so let's move on to some of the zones in

the game um there's quite a diverse

number of zones you've got you know the

ones in solomon island you've got egypt

transylvania

venice

um

tokyo

uh agartha

london seoul new york there's quite a

few

uh

which one's sticking in your mind

what what sort of had an impact on you

um

i think it's i think those initial

initial um missions in new england uh

just that that that setting was just so

well done so moody um it feels like

you're walking through a new england

town

um

just the storyline of the fog and then

and the people turning into zombies but

they don't want to use the z word some

of them

and then definitely um

uh smith academy i love those characters

my jeffrey combs

yeah there were some cracking voice

actors

yeah and i loved i loved his character

the whole bell trio of characters uh at

the academy

yeah there was there was there were

definitely some very iconic locations

weren't there like intimate academy like

the at the atlantic island theme park i

think for me is a

is an absolutely awesome place because

it's it's just like one it's just a

little self-contained

theme park

um yeah and it's got its own little

story

yeah so i think i think when i think of

a secret world that's usually

those are the first locations and

characters that i mean the first

location characters you meet but that

one really

really sticks with me as far as

what the game's like

it was quite nice as well as that even

though you had the the larger stories

each each zone had its all

his little sub stories so you know the

theme park had its little set of

missions and then the academy had its

little set of missions you go down to

the lighthouse and meet the author and

he had his own little set of missions

um and

sometimes they sort of crossed over

but more often than not they were little

sort of self self-contained episodes

within the whole

yeah yeah and then even even the people

i mean i think this goes into the larger

game but but particularly it stands out

to me in that in that location just the

the people had their own little mini

stories that were touching or scary like

whether you're talking to the deputy and

he's talking about his memories of the

bag of kittens and he's like oh god

um

just though yeah those little stories

within stories and uh

uh yeah just the atmos the atmosphere

i'm an atmosphere junkie and that

location really really did that for me

well i think the sound design really

sort of uh helps with that um when i was

talking to joel i mentioned the

the one sound that sticks in my mind was

the familiars in the academy

that little scream they did which was

just it's like nails on a chalkboard

it's

it's horrific

but it's also fantastically designed and

some of the monster designs are are just

awesome

yeah anytime you get you get a good uh

monster sound where you're almost

hesitant to kill them because you're

like oh it's going to make that noise

yep

there's some millions again

um

one thing as well is

after launch we had the auxiliary

weapons that came in you know the rocket

launcher the whip and the chainsaw and

all that um

how did they come about you did you have

any bearing on that

was that was it the um

no well not the whip it was it was the

the flamethrower in a dream to kill

wasn't it i

yes yeah that was that was the

flamethrower um

no i don't think uh i mean i would have

been involved in maybe writing

descriptive text but other than that i

don't think um
i don't i don't recall how those

initially came about though that was an

initial part of the plan if that kind of

developed organically

um

i remember using the chainsaw a lot i

like the chainsaw

and what about the dungeons did you have

any input

within that because they have their own

story and lore and

whatnot don't they

yeah yeah i'm certainly not in the in

the initial dungeons other than putting

lore into them

but like a dream to kill and onward

the

the quest designers usually

usually have pretty solid ideas and some

things they wanted but sometimes we

would have meetings uh uh way ahead of

time to kind of bounce ideas see what

worked narratively

um

um but usually there was a skeleton of a

kind of of a structure and then um i'd

add to it like we thought like well we

need to get it we need to get across

this idea how do we do it you know is it

something that a text you find is is it

just a corpse you know something

environmental that you find

um and we kind of go from there so did

you have a favorite dungeon or one that

you particularly enjoyed playing

um

i think

i think i found the nursery particularly

because of the um

again the the the creepy mood with the

the toys um

and then we'd worked

a song in from from someone that we

met in montreal um

uh one of the developers ramon took me

to this little uh

uh this little bar club he's like yeah

you gotta hear this the song and i'm

like oh okay we're sitting there and

this the song comes on and and

it's getting played like

with a little toy xylophone and it's

being something creepy that's the i walk

into empty

uh song

oh my gosh

that's gotta go in there it was really

that just felt really cool to like hear

something live and be like that's gotta

go in there and we were able to make

that happen and

the lyrics from it just worked really

well with uh i worked that into like i

think it's pain on the walls i walked

some of the lyrics from that song and

certainly into some of the other text

entries but uh

um

that uh

that

that i think maybe was my favorite

okay so

other than

the law

uh item descriptions and your general

sort of writing did you have any uh

influence on any other aspects of the

game

maybe an idea or something which you you

took and ran with or something maybe

that others listen to you about

i mean certainly we all kind of

contribute organically in that we're you

know talking at lunch and this and that

we we give each other ideas um

[Music]

certainly a lot of cosmic core and

lovecraftian kind of influence that was

already in the game but i certainly uh

pushed that and

[Music]

i would say

i don't remember whose idea initially it

was there's there's there's a section of

the game where you have

uh we have some these little games

within the game where you um you go to

the um i think it's the internet cafe

uh and you can play these sort of uh

text events yes i remember i remember

that one

yes

it's i think it was one of the issues

uh you pick it up from the the woman at

the top of scorched desert

yeah

um

so i was able to do some cosmic core and

that uh

uh

oh my you know what um i'm gonna step to

the other side of the room really quick

and i'll show you something i directly

uh put into the game oh please

so this hat which um i think

we were doing um

i think rahman and i were doing like

friday or thursday uh um
streams where we talk about the game

and for whatever reason i was wearing

this hat for those and so that became uh

uh the image i was known for i think

there was some there were some fan

drawings with it so we um at one point

we're like we got to stick the hat in

the game so there is a game there's an

item in the game i believe called the

nire lock top hat described as a

cosmic

outer god thing in in hat form

[Music]

so so this hat is directly in game and

it was surreal to be able to play in the

game and wearing the hat that i could

physically wear that's wonderful

it's actually

not a bad hat actually

okay

about the head initially and the eye

separately and uh

so

i guess when the game launched uh i

think it's fair to say that reception

was middling

um there were those of us who

really enjoyed it others

not so much

if you were to do it all over again what

would you do differently

um

well again at an initial launch i was

just involved in the uh the the lore

writing um but i

i think uh

i don't know getting the word out better

maybe because i remember i i think the

year that it came out i was at gen con

and telling a friend about the game

they're like oh yeah i definitely gotta

play that when it comes out i'm like

it's out

there like oh

uh and i don't know i don't know if that

was just my anecdotal uh uh

input from that from that friend or if

that was if that was a larger reaction

or people just didn't know uh

um so definitely that um

i don't know because again i wasn't

involved till late i wasn't directly

involved till later than the lore but um

[Music]

uh

i well i think uh if i did some

experiment like our little a little

twitterverse roleplaying definitely

doing that from the get-go because that

that got some fun engagement um

i got some hardcore engagement once once

once players are interacting on that

level and going like holy crap there's

stuff happening

on twitter with the characters that are

reacting to me that are interacting with

things i'm posting

that uh

you know you make some some very some

very loyal players that way once once

they're involved on that level

yeah um

i think if the idea of being able to

play with the

the people behind the game as well

whether that be

as an arg or actually within the game is

is definitely a draw

okay so

you became lead writer from a dream to

curl tokyo beyond is there anything that

you remember or you've encountered since

when playing and you think

actually that

probably not my best work

um

[Music]

good tough question

i'm sure there's something i'm sure

there's something i've run yeah uh

it's not coming to mind right now um

i'd say maybe some item descriptions

except i have fun with item descriptions

uh even though it's a it's a little

such a light little bit of storytelling

or text um

and i usually had

i usually had a pretty good feedback

loop to where if there was something

where it was like josh's just isn't

working

it would get caught pretty well um

i am blanking on that i don't uh

then it's not saying that everything i

wrote was perfect i'm sure because

there's there must be something where i

was like ah once i saw it but i am

forgetting now

my mind is is mercifully blanketing me

from

from the worst mistakes

all right there is another one for you

to think about

the secret world got the word secret in

it there are lots of secrets in the game

i think that's kind of the whole point

of it

are there any that you put into the game

maybe that we wouldn't necessarily have

noticed

some little easter eggs or tit bits that

we can go and look out for

in um

[Music]

in uh in tokyo

there are some some personal character

dramas with some of the characters that

you really have to dig into their um you

know you click on them you can have them

talk about different subjects you really

gotta dig into those and sometimes from

multiple perspectives before you get the

full story including um

a uh

a doomed romance between ricky pagan and

i'm blanking on her name she's in charge

of the love hotel

yeah i know the one um i can't think of

a name either

it's early for me so uh

my brain isn't fully fully working maybe

a sip of coffee will revive it

um but um

there is a story

there is some some some personal drama

and history with those characters

particularly her um that isn't

isn't just thrown at you it's not really

part of the quests or anything it just

happens to be and if you go back and

forth and talk to them

you realize some

some some tragic

um miscommunication or misunderstanding

um

or one believes that they were

that they broke up for one reason and

one for another and and uh uh it's it's

only in there if you kind of really go

back and forth and dig between the two

of them

so one thing i do like is

the attention to detail uh in the secret

world

i was talking to joel about this

you know things just like the extra bits

and pieces

as you say like you know the the

personal history between ricky pagan

um just things like when you're when

you're dead and you go across the

langmore bridge and you can see the

people hanging

uh it's just the little the little bits

that that show the designers and the

developers really cared about what what

it was they were doing that you know

these don't have to be there we serve no

purpose other than

when somebody discovers them they go oh

that's

really cool

it's definitely a sign of care within

whatever media you're you're ingesting

if there's if there are things put in

that um

that not every audience is gonna find

you know it might be by accident it

might be you know it's uh

when something's put in that is not

reaching the algorithm determined widest

possible audience uh i think that's a

that's a little bit of storytelling love

by things that don't have to be there

but are because they just are

yeah in the secret world yeah see where

they find a lot of that there's there's

a lot of love like when you do it in in

that way

okay which brings us on to cut content

every game every film every story you

know starts one way and ends another um

how much stuff

that you've written

never made into the game

is there anything that you think oh do

you know what i wish that had got in

there

yeah um

i mean that yeah that is a big a big

part of uh

game writing or just game work in

general is uh it's the

heartbreaking things that don't that

don't get in uh for various reasons um

i'm trying to think of a particular one

i mean it just happened it happened so

often it might even just be a bit of cut

text it could be a whole cut section a

character um something that wasn't

voiced

you know going onto something that was a

voice and we out we teased the idea

around the office and we talked about it

and never kind of fully jelled of of

fully voicing the um the buzzing um

which i would have loved to have done um

the reason one of the reasons we did the

the lore with the way we did was i i i

love game war but you know when i'm you

even i someone who works on story for a

living love story i i will sometimes um

skip or leave for later a big huge chunk

of text like uh like in an elder scrolls

game you pick up a book and it's like

several pages and it's it's interesting

stuff but like you're you're you're

you're you're playing a multi-sensory

thing right then it's you know it can be

really hard to focus it's like in mass

effect with the codex entries there is

so many of them and yeah there's so much

information that after a while you think

oh

yeah i don't want to read it anymore

right and it's interesting information

but like i said

so um i love it when so so one reason we

did the lore where we did those kind of

fragments that you get out of order is

that you can you can read a little

fragment quick

um you can collect them and you can

always go back to if there's a time

you're just like sitting around you're

just trying out ah you know i'm going to

read these lauren trees and and it's

just sort of uh uh

collectible thing um

but to further improve that it would be

great if you clicked on it and it was

told to you while you're playing because

you're gonna you know i can listen to an

audio story while i do the dishes i can

i can listen to a lauren tree while i uh

kill zombies um
plus if it if it if we if it had been

done in really well sound designed it

could have been a great way to kind of

realize this this weird multi-voiced

creepy thing um and it

that never happened

and i wish i wish to this day that we

had uh

i wish you could hear what's in my head

um

so did you

did you work or did you have anything to

do with the relaunch the um secret world

legends

yes that would be towards the end of my

time

sometime i think that came out in 2017

wasn't it

yeah yeah you know what i was probably

probably did some free um so i think i

left in 2016.

um

uh

a friend was involved with starting a

company um

china was like hey you should work with

me again and i was like oh you know i've

been here for eight years maybe i should

try
you know the only game company i'd

worked for full time i thought i should

try

try around

but i kept working with funcom on a

freelance capacity i still do now

actually um um

[Music]

but i think yeah i think for the

relaunch i maybe did some text for them

um

in the freelance capacity

what do you think of the relaunch do you

think that was a good idea

i had a long conversation with joel

about this and uh

he was very honest

i wasn't as directly involved other than

writing text which you know kind of

exists on its own

kind of

corner of it that that that's a little

divorced from some of those other

decisions um

yeah i don't know i i i i'm guessing

from from from the reaction my fellows

maybe that like like uh didn't

go how they wanted or

i don't know i've i've i haven't played

a ton of it i've mostly been playing

it's on the classic tsw i played a

little bit of uh

of the relaunch

um

so i'm not i don't

i'm not

i'm not really a a very good source

behind the scenes or or or or in front

of the scenes on exactly how it went uh

um but i know i know their reactions

from fans and devs that but

uh yeah maybe

it didn't go quite to plan or or

i don't know um it's a hard thing to do

because

um

you know

what do you do that changes it that

makes it feel like it was worth

you know doing getting this whole new

thing

uh but how much how far do you change it

where other people are like no no i it's

i remember it this way um it's it's a

tough i know it was a tough balancing

act to uh

do and mostly i was just in my own happy

little corner providing bits of text

so you you you say you've played the

secret world how far did you get i mean

did you get to what did you get to the

end of the story or

um yeah um

not completely i mean yes in that we

would you know test content so i've i've

played through most locations i'm trying

to remember my my main character was

probably

it's probably somewhere in transylvania

i want to say

um but i you know played through all the

tokyo and stuff beyond uh

uh just testing things out

[Music]

and what are you working on at the

moment

well actually before we come to that

what what have you done since leaving

funcom what's in your portfolio

i uh well i went and worked uh for a

company in china on uh

on a doomed project uh i don't think

i've seen any kind of later today but i

did some writing there um from there i

did uh i went full freelance

which was fun and scary um

and i worked

for a short

for a short time i did some freelance

work for um ubisoft on um

um

assassin's creed odyssey

uh is that the greek one that's the

greek one i got to do

primarily stuff on the island of lesbos

with with um

medusa and some other some other fun

bits

um

uh i've worked on

some arg games um

including the one that announced uh

although i don't know if the game itself

is coming out i don't know what the

status of it is uh bloodline uh vampire

the masquerade build lines too

um i've done a lot of tabletop game

writing uh four games like vampire the

masquerade and then a bunch of games

from onyx path publishing um

including um

uh

[Music]

let me look at my bookshelf and see

late one of the more latest ones is they

came from beyond the grave there's a

series of games called they came from

etc right um because they came from

beneath the sea which uh uh you you play

you play both the characters and sort of

like the actors in in bad uh

or at least schlocky b movie uh 50s uh

rubber suit and atomic monster um

that sounds like fun movies and yeah

yeah it's a it's a comedy horror game um

uh

not necessarily the sequel but the next

game in that series was they came from

beyond the grave which is the same

premise but you are playing 60s slash

70s um like hammer horror era uh uh

films you know technicolor blood uh that

looks a little too orange uh

actors chewing the scenery and just

committing to ridiculous scripts and um

that that's when

that's one of my favorite tabletop

things i think i've worked on i've also

worked on pugmire

which is a um

sort of

[Music]

d but everyone is a dog cat and other

animal people in a sort of post post

post post-apocalyptic world where

humans have long gone and these uplifted

animals are kind of left in this sort of

medieval
world but finding relics of the past and

uh

that was a lot of fun um

i'm currently

working full-time for uh amazon game

studios

initially i was hired for a lord of the

rings mmo that

one

tragically speaking of cutting room

floor stuff um

the stuff we were working on was really

cool i i i can't talk about it but the

license got pulled and these things do

happen especially with big licenses uh

big contentious licenses sometimes uh

but um the team stayed together uh

because again the company liked the work

that we were doing so we are now working

on um redacted uh

we've been we've been that's been

interesting though because i got i've

never

i've always worked on things that are

already kind of established or at least

partially established but this is a

chance where as a team we were just

coming up lots of pitches and

and starting from just that initial seat

of an idea

um and working on a particular seed now

and we'll see we'll see where that goes

are you allowed to tell me what it is

i am not ah

you don't ask you don't get

so what's next for josh

um

uh well definitely definitely more of

the video game writing uh definitely

more of the tabletop game writing um

my big love is is tabletop games uh um

um i would like to

i would like to play around with um

uh uh uh streaming some games

maybe maybe we'll do that with uh i

would love um this is totally unofficial

right now but i would love to get some

of the uh secret world devs and run a

secret world tabletop game on stream uh

you know what i think that would be

amazing

i've certainly mentioned it on on my

stream that uh you know i'd love to

you know get a group of people together

and

and and do some secret world tabletop

uh when that comes out and

the guys working on it do really seem to

have a passion for it so uh it's it's

one i'm keeping my eye on

yeah yeah they're very interested in

picking our brains to get you know like

to get things right and they're not just

right but like what can they do with it

to make their own you know uh

where can they go with the game to make

it

both the secret world everyone loves but

but also you know put their own stamp on

it

advance uh

advanced plot lines at least in the

tabletop version of the world uh you

know where they can go with it um but uh

they're very excited oh i might give you

a shout and see if we can uh do

something together

yeah yeah that would be really cool i'd

love to do more with that

um i would love to do more with um i

love

uh audio fiction audio drama stuff i've

played with it a few times here and

there i recently i um

recently had a baby uh so that's kind of

congratulations slow things down but on

the other hand i get

i get to say things like i have

successfully helped create

this is life

yes

oh it's alive it's uh it's it's it's

it's uh

it's it's been it's been great and tough

and and a few other things have gone

down the wayside are you getting any

sleep

luckily

uh my wife is a morning person and i am

a night owl and we've kind of um

mostly successfully uh utilized that to

get maybe a little bit more sleep than

some parents get although sometimes it's

hard um

but uh

but yeah and now we're hitting we're

reaching that six-month mark where the

baby's sleeping a little bit better and

i can start thinking about things again

i must say a couple of weeks ago with

the the 10th anniversary stream

um when joel turned up it was great and

then he got you and martin and to turn

up as well that was kind of icing on the

cake because everybody just loved the

fact that the devs are turned up and

were there just chatting and answering

questions so
thank you

thank you for that

oh you're you're welcome thank you no we

we still love the game it's fun to come

back to you from from the various other

projects it's it's like it's like coming

home

you know i do hold out hope it's it's

never going to happen i know but secret

world 2 would be wonderful or some sort

of revisiting maybe even as a

single-player game

i don't i don't know of anything in

particular at the moment but um i mean

it is an ip they have and i yeah i hope

they do stuff with it i

they you know it's still something where

they're

they're giving direct input on the

tabletop game and saying like oh do this

but not this so there

there is some interest in you know

what might happen yeah it would be a

shame if they let that lapse wouldn't it

i feel like it would mean it's going to

manifest in something i don't know what

form you know we've had things like

the park and moon's madness yes hide and

shriek
i was trying oh yeah yeah yeah that was

fun yeah i had fun on that uh uh yeah i

wrote the um

there's a ton of story in that but there

is in the in the uh the little little

diary entries and uh even spell

descriptions there's uh

um in fact there's a character i have in

there that never appeared in anything

other than the this little spell

description which is in several so it

kind of chronicles her life but this

this this this raucous uh magician and

laughing jenny is in

is in these spell descriptions but

several of them so if you put them all

together uh you kind of get the

chronicles of her really weird life i

haven't actually played moons of madness

it's it's something i keep on meaning to

to get around to and i haven't yet

that's um that is one that definitely

there was like a lot of stuff at the

cutting room floor there's some some

ambitious ideas i want to do the story i

i did the writing on that one and um

i need to go i haven't played all the

way through it i've i've played bits and

pieces i did the writing but i need to

go back and just like play through the

finished product

right final question for you this is

your opportunity now because you know

the people the guys listening to this

and watching this are going to be the

ones that have loved playing the game

for me i started playing i think i got

into

i think it was closed beta two

um back in the days where you applied

and you got lucky to be chosen rather

than having to buy a founder's pack

uh you know there are some

some parts of game dev at the moment i i

really don't like the way it's going

um but

yeah so i've been playing secret world

now for 10 years

a lot of the people listening are

exactly the same position as me so

what would you say to them you know

having thought about what's happened

over the last 10 years the game is

itself how it's evolved and

relaunched

um but these guys are still here they're

still interested they're still watching

you now so

what would you say to them

um i i would say thank you for still

being here um

the secret world was definitely i mean

you get on an interview you're always

going to want to say like oh this

project's really special to me or

whatever but

and they are but the secret world in

particular is one that stuck with me

both the fans the

game itself the people i got to work

with um i don't know there's a special

kernel of something there that uh i am

i am happy to have been a part of i'm

happy that everyone is still a part of

it still

thinking about it um

and uh

i i hope uh i hope that leads into um

more more manifestations of of that

world whether it's the tabletop or

anything else but um

but regardless i'm i'm i'm really glad

that uh

i'm glad i've had the history we've had

up to this point

josh uh thank you very much for joining

me today

uh it's been lovely to um to have you on

and to chat about the secret world with

you and uh wish you all the best of luck

for the future thank you

[Music]

you