Résumé — SJL

Portfolio available upon request.

THE CHINESE ROOM

Spring 2022 — Present

Acted as Employee Rep for TCR during the Sumo consultation period, negotiating better terms for affected staff across the wider business and advocating on behalf of individuals where possible.
Interviewed candidates both at higher and lower levels of experience.
Mentored other members of the studio in narrative design.

First writer on the project, working directly with the Project Creative Director.
Responsible for iterating on initial narrative design, story and characters in a way that will inform future development.
Involved in prototyping, research and initial design.

Writer on crit-path content, covering cutscenes, branching conversations, ambient VO and more across the game. Lead writer for Lou Graham, Ryong Choi, Safia Ulusoy, Benny Muldoon, Ysabella Moore and several unannounced characters. Acted as lead writer across the game for a few months between the departure of TCR’s founder and former Creative Director Dan Pinchbeck and the arrival of current Narrative Director Ian Thomas.
Workshopped story beats and narrative issues with the wider narrative team, drawing upon reference material and engagement with the community — and working within often immovable parameters — to seek character-true, lore-rich and tone-appropriate solutions that deepen the story, empower the wider team and make the best possible use of our medium where able.
Presented and iterated on feedback from studio leadership, the wider team, the publisher and other IP stakeholders.
Designed and implemented narrative systems that complemented the IP, made best use of existing content and provided players with a more variable, bespoke experience within set budgets and constraints.
Collaborated with design on the conceptualisation of optional and side content.
Provided feedback and direction to voice actors in the booth.
Took part in player-facing comms and provided a direct avenue for player relations.

Spring 2019 — Spring 2022

Two-time winner of the ‘I’d Play That’ category and one-time winner of the ‘Most Ambitious’ category in internal game jams
Mentored another member of the wider Sumo studio in narrative design
Helped senior members of the design team develop game pitches and concepts

Wrote four main quests in Articy Draft 3 focussed on Sebastian Sallow, working closely with in-house writers and iterating based on feedback from studio leadership. Check out Secrets of the Restricted Section!
Conceptualised and wrote content for Imelda Reyes, a tsundere character designed to inject some much-needed house rivalry and provide players with incentive to take part in broom races (and wipe the smirk off her face - initially, at least).
Brainstormed and iterated on the motivation for the main antagonist, encapsulated in Will I Fly (Isidora’s Song) by Dune Moss.
Pitched ideas for world events, iterated on their design and wrote dialogue and OST where required, with examples including Ernie Lark’s ‘One Man Band’, the Daily Prophet, Howlers, ‘Follow The Butterflies’, the Slytherin Common Room window display, Peeves’ interactions, hedge mazes and corpse notes.

Wrote cutscenes, linear conversations and ambient dialogue for a set of popular, established characters
Provided remote feedback and direction to voice actors in the booth
Supported the narrative designer who was leading the bulk of the project’s story
Worked closely with design to ensure cohesion between disciplines

Designed and wrote a linear story for a pre-existing brief and iterated based on changes to design

Summer 2018 — spring 2019

Lead writer, designer and editor on the season one reunion double episode
Lead writer, designer and editor on fifteen episodes of season two
Assisted with systems design for season two to maximise efficient, economic variability
Shared responsibility for character creation and breaking the story for season two, from season level down to individual episodes
Helped with editing colleagues’ scripts across season two

Summer 2018

Pitched, designed and wrote a branching Lovecraftian text adventure for Meta Arcade set within the wider Cthulhu Mythos
Contributed a dark fantasy branching text adventure to an unannounced mobile game
Wrote comedy bark lines for an unannounced top-down arena shooter
Consulted on VR and Alexa projects for Buchanan Productions

Summer 2016 — summer 2018

Won the 2017 studio-wide Jagex Workshop game design initiative after submitting multiple pitches across the year that either won or received honorary mentions
On the team that won the ‘Most deserving of further investment' category in an internal game jam
Wrote digital marketing and website copy; considered to be the in-house copywriting/editing authority
Member of the RuneScape Lore Council and the Jagex Writers' Group for two years

Wrote dialogue barks for the new hero, Trondson XIII
Sourced and directed voice acting talent (Doug Cockle of The Witcher franchise)

Wrote dialogue for the comedy quest Evil Dave's Big Day Out
Wrote in-game lore for the Menaphos expansion, the Elite Dungeons update, and the Hallowe'en 2017 in-game event
Advised on Astellarn's boss fight mechanics for the Elite Dungeons update
Advised on narrative and sourced voice acting talent for the Solak update (Doug Cockle of The Witcher franchise and Viva Seifert of Her Story)