Chris Avellone Interview

In case you’ve ever wondered what exactly Chris Avellone’s creative director’s (or chief creative officer, to use another variation) job entails, you’ll probably want to read this article-style interview from GamesIndustry. Here’s a snippet:

Even as a project director on a title, Avellone stressed that game development is always about collaboration. In fact, he said that one of the highpoints of his career was due to the “collaborative experience.” Avellone said learning when to allow your team to have freedom to explore ideas is key to being a creative director.

“One of the highpoints of my career in terms of fun and raw creativity was Fallout New Vegas: Old World Blues; it was a pure collaborative experience of everyone on the team, including the publisher and our contractors. Our voiceover company Blindlight and our Bethesda producer, Jason Bergman, helped us line up a cast that was perfect for the title, and that helped us sell the tone of the game perfectly. Never have I felt more joy in hearing the words, ‘hey, we might be able to get James Urbaniak for Old World Blues.'”

“If someone came to me and said they had an idea for a game that featured a plumber as a protagonist, or a man that dressed up like a bat to fight crime and whose arch-enemy was a clown, I could either roll my eyes and shoot it down or take the next step, ask for concept art reinforcing the idea, and ask more questions,” he explained. “After being a designer for 20 years – you take a step back and say, ‘even if this isn’t how I would do it, would the player still like it, and does the concept depend more on execution than a one sentence idea?'”

“All it takes is imagining myself in their place, and imagine what I would have liked to have the freedom to express if I were in their shoes. While I may give cautionary tales and point out things that need to be prioritized or downscaled more, I’d like to think more of what I contribute is solutions to narrative problems or design pipeline issues, but I’m not the best judge of that,” added Avellone.

Avellone believes the most important part of being a creative director is “taking in the big picture.” He prefers to shepherd his team towards finding great execution in their own ideas, instead of driving his own vision forward by doing everything himself.