Raphael van Lierop 🇨🇦

Harnessing the combined power of art & technology to create the future of entertainment. Leading and supporting the best team in games. Creating thoughtful places. Building worlds that last forever. Creator, Writer, Director — THE LONG DARK www.hinterland.com www.thelongdark.com

Benchmark every platform, track every game sold, build a better studio. IndieBI is a first-of-its-kind data aggregation and analytics platform for PC and Console video games. It provides games studios with a suite of tools - web and desktop apps, data visuals, insight reports - to help understand their sales and marketing information, to analyze it for valuable trends and patterns, and to provide them with actionable advice to optimize their sales and revenue. It helps studios and publishers run smarter businesses. It helps them sell more games. And it's never been done before.

Astrid is a new entertainment venture creating the future of premium IP, immersive worldbuilding, and interactive experiences. I advise CEO Sharon Tal Yguado on creative and production matters relating to game development at this exciting new startup.

Guest speaker at a variety of industry and academic events and conferences. [2024] Writer's Guild of Alberta, Panel Discussion. "Writing for New Media" [2023] University of Winnipeg, Dept. of Creative Writing | "The Long Dark as Canadian Science Fiction" [2022] University of Victoria, Dept. of Creative Writing | "Storytelling in The Long Dark" [2021] The Future With Rovio (Podcast) | Interactive Narrative & Cross-Platform IP Creation [2021] Harvard University, Graduate School of Design | The Long Dark & Creating Virtual Spaces [2021] USC - School of Cinematic Arts, John C. Hench Division of Animation + Digital Arts [2020] Canadian Crafts Federation | (Keynote) 10-Digit Technology: Understanding Virtual & Material Realities [2019] Reboot Develop Red | Fireside Chat re: The Long Dark & Hinterland’s future [2018] GDC 2018 | Blending Authored and Player Narrative [2015] GDC 2015 | Early Access Development [2015] GameOn Ventures | Canadian Industry [2015] Vancouver Island University | Speaker, Digital Media Symposium [2014] University of Victoria | Department of Creative Writing [2014] PAX Dev 2014 | Is Game Storytelling Coming of Age? [2013] Canadian Video Game Awards | Presenter [2012] Montreal International Game Summit 2012 | Transmedia IP Development [2012] GDC Online 2012 | Writing for Video Games [2011] Montreal International Game Summit 2011 | Future of Midcore, “Smaller Big Games” [2011] Vancouver Film School | Leading Creative Teams ...

Creative Advisor & Mentor for Game Startups at Execution Labs, the first-of-its kind, hybrid game incubator and go-to-market accelerator based in Montreal.

HELM Studio is a creative and production consultancy for video games and entertainment IP development. More details at: http://www.helm-studio.com Some previous clients include: * CITY INTERACTIVE // ENEMY FRONT * GAMEFORGE // MULTIPLE GAMES * CONFETTI FX // TOP SECRET * BIGPOINT // GAME OF THRONES, MERC ELITE * EDGE OF REALITY // LOADOUT * WORLDTRIBE MEDIA // COUNTERSTORY * ACTIVISION // TOP SECRET * PRIMA GAMES // MASS EFFECT 3, HALO 4 * BLACKLIGHT TRANSMEDIA // TOP SECRET * MUNICHRE // TOP SECRET

Blacklight is one of Hollywood's premiere players in the transmedia entertainment space. Blacklight has a strategic partnership with WME, the premiere agency for film and television talent (writers, actors, etc.), and has special relationships with all the major studio entities in Hollywood. I advise the CEO of Blacklight on all matters pertaining to the creation of transmedia entertainment properties, with a particular emphasis on the interactive components (i.e. games). I also co-create original transmedia IP with Blacklight's executive team.

Relic's first Game Director. I held the Game Director role on Relic's first multi-platform 3rd-person action game -- the action-blockbuster Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine (Xbox 360, PS3, PC). Provided overall creative direction for the project and a team of 120+ developers. I directed a team of discipline leads in art, design, animation, and audio -- and their teams -- to deliver the richest, most compelling adrenaline-fueled action blockbuster experience possible. In my role, I paid particular attention to core gameplay, the realization of the world and characters, direction of the narrative and campaign, the relationship with Games Workshop, and relationship with both the studio and publisher executive team.

I held the Narrative Director position on Far Cry 3 at Ubisoft Montreal, from the concept development through prototyping phases. In this role I established the high-level narrative flow of the game, the characters and setting, tone and treatment, and transmedia strategy for exploitation beyond games. My primary responsibility was to drive all story-related content creation and development efforts on a new triple-A action game at Ubisoft's award-winning Montreal studio. This included the creation of all elements of the game's fiction as a transmedia entertainment property, leadership of the narrative design team, management of external consultant relationships, and representing these interests (for our project) to the company's top management in Paris. As a member of the 'core team', I worked with the other discipline directors to ensure our game had the highest potential to deliver memorable characters and strong storytelling through directed and embedded narrative. I had the opportunity to work with some incredibly passionate, talented people on an amazingly cool project, and was sad to leave the studio. Montreal proved to not be the best fit for my family and so we chose to return out West.

Executive Creative Director & Co-Founder of Radar Group Responsibilities: * providing high-level creative direction for multiple original IP projects built from the ground up to have transmedia potential; this work included establishing all key gameplay and fiction pillars in collaboration with the external dev teams * providing high-level production guidance for the successful planning, scheduling, team organization and management, and project leadership for multiple externally developed titles * building and leading a team of CDs who would provide front-line management for the multiple original IP projects co-developed by Radar. I also co-founded Radar with several industry veterans, and supported the startup efforts of Recoil Games. Focus on: Creative Direction, Brand building, Character and World Creation, Gameplay Prototyping, Production Management Projects: Earth No More, Prey 2, Incarnate, multiple unannouced original IP.