Interviews// Actor Warwick Davis on a new App-venture

Ricky Gervias co-star, Star Wars and Harry Potter star-star, actor Warwick Davis loves his iPhone. So much so, that when it came to trying to marry his love of performance with technology, the answer ended up being pocketWARWICK - an iOS and Android app which tasks players with looking after a portable version of the Life's Too Short TV and film star.

Releasing in a week or two's time as a free download, Davis is insistent that this is not just a random project he stuck his celebrity name onto. This is a real labour of love for him - something that contains a part of his soul. I have a chat with him to find out why.


SPOnG: After having seen the trailer for the game, it seems that pocketWARWICK is something between a cross of The Sims and a Tamagotchi...

Warwick Davis: Yeah, that’s about the size of it. You’ve hit the nail on the head, there. That’s exactly what it is, but I think it’s broader than those two brackets as well. It’s a comedy game, working your way through various missions and auditions... it’s near-enough role-playing too. Although Warwick is literally living in your phone, you end up trying to manage his life for him.


SPOnG: How do you progress through the game, then? Do you level up your little Warwick?

Warwick Davis: Yeah, the levelling up system is in going from a Z-list to an A-list celebrity. In doing that, you get better job offers that pay more money the further you progress. Just like in the real world of acting. When you actually get to A-list you end up earning much higher fees, get offered jobs that didn’t exist before, and you get ongoing payments in the form of royalties.


SPOnG: How did this whole concept come about?

Warwick Davis: As an actor, I’m always looking for new ways to express my performance. I’m also quite a gadget freak - I always have my iPhone with me. With that in mind, I’d always wondered what I could do to bring those two things together - my love for performing, and technology.

I thought one day, wouldn’t it be great to literally be inside of a phone? That idea produced this character and, ultimately, pocketWARWICK. Not only does it offer a game, but also gives a bit of an insight to the world of acting. For people outside the industry, it’s a bit of a mystery as to how you manage your career - so the game is a good reflection of that too. It’s a lot of balancing, between looking after yourself and getting the auditions.

There’s quite a lot going on. It’s quite a sophisticated game. On the surface, it’s fun and it’s very pick-up-and-play, but if you want it to be it can be a much more in-depth experience for the user that could take many, many hours to play through.


SPOnG: I take it you’ve had an input on all sorts of aspects of the game as well? You see celebrities that normally dive into gaming and other media, and they end up just putting their name on the cover and take a hands-off approach to development.

Warwick Davis: Yeah, this is completely different. My soul is in this game. The photographs of the character in the game - there’s 80 or so expressions that I did for the game, along with hours of audio - it’s all stuff I come up with. Every now and then I just sit in an office and record stuff that I think will be good for the game, then phone up the developers and send it over. Sometimes I ask them whether they can do anything with the material, other times I provide ideas for them to implement.

The thing is, often times it’s just me saying something that seems simple to add to the game - but I quickly realised that even something trivial is equivalent to about a week of development time! But, on the other hand, it’s these ideas and that expression that have made the game what it is.


SPOnG: It must be fascinating, getting an insight into how games development works.

Warwick Davis: Oh yeah, I don’t think anybody realises just what goes on behind the scenes. People play a console game and say, ‘Blimey, this just cost me 40 quid!’ But, these companies spend millions on these projects! I won’t tell you how much this game cost, but it is an obscene amount of money.

With pocketWARWICK in particular, it’s such a beautifully designed game that you don’t know what’s going on underneath - how sophisticated the AI that’s running or the processes involved. I mean, the developer got a professor in physics involved for some of the game’s elements! There’s a lot of tuning and programming that’s gone into this to make it do what it does.

The other thing that’s really fascinating is that, unlike a film or TV show that’s finished as soon as it’s released, there’s no finite moment for a game’s completion. We’re due to release this the week of October 8th - it’ll be a finished product, don’t get me wrong, but it will only be the start of what will become a continued development.

For example, there are over 150 audition opportunities in the game right now. At any point, I can add more to that number - so after a couple of weeks there may be 170 audition challenges. The same with the shop in regards to furniture and clothing.

What I want to do is, if you’ve ever seen me in a movie or TV show wearing a costume, I want to emulate that look for pocketWARWICK. You’d be able to go in there and buy Warwick a very similar outfit. That’s the kind of thing that you can do these days with this technology. It’s pretty exciting.


SPOnG: How does working in games compare to TV or film? I can imagine it being an interesting experience.

Warwick Davis: Yeah, it is. People ask me whether games are different to other forms of media. Well... it is, and it isn’t. It’s an extension of what I do. It’s still performance and acting, with the facial expressions and audio capture... so there are crossovers that can be just as rewarding as getting up on stage or doing a film role.

I feel closer to this project than anything else I’ve ever done. It’s been a collaborative process all the way through, working with the developer and the programmers. It’s been amazing, so I think it’s as fulfilling as doing anything else, in performance terms, and just as rewarding.


SPOnG: Would you say it’s difficult to get an app out there and discovered, with smartphone gaming now being so popular?

Warwick Davis: Oh, there are thousands, tens of hundreds of thousands, of apps. But I didn’t sit there and think, ‘What app can I make that will be different from all the others?’ I sort of decided to just make a game that I really wanted to make. Something I wanted to play and sounded like fun to do. It becomes too formulaic if you start thinking about what’s been successful and how to play to certain genres and game styles. When you play this... it’s just much more tactile. Feels more wholesome.


SPOnG: You mentioned this is your blood sweat and tears. What do you think about apps that are essentially just a celebrity’s name on an app?

Warwick Davis: I think there’s a place for them. But it all feels a bit hollow really, doesn’t it? In a way. I don’t know why those artists wouldn’t want to get more involved, if they aren’t doing so. I think it’s important that you get your hands dirty and experience these kind of things.

Everything I do, I like to know all about it. Because when you have to talk about it, like now, you can speak from the heart, rather than just having to study a crib sheet and remembering answers. Do you think consumers are bothered either way?


SPOnG: Well, I’d imagine that gamers in particular would feel somewhat cheated if they bought a game with a celebrity’s name on it and it ended up being an endorsement instead.


Warwick Davis: Sure. Well, if people liked what I’ve done in the past, they’ll like this. And... when you play this, you know that there’s more involvement than your average app. I mean... I’ve sort of stuffed myself in a phone.


SPOnG: Thanks very much for your time, Warwick.

Warwick Davis: Thanks for coming!