By Andrew Faught \/ Photo by AJ Thompson<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n As one of the narrative designers of the award-winning video game Unpacking<\/em>, Annie VanderMeer \u201903 helped dream up thousands of physical items\u2014from the mundane to the meaningful\u2014to illustrate life\u2019s journeys through the things we carry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The dialogue-free game follows an unseen and unheard female protagonist between 1995 and 2015, from her childhood, to college, and on to adulthood. In thirty-five rooms, players unpack boxes of her toys, books, and memories, decorating various living spaces, while also divining clues\u2014through objects and settings\u2014about the character\u2019s personal journey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe essentially mapped out this arc of who she was and who she became,\u201d says VanderMeer, narrative lead with Digimancy Entertainment, a fully remote studio. \u201cWe\u2019re telling a story with stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The experience, she adds, taps an emotional resonance in players: \u201cWhile you\u2019re putting together this person\u2019s story, you naturally reflect on how your own life has gone\u2014your moves and the stuff you\u2019ve chosen to bring with you.\u201d (One scenario suggests a breakup with a love interest, as the adult character finds herself living again in her childhood room.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Billed as a \u201cZen\u201d puzzle game, Unpacking<\/em> won the BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) for Best Narrative, and a number of other awards. The game was created by Australian game developer Witch Beam, for whom VanderMeer was a contract employee, and released on multiple platforms in 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the past decade, developers have pioneered new ways to develop more immersive, story-based content. Unpacking<\/em> provides a voyeuristic thrill, and a kind of intimacy with and empathy for the unnamed protagonist, says VanderMeer, who works from Seattle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe modern term is you\u2019re developing a parasocial kind of connection to this person whose stuff you\u2019re putting away,\u201d she adds. \u201cYou\u2019re helping a friend move in.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The game has a deliberate pace that allows for introspection, with no requirement that the player dodge bullets or slay dragons. A single player visits living spaces in eight different years of the character\u2019s life, learning about her through her possessions. There are no rules, and it\u2019s not competitive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThere\u2019s no way to fail,\u201d VanderMeer says. \u201cYou\u2019re not going to drop and break something. You\u2019re not going to put something in the wrong spot and the game is going to end. There are parts where you can\u2019t really finish a level, because you can\u2019t put a toaster in the bathtub, but there aren\u2019t consequences.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n VanderMeer always has been a video game fanatic. Growing up in Mesa, Ariz., she played classic role-playing games on her dad\u2019s PC, and \u201cplatformer\u201d games (in which players move through a series of environments) on consoles. Today, she enjoys \u201ca bajillion\u201d new titles, including the narrative-driven games Inscryption<\/em>, and Horizon Forbidden West<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But she never figured she\u2019d make a career of games. Male gamers often were openly hostile toward female gamers, including VanderMeer, questioning their interest. \u201cThere was a great deal of gatekeeping from guys, insisting that you prove your knowledge and skill or be labeled a fake,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There were other dissuading factors. She comes from a family of doctors and academics, and gaming didn\u2019t seem to fit the part. VanderMeer decided that she\u2019d become an English professor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She enrolled at Macalester because she wanted a liberal arts experience in a culturally diverse setting. She majored in English with, not surprisingly, a specialization in creative writing, but then fate intervened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After graduation, she took a job at the electronics retailer GameStop in Irvine, Calif. She met game developers from nearby firms who came into the store on their lunch hour. After VanderMeer served as a panelist on a \u201csci-fi\/fantasy\/geek convention\u201d at the University of California\u2013Irvine, the roommate of a friend who worked at video game developer Papaya Studio approached her and asked if she\u2019d be interested in writing for the company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It turned out the writing was more in the public relations vein. But company leaders did say she could write a game story\u2014Taxi Driver<\/em>, designed as a \u201csequel\u201d to the film of the same name.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She jumped at the opportunity, and then joined Obsidian Entertainment in 2006, helping to create the Dungeons & Dragons<\/em> property Neverwinter <\/em>Nights 2.<\/em> After working on both big-budget \u201cAAA\u201d games, including Destiny<\/em> and Guild Wars 2<\/em>, and small-team indie titles, she was hired as narrative lead at Digimancy in August.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While nearly half of all US gamers are women, only a quarter of game developers are women, according to the market research firm NPD Group. VanderMeer says it\u2019s difficult for women, including herself, to advance into senior roles, attributing this to the industry\u2019s having long been male dominated and a continuing perception that women aren\u2019t good with tech that has carried over into games.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Throughout her career, VanderMeer has been encouraged by Stephanie Burt, who taught English at Macalester from 2000 to 2007, and advised VanderMeer\u2019s thesis on science fiction and fantasy. Burt is now a professor of English at Harvard. An award-winning poet, Burt says it\u2019s her former prot\u00e9g\u00e9 who has given her a lesson in storytelling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the fantastical world of video games, VanderMeer has figured out new ways to address character and emotion, Burt says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cHow are the emotional possibilities for a character different because they can commune with cats, or merge with a laser-guided robot, or turn into a cloud?\u201d Burt asks. \u201cAnnie is just so good at thinking about things like that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n VanderMeer tells students who are interested in gaming to focus on what excites them. \u201cEven though I loved taking English courses at Mac, I deeply appreciated exploring other subjects. Game development is home to so many roles and disciplines\u2014having a diversity of learning experiences helps.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n While some players have questioned what Unpacking<\/em> is all about, VanderMeer has her own reasons for enjoying the game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt\u2019s profoundly satisfying to open boxes and put things away\u2014it\u2019s a weird primal thing,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s hard to not feel close to somebody when you\u2019ve put away their underwear.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Andrew Faught is a freelance writer based in Fresno, Calif.<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Annie VanderMeer ’03 unpacks a career in creating video games.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1077,"featured_media":19601,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19487","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni","mediatype-articles"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"fields":{"article_type":[8],"flickr_photoset_id":"","youtube_id":"","square_thumbnail":false,"press_photos":false,"story_title":"","story_caption":"","rotations":false,"maps":false,"marker_title":"","marker_text":"","geographic_location":false,"feature_embed":"","custom_link_url":"","news_icon_name":"","image_options":false,"main_feature_story":"","custom_image":false,"custom_feature_title":"","custom_feature_caption":"","custom_markup":"","custom_markup_link":"","custom_markup_title":"","custom_markup_caption":"","byline":"","post_thumbnail_style":"default","press_downloads":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19487","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1077"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19487"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19487\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30973,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19487\/revisions\/30973"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19487"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19487"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.macalester.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19487"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}