they think "These guys are doing something more -- they know all the different arms of the industry." It'll make you a far more marketable writer for your agent and it'll make you more interesting to the people that are going to hire you.

There's a great company, they're brand new, called Blacklight Transmedia. They've got a first-look deal at Imagine. One of the guys that runs it is [former Fox Atomic VP] Zak Kadison. He's a really smart guy. He's shopping franchise books. It's not a game; it's not a movie; it's not a TV show; it's a thirty-page concept book. Here is the world that is created, here are the characters and here are the types of stories we can tell within it. And they're taking that out to the studios. Essentially, the package says, "This is what we can give you; this is the whole thing." It's like what Kevin and I are doing, but he's got a first-look deal with Imagine and some capital raised. So, we'll go to a company like that with an idea. They can see what we want to do and give advice on it. Just recently, we sent the game design document over there for "Vendor" to ask, "What do you think? Do you want to go somewhere with this?" It's going to be interesting to see if more companies like that emerge.

Another company is called Union Entertainment. They do management and production in the video game and comic book world. In the interest of full disclosure, Kevin and I have been clients of theirs on the video game side for a year or two.

Q: How did you get tapped to start the game design program for New York Film Academy?

A: When I started teaching, I taught a one-hour seminar called "Writing Outside of the Box," which was writing for comic books, video games and kids animation. When I became the Business of Screenwriting teacher, I expounded on all that and made it into a huge overview of every form of writing. My idea was to take everything I didn't learn at AFI or NYU, and put it into this class to prepare students for the real world of Hollywood. That includes bringing guests in -- not just screenwriters, but also development execs, people that have interned before, video game writers, animation writers, TV writers and reality TV writers. (Even though, supposedly, there are not writers in reality TV. Of course we know the truth is that there really are writers in reality TV.) I try to bring in every facet of the industry just to point out there's more than just movies and TV to write for.

The school saw that video games had eclipsed the motion picture industry in total revenue. As a mass-cultural medium, video games are here and they're not going anywhere. Anyone who is under twenty right now plays video games far more often than they go to a movie theater or watch a TV show. Movies will always be here, but video games are where it's at. The school said it was time to start addressing that and asked me to create a game design program. It's not like we're the first school to ever offer game design, but we wanted to take a different approach to it. A lot of schools take a very technical approach. Here are the ones and zeroes; here's the binary code; here's what you need to know technically how to make a game. That is important and you need computer programmers and things like that. Back in the day when you played Super Mario Brothers, the extent of a story was "Save the princess" and when you got to the level where the princess was, you got a little guy who said, "Sorry, the princess is in another castle." As games got more technically complicated with better graphics and audio, the one thing that was lacking was story and players started to demand better stories in games, which opened up a career path for people like me.

What I pitched to the school was not a game design program, but a game writing program. Wisely, they said, "Adam, that's a foolish idea." (both laugh) "You need more than just game writing." Fair enough. I'm a writer, so obviously I think writing is the most important part of a game. The important lesson is that no one buys a video game because of a great story. No one has ever gone out to buy "Super Mario Galaxy" and said, "Oh, I heard this story was amazing." You buy a video game because you want to blow up aliens or jump on mushrooms, or play soccer or baseball. So gameplay always trumps story. But, when games really succeed like "BioShock," "Halo 3," "Batman: Arkum Asylum" -- those games succeed because the gameplay and the story are completely integrated. You really can't tell the difference between gameplay and the story because they are so integrated.

Q: How are other games different from those?

A: A lot of games are thrown together. The designer comes up with game and about two months before they are going to release it, they hire a writer and say, "Hey, can you throw some dialogue at it?" Those games tend to suck. The New York Film Academy is going to found the first game writing and design program. The motto is "Every student is a storyteller." It's a two-year program and in the first year, you get an introduction to everything; to game writing, game design, programming, art and animation, and the business of video game class where you learn the nuts and bolts about how the industry works. There's an evening lecture series where guests come in from all different angles of the game industry; we have a video game analysis class where, from "Pong" to "Batman: Arkham Asylum," we look at the whole history of games. We play them in class and talk about what makes this fun. Why does this part work? Why does this game not work?

In your second year, you have to choose a tract. You have to focus on writing, game design, animation, programming or producing. (Producing in games is one of the most overlooked subject areas and we're hoping to rectify that in our program.) Also in your second year, you have very focused, advanced workshops on your discipline. If you're in game writing, for example, you're going to come away from the school with two game design documents. If you're a programmer, you're probably going to make a handheld game for an iPhone or something like that.

The cool thing about the program is that you have a collaborative thesis project with one student from every discipline. So, you're going to have a writer, a programmer, a designer, an artist and a producer. And you're going to collaborate on a game. Just like in film school, where you have a thesis film, in this program you're going to have a thesis game. The idea is that you can develop a game for console or PC or iPhone. Whatever your budget can handle, that's the market that you can make your game for. The idea is to integrate game design and story. Three times a week, you come into a game development lab. That's the time that your team gets together, and there's a team of faculty members there, and you get to work out every aspect of the game in those labs. We have design reviews every quarter where the teams present where they are with the game. It mimics what actually happens in the industry. We want the second year to feel like you're in the video game industry.

It's not about putting story first. It's about the integration of story and game design. If this is going to be the mass market cultural medium of the of the 21st century, then we want to promote the fact that it doesn't just have to be mindless alien destruction. A very new game is "Heavy Rain" for the PS3. They've done a fantastic job of making it an immersive storytelling experience, and also great gameplay. Again, I'm a little biased because I'm a writer, but I think that the greatest games have great stories. I say this with the utmost love, because I'm a video game geek myself, but our program is not just for video game geeks. It's also for screenwriters or any creative artist. Maybe they're a graphic designer and they want to get into video games. It's for anyone who wants to learn more about video games or get into the game industry. We also push internships as a bridge to job placement.

The other motto for our school is "Anyone can teach you how to design a game, but we'll teach you how to make a great game." And what makes a great game is the integration of story and great game design.

Q: Is there anything you would like to add?

A: The best advice that I always to give to writers is, never say no to any project. My career has occurred because I've never said no to anything.

My partner and I were approached to do a game for IBM, to be installed in their pavilion down in Epcot Center. They wanted us to do everything; come up with a story, design the game, what the facility will look like at Epcot Center. About 75 percent of that -- we'd never done before. If Linda Reda from IBM is reading this ... surprise. We'd never done this, but we said, "Yes, this sounds great and we're totally up to the challenge and let's get to work." And it was assumed that we would figure it out along the way.

My first copywriting job -- I'd worked in Creative Advertising at Dimension films as an assistant, but didn't really learn copywriting. When I came out here, someone gave me the chance to write copy and I just said yes. I didn't say, "Oh, you know what, I don't have a ton of experience." I said yes and trusted myself to work the long-ass hours ...

When I got my first video game job, I really hadn't played a lot of video games for a while. I took a hiatus from video games and a lot changed in games between Super Nintendo and PlayStation 2. I went in for my first meeting at the company and they were referencing all these different games that I had never heard of. I just nodded, "Oh, yeah, I remember that." When the meeting was over, I went across the street to Best Buy and bought a PlayStation 2, an Xbox and every game they mentioned in the meeting, and when I got home, I went to lock myself in my office and I said to my wife, "Honey, I got work to do."

You can either say, "No, I don't really play a lot of games anymore," or say yes and realize you're going to work 18-hour days for the next two weeks just to get up to speed on things, but then you're going to have what you need to be a video game writer. When any opportunity comes, don't say "No." Just take it and then do the hard work you need to do to get up to speed.

The New York Film Academy Game Design Program is slated to launch in Los Angeles and New York this fall. For more information, see the Web site (www.nyfa.com/game-design-school).