In early February Sjoerd and I will cross the North Sea together to do some filming for a documentary. This fantastic documentary is about the passion for playing and building video games, and about one game in particular. Hardware Rivals!

Because we would like to make more documentaries, Sjoerd and I decided to make a documentary about a subject that is close to us each.

This is a blog about our first documentary project that we do together. It is about the PlayStation game Hardware Rivals. This is the documentary that Sjoerd wants to make because he plays this game a lot in his spare time. It is a small group of gamers who play Hardware Rivals, so many players know each other very well and that is one of the things that makes Hardware Rivals unique, says Sjoerd often. The players of this game are spread over all continents of the world and Sjoerd often talks about the long conversations he has with some players. So that’s pretty special.

Research

We started doing research about history, the creators of the game and the players. Sjoerd and I interviewed many gamers to hear from them what they think of the game and why they play it. This was especially nice for Sjoerd, because he often does not speak them for so long. Everyone we spoke to was very enthusiastic about the documentary.

Visualization

The step we are now making is to visualize the story about Hardware Rivals. That means filming the developers (developers) and players of the game. The game was not made in the Netherlands, but at Sony Liverpool. Most developers live in England. To be able to film the developers, it was first necessary to get permission from Sony. And after a month of emailing back and forth and skype Sony gave us green light! This means that we have to travel to the other side of the Channel.

Itinerary

On February 1st a.s. we first fly to Ireland to meet Andrew Phelan, “one of the developers of the game. In preparation we already had telephone contact and talked to him about his role in the team of developers working on the game. This helps us with the great story of the documentary and which part of his story we want to show.Then we fly to Liverpool. Here we meet another developer, Darren Douglas. There are also two players living there who have made time for us. In Liverpool we have five days to meet and film everyone.

I am very excited about this trip and am very curious what it will bring us. I will regularly blog to keep you informed about everything we experience on our trip.

Stay tuned.