Rhianna Pratchett has said should Mirror’s Edge 2 ever come to pass, it’s unlikely she’ll write the narrative for the game.
Speaking in a wide ranging interview with ActionRip, Pratchett said “under the right circumstances” she’d love the chance to try her hand at the sequel, but due to having “blotted” her “copy-book with DICE” during the first outing, she has “doubts” regarding her potential involvement.
“DICE was a great company to work with, but Mirror’s Edge was a challenging project and an important learning experience for me,” she said. “Unfortunately, because of the timing when I was brought in and a large amount of the script being cut (due to the late decision to remove level dialogue) the narrative wasn’t what I would’ve liked it to be.
“Thankfully, I got the chance to remedy this a little bit in the Mirror’s Edge comic series with DC. The story in those was much more along the lines of what I would’ve liked to have developed for the game.
“Game development is chaotic at the best of times and narrative often suffers. It’s no one’s fault. We’re all still learning. Stories being cut, restructured, pushed, pulled and generally poked about is one of the uncomfortable realities of the job. I’ve been quite candid about what happened with Mirror’s Edge, because I know some players were disappointed with the narrative in the game.
“The upshot of that is that I’ve probably blotted my copy-book with DICE. I’d love the chance to do it again under the right circumstances, and I have plenty of ideas, but I doubt that’s going to happen.”
When asked, Pratchett also touched upon the recent Mass Effect 3 ending controversy, stating that while she couldn’t fully comment as she hasn’t played the game yet, BioWare’s “excuse” for the ending was a bit “poor.”
“I have huge respect for BioWare’s hard-working writers; however, I do think that maintaining the internal logic of a game’s narrative is very important when you’re dealing with such a story-heavy series as Mass Effect, especially when you’re able to carry-over your character,” she offered. “Anything that breaks that, your players do have a right to be a little pissed.
“I found the ‘We did it to get players talking’ defense to be a poor excuse. You could fill the disc with images from LOLCats or tap-dancing Nazi nuns and it would get players talking.”
Pratchett is currently working on a screenplay adaption of Janet Paisley’s novel Warrior Daughter and a TV series, as well as “three large games and one smaller one” she is unable to talk about just yet, but “hopefully all will become clear later in the year.”
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