The Auteur as a figure in entertainment is dead. Grown strong on digital production, a more artistically bankrupt creature emerges in their place. It is the Executive Auteur, and it's coming soon to a theater near you, whether you like it or not.
If you've noticed all manner of artists increasingly taking a back seat in the discourse to studios and franchises, if you're weirded out by how much more valued a corporation's vision seems to be than the interchangeable drones tasked with realizing that vision, this article is for you.
I realised the other day it's kind of funny how Ken Williams was strutting around the other year to promote his book acting like he was some kind of highly influential industry luminary when all of Sierra's big hits were created and run by others
Leisure Suit Larry? Al Lowe Space Quest? Two Guys from Andromeda Quest for Glory? Lori and Corey Cole Police Quest? Jim Walls King's Quest? his wife Roberta
the closest thing to a major creative choice he made in a Sierra game was the decision to dump Jim Walls as the lead for Police Quest 4 and instead hire Daryl Fucking Gates
remember how he seemed to think it made him look like a brilliant entrepreneur to brag about how he brought his wife into his job to do the actual work while he messed around on work computers to try and get his business off the ground
it's so weird when this happens with games because I feel like early games fandom-criticism was pretty good at talking about who did what. at least that's the impression I've gotten from the deep knowledge people seem to have of things like "who designed each level in Doom". I'm not sure how we got from that very fine toothed analysis of how games came together to the modern auteur model... maybe it was just easier for news outlets and press releases to handle discussion that way once games became a juggernaut entertainment industry?
