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About Us
Experienced writers Sande Chen and Anne Toole formed the Writers Cabal in 2007 to bring great writing to large game projects on a contract basis. Accolades soon followed, as Sande and Anne's first joint project, THE WITCHER, earned a Writers Guild of America Award nomination for writing as well as recognition as best PC RPG of the year. Most recently, Writers Cabal contributed writing and quest design to KingsIsle's MMO, WIZARD 101. While Writers Cabal was formed to tackle large projects too big for one game writer to handle, they have also lent their pen to small projects, such as casual game RANCH RUSH and simulation game PET PALS for the Wii. With a special focus on MMOs and serious games, Writers Cabal has provided narrative design, game design, and dialog for a number of genres and platforms, including PC, Wii, and DS.
Our Approach
We believe that each game presents a unique opportunity to tell a story. Rather than approach each game like the last one, we learn your company's system and pipeline, then customize our approach to developing narrative, gameplay, and dialog. Instead of churning out interchangable stories and dialog, we conspire with our clients to identify that unique opportunity to deliver custom content. Our only magic is our passion. Our only formula for success is good writing. The only missing ingredient is you. | The Conspirators A Grammy-nominated producer, writer, and consultant, Sande has been working in the game industry since 1998. Her past game writing credits include 1999 Independent Games Festival winner TERMINUS. In 2003, she became the director of the non-profit, Girls in Games, Inc. She is the co-author of Serious Games: Games That Educate, Train, and Inform and a contributor to Secrets of the Game Business. She holds degrees from MIT, the London School of Economics, and USC School of Cinema-Television. She is a member of the Women in Games International Steering Committee, the IGDA Writers SIG Steering Committee, AIAS, and the Videogame Writers Caucus of the Writers Guild of America, west. In 2006, she was profiled on NextGen's list of the Game Industry's 100 Most Influential Women.
 Anne lays claim to over five years' experience in the popular media, with four hours of produced television and a growing number of shipped games under her belt. As a writer for NBC serial DAYS OF OUR LIVES, Anne wrote each script within a week of assignment. She translated these skills as the first Head Writer for MMO STARGATE WORLDS. Before embarking on her writing career in Hollywood and games, Anne graduated with a degree in Archaeology from Harvard. Born in France, Anne recently became a citizen of the EU as well as the US. Anne Toole on LinkedIn | What others are saying
"I hired Sande to develop a story for our MMO. She has the patience to listen to your ideas and extract from them the core narrative that you need. If you need advice on storytelling or need someone to develop and write your entire story, Sande is the person to have on your team!
Anne has both the imagination and drive to bring out the best concept in any game. In our project, she was constantly driving new ideas and solidifying old ones to the benefit of our Story. I highly recommend her to anyone who needs a strong driver for their narrative vision!"- Ricardo Rademacher
"I have had the pleasure of working with Anne for a dialog-heavy educational veterinary simulator. Working with her is like pressing an “awesome script” button on your computer and having the dialog generated for you quickly and perfectly. She reads provided documentation and gives you exactly what you ask for in an incredibly timely manner. My project is now ahead of schedule and we are now preparing to record VO! As you can imagine, it can be difficult to write for an educational game that focuses on some high concepts in medical biology. You would like all of the important biology facts to make it in, but you don’t want things to turn out flat. Anne has managed to bring our characters to life and to give the game some comedy which really helps the fun factor. I should also mention that Anne is always polite to work with; there are never any snippy emails when you forgot to ask for something or left a vague line direction. I would definitely jump at the chance to work with her again, no matter what company I am with."
- N. Thomas
“Sande has been an inspiration. A bottomless well of energy and drive. A lady who loves games, loves the industry, and will move heaven and earth to make a project succeed. She has been an incredible asset to me, as a friend, advisor, and colleague. With Sande in your project's corner, you can't go wrong.” - Dave Gilbert |
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