Breaking News: ‘Not For Broadcast’ Launches on Meta Quest 2 + Pro Today

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Mar 23, 2023

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Good evening, our main story on this National Nightly News program: Acclaimed FMV game Not For Broadcast releases today on Meta Quest 2 + Pro.

And it feels like it always belonged there. Settle into the National Nightly News control booth and make sure the show goes out to the public as planned. Pick the camera angles, choose the headlines, hit the cough button on swears, run the ads, and make sure to censor any surprise streakers or off-script comments. This is a live broadcast after all, and anything can happen!

Not For Broadcast is hilarious, mildly stressful, and full of more footage than you could possibly watch in one playthrough. Depending on your choices, the country (and some of its more noteworthy citizens) may exist under wildly different circumstances by the end of your tenure.

And what’s a news broadcast without a guest? Today we’re joined by NotGames Creative Director Alex Paterson to talk about the inspiration behind Not For Broadcast, accidental world records, perturbed neighbors, the move to VR (and the challenges that arise from all that high-resolution video), and more.

Can you talk a bit about what inspired Not For Broadcast—both inspired you to start the project and, later, inspired the look and feel of it?

Alex Paterson: Not For Broadcast was inspired by my experience working in Whitehall in London, where I constantly battled through marches and demonstrations. One day, I accidentally found myself amongst a particularly aggressive protest with two factions being separated by police. It struck me that this one event could be perceived in multiple different ways based on where you looked.

Once we knew that it was a game about censorship and how news is reported, an oppressive government was a no-brainer, and as the story developed, this alternate-1984/Black Mirror feel really began to establish itself.

Not For Broadcast holds the world record for most FMV footage in a game—more than 40 hours. What was it like filming all that footage, and did you always intend for the game to be so large?

AP: Honestly, the World Record was a complete accident. As it's a game where you pick from multiple camera angles to construct your broadcast, most of the game is shot on four cameras simultaneously—this means every 10-minute scene is actually 40 minutes of footage.

We also wanted there to be genuine consequence built into the game design, so there are alternate versions of many scenes which are based entirely on the player's choices which drastically increases the amount of footage in the game. It was vital to us to tell this story right, which meant putting more film into the game than anyone's done before.

Did anything unexpected/surprising/funny happen during filming? What’s your favorite clip or moment in Not For Broadcast?

AP: At one point, we shot a PSA-style commercial about the prostate that needed a full-scale replica of the male reproductive system. (Don't ask.) Our neighbours were not massive fans of the strange people making an FMV game next door—I think they thought we were making something more adult (no idea why), but due to a delivery error, I was forced to knock on the neighbour's door and ask him nicely if he would give me my big, plastic bum back.

My favourite clip from Not For Broadcast is from right near the beginning of the game, a newsreader is attempting to conduct an interview live from somebody's house but keeps getting interrupted as more and more ridiculous characters turn up until the room is stuffed with friends, several clowns and even a mariachi band.

How do you think VR improves the Not For Broadcast experience?

AP: Not For Broadcast was always intended to be a VR experience. The setup, which mimics a real life editing suite, lends itself really well to a VR camera because you can see the whole desk and all the cameras at once and naturally use your hands and head to interact like you would in real life. You can truly become immersed in making your perfect edit, using both hands to edit cameras simultaneously, move the volume faders and turn your head without restriction. It makes the multitasking that's necessary to keep the broadcast running so much more engaging.

I think Not For Broadcast is one of the first FMV games in VR. Anything you learned that might prove useful to future developers?

AP: Think about your file sizes, resolution and encoding of video at the start of the project—don't leave it too late! This is very specific to us, considering the absolutely huge amount of high-quality video footage we had recorded, but handling your media and file sizes is so important with a game like this!

What’s next for you and the team? Any future plans?

AP: It’s been a hectic year for us since the launch, and we’ve been super pleased with the critical reception of the game. We’ll continue to support the original game and are looking forward to new projects in the future, but we have nothing announced yet!

Anything else you’d like to share with our readers?

AP: We really hope your readers enjoy Not For Broadcast—it's a literal dream of ours to see the world of our game in three dimensions (actually three dimensions!) and can't wait to hear what everyone thinks!

Looking for a career change? You can pick up Not For Broadcast today on Meta Quest 2 + Pro for $24.95 USD.