Alex Horne on Taskmaster VR and being a one-man writing room

Long-running British comedy panel game shows aren’t something we usually cover here at Game Informer (a magazine and website dedicated to informing readers about video games), but Tyrant, the long-running British comedy game show, is getting a video game adaptation. The Taskmasters themselves, Greg Davies and Alex Horne, will be featured in the game, and Horne, who created the concept for the series and is technically its sole writer (see below), was available to discuss it. We heard about the upcoming VR game (out June 13 on Quest), why Comedy Central’s American version of the series didn’t work, whether or not it’s time to give an American version another chance, and what it feels like to meet. yourself in VR. So without further ado… it’s little Alex Horne!

Game Informer: Do you play video games? Are you really a fan?

Alex Horne: Not really. I had an Amiga when I was a kid, in the 80s. I have a quest and I played it a bit during lockdown. I played it quite a bit. I found it useful for that. But I have three boys, three kids aged 11, 13 and 14, so my job is to tell them to stop playing computer games and go outside. But they play a lot. They play a lot of Roblox, Minecraft and Fortnite. But I’m not a gamer, so it was quite an education for me.

But you played Taskmaster VR, right?

I have. I had a demo. I dipped my toe in it. But it’s too weird for me to play. To find myself there and be a competitor. It reminded me of the very first time I put on the VR headset, or even put it on my mother. It blows your mind the first time. It was like that again, going around the Tyrant the house, in particular, was so strange. It’s so realistic. Not realistic, because it’s obviously a cartoon, but it’s so well drawn and faithfully recreated.

THE Tyrant the house is there and you can walk around? It’s precise ?

It’s so precise. Somehow unnecessarily precise. The house itself, in real life, is disappointing. It’s a bungalow. There is only one floor. There are only about five rooms. So we could do everything with the house. But instead, we recreated the Taskmaster House absolutely faithfully (laughs). But it’s incredible. You can open each cupboard and you will see things from the series. There are a lot of Easter eggs, hidden things that don’t matter. And all the rooms are about the right size, we had to make the kitchen hallway a little wider, because they’re narrower in real life. That’s great. And then, there is so much potential. In the real house in the real world, there’s a door that opens and there’s nothing behind it except a green screen, which gives us potential…we never really used it. But similarly, in the VR house, you could open a door and find yourself in a different place.

Is the scene also in the game?

Yeah. You find yourself in the studio. And it’s like the television studio. So if you look around, you’ll see the cameras and where the audience is sitting, and you’ll see Greg (Davies) on the throne. The team often went into the house, measured themselves and took photos, you know, like real estate agents would do. And they went to see the show live. They tried to pull it off, so if you’re a fan of the show, it’ll be really exciting to be in the world. And I hope if you’re not a fan of the series, it’s a… VR games are so weird. The ones I know are either like Star Wars, which is awesome, or like that job where you’re doing something really menial, and this one is hopefully somewhere in between. So these are pretty practical and simple tasks, but you’re in a fantasy world.

I imagine it would be difficult for you to answer: did they get the right size in VR? If I play the game, do you dominate me?

I don’t know what size I am anymore. I lost all sense of it. You know, if you Google a Hollywood actor and try to find out how tall Johnny Depp is, you’ll never get the right answer. And I think it’s the same with me. I can’t find the right answer. So, I think I’m smaller in VR. I should be small in VR. This is the right Taskmaster height for me.

Did you come up with any tasks specifically for the game? Did you give the team any ideas?

It was a collaborative process. And, to be honest, the team – Scallywag Arcade – came up with some things and they pitched them to me quite nervously and I may have tinkered with them, but they know computer games. I know Tyrant Games. And we kind of met in the middle. So, they came from them and I absolutely gave them the seal of approval.

There’s a very small part of me that… the tasks are quite precious to me, without sounding too serious, there are only a certain number of them. I’m afraid I’ll run out one day. There are some things I’ve come up with that are so good because for me, it’s not all about the task. These are the small layers. For example, your time starts when you have done something. You said a certain word or something. And they came up with some good ideas. For example, your time only stops if you don’t put the object in a box. I’m not sure I’m being very clear, but they totally understood Tyrant language and ideas. So yes, I collaborated, but I can’t take responsibility for all the games.

One of my favorite things about the show – and honestly, I don’t know what you think. It’s hard to tell as a spectator, but I love it when contestants flout the rules to get around a task.

Are there any possibilities to do this here? Because sometimes video games have to be stiff to work. Is there room for this in Taskmaster VR?

This is one of the real challenges. We absolutely want it. Well, what you can’t necessarily do is sort of nitpick the language that much. But there are certainly several ways around (a task). So, to me, the whole point of a good task is that there can be three or four ways to accomplish it. And then one or two ways that we haven’t thought of are about to cheat, but we don’t. It’s just a clever workaround. And yes, we hope this makes it into the game.

On the verge of cheating. That’s a great way to put it.

I really hope we see people doing things we didn’t expect, or that we find out that people did things in a completely different way than we expected.

Are there any tasks typical of the series? Like very popular tasks that had to be in the game?

No, it’s the opposite. One of the things we pride ourselves on on the show is that we never repeat a task. So when you open the envelope, you have no idea what it will contain.

Here’s the thing. When we did it Tyrant America – we did an ill-fated show for Comedy Central – and I think one of the mistakes we made was repeating all the tasks. These were the ones we had done in England. And it just felt like we were kind of treading water and it wasn’t exciting. We should have taken a lot more risks and accomplished entirely new tasks. And that’s what we decided to do with it. We don’t want players to say, “Oh, well, I know what to do with this one.” I saw five people do it. So, it’s all new. There are elements of tasks that we love about the show, but there’s nothing taken directly from the show.

I admit I was hoping… one task I love was one where all the contestants were blindfolded and they drove a moped in a parking lot.

Yeah, near the railway museum.

Is there anything like this in VR gaming? I love the idea of ​​being blindfolded in VR and having to complete a task.

Well this is an ongoing project, I don’t think there is a blindfold project, but the developers might tell me otherwise. I don’t know how that would work. It’s a good idea. Do you mind if we steal your idea that you stole from us?

Please. Everything is a circle, right?

I mean, you can blindfold yourself. You can do what you want. But uh, yeah. It’s a good idea. THANKS.

What does the writing room look like? Tyrant? How it works?

I’m afraid you’re looking at the writing room.

Just you?

That’s right, yeah. This is pretty stupid because most comedy shows need a writers room. But from the start, it was just me. And actually, most of the team that makes the show, it’s still the same people – producer and director and part of the crew. So people contribute ideas, but it’s nice of me and I’m a little precious about it and a little control freak, I guess. Because I think it’s quite tricky to find the right balance between being interesting, but not crazy and wacky. So yeah, that’s pretty much me.

In New Zealand they have a team. Sometimes I look at him and think, “Oh, yeah, we should form a team.” » But I don’t want to let go. The public suggests many tasks to us, but it is very rare that they come up with one that is really good.

I imagine it’s more complicated than you think.

It is. And also, we’ve thought of most of the things now, because we’ve done 18 sets. That’s a lot of tasks, you know, it’s 600, or whatever. So a lot of the time people suggest something and we say, “We tried that.” It did not work. Or: “We actually did it.” » So the writing room is just me and my dog.

Do you think it’s time to give an American reboot another chance?

I think so. We learned a lot from it. I think what we should have done is brought Greg in, we should have had some new stuff and we should have done the same length as the British series. We accepted everything Comedy Central said, because we thought they knew better. And I’m sure they know best in many ways. But I think if we did it again, we would stick to our guns a little more.

Taskmaster VR releases June 13 on Meta Quest.