Infinity Skies Team Interview: Janna | Narrative Designer
Primer: Join Cooper as he interviews the different team members of DreamFuel who produced the NFT castle building game, Infinity Skies. In this debut of the series, Cooper had a chat with Janna, who is the narrative designer. Find out what she has to say about the game and what new releases we can expect in the near future.
Janna and her role as a narrative designer
Where is Janna based and where is she from?
Based in the Netherlands near Utrecht
This is also the location of the office and home base of DreamFuel
What role does she do and what does it involve?
Narrative designer of DreamFuel
Not the only person working on this - also worked with Sander (co-founder) and Micah (lead game designer)
In DreamFuel, they have an open feedback system where people from other departments can look into the stories and give feedback and comments
It’s great because sometimes you have creative blocks and it’s nice to have someone coming in to chip in
She does anything that deals with the lore within the game
Like writing the stories and the background, and essentially provides the world-building narration in general
She will come up with the general plot lines and the whole team will just brainstorm over it
An important role because a game needs a story to relate to that will make you come back - makes you come back, again and again, to ask if there’s something more
How did she become the narrative designer?
Had it rough in high school and was bullied a lot so she used to play a lot of video games as a form of escape
Had been playing since a young age due to an older brother who loves gaming
“Growing up I realised this is what I want to do because I could forget about everything - it was escapism for me but in a healthy way.”
- Janna
The story makes the game interesting and realised this is what she wants to do
Applied to HKU - a university in Utrecht - to study game design with a focus on narrative design
Met Sander (co-founder of Infinity Skies) there and had been friends since 2015
Both of them dropped out at some point
In Dec 2021, Sander approached her saying that they still needed a narrative designer
She took a while to decide because she was back in university at that point but she wasn’t happy
Eventually decided to go for it
Is it more about who you know than what you know?
Agrees that networking is important but skills/knowledge in your specialised area is also very important
If Sander didn’t trust her that she can do the job competently, then she wouldn’t be hired
She puts down a number for skills/knowledge vs network as 75 to 25
Is she involved in other NFT projects?
No, this is her first professional project
As a student, she gets enough money from the government to pay for housing, college tuition and basic necessities and not much more than that
Not very good at saving money too
About Narrative Design
Favourite thing about narrative design
Nice to be getting stories out there and getting people excited
It’s also about the connection she can make
Made a lot of friends because she is a huge fan of the Borderlands series
There are a lot of aspects in games that you can recognise yourself as a player
Community building
Makes one feel less alone in a community, which is also the same for the community they had created in Infinity skies
What had she designed in this game so far?
What she can say is that she did the lore and narrative for Infinity Skies
There are 4 planes in Infinity Skies
One of which is the Earthly realm
This realm is also what you get when the game launches
Wait for more details
How does she plan to be constantly innovative to come up with great stories?
Cannot really plan for such things
A good way to go forward is repertoire research
Look at what had been released and what had been done so far
Think about how to add your own spice to what already exists
For Infinity Skies, they had to do a lot of regular research on mythology and history from a particular era
Looked at medieval history but not just centred around European parts
Also looked around globally and how to ‘dreamfuel’ it
Puts pieces of herself into the lore
She’s 26 but she had been through a lot of ups and downs
Includes stuff that she had gone through, but mystifies and exaggerates those bits more
Helps people to connect to the stories in the sense that the audience can recognise some elements of the stories that they also had experienced before
She loves reading all the different kinds of mythology, paranormal, horror and magic
Gives her something to relax and not think about work, yet at the same time inspires her to come up with even better stuff
But the game has nothing to do with horror themes
Difference between NFT games and traditional games?
Feels that she needs to get a crash course for NFT/blockchain from Sander
Thinks that because one needs to put in money to invest in an NFT game, so the stakes are higher
“I’m assuming it’s always going to be at the back of your head if your investment is going to pay off.”
- Janna
Less of a leisure game to relax
Some people might even see it as a business
About Infinity Skies
Are there any story plots she can share?
She talked about mythology a lot, so there will be many kinds of gods and different generations of gods, with each playing a role in the game plot
There will be a lot of sagas, with a lot of stories and perspectives
“I think the narrative can go insanely far, especially once adventure mode launches, and with each new season that will be coming out, there will be new pieces of the lore available on both aspects.”
- Janna
The narrative is already very extensive and they are not even halfway done
What excites her the most about Infinity Skies?
They are creating something different from what is already out there with regard to NFT games
Adventure mode (coming in 2023) will showcase all the different talents that DreamFuel has to offer
Will show off a completely different element of the narrative
Are there any new releases at Infinity Skies?
They had a meeting recently and land sale is finally coming
Land sale is for the VIP members first
In Sept 2022, they will have their launch of the first season of NFTs
Will have a description of the NFTs and also little pieces of lore of the world in Infinity Skies
Each new season will have its own set of NFTs, something like the seasons of Apex or Fortnite
Going to have more interesting releases sooner rather than later
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