"We wanted to create an environment where if a game player enjoyed the "writing style" of a particular game designer, he or she could look for the next game by that same author and not be disappointed"
About this Quote
Crane is quietly arguing that video games deserve the kind of authorship we already grant novels, films, and TV: a recognizable voice you can follow from work to work. The key move is the phrase "writing style" in scare quotes, a tell that he knows the term doesn’t quite fit the medium as people stereotyped it then. He’s stretching language on purpose, smuggling in a bigger claim: design is expression, not just engineering.
The intent is partly consumer-facing and partly political. Consumer-facing, it’s a promise of trust: if you liked this, you can buy the next one without fear. Political, it’s a bid for credit inside an industry that long treated creators as interchangeable parts while publishers owned the spotlight. Crane, an early Atari star who helped found Activision, is speaking from the front lines of that fight. Activision’s breakthrough was not only better boxes and marketing; it was selling games like albums, where the artist matters.
The subtext is about dignity and continuity. He imagines players forming a relationship with a designer’s sensibility - pacing, humor, challenge curves, the way a world “feels” - and having that relationship rewarded rather than erased by corporate anonymity. Even the careful, slightly clunky "not be disappointed" reads like a manifesto written in the language of the marketplace: artistry justified through reliability.
In 2026, it lands as both prophetic and incomplete. We now have celebrity auteurs and “signature” studios, yet the industry still struggles to attach authorship to massively collaborative productions. Crane’s line captures the moment games started insisting they were culture with bylines.
The intent is partly consumer-facing and partly political. Consumer-facing, it’s a promise of trust: if you liked this, you can buy the next one without fear. Political, it’s a bid for credit inside an industry that long treated creators as interchangeable parts while publishers owned the spotlight. Crane, an early Atari star who helped found Activision, is speaking from the front lines of that fight. Activision’s breakthrough was not only better boxes and marketing; it was selling games like albums, where the artist matters.
The subtext is about dignity and continuity. He imagines players forming a relationship with a designer’s sensibility - pacing, humor, challenge curves, the way a world “feels” - and having that relationship rewarded rather than erased by corporate anonymity. Even the careful, slightly clunky "not be disappointed" reads like a manifesto written in the language of the marketplace: artistry justified through reliability.
In 2026, it lands as both prophetic and incomplete. We now have celebrity auteurs and “signature” studios, yet the industry still struggles to attach authorship to massively collaborative productions. Crane’s line captures the moment games started insisting they were culture with bylines.
Quote Details
| Topic | Writing |
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