I sent a very detailed Night One to Mike today. It’s basically the script. The more I worked on it the more carried away I got. I always knew night one would write itself. I didn’t send it to Whitley but I wish I had. Mike said something about sending it his way first so I did as I was told. But after I get Mike’s notes I’ll send a draft to Whit.
Laura bought Patrick an SUV for his birthday and they’re parking it in one of our spots until the end of the month as not to spoil the surprise. By the way, if anyone buys me an SUV early, feel free to give it to me early as well.
Mel and I are buying their old Montero for Sarah. She’s been driving our old truck and it’s on its last leg. Sarah will work out some way of paying us back, either through a painting or money. Dunno yet. Mel’s gonna talk to her see if she’s interested. We’re also buying the Lorey’s SUV so Mel will have a vehicle to herself. But Dean’s gonna wait until after he’s been picked up for another season before they sell. This vehicle shuffle is not uncommon. Mel bought Natalie a Jeep a few months back. She’s paying it off monthy but her credit was challenged so we paid the sticker for her. While we’re at it, does anyone else need a car?
Well, it seems the rumors were true. Paramount’s in turmoil. Not sure if we’ll get a meeting rescheduled.
This weekend we’re meeting the Lussiers and Jason Scott Lee on the ocean for breakfast.
Met Mike, Whitley and his son Andrew at a Starbucks in Santa Monica this morning. We chatted through the story and I’m gonna get started on the Outline as soon as I’ve read through the books. One of the steps calls for an outline so it’s all good. I’m thinking I might write the outline in script form because I want to play around with the characters and story in detail so I can better figure out night two. But the meeting went great and more and more I’m impressed at Whitley’s support.
The Take2 pitch went great too. The designers had to fly back to Texas so the plan changed slightly. Brad had stayed up all night learning the demo so he could play it. After my pitch Brad went all video while Lori and I did the commentary. These guys talked like they wanted to pursue it. They said they would draw up an offer.
Only thing that bugged me was Brad’s set up was different this time. He basically said they were new and what they were trying was new and they realized they’d have to prove themselves. It sounded to me like he was saying they’d take whatever offer came. Hope I heard that wrong. I ain’t bargain basement and neither should they be. This is a great game and a great story and it’ll make bank.
Tomorrow Patrick and I head to Paramount with Glenn to pitch Narcosis. But I’m hearing some horror stories about Paramount. Sounds like they are all about to get fired.
The first was at Vivendi Universal which took forever to get to because the 405 is and always is a nightmare. There were nearly a dozen guys from Vivendi. One interesting difference between the gaming industry and the movie industry is the business cards. Everybody has them and everybody uses them. After the introductions, Brad did a little intro, then asked me to introduce myself and tell what I’ve worked on. I did my quick pitch then the design boys ran the demo.
Looks like a very cool game. It would tough to keep up when they would break into the business gaming jargon, but I think I caught the gist. There are developers who create the game from story to finished product. Then there are Publishers who put up the money. I think the hurdle in our situations is that Tiger Hill falls somewhere in between. They introduce developers to publishers. The problem is, most publishers these days have their own in-house developers. Tiger’s big offer is what John Woo’s name brings to the table. He has Hollywood connections, IP and his name should and probably will carry a game. I may have that wrong but that’s what I gathered.
But overall they seemed very impressed with the game and the story. Of course, I clearly can’t tell how a Hollywood meeting goes so I’m not even gonna try to guess the outcome of this one.
After the meeting we dropped by Tiger’s office then carovan’d out to Calabasas where we had our meeting with THQ. The mood was different. Brad and Lori must have detected something because Lori whispered to me to do the three minute pitch while Brad was still doing the intros.
I did the three minute and the developers showed the demo then the guy we pitched proceeded to tell us why he was passing. Always a bummer but I got no problem with a guy telling me right then and there rather than allowing me to get my hopes up.
I left them and ran down to Woodland Hills to pick up Mel. She visited the eye doc again where she was told they would not do surgery on her. That she should come back to them in ten years when her eyes have gotten worse. Mel was clearly bummed….and due to all the tests…even more blind than before. It sounds like her eyes are so bad they are afraid they could actually make them worse. So they want them to get worse before they’ll even try to make them better. Okay, sure.
We boogied back to the Commons and met up with Lori, Brad and the developer team for dinner. It was fun. Mel was the life of the party and I drank Chopin on John Woo’s tab. Thanks John.
Tomorrow we have another pitch with Take2.