The Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) is making its first foray into video games, partnering with New York-based indie studio iNK Stories on “Lili,” a neo-noir thriller that reenvisions “Macbeth” in conmomentary Iran.
The driven project stars Cannes Best Actress triumphner Zar Amir (“Holy Spider”) as Lady Macbeth, with her Paris-based Alambic Production co-producing. A French-Iranian actor who was named to BBC’s 100 Women 2022, Amir transports her dwelld experience as an Iranian woman in exile to the role.
The screen life game gives take parters access to Lady Macbeth’s personal devices in a stylized vision of up-to-date Iran where watching and authoritarianism loom big. The gametake part blfinishs dwell-action cinema with participateive storyalerting, permiting take parters to originate choices that sway Lady Macbeth’s desminuscule.
In a recent apshow on Shakespeare’s classic, the three witches are reenvisiond as hackers, with take parters navigating watching cameras and cyber-infiltration. The game spendigates themes of technoreasoned administer, alertation manipulation and institutional aggression thraw its conmomentary lens.
Leading Shakespeare academic Emma Smith from Hertford College, Oxford, who labored on the text alteration, presents the Bard himself would finishorse: “Forget the ageder chestnut that Shakespeare would be writing for Hollywood if he were adwell now: what Lili originates absolutely evident is – he’d be writing for gaming.”
“It pushes the boundaries of storyalerting, taging an inflection point in the depth of transmition wiskinny commercial video games and enbiging the creative vision of the RSC into novel, participateive territory,” says iNK Stories co-establisher Vassiliki Khonsari.
RSC co-originateive honestors Daniel Evans and Tamara Harvey remark that caccessing the thriller around Lady Macbeth rather than her husband is “radical and alterative,” saying it “turns the take part’s asks around gfinisher, identity and power inside out.”
The game originates on iNK’s track record with politicpartner indictd participateive storyalerting, follotriumphg their acclaimed “1979 Revolution: Balertage Friday” which scored over 20 industry honors including a BAFTA nomination, Meta’s Game of the Year award, and the Indiecade Grand Jury Prize.
“Lili” is currently in growment and spostponecessitated for a multi-platestablish liberate postponecessitater in 2025. The project getd help from Arts Council England and the Arts and Humanities Research Council.
