Making Movies

Do you know how unconsciously tempted I was to type "Makin' Magic" for the title? Oh well.

The art of making movies in The Movies is a strange one, and it's extremely subjective. There is no possible way anyone in the world can tell you what makes a good movie, because your tastes are unique. This section will cover HOW to make movies, and perhaps generally accepted techniques and strategies, but you should take any advice on creative decisions with a grain of salt.

In fact, if you do decide to create movies with the intent of publishing them online, don't let anyone tell you that something you do is a bad idea. Take constructive criticism, of course; but if you're dead set on a certain style or series, don't let someone dissuade you from trying it. Creativity and artistic vision are too subjective to be dictated by someone else.

I personally have two save files on my game. One is for the game itself, and one is for shooting movies that I intent to upload. This is ideal, because you can concentrate on the game's star system with the former save file, and deal with your creativity on the latter save file.

We'll start with the easy stuff first: how to achieve "good" movies within the context of the game.

Writing Movies the Computer Likes

Because of the subjective nature of movies, no computer program can calculate what makes a movie truly good. So, the game must use a fairly arbitrary method of figuring out script and movie quality, which is easy to figure out and exploit.

Let's start at the beginning: with a script. Whether you write it yourself or not, a script in The Movies only has a certain potential it can achieve. This is based wholly on the level of your Script Office. The very first Script Office you can build (the "basic" kind) can only produce scripts of one-star quality at best.

For efficiency's sake, your scriptwriters will do the bare minimum to achieve script potential. In the 1920s, movies of only one or two scenes can achieve that quality, so that's all the scriptwriters will do. This will make the movies choppy and hard to understand, but I suppose that's the way we'd view a 1920s movie today anyway.

You can, from the moment you start the game, make scripts as long as you want. But really, why would want to make a script that has 55 scenes when you can make one with 1 scene be just as good? Too many scenes just wastes time, both in creation and because your employees will needlessly run around. Remember, every second that a star is shooting a pointless scene is a second they could be using to shooting a movie that has some semblance of use.

Now, in the Advanced Movie-Maker room (of the Custom Script Office), dragging the nearby blank script icon will start the process of writing your own script. We'll go into more details of all that soon, but there's one thing we need to point out now: the structure option. You can choose whether to see a template based on a simple structure, the Hollywood structure, or no structure (freeform). When writing movies for the computer, it's best to stick with a simple structure.

At the bottom of the scene screen is a storyboard of the scenes you've implemented so far. If you chose simple or Hollywood structures, you'll see sections listed. This allows the computer to suggest a scene based on what section you're in and the genre of the movie.

Although adding basically any scene will improve script quality as far as the computer cares, adding an appropriate scene will give it a bigger boost. Remember that the star system is divided into fifths of stars; adding any scene will normally increase the star rating by one-fifth star. However, adding an appropriate scene (such as an establishing crane shot in the "intro" section of a simple structure) will boost it by two-fifths. The scenes suggested by the computer will normally bring up the script quality by two-fifths or better each unless you overuse them.

If you went with a freeform structure, the computer won't know what you're doing, so it can't suggest anything for you. This also seems to remove the "bonus" you get for choosing an "appropriate" scene.

No matter what structure you have, you can gain some bonus stars by dressing the set with tons of props. Details about that will be later.

The Other Factors

Although script quality is a large factor, there are other things that go into determining overall movie quality.

First and most important is the stars' experience in the genre.
All else being equal, an actor who is skilled and experienced in sci-fi will make much better sci-fi movies than anyone else on the lot, period. That's why Vin Diesel is headed downhill in a hurry: you can't switch from pure action to family comedy and expect anyone to take you seriously.

Second is the stars' moods.
Good moods mean good performances, and bad moods mean bad performances, simple as that. Now, a star's mood will not affect his ACTUAL performance, so if you're making a movie for the Internet, you don't have to worry about this at all. Well, I guess if you don't care about the star rating, you can ignore this entire subsection, but still…

Third is the actors' fit into the genre.
This is much less important, but every genre has its own preferred requirements for actors. For example, romance movies favor people who are young with high meters in looks and physique. Would YOU want to see a serious romantic movie between Rosanne Barr and John Goodman? Because they're behind the camera, directors don't "fit" into any genre, although their experience is still extremely important.

The fourth factor is star relationships.
The better all the stars like each other, the better the movie will be. This does include the director to his actors. However, even with the standard relationship, movies tend to turn out all right.

Fifth is repair of sets.
Sets that are falling apart don't make for a convincing movie. If this is a consistent problem, you may need to hire more builders. If you're intentionally going for a five-star movie, you may want to force a builder to repair the given sets before shooting to ensure this rating stays nice and high.

Sixth is crew experience.
There's absolutely no way you can force this one to be high. Crew gain experience every time they do a movie, so you won't being seeing perfect ratings here until very late in the game. Of course, once you do get late in the game, you'll never see an inexperienced rating for your crew.

Those five factors combine to make the movie's quality, but there are a few more to determine the final movie rating. These are the "intangible" things that affect the perception of a movie more than its actual content.

The seventh factor is star power.
Even if a star is extremely experienced in the genre, a lower-tiered star will suffer a slight penalty in the movie. Obviously a lower star needs to act in movies to gain star power, so that penalty is unavoidable. If you're going specifically for a five-star movie though, you'll need to pack it with your best stars.

The eighth factor is genre interest.
World events and just the randomness of trends will affect how much the public wants to see a given genre. Sometimes, bad luck forces you to release a movie when interest is low. Remember though that you never have to release a movie when it's complete; you can wait and let it sit, and release it when conditions are better.

The ninth factor is novelty value.
This is the novelty of the sets, not the novelty of the scenes or anything else. As a set is used, its novelty value dips a bit. You will often overuse sets in the beginning of the game, because you won't have too many sets to choose from. As you get to the later years of the game, though, you'll have plenty of different sets at your disposal, so mix it up.

Note that this value is based on the STARTING value of the sets; so, if the Suburban Bathroom has a perfect rating of 100% novelty, and you shoot a 250-scene movie on just it, the novelty score will be perfect. Of course, once the movie is released, no one will want to see another scene in the bathroom for the rest of their lives.

The tenth factor is movie technology.
This one is kind of strange… If you've been doing good research, this rating may be really high because you're ahead of the game. However, you are not penalized for having standard technology. This means in the 2000s, your technology will technically be called "standard," but you'll still get a perfect rating on it because the technology simply cannot and will not get any better.

The eleventh and final factor is the marketing and public relations of the movie.
This will not even appear until you build a Publicity Office. Once you have it, you need to drop your movie (no matter how complete it is) in the Publicity Office now and then. This will increase public awareness of the movie, which will raise ticket sales.

When you're ready to release it, five little boxes will then appear in the release room of the Production Office. Placing the movie in one of those boxes selects how much you're willing to spend to market the movie. Theoretically, you're supposed to spend as much in marketing to create an equal amount as you did in the Publicity Office. That is, if you made the public awareness of the movie half of maximum, you should (theoretically) spend half the maximum for marketing.

In practice, you don't seem to be penalized for spending too much. Although the critics may make some negative comments, you may as well just release all movies with maximum marketing if you can afford it. It turns into bigger profits and a higher overall movie rating.

One more thing… post production MIGHT add to a rating.
We haven't done extensive testing on it, but there are rumors that doing things in post production (such as adding subtitles and scene fades) might help out the overall movie rating as well. That may not be true, but it can't hurt.

Quantity Over Quality?

This guide so far has assumed you wanted to make some high-quality movies (well, high-quality as far as the game cares). However, during the early and middle of the game (basically anytime before 1985), movies are simply incapable of getting that high of quality.

If you want to quickly rise to the top of the charts, there's one extremely easy exploit that can take you there. I ended up discovering this when I simply was aiming to get the "Most Prolific Star" award. Simply put, you need quantity over quality. Just produce as many one-scene movies as you can, and put the same star in them.

This is because, before 1985, the game doesn't expect you to have anything that's very high of quality, and it seems to calculate star and studio power by total performance. In other words, it thinks five one-star movies are just as good as one five-star movie.

In order to keep things running smoothly, you should consciously work on directing (no pun intended) your people around. Basically, you'll want two groups: the A group contains your best experienced crew, your best stars, and so on. They will create the big movies, the blockbusters, the ones that will sell well. You'll also have the B group, which contains crappy stars, a green crew, and scripts you write yourself. Treat the A group with the strategies outlined before this section.

The B group, meanwhile, will need to be babysat. Write a script of one scene on the set with the lowest novelty value score. A quick scene is best, such as a single intro scene. You should throw in an extra too so they gain experience. Shoot the scene, release the movie, and do it again in the SAME SET. Repeat, repeat, repeat.

You will be amazed how quickly your star power and studio power rise, despite releasing repetitive stories on repetitive sets, and you'll still make money despite how incredibly lame every crappy production is… you will have become Disney.

The reason this works is because movie success is partly based on the era of the movie. That is, a one-star movie released in 1920 is looked at about equally as a four-star movie in 1990. After 1985, this trick no longer works because the potential of movies rises too high, and the era bonus vanishes. You could still get away with a quantity-over-quality strategy, but the movies will have to be at least three to six scenes long each, instead of just one.

Writing a Movie for Publication

This subsection is about writing a movie for putting online, or perhaps just for yourself. As mentioned in the introduction to this section, no commentary will be made here about creative direction. Everything we say here should be experimented with, and altered to fit your own preferences.

At the end of this section is a link where you can download special movie made just for this guide. It shows you what all I have to go through to write one of these guides… it's a lot harder than it seems!

Step 1: Prepare your script in your head.
A lot of people don't realize just how much planning can help you. You don't need to be in the game and write on the fly. Before anything happens at all, think about what you want out of your movie.

Many times, what you end up with will be slightly different and evolved from what you planned initially. This is okay, and extremely common. However, a starting plan will help you avoid major missteps during the actual scriptwriting part of the game, and it prevents major holes that you have to solve.

Step 2: Prepare your stars.
If you have preferences for how your stars will need to look (in the face), then your next step isn't even in the game. Open up Star Maker and start tweaking those factors.

Remember that if you're going for publication, then the star system has nothing to do with anything. Therefore, when building your star in Star Maker, don't even bother giving them anything in their experience meters. Those meters just don't matter; however, you may want specific looks for your characters. My starring character, for example, was created to look as close to me as possible.

For clothes, you'll want to think about them, but remember that you can worry about wardrobe once you're in the game.

Step 3: Start a new game in Sandbox Mode.
Setting the game to give you maximum money, in the latest year, with buildings that build instantly and never decay, and with stars that always do what they're told, removes a TON of stress from your movie-making attempts. Remember that when you're specifically making a movie to be published on the Internet, in-game star ratings are pointless, and other gameplay mechanics are just time wasters.

That said, I tend to keep "movies are made instantly" off so I can watch my movies getting shot. This is actually the longest time waster, because if you keep it on, you won't even have to buy and build sets. Still, I enjoy watching the scenes being shot… it's up to you, really.

While you're at it, immediately save this file with its own special name. This way, you can always jump into it to make another movie for online publication without having to set up a new game again.

Step 4: Activate the Advanced Movie-Maker, and use a "Simple" structure.
If you tend to have a creative tendency in your hobbies (such as writing fan fiction of games or writing music), you may not need the structure at all because you probably trained yourself to mentally organize your scenes and so on. Otherwise, you should go with a Simple structure for your movie so you can get a feel for where scenes go and how to organize them.

The Advanced Movie-Maker is WAY too complex to get into here, so it's got its own section.

Step 5: Preview your movie in Post Production.
Even if you have dialog planned in your head to put in subtitles, don't do it yet. Watch your whole movie first, and ignore music and fades. You're looking for a specific problem that you may need to deal with.

If you do notice a big problem, do the next step. If not, skip to step 7.

Step 6: Re-shoot any messed up scenes.
If you notice there's a problem with a scene, you can re-shoot it. Exit Post Production, then drag the movie icon back to the Advanced Movie-Maker room of the Custom Script Office. The storyboard at the bottom will show little green checkmarks over scenes that have already been shot. If you alter the scene in any way, its checkmark will disappear, and that scene will be re-shot when you exit the screen. Any scenes that still have that checkmark will be skipped. This is extremely important if you're making any movie longer than a dozen scenes, so you can edit mistakes you may see without dealing with the whole thing again.

For example, in one scene of my movie, my persona is running through a rainy field. In one scene, I forgot to set the weather and lighting. This is called a "continuity problem." But beyond that, you're also looking for general issues with your movie, such as scenes being inappropriate or scenes being too short or long. As you watch it, you should recite your dialog (if you have any) in your head, but don't worry about recording it or putting it to subtitles yet.

Step 7: Add subtitles (or spoken dialog) and music cues one-at-a-time.
Post Production gets its own section as well to describe its various features, but we'll summarize it here as well. When you make subtitles, it generally takes a bit of tweaking to get the timing right. I recommend that you have a stopwatch handy when you do them. Add subtitles as you desire, but try to keep them on-screen so they last about one second for every four words. Let's say your star's opening line is, "Good evening. I'm PyroFalkon. You may remember me from such guides as…" That's 12 words, so the subtitle should stay on-screen for 3 seconds. Speedier readers may be able to keep up if the subtitles go 1 second per 5 or 6 words, but the vast majority of the people will be happier for 1 second per 4 words. Make it any slower, and you'll annoy people.

Music is also a little stringent on timing, because the game has trouble figuring out where to resume if you start the scene in the middle of a music cue. You pretty much have to replay the movie from about two seconds prior to the music cue to hear it correctly. For this reason, hold off on music until the last thing.

Step 8: Add screen fades as desired.
Screen fades are purely atheistic, but can serve many functions, such as expressing a delay of time, or an easy drift into another scene. Alternately, you can elect not to have a fade, which works well when you want to quick-cut to a different set, perhaps to show a sinister plot that the hero isn't aware of, or to simply avoid breaking the momentum of a scene. (You may not realize it consciously, but when you watch a screen fade, your mind is eased out of what you just saw; fading out of an action scene, for example, slows your adrenaline.)

The example movie I made employs all three ways described, at different points: establishing a time break, establishing a new set, or not being there to keep momentum going.

The type of movie you are writing will dictate what kind and how many fades you should employ. Fast-moving movies, such as action movies and some comedies, should have few fades. Slower movies, such as horror or romance, typically need many fades to keep the pace nice and slow until critical scenes and moments.

Step 9: Watch the WHOLE movie again.
Even after you get all your subtitles and music cues set, you'll want to watch the whole thing from the very beginning to see how it all syncs up. Plus, you can see (and unconsciously feel) how the fades worked with your movie. This is basically the last step, so you'll want it to be perfect; even the tiniest mistake should be edited until you're 100% satisfied.

Step 10: Export the finished product. The file will export as a WMV (Windows Media Video file). It will be placed in the following directory…

../My Documents/The Movies/Movies

…and then you can copy it or move it or whatever.

WARNING!!!

Note that inside that directory will many files with identical names. The TRL files are the in-game movie format, and should be kept unless you have no intention of ever editing the movie again. The INI files are the settings for your subtitles and music cues; getting rid of these will RESET your movie in-game, so while you'll still have the scenes shot, all your work in Post Production will be lost. In short: After exporting a movie, if you must move a file, ONLY MOVE THE WMV. If you rename, move, or delete the INI and/or TRL files, you'll lose your movie in the game, and you won't be able to ever edit it again unless you start over from scratch.

Details of how exactly the movie is exported are in the Post Production section.

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