Wales Interactive is a computer games publisher and developer based in South Wales. Their Media Cymru project – the Interactive Film Challenge – focuses on placing Wales on the map as a global hub for the creation of interactive movies (in an interactive movie the audience engages in the story and chooses its outcome via a series of choices). 

Richard shares why research and development is so important to help grow a business and ensure resilience in the long term.

Richard Pring, Co-founder of Wales Interactive:

Placing Wales on the map for interactive movies… 

I’m Richard Pring, Co-founder of Wales Interactive – a games publisher and developer based in Wales.  

Wales Interactive started with making 2D and 3D games, then about six years ago we tried something new in the interactive movie genre (in an interactive movie the audience engages in the story and chooses what happens next). 

We looked around the world and found not many people were making interactive movies worldwide. People who wanted to make them had barriers to entry – such as training, or they didn’t know how to get into it. We wanted to change that.  

Now, Wales Interactive is the second largest publisher of interactive movies in the world. Our in-house interactive writing scripting tool – WIST – helps writers and directors from a non-traditional background to create games and branching narrative scripts (a branching narrative is when the storyline direction changes based on the decisions of the player, unlike linear narratives that follow a predetermined path).

The creation of an interactive movie is a unique experience unlike traditional film-making. Imagine filming one simple scene in vastly different ways, to reflect the choices that the audience might make. This is where our narrative tool WIST comes into play. This interactive script editor allows writers to create non-linear stories using a Graph node interface (it’s like a big map of choices).

I’m proud of how far we’ve come. We’ve now got people from all over the world working with us –  developing skillsets for writers, directors, producers, or companies. We are giving them a new way to tell interesting stories and and share them with the world.

Wales Interactive × Media Cymru   

For the Media Cymru Interactive Film Challenge project, we issued a world-wide call-out to train people and get them into interactive movies. We had submissions from students based in Slovakia all the way up to Hollywood actors, writers, directors who have worked on big projects such as Die Hard.

We were able to provide experience and advice in writing interactive stories with satisfying narrative branches, engaging characters and choices in which the audience can truly feel in control of the story.

We hosted an initial seminar with a large cohort then from there, we developed a group of twelve with the storytelling skills for interactive scripting. We got cool projects across different genres from horror to thriller to action, to lots of stuff we wouldn’t have necessarily done in-house. 

One company we’ve ended up working with is a company based up in Leeds – Dark Rift Horror. They make visceral shock horror projects, and their ideas evolved nicely into our interactive movie project.

Embarking on a research, development and innovation (R,D&I) journey 

We’ve learned many lessons over the years, and here’s my advice for others who might be embarking on a similar R&D journey. Sometimes, there are barriers to entry. When there is a sixty-page technical documentation or you need to do two weeks of due diligence, for example, it might seem daunting, but working with people who know what they’re doing, like Media Cymru helps you understand and overcome barriers.

The main thing is: try it. Find out what the problems are and look for support because it is there. It’s one thing we’ve found out time and time again – when we have thought there isn’t support, there usually is, it’s sometimes just hard to find. It’s about getting out there, talking to people and seeing how you can get into the R&D mindset.

I think sometimes it’s about reframing your business and understanding R&D is a massive part of everyone’s business – it just may not be classed as R&D, but I can guarantee almost everyone is doing it and it’s a matter of finding that support out there and discovering ways of doing things in a new and improved way. 

Showcasing our strengths in an innovative creative sector

Here in Wales, we have so much access to innovation. Some may not be sure of how to access the money, or the support on offer though. We can be quite bad at applying to those larger grants and putting our hands up and saying we’re doing world-class things here in Wales. We need to showcase that more, we need to shout about that more. We’re quite fortunate as a company to travel around the world – and sometimes people in industry don’t find out about us until we have gone there and shouted about it. As a country, we’re probably a little bit shy about shouting how good we are. So we need to focus more on showcasing that, elevating our work on a global scale and not hiding out at home!  

Aspirations for the future of Welsh games industry 

In the next decade, we’re looking to evolve our Media Cymru project. We’ve been on this development journey for quite a few years now.  The Interactive Film Challenge project has evolved what we are trying to do. It’s created that pipeline of training, of creating, of making interactive movies sustainably and regularly, taking more risks and working with different people. I’d like to see bigger and better things and ideally maybe an interactive movie being nominated for an Oscar one day, which would be absolutely amazing – and made here in Wales! 

About Wales Interactive 

Wales Interactive is a multi-award winning indie video games and interactive movie developer and publisher based in Wales. Their growing portfolio of titles have been played by millions globally, including; Sker Ritual, Maid of Sker, Ten Dates, The Complex, Five Dates, Late Shift, The Bunker. Wales Interactive’s products are entertaining the world as well as putting Wales on the video games map.  

About Richard Pring 

Richard is a multi-award winning Film and Computer Games Director who embarked on his journey within the entertainment arena more than a decade ago. He has experienced a diverse range of roles in games and television, ultimately steering him toward co-founding his own successful studio Wales Interactive in 2012. He has become one of the leading video game entrepreneurs in the UK. 

About Dark Rift Horror  

Dark Rift Horror is a multi-media horror studio behind the award winning movies BOOK OF MONSTERS and HOW TO KILL MONSTERS. Driven by their unique brand of blood-soaked popcorn horror, Dark Rift Horror create community driven horror entertainment for a worldwide audience.