Against Worldbuilding, and Other Provocations: Essays on History, Narrative, and Game Design

by Alexis Kennedy

For twelve years, Alexis Kennedy has been writing some of the most original and intelligent narrative games of the last decade - Fallen London, Sunless Sea, Cultist Simulator, and more, as well as guest-writing gigs for BioWare, Paradox and Telltale Games. And for most of that time, he's been writing *about* games as well.

Here for the first time in one place are the best of his essays and columns - from hard-won lessons about game development to reviews of unreviewable games, from narrative design principles to writing masterclasses, from historical discursions on labyrinths to the notorious 'Against Worldbuilding'.

Genres: Nonfiction, Game Design, Writing, Essays

164 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 31, 2021

About the author

Alexis Kennedy is a writer, game designer and entrepreneur who’s founded two successful game development studios, and has been making innovative, evocative narrative video games for over a decade
At his first studio, Failbetter Games, he created the Fallen London franchise, beginning with the Fallen London browser game – a dark literary fantasy of life in a subterranean metropolis, which has now been running continuously for over ten years, with well over a million users.
At Failbetter, Alexis led development on a string of award-winning narrative games, in the Fallen London universe and for partners like Random House, BioWare, the BBC and Channel 4 – and a browser-based interactive story platform called StoryNexus.
Alexis’ final project at Failbetter was Sunless Sea, a game of loneliness, exploration and survival set on a night-bound archipelago in the Fallen London world, on which he served as creative director and lead writer. Sunless Sea was a critical and commercial success that sold almost half a million copies in the first year.
After growing Failbetter from a bedroom startup to a multi-million pound business, he left the studio after seven years to focus more directly on on experimental creative work. He took a ronin year to do guest-writing gigs for big names like BioWare, Telltale and Paradox, learning from very different approaches by very different studios; and then founded Weather Factory, a boutique studio specialising in narrative experiments, with Lottie Bevan. Weather Factory won the Best Microstudio award at the Develop Star Awards in 2019.
Weather Factory’s debut game was Cultist Simulator, a unique and intricate game of occult discovery described by press, variously, as ‘brilliantly written’, ‘deeply engrossing’, and ‘significant’. Cultist Simulator won several awards and was nominated for two BAFTAs.
Weather Factory’s next announced game is BOOK OF HOURS, a combat-free role-playing game set in an occult library.
Alexis speaks internationally on narrative, on game design, and on their overlaps.

Reviews

[Iwona Marinov · Rating 4 out of 5]

Taking a peak around the inside of the head of Alexis Kennedy was a fascinating experience. The writing is witty, funny, and the points he makes are insightful, whether he is going for some simple truths or more elaborate metaphors. Not only have I learnt a lot from it, I did so while enjoying every minute spent with this book. And even though I disagree with some of the points Kennedy makes (because yes, I have, in fact, fallen in love with timelines! and more than once in my life), I still got a lot from disputing those points in my head.

I reached for this book as a big fan of Cultist Simulator and an aspiring game writer and novelist. I'm very glad that I did.

Since I am that type, I just have to take down one star for editing because for crying out loud, there were so many hiccups in this text that it got too annoying to ignore at some point. Sorry.

[Stefan Manolov · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection of essays stayed for a while in my "Currently Reading" list.
Early on I decided that they are best consumed slowly with your choice of morning brew.
I enjoyed the brevity and directness of Alexis' columns as they throw an idea or opinion in your direction and leave you to your own devices. The great thing is that you can find all the articles online later, share them with your friends or codevs and get a conversation going later in the day.

I presume the contents would be less engaging to long time readers of Alexis' posts but the author's introductions to the different essays and how they have aged is a nice addition to this collection that you can't find online.

[Philippa · Rating 4 out of 5]

What I liked:
- I've enjoyed Alexis Kennedy's columns and essays online and wanted them all together in one place. Goal achieved.
- The writing itself is enjoyable. Not particularly in-depth, as each piece is quite short (being intended for a column, mostly). But most of them contain enough to get me thinking about game design/narrative and there's often something to inspire me.

Room for improvement:
- The editing was not great. Some typos; no page numbers, despite the TOC having them; certain words underlined because they were once a hyperlink but there's no further information in the book to help me find them, so I'd have to find the online article to find the link, etc. It's small things, so nothing to get my pantaloons in a twist over, but it could have benefited from a bit of polish.
- I would have liked more of Kennedy's writing about the games he's been involved in. I've loved everything produced by Failbetter and Weather Factory, but the section on his own work was fairly small. I would have appreciated some writing that was especially for the book, perhaps.

For what it is, I think it's good. But I also think that it could have been better.

[Giovanni Attanasio]

Terzo nella mia classifica "teoria letteraria e scrittura" nel 2023.

Articolo intero sul blog: https://attanasioscrive.it/articoli/c...

[James · Rating 2 out of 5]

Honestly, I bought the book of "essays" purely on the basis that Kennedy led Fallen London, Sunless Seas, etc. and the beautiful writing contained therein. I was hoping for a partially-academic but accessible and insightful collection of pieces on game design, psychology, etc. Armchair game design.

Basically, The Design of Everyday Things but for games. This is why a door with 'Pull' written on it is a bad door. This is why Looking Glass Studios made great games.

This reads more like a collection of short, easily digestible columns originally posted on gaming websites rather than essays.

[Andy Cyca · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's always refreshing to read about someone who «found their passion» later in life. Alexis Kennedy is a game designer (in the broadest sense of the word) who talks about games with clear thoughts and well paced arguments. Even though the book is technically only an anthology of previously published essays, it's a nice collection and a must have for most anyone who has ever thought about videogames, whether it's planning, creating or even just enjoying them.

[Tristan Grace · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really liked it. Alexis has some great advice on focus, simplicity, and theme that I think translates well to other industries and not just game design.

[Miguel · Rating 3 out of 5]

no voy a mentir, me salté unos cuantos artículos

los últimos, en relación a formar un estudio de videojuegos, me han motivado a intentar hacer algo por mi cuenta, así que: gracias Alexis.