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| Joseph Staten | |
|---|---|
| Genres | Science fiction |
| Notable work(s) | Halo: Contact Harvest |
Joseph Staten is a bestselling American writer born in San Francisco, California. He currently works for game developer Bungie, and has worked at the company since 1998. His first novel, Halo: Contact Harvest, reached #3 on The New York Times bestseller list in the first week of its release.
The son of a theologian, Staten originally planned on becoming an actor, but joined Bungie in 1998. Staten served as director of cinematics for Bungie's games including the Halo trilogy, writing mission scripts and movie dialogue for the titles. Staten has also been involved in managing the expansion of the Halo franchise to other game studios and producers, including Peter Jackson's Wingnut Interactive.
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Biography
Early life and education
Joseph Staten is the son of a minister who is a professor of theology and philosophy of religion.[1] He entered Northwestern University in 1990 with the intention of becoming an actor.[2] Realizing he wasn't material to be a leading man, he dropped the idea, but stayed with theater. After graduation Staten intended on getting his Master's degree at the University of Chicago and joining the Central Intelligence Agency. Having completed his masters, and being rejected by the CIA, Staten dropped the idea of entering the foreign service and helped his family at their winery in in Sonoma Valley.[1] Eventually, Staten met some of game developer Bungie's staff playing multiplayer games of Myth and joined the staff in 1998.[2][3]
Bungie
Staten's former role at Bungie was director of cinematics, and was responsible for the in-game movies for Bungie's Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2 and Halo 3.[4][2] Work on the games at "crunch time" involved 80 hour weeks and stretches without sleep maxing out at 72 hours.[2] Staten worked alongside three other staff writers at Bungie, each with a separate role: Frank O'Connor developed Halo 3's combat dialogue, Rob McLees focused on Halo canon and working with licensing partners, Luke Smith interacted with the fans online, and Staten developed the cinematics and missions scripts.[5] In addition to his writing contributions, Staten lends his voice to small aliens known as Grunts in all three video games.[2]
Though previous Halo novels had been written by professional writers like Eric Nylund and William C. Dietz, Staten was chosen by Tor Books to write the fifth Halo novelization, entitled Halo: Contact Harvest.[6] As Tor's chief editor Eric Raab noted, "who better to tell the tale" of humanity's encounter with the alien Covenant, the series' antagonists than Staten, who had "intimate knowledge" of the series' story.[7]Contact Harvest would end up reaching a top spot of #3 on the New York Times bestseller list.[8] The novel also appeared on the USA Today bestseller's list at the same time.[9] Reviewers noted that despite being an unproven writer, Staten had succeeded in crafting an excellent novel.[10]
Staten has played an important role in the development of offshoots the the Halo franchise, and has traveled to New Zealand several times to work with Peter Jackson and Weta Workshop.[11] Staten is currently assisting with the fiction of Ensemble Studios title Halo Wars, and the now-postponed Halo film.[4] In interviews, Staten has explained that the game's protagonist, the Master Chief, would serve as a supporting character rather than who the film would focus on.[12] Staten is married with two children.[1] Staten is currently working on undisclosed projects at Bungie.
References
- ^ a b c Perry, Douglass (2007-10-29). "The Halo Harvest Interview, Part 1". GameTap. Retrieved on 2008-04-22.
- ^ a b c d e Lu, Cathy (2006-07-01). "Halo's Big Grunt". Northwestern Magazine. Retrieved on 2008-04-22.
- ^ "Meet The Team". Bungie (2008-04-01). Retrieved on 2008-04-22.
- ^ a b O'Connor, Frank (2007-05-10). "Halo: Contact Harvest". Bungie.net. Retrieved on 2008-04-22.
- ^ Croal, N'Gai (2008-01-15). "The Joseph Staten Interview, Part I". Newsweek. Retrieved on 2008-07-12.
- ^ Johnson, Stephen (2007-10-31). "EXCLUSIVE: Joseph Staten Interview". G4 TV. Retrieved on 2008-04-22.
- ^ Tor Books (2007-11-04). "Tor Books Debuts Halo: Contact Harvest Today", PR Newswire, p. 1.
- ^ Brightman, James (2007-11-19). "Halo: Contact Harvest Becomes New York Times Bestseller in First Week". Game Daily. Retrieved on 2008-01-15.
- ^ Beradini, César (2007-11-19). "Halo: Contact Harvest Debuts on NY Times Bestseller List". Team Xbox. Retrieved on 2008-01-14.
- ^ Clausen, Joel (2007-12-01). "Book Review: Contact Harvest". PlanetXbox360. Retrieved on 2008-01-20.
- ^ Fritz, Ben (2005-10-09). "The Jackson brain trust hooks up with 'Halo'", Chicago Tribune, p. 30.
- ^ Caron, Frank (2008-01-18). "Bungie writing director Joseph Staten talks Halo film". ArsTechnica. Retrieved on 2008-06-29.
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