Keith Nemitz was the lead writer for Dangerous High School Girls in Trouble, a casual game that has been recognized for its visual style and writing. The game follows a gang of young women who you'll guide through various 1920's locales, starting in a girls' school. From their, you'll flirt, sneak, convince, and bully your way to solving mysteries that range from the amusing to the deadly serious. It features various casual puzzle game mechanics (reminiscent of a very complicated game of Clue), wonderful writing, and a rich atmosphere. It was nominated for a WGA award this year, and Keith was kind enough to answer my questions concerning the writing, style, and gameplay of DHSGiT.
Thomas Cross: Dangerous High School Girls for me has two really interesting aspects: its atmosphere and detailed world, and its branching dialogue system. Respectively, how did Mousechief decide to set the game in this vibrant 20’s setting, and how and why did you decide to create such a dynamic dialogue system?
Keith Nemitz: The setting was picked indirectly as a result of considering a target audience and a story I wanted to tell. As this was a commercial endeavor for the casual sector, I sought to interest older women gamers. I decided then on the genre, teen romantic comedies. Four years ago, teen stories had been untapped by casual games. They are a big draw for the movies. I hoped the genre would help differentiate my game. The story that appealed to me was of how young women change society. I grew up in the sixties and seventies but was too young to participate in the incredible victory of women's rights of that time. Four years ago, I saw that victory struggling to preserve any of its momentum. To tell a story of modern feminism's lost momentum would be a tough sell in the casual game market full of one dimensional cartoon characters.
It occurred to me, in the 1920s, women encountered the same victory and loss of momentum. It's a setting rich in mythology and romance. And that's I decided to write a satire of life in the 20s as reflection of modern times.
The dialog system could have become a sixth conflict resolution mechanism, but my experience with The Witch's Yarn showed that it's very difficult to teach casual gamers the gameplay of interactive fiction. Instead, it's a pacing mechanism that gives the players a rest from playing the mini-games, while providing more story content. I wanted players to decide one full conversation with an NPC. So instead of simply asking a series of questions, there is an ebb and flow to it. You might start with several questions, but as answers take the conversation away, new dialog choices. You can often respond with your choice of answer to the NPC's questions. Back and forth. One conversation per encounter, pretty much.
TC: Were you entirely happy with the way the dialogue in the game plays out, or are there aspects of it you wish you’d designed differently?
KN: It was a mixed blessing, players often walk away from an encounter wondering about issues they weren't able to discuss. This can be frustrating, but it might be the kind of frustration people are familiar with from real conversations. I don't know if this is the common experience, but I often will think of several things I want to say in the middle of a good chat, and can only follow one or two of them without dominating the conversation. Basically, I'm pretty happy with it, because there is sufficient redundancy in the encounters to answer most questions.
TC: The group discussions between the player’s gang of girls were by far my favorite parts of the game. Why don’t you think we see this kind of dynamic, group conversation-interface in more games, casual or mainstream?
KN: I don't know. In general, I think there is a rush in the game industry to work on exciting new technologies, when the application of earlier inventions have hardly been explored. One example is the incredible effort behind lip-synching. Most players don't see the difference between simple amplitude to mouth size vs. sophisticated phoneme based animations. Yet gesture assisted delivery of dialog has far more impact. Check out the old, old game, Dark Earth. It used gestures quite effectively but had no lip syncing. Nowadays, we'd probably want to do gestures more smoothly and with greater variety, but technically it wouldn't be much more difficult.
TC: Furthermore, was it difficult designing that particular dialogue system? What were your goals when it came to creating the Powow sections?
KN: Gotcha! The powwow system is nearly total smoke and mirrors! It's almost linear. Its purpose was to serve the same function as cutscenes, but with slightly more interaction to keep from simply clicking through line after line as in so many JRPGs.
TC: The dialogue in the game is consistently entertaining; it is also consistently tonally. You never once get the sense that a person from the 21st century is writing about young women in the 20’s. How did you research the style of writing and speech from this period, and did you enjoy writing in this style?
KN: I read a lot of fiction that was written in the 20s. My principle source was Sinclair Lewis: Main Street, Babbit. Another big source was magazine short stories from that era. I guess I enjoyed the style, it didn't get the way of what I enjoyed most, imagining all the crazy events of the story. However, writing in that style for three years strongly affected my personal writing style in a way that pleases me.
TC: What do you think most differentiates Dangerous High School Girls from other casual games, and were these differences intentional decisions on the part of Mousechief?
KN: Um, I guess that would be the content that caused it to be banned from Big Fish Games, after a week of rising in the top 100. Apparently, several customers bullied Big Fish Games into pulling it. Near the end of Act III, the story turns dark, and the player's band of girls prevent a rape by shooting the rapist. The event is told in text, only. The written word can still offend people, yeah!
TC: I found the game especially refreshing for its mostly female cast and emphasis on some non-traditional (for video games) tropes like intellect, wittiness, and good humor. Was this a product of the games’ setting, or did you always want to write the characters in this fashion?
KN: All those things came about from the perspective I used to tell the story, through the imaged minds of ballsy movie starlets from the twenty's. Basically, I put myself into screen diva's heads and told the story as they might have, or as I imagine they might have. I may have missed participating in the 70s sexual revolution, but I did not miss reruns of old black and white movies on our pre-cable independent television channel. I adored Mae West, Myrna Loy, and Marlene Dietrich. They were in control of their sexual power. There is a lot of sexual innuendo in the game. Very little of it is vanilla.
TC: Obviously the game has found a lot of fans all over the gamer spectrum, but who was your original target audience, and how did you design the game to cater (to whatever degree) to their interests?
KN: I've addressed that, but to clarify... I had hoped to attract women casual gamers, who were getting tired of match-3, time management, and hidden object games.
TC: Has the success of Dangerous High School Girls (critically and financially) changed the way Mousechief plans on approaching games? Does it give you more leeway and confidence going into your next project?
KN: I'd say is been pretty successful since people are still talking about it, eight months after its release. Metacritic-style of the eight reviews so far it's holding a > 80% average. Only two are recognized as official Metacritic reveiws. (both at 80%) More are on the way.
Financially, especially after catching an arrow from BFG, it has yet to recoup its measly $30,000 budget. But it's still being release on new portals. I'll just have to tighten my belt a couple more notches. I'm not yet at the point where I'll have to cut new notches. However, if it doesn't make a profit this year I won't be able to fund a new game.
TC: Dangerous High School Girls in Trouble was nominated for a WGA award. How do you feel about the nomination, and do you think it’s a sign of the increased power of writing in games that the WGA now has its own section for video game writing?
KN: The WGA nomination was a great boon for my business. There is a lot of controversy over their membership requirement, but to me it was no different than entering the Independent Game Festival. I signed a form. I paid $75 dollars. I submitted my game. Concerning the WGA's drive to attract video game writers, I wrote this for RockPaperShotgun.com:
"Clearly, they want to extend their power base in film and television to games. I am mostly a union sympathizer, but when professionals in my core field, software engineering, started talking about organizing, I really felt it was a poor idea. I’ve always wondered about the idea of competitive unions, along the lines of the anti-trust laws that were eviscerated by Ronald Reagan and Co. When the WGA struck over earnings from DVDs, they were largely reviled by the game media. But in movies and TV, writing is the backbone."
I'll add: They deserve a fair cut from new media distribution. In computer games, I'm not sure if we need unions, but if game corporations are as stupid as movie companies, they'll be the ones who create unions. My wife works for Whole Foods, which isn't union. The reason they aren't is simple, they treat their employees better than other grocery stores. The WGA cannot create a video game writers guild by itself, no matter how prestigious their awards. Note the WGA currently has a caucus, not a union for video game writers.
TC: Speaking of which, what is your next project, and will you be serving as a writer for it as well?
KN: I'm not sure what it will be. I am chasing a few gooses, but most likely I'll be the principle writer again.
TC: Although this might be a bit premature, do you think that you and Mousechief might return to the world you’ve created in Dangerous High School Girls? I’m sure there are more high schools to explore, with more dangerous work to be done.
KN: The only idea that has occurred to me is to make a free prequel that does a better job of introducing the game to less sophisticated players. It would be a game about the girls inventing the four games they initially use. It would take place entirely on the school game board. It would be about how they became dangerous.
A while back, I had the idea of making a parody called, 'Crotchety Old F's Won't Die!'™ It'd be a blast to make but wouldn't earn a penny, probably.
Dangerous High School Girls in Trouble is not only a fun game, it's a witty, tense and exciting game. The writing really drives home some of the dangerous situations the girls will find themselves in (as well as the humorous encounters they'll have with adults and their peers), and the game has enough mini-games and modes of play to keep you interested for a long time. I'd like to thank Keith for coming up with some really great responses to my questions, and for providing us all with a great interview and game. You can download the Dangerous High School Girls in Trouble demo at the Mousechief site, or you can spring for the whole game, which rings in at $20. You can download it for either PC or Mac, so you really don't have an excuse not to check it out. It’s definitely worth checking out, even if you don’t see yourself as a “casual games” fan.
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