SJL
Sarah Longthorne - Games Writer & Narrative Designer
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Résumé

About

RÉSUMÉ

Portfolio available upon request.

THE CHINESE ROOM

Spring 2022 — Present

  • Interviewed candidates both at higher and lower levels of experience

  • Mentored other members of the studio in narrative design

VAMPIRE THE MASQUERADE: BLOODLINES 2 (CURRENT)

  • Lead writer on crit path content, working in Ink to cover cutscenes, branching conversations, ambient VO and more across the main game.

  • Brainstorming and breaking story beats with the wider narrative team, working within immovable parameters to seek character-true, lore-rich and tone-appropriate solutions that will empower the wider team and make best use of our medium.

  • Presenting to and iterating on feedback from studio leadership, the wider team, the publisher and other IP stakeholders.

  • Designing and implementing narrative systems that complement the IP and make best use of existing content within budgets and constraints.

  • Collaborating with design on the conceptualisation of optional and side content.

  • Immersing myself in research and championing topics that players will care about.

  • Providing feedback and direction to voice actors in the booth.

  • Taking part in player-facing comms and providing an additional avenue for player relations, where reasonable and appropriate.

SUMO DIGITAL

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

HOGWARTS LEGACY

  • 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.

THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE

  • Provided Narrative Design consultation and scratch VO

HOTSHOT RACING

  • Wrote racing barks for all characters

  • Wrangled cutscenes using existing assets

  • Wrote bios for existing characters

  • Edited on-screen text

UNANNOUNCED PROJECT

  • 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

UNANNOUNCED PROJECT

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

FUSEBOX GAMES

Summer 2018 — spring 2019

LOVE ISLAND: THE GAME

  • 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

FREELANCE

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

JAGEX

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

BLOCK ‘N’ LOAD

  • Wrote dialogue barks for the new hero, Trondson XIII

  • Sourced and directed voice acting talent (Doug Cockle of The Witcher franchise)

RUNESCAPE 3

  • 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)