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Jamin Warren founded Killscreen as well as Gameplayarts, an organization dedicated to the education and practice of game-based arts and culture. He has produced events such as the Versions conference for VR arts and creativity, in partnership with NEW INC. Warren also programmed the first Tribeca Games Festival, the groundbreaking Arcade at the Museum of Modern Art, and the Kill Screen Festival, which Mashable called "the TED of videogames." Additionally, he has served as an advisor for the Museum of Modern Art's design department, acted as cluster chair for the Gaming category for the Webbys, and hosted Game/Show for PBS Digital Studios.
Here is the verbatim transcript of the conversation between Dom Rabrun and Jamin Warren.
Jamin Warren: Just leave the um... leave the uh, the browser open cause it like records the audio and the video like separately.
Dom Rabrun: Gotcha. Sounds good.
Jamin Warren: Cool. Uh, well thanks for making time to chat. Really appreciate it.
Dom Rabrun: Of course. Yeah.
Jamin Warren: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Dom Rabrun: I’ve been reading your stuff. I’ve always looked forward to seeing it in the inbox and I... I appreciate you reaching out cause I mean I really enjoyed talking to you and I was hoping we’d get the chance to talk more, you know, just in general. So yeah, really happy you reached out.
Jamin Warren: Yeah, no, of course. Um, tell me a little bit about your... your background. Like how did you make your way to like games as a... as a medium?
Dom Rabrun: Whoa. [Exhales deeply] You know, I... I told myself I’m gonna give you a full blast of my... my brain, you know what I mean? Like, like Cyclops like fully open. Like... the reality is I remem... I remember the first time I encountered video games, which was like a Super Nintendo that my uh... neighbor had. And I grew up... um, I’m Haitian-American. I grew up um, pretty much in... in... in Brooklyn in like... uh... I don’t want to say "projects," it was... it was not a... it was like a tenement building, it was like not very nice... it was like rent-controlled building. But like... and I... I don’t know why my... my brain is like this but I... I have very specific memories around technology, sounds, and imagery. And it makes sense considering what kind of person I am, but I remember seeing Super Nintendo and Mario... Super Mario World... and that game, the sound... I’m hearing it now... the... and that was so powerful for me. Um, and my first console was a Sega Genesis. And I... I feel like since then, it’s been this dance of me trying to... almost like being so in love with games as a medium and almost trying to like... uh... portions of my life where I tried to downplay just how important they are to me. Musically, uh, visually. How I even perceive reality. You know what I mean? Like... that’s a... I... did I answer your question?
Jamin Warren: Yeah, no, 100%. Yeah, I mean that’s like often a challenge for like... often a challenge for artists um, like to find a way to talk about the influence of games without getting... without people like making presumptions about like your... like making presumptions about your work, you know? It’s like uh... if you say... you know, cause you don’t do like "game art" for example, right? You know, so stylistically that’s not something, or aesthetically something that you’re interested in. But it influences like the way you think about like structure and form and... um, so it can be... I think it’s a real challenge I think for artists to figure out how to talk about... talk about their work to talk about games. So they use other languages, like usually deflect or like, you know, you talk about like uh, you know... I... it’s funny I have a conversation coming up with um, Melissa Cody, who... who is a uh... who uh... who works with... with fabrics. Indigenous woman out here in California. And does a lot of like contemporary like weaving techniques that’s like deeply in... deeply inspired by like 8-bit games. Like the... the texture and the form and color and whatnot. And so, like I’ll be interested to hear like from her in terms of like, well how do you talk about your work? Cause if you come out, you know, for a contemporary art museum and tell people that, you know, games are a reference point, they make a lot of presumptions. A lot of presumptions about it. So, yeah. I feel your... I feel your pain. I understand.
Dom Rabrun: Yeah. It’s... it’s an odd connotation. I mean, it’s... I always think back to like um... Roger Ebert just spending years being like, "It’s not... it’s not a thing." [Connection glitches] You’re... your video cut out. Okay, you’re back. Yeah, Roger Ebert spending years being like, "It’s not... like it’s not a thing." And I just feel like it’s such a powerful medium that’s just been fighting for legitimacy when it didn’t... didn’t have to. You know what I mean? It just doesn’t... And I... I was reading... I was reading one of your articles and just... it just... it... it was really kind of inspiring to me to think about... like uh... maybe some Swedish philosopher or someone was like: "To kick a ball is what you’re doing in the real world. Oh yeah, Huizinga. But to score a goal... to score a goal happens in the game world. Scoring a goal is not even real. It’s not a real thing." So... it... it’s like, you know we have this World Cup coming up and I’m not a sports person, but the language of sports is like this thing that’s understood about like... I don’t know, racing a lap, overtaking, touchdowns, and all of these systems that we’re just really comfortable with. But like when I start talking about D&D, it’s... it’s like it becomes this thing of just like, "Huh?" But we roleplay all day. There’s games all around us. But the video game aspect, having this component that is doing a lot of the com... uh... computing changes stuff, right?
Jamin Warren: Um, tell me about like your... like your method and practice like as a... like as a painter. Um, you know just from like... from a... from a... like a style standpoint. You know, you work with like these like heavy... heavy brushstrokes, strong colors. Tell me about like the tradition that kind of led you there.
Dom Rabrun: Well, I’m... it’s... it’s been an interesting journey for me. I... I think I went from being really inspired by manga and comics art. And like going into college, I discovered like James Jean’s work and a bunch of these other comic artists who were doing super interesting covers in like the late 2010s. And then simultaneously I was learning about Basquiat... or just becoming a Basquiat disciple. Right. And I was like, "Oh, wow... like wow. This is... this is speaking to me." And then... um... similarly... similarly to video games, there were always these paintings in my home and my family’s homes of like... with Black art you would always get like um... I’m trying to find a good version of this. I’m gonna... I’m gonna give you an example once... [Rustling sound as he grabs an object] This is a... this is a great example. This is like woodblock. But you would get these... these ima... these images that you would easily... you... you’d be wrong to think this but it’s really easy from a Western perspective to just think of them as sim... simple. You know like they used to call these i... things prim... these images "primitive." Right. This... the kind of image where it’s like flat... if you’re not paying attention. And like a person’s hand is as big as like a car behind them. And it’s so much motion and color. And I remember thinking that, "Oh yeah, that’s not as... not as fancy as these Batman paintings or some like John Singer Sargent painting or whatever." And I went through this... another dip where like I think after high school I was like, "Oh, this has been around me so often... so... so much." And I spent years in my Japanophile phase kind of pushing away from that being like, "I’m not... like pushing away from these traditions and being like, 'Ah, I’m doing this.'" And I think in my... in my late 20s, early 30s I was like, "Oh, this has always been in my soul and like it’s okay for me to paint like this." Heavy brushstrokes like you were saying. Color. Um, I don’t see it as flat. I think uh... to me I’m really interested in like... in painting or drawing, making the foreground image as important as the background image. Like that’s what I see a lot when I look at Haitian, Caribbean, Latin... Latin American painting.
Jamin Warren: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Why... why is that for you? What... what is it about like wanting to bring certain things... cause there’s obviously like a... a context, right, about who belongs in the foreground and who belongs in the background. So, you know, tell me about like your... your approach there.
Dom Rabrun: Yeah, I think... I think it’s like ancient wisdom. I think it’s stuff that like our ancestors knew, you know, a thousand years ago that we just have to keep reminding ourselves that like... you know, the earth is important. You know what I mean? Like we... we’re part of this thing. You know, it’s not a thing you stick a hole into and dredge up. It’s like... you... you should be able to hold a leaf and be like... "I... I’m... like the leaf is... is me too." Like we’re... we’re all kind of... I’m wearing a floral shirt cause I like... I really like that. It... it speaks to something super deep in me. Um, and like if you pay attention to some of these paintings, you could see a hurricane and be like, "That’s also a part of us." Like the goat that’s like chilling in the painting is also a part... is in the environment and it’s... back to the game thing, I think it also flies in the face of this idea of... "I click this thing and my character moves here and I move there," or even "controlling" a character. Cause like now we’re getting into some weird shit that I would love to play with at... at some point. You know, like the met... the... the thing of "what does it mean to even hold this controller and control someone?" Um... yeah.
Jamin Warren: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I... yeah, I... I... I understand what you’re saying. Like um... yeah, was there like a moment for you as an artist, like uh was there a painting that like jumped out at you that really like changed your... changed your perspective? I mean you mentioned Basquiat. I don't know is there a particular like work from... from... from him that, you know, was like, "Oh, okay. I think this is a place that I want to go and explore."
Dom Rabrun: I think... I think his work is like... yeah, the background elements are saying stuff. I... I remember he was... he... he would talk about Cy Twombly being an influence. I remember looking at Cy Twombly’s work being like, "I don’t get this shit." But like... but now I’m like, "Oh, there’s... there’s stuff here." My favorite Basquiat painting is "Glenn." Or well, maybe my second favorite. My first was probably "Riding with Death." But "Glenn," I saw in person I think at the MoMA. And seeing all these sort of Xeroxed ima... images... I... I noticed in my... in my head what it’s... a Basquiat painting is like I have a cursor in my... and I’m just selecting. And I can right-click. And if you could imagine right-clicking on an element of a Basquiat painting, what does that menu look like? It’s so much stuff. It’s... it’s... there’s so much going on. And pretty much any element you click is gonna give you sound, video, weird shit. And so I... I think "Glenn" is maybe the best example of that but I could... that's the first one I could think of. But like there have been a lot of paintings like that that... that have made me sort of think like, "Okay, maybe I’ve been looking at this stuff kind of wrong."
Jamin Warren: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Did you uh... did you grow up in an artistic family? Was um... were the arts like a natural place for you to go?
Dom Rabrun: No. Um, my... I have a... I have a very like uh... conservative Christian, super working class... I’m first generation American and drawing for me was always like... yeah, I... I don’t come from a... a... an artistic family. I come from a family of like merchants, I guess they were like business people and merchants back in Haiti. Um, but like expressing oneself... like there... I had maybe a... an uncle who was a painter and gave it up when he was like 15 or something. But it was very much my thing and I was rarely if ever like praised for it or even barely acknowledged. It was like, "Oh yeah, that’s a thing you do." Like, "Okay." Which I think is kind of... in hindsight I think it was kind of good for me to kind of just be like, "I’m... I’m completely forging my own thing."
Jamin Warren: Yeah. Do... um, did you like spend summers in... in Haiti? I know that’s not uh... like uncommon for like Caribbean folks to, you know, do summers or see family. Obviously it’s, you know, much more challenging now but like uh...
Dom Rabrun: Yeah, it... No. I... I went two... two times. I went in ’99 for... for two weeks where I played um... I had Pokémon Yellow on my Game Boy Color playing that in Haiti. And then I went in... I think it was 2018. Um... so yeah, very, very different. And I was bringing my aunt there who ha... was like slowly... like she was like early-onset dementia. That was like a very different kind of trip. Um, so those are two times I went. It was kind of a threat. Like going to Haiti was like... it was kind of like, "Don't... like you like... we're gonna send you back" kind of thing. It was... it was like, "We're gonna just drop you there, you know, if you don't behave." Which is... which is a weird thing, right? To be like threatened with your... your... your ancestry.
Jamin Warren: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean like ostensibly like uh... the place you’re from should be uh... like you should... it should generate like feelings of like longing and, you know... excitement.
Dom Rabrun: Like, "No! Please!"
Jamin Warren: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Not like uh... not like fear. I... I mean I... I had that experience with... you know, Texas. I... I didn't grow up there but my family's there. My... my grandfather would, you know... I came a couple times. And uh... it’s kind of a similar thing. Like my grandfather was like a pretty uh... pretty strict person so uh... he still... he still is. He’s... he’s, you know, 94 at this point. So still like everything’s super buttoned up. But that was like a threat for my parents. It was like, "You know, if you... just you'll do another summer with Popo." Like that was, you know, I had more than enough. It was enough to... you know, I was like, "I don't... I don't want that smoke."
Dom Rabrun: Damn. I imagine you out there like cat... what cattle ranching or something? Like what...
Jamin Warren: It’s San Antonio, so it's like pretty... pretty urban so. Nothing uh... Nothing uh... nothing too... too... too dramatic. I mean it is very Texas just in a very... just in a very, very, very different way. Um, yeah. Um, did you like have someone in your life that kind of like pushed you towards like painting? Was it like uh... was it self... self-directed? Who were like the people along the way who kind of encouraged you like in your... in your practice?
Dom Rabrun: It was mostly self-directed. Like my... my mother kind of put me on the path of like extreme love of knowledge. Like she bought us... she... she bought a... a... a Mac for my brother and I when we were like six. And for context, my mom was dying of HIV-related illnesses at the time in like ’94. So it was like the average American didn’t even have a computer. It’s... this is a really bizarre and amazing thing that she did. And now my brother and I both work in computers... in computer stuff. Um, but I... I... I think that’s a really big component in my artistic life cause I think about like... there was this... there was this Mac game called Flying Colors. You ever heard of that?
Jamin Warren: Mmm. No. No.
Dom Rabrun: I feel like you might find that inter... I... I’m gonna send it to you... a... an image. It was like this proto... Photoshop thing where you could like... you could basically make clip art but also like st... these strange animations like Garden of Edens and all kinds of strange tableaux. You basically make like these tableaux. And I remember it had sound effects while you were painting but stuff like that I... that were really sticky in my brain. But I’m pretty much self-directed. Like I don’t... um... no one encouraged what I did. It was kind of like, "Oh, it’s a cute thing that you do." And I also grew up very strict Jehovah’s Witness. So it was like all the stuff I wanted to draw was... was forbidden. You know like I wanted to draw... I wanted to draw comics. And it’s like, "Okay, well I can't draw people beating each other up and like Hulk and Spider-Man." So like it was kind of like shameful as well.
Jamin Warren: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. That’s um... yeah, I... you know it... it... that... that period of like creative technology is like super... super interesting. Hypercard and Kid Pix and um... you know, a bunch of that stuff is super interesting because it was so new. Um, you know, so you... you know, from a user interface standpoint you're trying to experiment with like how do you teach people like how to make new things? And uh... clearly like a real touchpoint I think for also for like a generation of like interactive folks, you know. It was the first time you could like make something that, you know, clicked and it moved and, you know, led a lot... led a lot of people to like HTML or designing games or other interactive experiences. So um... you know I do wonder if, you know, like for kids growing up today, things like Roblox and Minecraft and then on the other side of the spectrum, you know... Gen AI, like Sora stuff. I wonder, you know, those are not end points necessarily, right? Like those are not the places you want to stay, but they can be springboards for like something new. So it will be interesting to see like 20 years from now like what's the uh... you know, what's the gener... what... what is the... what is the... what is the... for those influenced by those types of things, what are gonna be the things that they create um, you know, 20, 30 years from now.
Dom Rabrun: I can... I think about this a lot too. And I can take a swing at this. I could be completely wrong but I try... and I'm trying not to be like "old man yelling at cloud." I... I really try to be sympathetic to what their experience is because it's... it... they're like on a... on a treadmill that's going at like 70 miles an hour or something. And... but my... my guess is that identity and the avatar... and perhaps how one moves... how one is perceived and moves through virtual environments will be respected as art. Um, the same way we have fashion, right? And like I love... I love like uh... shitting on Fortnite for having dudes like wanting to pay... pay $15 to look like Thanos for two months. But there's something there, right? Like you paid money to look like Thanos and maybe to them it's like... there... there's... there's something there. And one of these kids will be smart enough to tell us what that felt like for them. I don't think we're there yet. Because they're... because they're... they're looking like Thanos or whatever. And they're... they're seven years old. But they're not... they're not able to get there yet. Tell us why that's imp... you know. What... or what it even feels like.
Jamin Warren: Yeah. Yeah. I mean it’s interesting you think throughout like uh... you know, throughout like the... throughout art history, you know, you had people paint portraits of you, right? That’s a... that’s a form of avatar building, right? In some con... in some context. Like as a world building, as an act of, you know, as an act of constructing a self. It’s... it... and then you have, you know, then we have portraiture and photography or um, you know, you have the ability to capture like more verisimilitude. And so now we’re sort of maybe somewhere sort of like in between where it’s both like very real but there’s also like a... like a projected self that’s on these like avatars. And maybe that... that... that playing with the self is um... that’s maybe what’s... maybe that’s what’s interesting. I had a conversation with um... Carrie Chen, who’s a... who’s an... who’s an artist and did this work called um... um this work called Primavera. Well she’s done a couple different works like in this vein but like um... one called Temporal Portrait, another one called Primavera. In Temporal Portrait she did like 24 different, you know, portraits of herself at different ages and then used, you know...
Dom Rabrun: Oh right, I saw that.
Jamin Warren: A mixture of kind of different tools, a mix of... mixture of some like Gen AI, you know, some facial... facial mapping stuff to kind of get a sense of like, "Oh, if I could have all my selves past, present, future sort of sit together." But she looks alive. Like avatars as being like a center for her work. Like, you know, that uncanny valley is not a place to... it's not something to be avoided. It's like an... it's a discomfort that's meant to be sat in. And so, yeah. I think maybe there is something there about like something very nascent about like just experimenting with um... uh... experimenting like with your digital body in some kind of way. And especially si... nowadays like so much of like these fake selves like in Fortnite are really colliding with these like these real selves um, you know, with camera technology. So there's something that's happening I think in terms of the way people like look at themsel... like look through themselves and at themselves. Um, that I think will generate... I don't know, some really interesting avenues. I'm... I'm not sure where it will go but like I... I think that... I think you're right that that like the idea of the avatar as being a site of creation is... is... that's... that's a... that is a... a playful self. That's something that will, you know, encourage creation in the future. That tracks. That tracks. Yeah.
Dom Rabrun: Yeah.
Jamin Warren: Um, well let's talk about games. I mean um, you know, making the jump... you could be someone who's inspired by games, someone who just admires games in their free time. Um, but you know, you've been making the jump, the transition into like actually designing games. Um, what encouraged you to make that... to make that leap? To, you know, decide that like you don't just want to be on the sidelines. You know, you want to be... you know, you don't want to be in the stands, you want to be down... you want to be down in the pit.
Dom Rabrun: It's... it's so different. Did I show you Hip Hop RPG? Because I feel like I... I told you I was gonna...
Jamin Warren: Yeah. I... oh sorry. I... I... I looked at the stills on your website and whatnot but um... yeah.
Dom Rabrun: Okay. Got you. That was like... I love games so much, clearly. And like... Hip Hop RPG is like the first time I was like, "I want to make a game." But I was like, "Let... let me make something that looks like a game." It's not a ga... it's a... it... it's a... it's a facsimile. It looks... it looks a lot like a playable game.
Jamin Warren: Right. Oh that's interesting. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Dom Rabrun: And I... and I remem... I remember my brother being like, "You know you could do that in... program that in Java, right?" And this was like 11 years ago. And I was like, "No! I'm not doing it. Fuck that. It's too difficult. Fuck... no way." And I had no coding ex... I just had... I just rejected it from my mind. And I th... over the years I just... I think I just needed to mature more and um... realize that he was... he was kind of right. There were IP issues with Hip Hop RPG which is like the main reason I didn't want to do it. And I... and I still think I was right um because it would have just been... it... it was also just... yeah, it... it wouldn't have gone the way I... it wasn't what I wanted to be doing. Like what I'm doing now is what I wanted to be doing. And I th... um... Black Public Media, I will credit them with pushing me farther into this because I... I was signing up for this... they had this MIT sort of um... grant collaboration thing and I... and I... my proposal was... did I tell you about the... the... the character select screen?
Jamin Warren: Uh, I don't think so. But maybe let's back up just for people who don't know. You want to tell me a little bit about Hip Hop RPG? Like what that project was for you and yeah, maybe a little bit more about like how it was an off-ramp or, you know, um... how... how there's a direct line between like your painting practice and like developing... developing uh... developing that.
Dom Rabrun: Yeah, so Hip Hop RPG was one of the animations I put on Dom's Sketch Cast which was my YouTube show... um... my YouTube channel. And it was a six episode animated series about a video game that doesn't exist. Uh... Super Nintendo Final Fantasy 6 style RPG where a bunch of rappers are stuck in a post-apocalyptic world starring Kendrick, uh Drake, um Tyler, the Creator, and a bunch of other people like... and they all have their very clear archetypes of like "oh, fighter" or like "swordsman," "healer." I... I made Drake like the white mage. It's like this is like... I'm... I'm... I'm trying to be clever about like sort of their interaction. Interestingly enough, in the first episode um Drake heals Kendrick. Which I haven't... I haven't gone back to that but it's kind of interesting.
Jamin Warren: Yeah. Right. It... it's... it's inter... cause now... now looking at where they are now... like whoa.
Dom Rabrun: But these are things I'd have to contend with if I were still doing that... that series. I'd have to... like change based on their real world... uh... mechanics. So... but that was...
Jamin Warren: Yeah. Yeah.
Dom Rabrun: Yeah. So I did six episodes. Never finished it because my scope... scope creep out the ass. Just like could not... could not wrap it up. Um... yeah, that was Hip Hop RPG. It... it... it grew like this nice small community around it. I got uh... these like really cool strange gigs from that. And I... I think it was a... it was really... it was really important for me to make that. To...
Jamin Warren: Yeah.
Dom Rabrun: Excuse me. To make something of that scale that took a lot of thinking, directing, writing, production, audio, animation. Um... yeah, it was a really important thing that I... that I made. So... yeah.
Jamin Warren: Yeah. It's interesting with music like in games, you know. The lineage for... for games is like making your own music and it has its own uh... kind of distinct uh... genealogy... um... you know, that like because games started in this place that was like 8-bit, um... you know, encouraged a certain type of creativity in terms of trying to get sound. And you couldn't have realistic sound. And then you moved into like the CD-ROM era and then you can have realistic sound. But you know, the direction is more towards this like um... often more like orchestral or like cinematic uh... like the... the language of sound in games is often takes from like kind of more the um... kind of like the more of like the background music cinematic tradition.
Dom Rabrun: Wow.
Jamin Warren: And it's interesting that, you know, games for the most part don't use like real music in the... you know, with the exception of Grand Theft Auto which I think has always been like really clever in terms of like using the radio as a mechanism to, you know, build out these environments and just having like incredible music direction. This guy, Ivan Pavlovich, I think is their music director and you know, they've won Grammys for like their music selection. And um... but like games don't really do a lot with like real world like music. Um, which I always found like very... very strange. Like there's always a impetus to, you know, hire a composer or work with someone to make all new music as opposed to like... you know, and some of it's cost obviously like paying a composer versus like licensing... licensing something. But that, you know, even so, I... I just, you know, so much independent film and there's, you know, so much of a tradi... so many directors... Scorsese for example or Tarantino or like... there are directors who lean so much on like using real music in their... in their work. And you just like don't... you don't see that in games at any scale? Um, even with like smaller... even with like smaller independent game creators like they just don't... just music is not a place. So that's what interested me about the Hip Hop RPG side of things. It's like you can envision a world where, you know, where it's not just like uh... what was that Def... there was like a Def Jam fighting game. But something that's like more like takes the world of hip hop, right, and like works music into... works music into it the way that, you know, Spike Lee worked hip hop into, Do the Right Thing or you... I just... you could see that being a... a place where games could really do something interesting. Um, so I feel like that game like, you know, the... the work that you're doing is like gesturing at that possibility. That like, "Oh of course if you have a game with Kendrick in it, like there should be Kendrick's music in it as well." Why doesn't that exist? Like you're asking a lot of questions about like, "Why doesn't this thing exist um... in the way that maybe... in the way that maybe it should?"
Dom Rabrun: And I'm... I'm wondering what that... what that even looks like. Like I... I feel... in Red Dead Redemption... like I'm wondering if you... if you think it counts that they had D'Angelo do music for that and there's stuff like... there... there was good original music composed for that that... that had like original instruments. I... I'm wondering like are you implying that like if you... I... I watched one video after another and read your article and I... the Jonny Greenwood sound... the Jonny Greenwood P.T. Anderson connection is just off the charts. What does that look like then for... like what... what would that look like in... in... in... in... in games? Because I'm trying to... I'm trying to imagine it.
Jamin Warren: Yeah, I mean the direction that people go was like rhythm... like rhythm games. Like Guitar Hero...
Dom Rabrun: Hi-Fi Rush.
Jamin Warren: Oh, Hi-Fi Rush, right. Yeah, yeah. Hi-Fi Rush is like another one. Um, I think I... I'm just like interested more in the... like the idea that more games should um... should simply like license... license songs for key sequences in the game.
Dom Rabrun: Oh! Oh. Oh, okay. Real... real... got you. Okay. Okay. I was... I was thinking about like... like we hired Jonny Greenwood and then each step is a... Okay. I see what you... yeah just regular...
Jamin Warren: I mean, I think both things... both things are true. Like I... I do think that like games have been uh... have gotten really attached to people who have composed music for games. And there's nothing wrong with that. But like that's like saying that films should only work with people who compose music for films and not bring in like a Jonny Greenwood, right? Whose background with Radiohead and like... like you can have a life as a musician that exists outside of like the scoring work that you do. And with games, it's like it does... that just does not happen. You simply do not either see musicians who have established themselves like as musicians doing work for games... extremely rare. Um... nor do you see outside of like trailers... like game makers licensing music that fits into the universe of the... the thing that they're trying to... trying to create. The way that you see in like, you know, film or whatever. So I... I guess you know, it's not... it's not just a cost issue cause you don't have to like, you know... you don't have to shoot the moon and try to get a Taylor Swift track or whatever. Like it... like it doesn't have to be... it doesn't have to be that deep. I just... that music supervision capacity simply does not really exist in games the same way. Um, unless it's a sports game... um... or it's a... or it's a Grand Theft Auto, right? It just... I don't know. Game makers just don't really have a interest in music in that way. So anyway, I... bit of a tangent but... um...
Dom Rabrun: I love it. Cuz I... cuz it's really... it's really important for what I'm... what I'm trying to do. So like it's... it's great to talk about this.
Jamin Warren: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean 100%. Yeah. It's like look, I mean you're not gonna be able to like sign a Kendrick track but like I... I just... I don't know, I think there was just like so much crossover between like the work that you're doing and other... this like this is what interests me about, you know, artists that... people who come to games from other mediums is that you're bringing a set of like, you know, a set of... a set of... a set of uh... inspirations and a set of like creative desires that are different from someone who maybe was just like, "Oh I've made games my whole life. My... I want to make things the way that they've been made," as opposed to like, "Oh wouldn't it... yeah." Um, so with the six episodes and then did you end up... yeah so with the six episodes, like what happened after you released them and then like kind of you took a big... big step back and said like, "Okay, like this seems like too much."
Dom Rabrun: Yeah. Yeah, I... I think it just scope creep and I just... it just tapered off. It was... I think I was... and I won't say this in a negative way, I don't think I was mature enough to... I hadn't scoped out the whole story. Like I didn't... I was like a baby writer. Um... and now I'm... now I'm learning how to finish my stories and things like that. But I... I don't think I was... I wasn't quite there yet. So just tapered off. It's unfinished. It's like episode six kind of just leaves and yeah. They... they... they haven't finished... haven't finished the fight.
Jamin Warren: Um, well let's talk about the... the new project that you're working on for the Haitian Revolution. Um... uh... tell me like maybe like what do you think people don't understand um... about the Haitian Revolution? Um, you know I think about in the context of like Reconstruction being like one of these stories that like Americans don't really understand. Um... and I... I don't know, just tell me a little bit about like... like uh obviously aside from being like Haitian, but like I don't know as a personal interest, what was it that you wanted to say about the Haitian Revolution? Why... why games as opposed to, you know, another... another... you're... you're multidisciplinary. You know, why not approach it as a painter or yeah. Tell me about like what was the interest in like wanting to explore making a game about the subject?
Dom Rabrun: Yeah, I... I... oh right. So the back to the Black Public Media thing. My... my pitch to them was a character select screen. Where you played Marvel vs. Capcom 2, right?
Jamin Warren: Uh... yes. At some point. I was not good at it, but yeah, yeah.
Dom Rabrun: Right. So like that Marvel... Yeah. Me neither. I don't... I don't think fighting games are that interesting frankly. Um...
Jamin Warren: It's very... it's a very specific like... like people who are into them are really... really, really... really, really, really into them. It's like... it's a very... it's a very, very specific... like it's a very... uh yeah. Fighting games are a super interesting genre just because to both understand and to play requires like a level of um... and define joy in them requires like a level of like uh technical dexterity that also does not uh carry with you when you age. That's another thing too. You like actually like physically age out of like playing fighting games. Um, and uh... games... most games are not... are not that way. Uh, but that... that those... they definitely are.
Dom Rabrun: Yeah. Yeah. And a 12-year-old could beat you at it. But I... this is like a... tangent, but I'm... I... I will get back on topic. I'm more interested in a fighting game where it's like you play Charles Xavier and there's no physical punching and there's like two thinkers talking. Show me... show me that... yeah, show me that game where you have to just puzzle through... There's a game called like Pro Philosopher. Something... more like that. I think that's more interesting. But I... I had this idea for a character select screen where you basically look at 1790 or something like where the Haitian Revolution is about to pop off and you're scrolling through different groups. Um... racially, uh... uh... gender-wise, like class-wise. And it was almost like... it was part entertainment but part like educational tool of like, you see Toussaint, what are his stats? What does that say about him? You see um... Alexandre... like Pétion. Like what does that say about him? Like I'm trying to uh... trying to teach you about like the stratification of like how important skin color was in a different sort of way like... the... the fre... like in... in Saint-Domingue. Which is just... it still blows my mind. Having like... they had something like 16 different racial classificat... racial classifications. So the colorism just rampant, very strange. Um... and I... uh so my executive producer Lisa Osborne was like, "You gotta make this into a real game. Don't... stop playing with it. Like just... it's time." And I was like, "Oh my God." And she was right. It was like... cuz just do the char... it would have been cool. The character select screen would have been cool. But like what happens after you select them? And I didn't... I... I didn't think that far. So I wanted to... [Sighs] This is just classic stuff for me. Like it doesn't... the thing I want doesn't exist. The... a... any... first off, game that takes place during the Haitian Revolution. The only one is pretty much made by Ubisoft. It's an Assassin's Creed offshoot made by mostly white folks. I'm not knocking them, but that game is mostly... "Shh! Shh! Wa! Shh! Shh! I'm gonna... I'm gonna free slaves! Oh my God. Psh!" "You freed... you freed the slaves! Bah-bah-bah-bah-bah!" You know what I'm saying? "Rainbows! Uh... Assassin's Creed Rainbow Six... Call of Duty." All right? That's what... that's what we're doing? "Pfft! Pfft!" Like okay.
Jamin Warren: Yeah, yeah.
Dom Rabrun: You know what I'm saying? That happened, but like honestly, I ain't getting that game sold if I try to make that shit. And I'm not interested in it. Disco Elysium is like my favorite game of... it's probably my top five. So like I want games where you sit and think about stuff and talk and explore. And so that's why I was thinking like...
Jamin Warren: I mean at some level it's interesting with Assassin's Creed because like it's almost like they did you a favor by like producing the game. Because now you are like relieved of the like... you're relieved of the idea that like you've... you've... you don't have to like dwell in the idea of like, "Oh well I guess I need to focus on the like... the violent, you know, the violent part of the revolution." Which is what, you know, which is like what Assassin's Creed does. You don't have to focus on that. And you can just be like, "Well, I'm not... I'm not making a game at that scale anyway. That has been done. That has been done." You could... you could say whether or not... like whether they did it the right way or, you know... you could make notes and you know that I know that they try to be uh... historically... they bring in a lot of like historians. They try to make them like pretty accurate. But like... but just by... by nature of the... that that genre and the combat, you are now relieved of the idea. So now you can explore like... you can explore other aspects of this thing. Um, other aspects of this thing um... you know in the way... you know in a way that um... you know, Thin Red Line for example or like... you know, there are other... you see this in like... in film and in television where you can explore... you can explore something that is like this but you can just look at it through a different... a different... a totally... a totally different lens. Um, so I guess in some ways maybe you can, you know, thank Ubisoft for... for saying like, "Oh thank you. I don't have to make that game. I don't have to make that game."
Dom Rabrun: Yeah, cuz they... they pretty much took the low-hanging fruit and uh... right, cuz physical violence is so easy in games. And you... you know this, right? That's the... that's the easiest thing is I blew... blew someone's head off. Okay. Now I'm really interested in the... v... I... I... I hesitate to even call this "violence," but the conflicts that happen in... when... let's say a person who's like formerly enslaved is like talking to someone of a different social status and has to pretend like he doesn't know something. Like what does that dialogue tree look like for someone who's like, "All right, if I don't say the right thing, this dude is gonna murder me."
Jamin Warren: Yeah. Right.
Dom Rabrun: And I don't... I'm not... I'm not interested in showing the murder. I'm interested in what does that dialogue tree look like? It's not just like, "I choose this one or that one or that one." Like I... I... I'm desperate to try and do more with dialogue trees. I love dialogue and di... and choice in games and I feel like... again Disco Elysium did something super interesting with that. And that's what I'm most interested in existing in that realm with Mindsinger. And like I'm not... She has like zero strength and dexterity. She's a telepath and she... she's a singer and she can talk really well. And so I... I'm being very um... and this is Fabian, the main character of the game. I'm being very deliberate about putting you in that character's mind in that POV. Because going... being the soldier is what most game developers will put you in.
Jamin Warren: Right. Right, right, right, right. Yeah.
Dom Rabrun: I'm... yeah.
Jamin Warren: Yeah. Where is the... where is the project right now? Tell me a little bit about like where you're at in the process and um... yeah, how things are going and...
Dom Rabrun: I'm glad you're asking cuz I was definitely gonna email you. So we... we finished... we finished uh R&D phase one. We got the vertical slice complete. It needs a lot of polish. Actually, it needs polish... not a lot of polish. And sort of rescoping with some of the narrative. I feel like there's some... it needs some "Save the Cat" and like narrative changes but I would say like the vertical slice is maybe 70% of the way there. Uh, the thing is playable. People have played it. It exists. I have a pitch deck. And um... yeah, we're basically... we need to polish the vertical slice, add more to it. I think it needs conflict tension, stuff... all the stuff I know about... that makes stories work. I think we need to push that more cuz this is... it's a narrative-driven game, right? So if the words aren't inspiring you to ask questions and move forward, I feel like we just haven't done it yet. So...
Jamin Warren: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean...
Dom Rabrun: That's where it is.
Jamin Warren: I mean I think um... you know, we're at a stage now also... I mean games are so nascent in terms of exploring like... exploring other elements of like the... you know, diasporic experience. You know, like you just... we're starting to get more of that in film, you know, things like Sinners for example. I'm a... hope... I'm very hopeful about like what comes... what comes next. And there's obviously so much like pathfinding that's been... that's been done um... you know in a... in a medium like film from, you know, Watermelon Woman to Spike Lee's work to, you know, from Charles Burnett. Like there's... you know, there's obviously like a long history of um... you know, diasporic filmmakers pushing... you know, Oscar Micheaux. Like there's... there's so many people who have contributed to this like present moment. And I feel like um... you know with games there's just like none of that lineage. So in some ways it's exciting, but it's also frustrating, right? Like you don't have a...
Dom Rabrun: Yeah.
Jamin Warren: Like you don't have like an OG... like there's not... there's not someone that you can tap that's like, "Oh yeah, this person's been working in games for, you know, 40 years and can provide like guidance and wisdom." And so, you know, in some ways you're like laying foundational work that other people will... will walk into. Which is um... exciting. But I suspect it's also like very hard and frustrating too in terms of wanting to find community and other people who are making games um... you know, making... making games that are like this.
Dom Rabrun: Yeah. I mean I... I found... like Game Devs of Color has been awesome. That community is just great. I met so many people there. They're... and we're... I mean this generation is like... stuff's happening and we're all... I feel like we're all just kind of trying to make stuff... make stuff happen. But yeah, it's... I got a little terrified just now when you were saying that. I was like, "Yeah, it... it is... it's kind of me." Like in this... in... in this... in this place. I'm like, okay. And I have this awesome team uh and... and we're like, okay. We're gonna do this thing. And I... and I know... what I know in my... in my spirit is like... I'm... I'm trying to come at this somewhere in between like Donald Glover and David Lynch. And I'm like, "That's what I have for y'all." Someone else is probably gonna come at this from a more like traditional like palatable for a wider audience thing. But like this is what I have. And this is how I'm able to... this is my entry point even into Haitian history. Is like I've been doing so much research. And this is part of my... I don't know if I told you about my book, but I'm like writing all these uh... I'm... my book should be coming out in early January. But like... that's how I... that's my entry point. That's how I stay interested in it. Because I... frankly like the... the reality of this stuff is like to... to depict it realistically is like... it's... it's... it's miserable in so many ways. It's like...
Jamin Warren: Yeah.
Dom Rabrun: It's like... I... I just... I can't... I can't do that. And I don't...
Jamin Warren: Yeah.
Dom Rabrun: It's funny like being Black sometimes when you're just sort of like... just to make stuff that is historically accurate is... you feel like this... Ugh. Like you think of something like Amistad or Roots. And it's like I don't think... I ask myself this all the time: Does this work in games? Does this... where does this... where does this lineage fit in games? And why or why not, right? I play this game with my... with myself. And on the flip side, I'm like, "Okay, well how many games have I played about a samurai?" You know what I mean? Like... what's... or... or a... a fiefdom in, you know, a... ancient uh... uh Europe somewhere. And I'm like, "Okay, well then why... why is this one uncomfortable? And why would this not work?" Um... and I... I f... I feel like we're in this... it's hard to describe this age we're in and it's also hard to not to... to... I live in the D.C. area. It's hard not to talk about that in relationship to this, but we're in this ecosystem. This is all kind of being affec... uh... uh affected by... our political situation. I think... I'm one of those people who thinks everything is political. But um... it's like a care and a... when you're dealing with any material like this, it's not like just working with samurai stuff. It's like we're... we're... it's... this is... this is... this is uh... I'm... I'm... I'm walking on ice. I and I know that. It's like you have to make these deliberate choices for how the audience will see it. Do you... do you know what I mean? I know I'm kind of...
Jamin Warren: Yeah. No, no. I... I think I... that's true. I mean... I think it's... you know, some of it is um... you know I mentioned Reconstruction just because like that... that's a... that's just like a... an era in American history that Americans understand uh very poorly. Like in general. Um... is a really crucial time period. And I guess I... I feel that way about the Haitian Revolution in the sense that like, you know people know... or they have ideas about what they think Haiti is like now and today. And you have to kind of like look at this like longer like lineage and the extent to which...
Dom Rabrun: Jamin, you cut out.
Jamin Warren: Oh.
Dom Rabrun: I think you froze.
Jamin Warren: No.
[Silence and typing sounds]
Jamin Warren: Oh, Dom? Can you hear me?