Martin Ganteföhr

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Martin Ganteföhr (* 1969 in Rahden ) is a German designer of computer games and novelist.

Life

Ganteföhr did his community service in the closed department of psychiatry at the Osnabrück State Hospital . From 1992 to 1996 he studied linguistics and literature in Bremen and Osnabrück. In 1996 he started his career as a game designer for the Neunkirchen software house Buhl Data Service . In 1998 he founded the development studio House of Tales together with Tobias Schachte , of which he was CEO and creative director for 12 years. After House of Tales was bought by dtp entertainment in 2008 and in 2010 there were differences with the owner regarding the creative direction of the studio, Ganteföhr left House of Tales. In 2013 he founded the development studio Unsmile Games and received a grant of 10,000 euros from Nordmedia for a new adventure that never appeared. In 2014, a collaboration with the Hamburg development studio and publisher Daedalic Entertainment was agreed. Ganteföhr lives in Osnabrück .

plant

As a game designer for Buhl Data Service, Ganteföhr wrote the scripts for six learning adventures for children, which dealt with topics from the television series Terra X and were distributed by ZDF Enterprises, and was responsible for the application design of the WISO financial software programmed by Buhl . After founding House of Tales, his first game was the 2001 point-and-click adventure The Secret of the Druids , which received mixed reviews. In 2003 and 2004, Ganteföhr developed four adventure games for mobile devices under J2ME , which were published by the publisher Elkware. In 2004, The Moment of Silence , written by Ganteföhr, was released , a dystopian science fiction thriller that deals with the surveillance state, was voted Adventure of the Year by several game magazines and was nominated in seven categories for the German Developer Award 2004. In 2007, Ganteföhrs Overclocked was released , a complex psychological thriller that was highly praised by the critics and won the jury's innovation prize at the German Developer Prize. The NZZ called him a “gifted narrator” and drew comparisons to Benoît Sokal and Gaspar Noé . In 2009 he was creative director for 15 Days , an adventure game with an unusual political background for the genre: As a political activist, the player commits crimes in order to use the proceeds for a good cause.

In 2012 and 2013 Ganteföhr was responsible for translating the scripts for To the Moon and three games in the Galaxy on Fire series into German. In 2014 he advised the Berlin artist group machina eX on the design of the interactive play Right of Passage , which was performed in the Forum Free Theater Düsseldorf. In 2015 he wrote the interactive play Toxik for machina eX , which was performed in the Hebbel am Ufer theater in Berlin. In 2015, Ganteföhr wrote the script for the interactive radio play 39 for WDR .

In addition to his work as a game designer, Ganteföhr regularly appears as a speaker on topics related to interactive storytelling, for example at the Quo Vadis Developer Conference in 2006, 2007 and 2007, at the Filmforum NRW in 2009 and at the Lünen Kinofest and the Clash of Realities in 2010 . Since 2010 he has been teaching at the Cologne Game Lab at the TH Köln . From 2007 to 2011 he worked as an author for Die Zeit . From 2015 worked as creative lead for Daedalic on the dystopian science fiction adventure State of Mind , which deals with transhumanism and the transmission of consciousness. In 2017 he published the novel Kreutzenbach's disease on CreateSpace.com . In December 2017, the interactive play Endgame was premiered in the Hebbel am Ufer Theater in Berlin , a renewed collaboration between Ganteföhr and machina eX. State of Mind was published in August 2018.

According to Ganteföhr, he was influenced by the adventures The Mask of the Sun , Maniac Mansion , Day of the Tentacle and Myst . As literary influences, he gives Brian O'Nolan , Raymond Kurzweil and oral myths . With his games, he is explicitly targeting an older audience over the age of 30, where he sees potential for interest in more challenging topics, which he seeks to implement with his games. He regards his games as cultural works in which he allows current events, political currents and moral ideas to flow.

reception

In a review of Ganteföhr's work 15 Days , the German entertainment magazine Gamona described him in 2009 as “perhaps the best German computer game writer at the moment” and concluded: “15 Days is Martin Ganteföhr's worst work to date. The fact that a good story ultimately saves the title from crashing says a lot about its capabilities. "

Ludography (selection)

  • 1996: Terra X: The Curse of the Pharaoh ( Buhl Data Service )
  • 1996: Terra X: The Search for Atlantis (Buhl)
  • 1997: Terra X: The Mallorca plot (Buhl)
  • 1997: Terra X: Ayers Rock Death Trap (Buhl)
  • 1997: Terra X: The Treasure of the Knights Templar (Buhl)
  • 1997: Terra X: The Blood of the Aztecs (Buhl)
  • 2001: The Secret of the Druids ( House of Tales )
  • 2003: Secret of the Lost Link (House of Tales)
  • 2003: The Paper Menace (House of Tales)
  • 2003: The Black Hole (House of Tales)
  • 2004: X-Files: The Deserter (House of Tales)
  • 2004: The Moment of Silence (House of Tales)
  • 2006: In love with Berlin (House of Tales)
  • 2007: Overclocked (House of Tales)
  • 2009: 15 Days (House of Tales)
  • 2015: Toxik (machina eX)
  • 2017: Endgame (machina eX)
  • 2018: State of Mind ( Daedalic Entertainment )

bibliography

Awards

  • 2004: PC Games Readers Award, Category "Best Adventure", for The Moment of Silence .
  • 2007: The jury's innovation award for Overclocked at the German Developer Award .
  • 2007: 4Players Game of the Year, category "Best Story", for Overclocked .
  • 2008: Aeggie Award, category "Best Writing - Drama", for Overclocked .

Literary contributions and essays (selection)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Martin Ganteföhr. In: Tatort-Eifel.de. Retrieved January 19, 2016 .
  2. ↑ a b Klaus Rebensburg (Ed.): Film, computer and television in the name of content . Univerlagtuberlin, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-7983-2198-4 , pp. 140 .
  3. ↑ Martin Ganteföhr with a new studio at gamescom. In: Adventure-Treff.de. Retrieved January 31, 2016 .
  4. ↑ Daedalic employs Martin Ganteföhr as the author. In: GamersGlobal.de. Retrieved January 31, 2016 .
  5. ↑ No grand prize for The Moment of Silence. In: Adventure-Treff.de. Retrieved January 24, 2016 .
  6. ↑ a b 2007 winner of the German Developer Award. Retrieved December 18, 2017 .
  7. ↑ The great storytellers of the computer game. In: NZZ. November 6, 2007, accessed January 31, 2016 .
  8. ↑ 39 Part 1. (No longer available online.) In: Einslive.de. Archived from the original on January 30, 2016 ; accessed on January 30, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.einslive.de
  9. ↑ Lecture list. In: Website by Gundolf S. Freyermuth. Retrieved January 19, 2016 .
  10. ↑ Speaker portrait. In: Gathering of Game Developers website. Retrieved January 31, 2016 .
  11. ↑ Author profile. Zeit.de, accessed on January 31, 2016 .
  12. ↑ Endgame. (No longer available online.) Hebbel am Ufer Berlin, archived from the original on December 24, 2017 ; accessed on December 11, 2017 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.hebbel-am-ufer.de
  13. ↑ Martin Ganteföhr Interview. In: AdventureGamers.com. Retrieved January 30, 2016 .
  14. ↑ Interview with Martin Ganteföhr. AdventureClassicGaming.com, accessed January 20, 2016 .
  15. ↑ Computer games are fragmented narratives. In: Telepolis . Retrieved January 24, 2016 .
  16. ↑ After Overclocked a new adventure gem from House of Tales? In: Gamona.de. Retrieved February 6, 2016 .
  17. ↑ Games of the year 2007. In: 4Players.de. Retrieved January 24, 2016 .
  18. ↑ Aeggie Awards 2008. In: AdventureGamers.com. Retrieved January 30, 2016 .
  19. ↑ story vs. Game 1: 1 - structures and problems of interactive storytelling. In: 4Players.de. Retrieved January 31, 2016 .
personal data
SURNAME Ganteföhr, Martin
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German designer of computer games and novelist
DATE OF BIRTH 1969
PLACE OF BIRTH Osnabrück