Doug Cockle said something to me oncethat always stayed with me.
He never recorded with any of the other actors - he barely met them.
And I found that so strange - I still do.
But I get it.
And the greater the interactivity, the more you should probably do it.
Sometimes it’s obvious, sometimes it’s not.
Because it’s not.
South of the Circlegot me thinking about this again.
Some of it’s to do with the cast, for sure.
They’ve all made a name for themselves in Hollywood.
And obviously their hiring is a big draw because they’re advertised like movie stars on game artwork.
But another large part of it is to do with how the game plays.
There are dialogue choices, then.
So on the sliding scale of interactivity, it’s going the other way.
But the trade-off is fewer interruptions and this ability for scenes to flow.
The result speaks for itself.
It’s not showy or gaudy but it’s, gently, real.
It’s convincing and believable.
But a play can, perhaps more importantly, pull you into the emotion of it all.
And it’s this essence that makes all the difference.
It’s watching a stranger take a risk to help another in a time of desperate need.
It’s feeling indignity when people rise up against inequality.
But it’s not as interactive as it could be.
So is more interactivity always better?
It’s a tricky one.
