Carleton Alum Explores the ‘Open World’ in L.A.
By Dan Rubinstein
In an open-world video game, players navigate a non-linear environment, choosing which objectives to pursue. Unlike, say, Super Mario, in which the goal is basically to get from A to B, games such as Grand Theft Auto feature an overarching mission and countless side activities in vast virtual spaces that can be chaotic, exciting, nerve-wracking and beautiful, or any combination thereof.
“Interactions with most art forms are fairly passive,” says Nick Najm, an open-world designer at Absurd Ventures in Los Angeles and a graduate of Carleton University’s Interactive Multimedia and Design program.
“You listen to music, you watch television and film. If you go to the ballet, your presence doesn’t change what you’re seeing on the stage.
“But in an open-world game, there are branching decision paths and systems that behave independently. In Grand Theft Auto, pedestrians, police and gang members all live and breathe on their own, and when they interact, things get interesting. When you explore that world, your moment-to-moment experience is unique. That’s what makes games different than other types of art: the output is different because of your input.”
Najm is currently working on a new open-world action-adventure game. In his previous job at Insomniac Games, part of Sony’s PlayStation Studios, he contributed to Marvel’s Spider-Man 2. And for the past eight years, since he moved to L.A., the city has been his open world — a creative hub where a guy from Ottawa can find a home in an industry he loves while chipping away at his R&B/hip-hop ambitions on the side.
“Los Angeles is a strangely magical place,” says Najm, describing its vibrant mix of celebrities, food, fashion, movies and music.
“Being here presents opportunities that I couldn’t have had anywhere else. Maybe New York City, but the weather there doesn’t come close.”
Building Your Own World
As a video game designer, Najm is hidden behind the curtain, pulling strings. Using rudimentary blocks and scripting tools in a software framework called a game engine, he helps create both a virtual environment and the sequence of events that happen within that environment.
“It’s kind of like a kid playing with LEGO,” he explains.
“You’re building your own little world piece by piece.”
The job combines elements of different skill sets, from computer programmer and graphic artist to writer, director and producer. “Design is the intersection of all these disciplines,” says Najm. This entails a lot of collaboration within large, diverse teams to ensure that the on-screen experience is seamless for anybody who picks up a controller.
“Games have to have a certain cadence and flow,” says Najm.
“The best part for me is when you’re locked in, contending with a set of constraints, and have to make something clever that’s on time and on budget. That’s where a designer shines.”
While working on Spider-Man 2 — his favourite superhero — Najm had an opportunity to shine in a way that transcends video games. PlayStation Studios has a series of employee groups representing equity-deserving communities (Black@PlayStation, Pride@PlayStation and so forth) but none that reflected his Lebanese heritage.
So Najm started the MENA (Middle East and North Africa) employee network and pushed for ways to reflect the MENA diaspora in the game. Ultimately, like so much film and video game content, most of that material was cut. But if you play Spider-Man 2, you can see MENA character faces and you might come across a street in Brooklyn where the storefronts have Arabic signage and one shop owner bears an uncanny resemblance to Najm’s father.
The Fundamentals of Every Discipline
Carleton’s Interactive Multimedia and Design program was a perfect fit for Najm, teaching him the fundamentals of every discipline within a game studio.
“It’s so multidisciplinary,” he says. “At a base level, you learn 3D modelling, animating, programming, audio/video, marketing, business development and design. I can relate to everyone’s jobs in the studio. When I have to ask one of my colleagues for something, I know how long it’ll take.
“Carleton was really a fantastic foundation for my career,” he continues.
“The program couldn’t have set me up any better for success.”
Breaking into design was difficult, but Najm finessed a video game marketing job into his first design gig, then joined Ubisoft Toronto — “with just a three-month contract and an Airbnb rental” — and has never looked back.
“You have to be willing to take a risk and do something no one else is going to do,” he says.
“You might have to sell yourself with nothing but your education and your personality to get a foot in the door. But don’t wait for things to happen. Make something happen.”
After all, it’s a big, open world out there.
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