Gary Whitta has stated that the final product of Forspoken is nothing like the initial pitch he gave to Square Enix.
This information was revealed by Whitta during an interview with Alanah Pearce. If you are interested in Square Enix and Luminous Productions games, you can check out our other articles here.
Gary Whitta: Forspoken’s Initial Pitch is Very Different from the Final Product
Speaking with Alanah Pearce, Gary Whitta confirmed that he never wrote a single line of dialog in Forspoken, although he has never played the game so is not entirely sure.
What happened was, Square [Enix] came to me about 5 or 6 years ago and said ‘we have this idea… will you help us build the world and the mythology?’What happened was, Square [Enix] came to me about 5 or 6 years ago and said ‘we have this idea… will you help us build the world and the mythology?’
Gary Whitta, Co-Writer of Star Wars: Rogue One
Square Enix apparently liked what Whitta was creating and asked if he would run a writers’ room. Whitta did just that and gathered a group of writers he admired.
Whitta later claimed that Square Enix and Luminous Productions had remade Forspoken’s original story. The companies had contacted Whitta and asked if he would write a new version of the Forspoken story, to which he declined due to scheduling issues.
A few months after that, they came back to me and one of the other writers and said ‘we’re going to start from scratch and remake this story completely, we want it to be like this.’ What they offered us was something closer to what they have now, which is about a girl from the real world trapped in a fantasy world.
Gary Whitta, Co-Writer of Star Wars: Rogue One
Whitta later explained that the version they had was not the same as the version provided by Square Enix. However, neither he nor the other writers were willing to continue writing the project.
In Forspoken’s end credits, the game lists Whitta under “Original Concept” and Amy Hennig under “Story Concept”. This gives a lot of credence to Whitta’s comments, considering three other writers are credited before Whitta and Hennig in Forspoken’s credits.
Forspoken is already available on PS5 and PC (Steam).
