Hollywood and Games summit panel

Joystiq has a summary of what sounds like a great panel from Hollywood and Games. (Gamasutra coverage here)

My fave quote comes from Ben Mattes (link to his blog on the right) who I bumped into back at MIGS, and who I hadn't seen since I knew him 15 years ago when I was friends with his sister in school. Anyhow, Ben says:

"There's not really room for "writers" in the video game world. We have game and story designers, not writers." Flint backed him up saying, "Your job is to give meaning to the gameplay."

Well put!

Red5's awesome recruitment tactics

Awesome, remarkable, "purple cow" if you will, recruitment effort by Red5, pointed out to us by Ben Mattes:

"... FedEx parcel arrives for you. [snip]. So you open the box and find inside a series of 'Russian Doll' type nested boxes, each more beautiful then the last. Written on each box a section of what appears to be a riddle.Of course, as you open each subsequent box the attention to detail in this package is sure to start to attract attention. Some of your coworkers would certainly be drawn to the affair and hover around to know more.So finally you reach the fifth and last box, open it up, and find...."

Go to Ben's blog to find out the rest. I don't want to steal his thunder. (just realized this is also covered in detail in this escapist article here. PIctures of the nested boxes and surprise inside are here)

This is a great example of how recruiting - if you really want top notch, cream of the crop people, should be viewed as wooing. You need to go above and beyond to stand out from the other suitors, and make the person feel special, wanted, etc.