unforum

[Leeravitz]

Well, quite. From an actor employment perspective, it'd be pretty difficult to do anyway - you're right about the lack of flexibility. You'd have to have got tour entire cast together at some point, taken all the photos you needed and then retained them for use as and when. You couldn't keep calling in the actors to take new photos whenever you felt like it. Chances are: a) their agents would get fed up with it and b) they'd get committed to other ventures in the meantime and not be available. Cost - wise, minimum Equity fees would be fairly expensive as well, and I can see why MC wouldn't want to stump up for these additional expenses [although this sort of thing does make you wonder if they're actually getting dangerously near to bankrupting themselves by pursuing this whole endeavour, prize money and all].

Flexibility is nice in one sense: I like the feeling that, maybe, the Salk developments were only thought through in recent months, and have been introduced partly in reaction to our own actions. Or that if we convince Violet to hack the library catalogue for us, then that's the trigger needed to get the thing up and working - in this way, the experience becomes truly interactive.

But, on the other hand, the one thing you can say about anyone with a 'grand plotline' in mind is that things are ever progressing towards a set denoument. If this sort of grand plotting has been left too vague, then the idea that much of the game is just made up as we go along is...well...a tad disappointing. I think, broadly, the balance is holding well. But I've yet to quite efface the memory of the Reconstructionist puzzle...

And this is waaaay off topic by now, I think...